Montreal Unitarian*Universalist U*Us Are Full Of Shit. . .

It is always gratifying to receive validation for my ongoing protest against U*U injustices, abuses and hypocrisy in front of the Unitarian Church of Montreal from members of the Montreal public. A couple of Sundays ago, as I was protesting, a passer-by stopped and informed me that she had stopped attending the Unitarian Church of Montreal about three months previously. When I asked her why she had stopped going to the Unitarian Church of Montreal her blunt response was, "Because they're full of shit." I thought this was quite funny since about five minutes earlier I had told another person leaving the Unitarian Church that Rev. Ray Drennan and other intolerant and abusive Montreal Unitarians were "full of shit" when they falsely and maliciously labeled Creation Day as a "cult". When I asked this young woman why Montreal Unitarians were "full of shit" she made it clear that it was because they did not practice what they preach. When I asked her about what had happened to convince her of this she responded that she had been subjected to bigotry and that when she complained about the bigotry her complaint was not only dismissed out of hand but that she was treated as "a troublemaker" and a "bitch" for having complained about the bigotry. I told her that I had been subjected to similar treatment for complaining about anti-religious intolerance and bigotry on the part of Rev. Ray Drennan and other leading members of the Unitarian Church of Montreal.

In that this young woman was what Unitarians would call a "person of color" I assumed that the bigotry that she had been subjected to was discrimination and harassment based on her race but she did not specify this at the time and I was quite aware that she might well have been subjected to other forms of bigotry including anti-religious bigotry. She asked me if I knew "Brian" and I responded by asking, "Which one?" She said that "Brian", the choir director, was "the biggest bigot" that she had ever met. She did not provide details of his alleged bigotry but it was clear that she had complained about Brian's bigotry and had not received a satisfactory response to her complaint from the Unitarian Church of Montreal. Au contraire, like me, she had been treated as a "troublemaker" and ostracized by Montreal Unitarians for complaining about the bigotry that she had been subjected to. I empathized and told her that my protest was as a result of very similar mistreatment by Montreal Unitarians aka Montreal U*Us.

This Monday evening, as I was protesting in front of the Unitarian Church of Montreal when it held its annual general meeting, this young woman passed by the UCM once again and said hello as she passed. I asked her if she minded if I blogged about the bigotry and related mistreatment that she had been subjected to by Montreal Unitarians on The Emerson Avenger blog and she gave me her assent. I asked her more questions about what had happened and it quickly became clear that the bigotry that she had been subjected to was indeed of the racist variety. According to her testimony Brian Brice, the direct of the Unitarian Church of Montreal's Carmina Choir had repeatedly humiliated her, sometimes in front of the whole choir. She did not want to go into too much detail about his racist comments but she did mention that on one occasion he had said, "You know how you blacks are."

This young woman said that when she had complained about Brian Brice's behaviour to Frank (presumably Frank Greene) that he had pretended that he could not do anything because he did not know if Brian Brice had said what she accused him of saying. This is typical of how Montreal Unitarians, and U*Us more generally, respond to complaints about misconduct of various kinds. They get all politically correct and pretend that their hands are tied because they don't really know what happened and then they very quickly turn on the person complaining about the misconduct and treat them like a "troublemaker". . . I told this young woman that I would make a point of protesting this Saturday evening when the Carmina Choir holds its annual public concert and that the word 'bigotry' would appear prominently one one of my picket signs. I might add that this is but one of the ways that Montreal Unitarian*Universalist U*Us, to say nothing of Unitarian*Universalist U*Us rather more generally, are "full of shit" and that I will be addressing the various other ways that U*Us are "full of shit" in future Emerson Avenger blog posts.

Oh. . . I almost forgot to mention that during my second conversation with her last Monday evening this young woman made it very clear that, quite apart from the racist bigotry that she had been subjected to by Brian Brice, she had been made to feel far from welcome at this alleged "Welcoming Congregation" by the cold-shoulder that most of its members had shown her. She said that in the whole time that she had attended the Unitarian Church of Montreal only a small handful of members had taken the time to speak with her and that most of them ignored her. This sounds typical not only of the Unitarian Church of Montreal but rather too many other "corpse-cold" Unitarian churches.

This reminds me of a "joke" that some members of the Lakeshore Unitarian Universalist Congregation had made up about the Unitarian Church of Montreal years ago that was no doubt based on their own similar experiences of stand-offish "corpse-cold" Montreal Unitarians who had given them the corpse-cold Unitarian shoulder when they had visited this alleged "Welcoming Congregation" from time to time. The sardonic "joke" is that, "The green mugs are (there) to tell them (i.e. Montreal Unitarians) who *not* to talk to. . ." Needless to say, the Unitarian Church of Montreal requests that newcomers and visitors use special green mugs during the coffee hour that follows Sunday services so that church members may identify who the newcomers and visitors are. Obviously the idea is that Montreal Unitarians will make a point of being extra welcoming to newcomers and visitors but, equally obviously. . . that was not the actual experience of West Island Unitarian*Universalists who visited the Unitarian Church of Montreal on occasion.

I might add that this young woman described Montreal Unitarians as "snobs" several times during our conversation on Monday and that this "name-calling" was clearly based on her own personal experience of a condescending and snobbish attitude on the part of many of the Montreal Unitarians she encountered while attending the Unitarian Church of Montreal. Not only was this young woman subjected to racist comments and related discrimination and harassment that were tolerated, and at least tacitly condoned, by Montreal Unitarians, but she was subjected to the all too typical elitism and classism that Unitarian*Universalists are all too famous for throughout the so-called U*U World. Need I point out that this all took place on Rev. Diane Rollert's watch?