Open Letter regarding PCUSA 2015 One Great Hour of Sharing materials
Filed under: Chaplaincy, Current Affairs, Religion, Shoot Yourself in the Foot
Dear Linda Valentine,
I am very concerned about the posters for the 2015 One Great Hour of Sharing campaign that were highlighted in the December 3 PNS story: https://www.pcusa.org/news/2014/12/3/special-offerings-take-new-look/ I find that these posters are quite offensive towards two groups that I minister to – those with addiction issues and people of color.
I am a Candidate for ordination and I am currently serving as the Resident Chaplain for the Capital Health hospital in Trenton, NJ. Our hospital is an urban trauma center and is also the designated mental health in-patient crisis center for the county. My particular floors include the trauma ICU and the in-patient mental health unit.
On both floors I work with patients suffering from addiction. Some are victims of violence as a result of their addiction and are in the ICU. Others are suffering from mental health issues including and related to their addiction. Other patients are in the ICU because they have literally drunk or drugged themselves to death.
Those patients who survive and who will be released into the community generally express a desire to avoid the substance that they are addicted to. They want to stay clean. Those who come from a Christian background speak of needing God’s help to overcome their addiction. I often recommend that these people connect with a church – either with the pastor or with the groups (AA, NA, Al-Anon, etc) that use the building. On learning that I am Presbyterian, these people often express interest in getting help from a Presbyterian church. In our area, there are many.
I would be horrified if any of these children of God that I spoke with walked into one of our churches and saw one of these posters. Instead of the church providing a place of refuge for them, the church would reinforce the stigma that they already feel. These ironic “jokes” aimed at addictions might be enough to send those church attenders with mental health issues back into the hospital.
Then the word brutiful started making sense sildenafil generic cheap to me, and I was getting the idea. If you have truly succeeded at moving your awareness-energy down into your body, your will likely notice your thoughts cheap viagra from usa are negative, you attract negative people and events into your world to match that inner image. A number of the issues that could be http://mouthsofthesouth.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/MOTS-03.24.18-Turlington.pdf levitra generika efficiently remedied are very different varieties of discomfort, stress and anxiety, psychological disorders, despression symptoms, hypertension, menopausal and a few Acupuncture Ny alternative gynecological problems. All these ingredients are blended and processed in the decoction of Semal Musli, Gokhru and Sya Musli. cheap tadalafil no prescription Beyond the issue of addiction, these posters all include people of color, women, or the elderly. I have also seen the presentation deck used by the ad agency back in September. Only one of the five people presented was a white male, and he was middle-aged to elderly and his “drug addiction” was for a health issue. The remaining figures were all people of color or women. Are we really trying to imply that Asian girls have a drinking problem? That Latino men get high? At a glance, that’s exactly what these posters are implying. If our aging Presbyterian audience suffers from presbyopia, the small print will never be read – those “ironic” messages will be all that people see.
I urge you to pull these posters from the campaign, and any other materials that use the drug addiction play on words. I hope that an apology will be forthcoming for people with addictions and people of color. And I hope that in light of this issue, and the 1001 New Worshiping Communities outside corporation debacle, that you will change procedures in Louisville to implement tighter program review. It is my understanding that this campaign was presented to groups that highlighted these issues, and that their concerns were ignored.
Sincerely,
Mark Smith
Hamilton, NJ
cc: Marilyn Gamm, PMA
Sam Locke, Special Offerings
Terri Bate, Funds Development
Malaise
I’m sorry I haven’t written lately. I’ve been busy at work, busy outside work.
I’m also having one of those weeks (heading towards months) where everything is going just a little wrong. Nothing is seriously wrong. Nothing is seriously right. Everything is just a bit off kilter.
Work – as I’ve noted previously, the company is up for sale. Just today I heard two different rumors listing different companies that want to buy us – one possible and one unlikely. The senior management committee that approves IT projects just deferred a decision on a major technology change that we want to make. If they turn that down completely, I probably need to either find a new job or resign myself to being caught in a technical cul-de-sac (like COBOL programmers were 10 years ago).
Home – Home is generally OK. I wish that Carolyn and I shared more common interests – so that we’d end up spending more time together. I don’t want to grow in the wrong direction. Finances are being pinched just like everybody else between tiny raises and huge cost increases in everything else. As I said – pretty much completely OK but with a few signs of wear.
Church – I’m serving as a “Visit Steward” for the capital campaign. I’m getting the feeling from conversations with people that folks are really unhappy with the way that the campaign is being run. Most people agree with the need for funds and support most of the projects involved in the campaign, but there’s a lot of disaffection with how it’s being run. Also, the consultant sent to us by the PC(USA) Church Financial Campaign Service is really turning people off. There has to be some way to let the people in Louisville who sent her to us know what a terrible job she’s doing. We had our campaign visit training this past week. The handout was clearly cludged up from other campaigns and included references to things that we aren’t doing in our campaign (like 2nd and 3rd visits, household information cards, etc). One of the biblical references for stewardship actually came out against giving to the church if you read the next verse. Oh, well. I did make my pledge as required (all visit stewards were told to turn in their pledges as part of the commissioning ceremony yesterday, with less than a week’s notice) and even included a check for the entire amount. As soon as I do my 3 visits with members I’ll be done with the campaign. Here’s the hard part – one of my visits is to a family where one breadwinner is jobless.
“In Deuteronomy we are told to give 10%. Jesus tells the rich man that he should give everything. So the amount that we should pledge is somewhere between 10% and everything.” – no, this wasn’t a joke.
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Youth group is another area that is fine, but still not quite right. We had one youth make a life decision that will greatly negatively impact her choices in the future and it’s hitting me harder than I expected. Our attendance is rather spotty – we see a decent number of youth at each meeting but the list of attendees is different most weeks and we don’t really get to connect with them regularly. As I said – things are mostly OK. Youth Sunday is next week and we really have our act together in advance for a change. I am looking forward to going to Montreat for Week VI this summer.
Then there is the team that I co-chair. At our last meeting I got called a racist – under the theory that any white person is automatically a racist. This was said by a white person to a room full of white people – all of whom are well-intentioned in mind and as far as I can tell in practice when it comes to racial issues. I’m not looking forward to our next meeting two weeks from today.
When it comes to church I’m at a crossroads. I want to either become more involved or less involved. I don’t think continuing my current level of involvement is feasible – it’s gonna have to go up or down in the fall. I’d really like to be more involved, but in a meaningful way in a position where I can help the church change for the future rather than in a “pair of willing hands” way. I don’t mind doing the necessary, but it seems so much of church work is maintaining the old ways rather than working for the new.
Hockey – the Trenton Devils finished 6th out of 7, with the lowest number of wins in the entire history of the franchise. Enough said.
So malaise is the word of the day. Judging from the economy it might be the word of the entire country.
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