"Corpse-Cold" Montreal Unitarians Are Locked Out Of The "Corpse-Cold" Unitarian Church Of Montreal

Readers of this blog may recall that I decided to add U*U stupidity to the short-list of items that The Emerson Avenger blog will deal with, above and beyond U*U injustices, U*U abuses, and U*U hypocrisy. This post deals with some short-sighted stupidity on the part of the leadership of the Unitarian Church of Montreal that affects no one but the "corpse-cold" Unitarian members of this so-called "Welcoming Congregation". . .

I have often noticed that early comers to the Unitarian Church of Montreal find themselves locked-out and waiting for someone with a key to arrive to open the front doors (to say nothing of the back door) of their alleged "Welcoming Congregation". I never show up *that* early to begin my protest activities, rarely before 9:30 am unless there is an early service or some other reason to show up early, so the people that I refer to here as "early comers" are not really arriving all that early either. This morning I arrived at approximately 9:20 or so as I had got off to an early start. As I was approaching the church I noticed a couple of women leaving the church and suspected that they had found themselves locked out. The fellow in the maroon coat with a cane that you see in the photo arrived a bit later after I had begun to display my picket signs. Sure enough, he was locked out. One after another, over the space of at least another fifteen or twenty minutes, and possibly as much as half-an-hour, several more Montreal Unitarians showed up only to find that they were locked out of their not so welcoming Unitarian "church".

The photo shows seven "corpse-cold" Montreal Unitarians locked out of the "corpse-cold" Unitarian Church of Montreal on a rather cold, windy, and snowy winter day and I believe that one or two more people showed up before the front doors were finally opened. Rev. Diane Rollert, the new settled minister of the Unitarian Church of Montreal, showed up no earlier than 9:45 am and no one else with a key arrived before her. In fact, if I am not mistaken, it was actually Frank Greene who opened the front doors as he showed up a few minutes after Rev. Diane Rollert arrived. I don't think that Rev. Rollert even noticed the little flock of "corpse-cold" Montreal Unitarians huddled in front of the church entrance when she rode by in her silver Volkwagen because she was too busy staring at yours truly and my picket signs. . .

It seems to me that it would be prudent for the Unitarian Church of Montreal, to say nothing of all other Unitarian congregations ("welcoming" or otherwise. . .) to take steps to ensure that *someone* always arrives at the "church" building at least an hour before the service begins in order to allow early comers into the "church". This is especially true in Unitarian congregations in cold climates. It's one thing to be a "corpse-cold" Unitarian in the figurative sense that Ralph Waldo Emerson meant when he "ranted" about "corpse-cold Unitarianism" but it is quite another thing to be a corpse cold Unitarian in a literal sense having died from exposure after finding yourself locked out of your Unitarian "church". Even if one does not actually die from hypothermia it is bad enough to be standing outside one's U*U "church" freezing one's U*U off for fifteen or twenty minutes, if not longer. . . before someone with a key arrives to open up the doors.

The "long retired" minister emeritus of the Unitarian Church of Montreal Rev. Charles Eddis remarked on how cold it was today as he passed by me on his way into his U*U "church" a bit later. It wasn't really all *that* cold and I responded to his comment about the cold weather by saying that I thought it was actually quite a bit warmer outside his "corpse cold" Unitarian "church" than inside it. Indeed I said that it was quite "balmy" outside compared to his "frigid" Unitarian "church".