Finally A UU Who Hears, Listens and Understands. . .

The following email message arrived in my inbox today.

I am deleting the person's name to protect them from possible reprisals by their fellow UUs.


Hey Robin,
I have read and re-read your response to my blog...and
your negative experiences with Unitarian church. I was
surprised and a bit shocked to read what you had
experienced, and it's taken me some time to decide how
to respond. I am sorry that your experience with UUism
has been so negative. I know that is Not what the vast
majority of UU's are about - they wouldn't be
committed to the principles of understanding
everyone's worth and dignity and treating everyone
with compassion if that were true. So it's too bad
there is a UU minister there who is Not being true to
those ideals. And I would say they are hard to live up
to and live into every day. It is a continual
challenge to treating everyone I encounter with
dignity and compassion...but that is my practice.

At any rate, I hope that you have felt heard and
again, it is Not okay to be treated the way you were,
Especially by a minister.

in faith,
XXXXX

XXXXX


Here is my private email response to him or her, typos, HTML errors and all -


Hi Xxxxx,

Thanks for your private email response.

Thanks also for not "memory holing" my post to your blog.

You are in fact one of the very few UUs who have clearly acknowledged that I should not have been treated the way I was, especially by a minister.

Regrettably the vast majority of the UUs that I know do not seem very committed to the principles of understanding everyone's worth and dignity and treating everyone with compassion. "If that were true" as it were this ongoing conflict would have ended years ago in a manner that actually lived up to UU principles, especially that principle which calls for justice, equity and compassion in human relations.

This ongoing conflict is not just about a single UU minister that should not have treated me the way that I was treated by him.

It is about a Unitarian Church board and whole congregation that should not have treated me the way that I was treated by them.

Search - "Robin Edgar" Unitarian Church of Montreal

It is about at least one UUA President who should not have treated me the way that I was treated by him.

Search - "Robin Edgar" President Buehrens

It is about at least one Ministerial Fellowship Director who should not have treated me the way that I was treated by her.

Search - "Robin Edgar" "Diane Miller"

And it is about a whole lot of other abusive UUs who should not have treated me the way that I was treated by them in their insensitive and outright hostile responses to my online protest.

I do feel heard by you and I do feel that you have also sensitively and responsibly listened and understood what I have to say.

Unfortunately, as the above links clearly demonstrate, I have been most certainly been "heard" by many other UUs, including many UU clergy and some top level UUA and CUC officials, who have neither responsibly listened to, nor sensitively understood, what I had to say to them. These UUs, the vast majority of the UUs that I know, have willfully chosen not to take the responsible steps that are necessary to create peace. These UUs have chosen to deny me any justice, any equity or indeed any genuine compassion in their human relations with me. Sadly these UUs have inspired me to come up with the following saying -

Regrettably it is all to human to be inhuman. . .

Needless to say that "bon mot" has a much broader application but it is truly a shame that it was inspired by my being treated by most of my fellow UUs in a manner that was callous and insensitive at best and outright hostile and abusive at worst.

Thanks for hearing, listening, and understanding,

Robin Edgar