Thursday, May 18, 2006
Underbellies
Recently, the Dean of the Cathedral stopped into the Church office. He caught up briefly on my life, when I reminded him that he was Curate at the church were I first became an Episcopalian back in the 1980s. "And now you're the church secretary!" Then seeing my expression, commiserated: "You really do see the underbelly of the church, in this job." It is true, for some reason, I am witness to, and often the recipient of, some of the Episcopalian's worst behaviors. But why, I wondered, was this compared to an underbelly? When my kitty lies on his back, stretching out all four paws in relaxation, I exclaim with delight: "such a cute belly--I wants to touch it!" (Not allowed.) When my friend's dog squiggles his back into the dirt, wriggling with pleasure, again, I laugh and enjoy the sight. Underbellies, in our "emotional support animals" are beautiful. Ah, if only I could find such beauty in the parishioner who called a meeting with me and all available clergy, presenting us with a manifesto claiming that removing a few names from the parish phone directory was "unethical" "unconscionable" and "damaging to our community." Excuse me for touching the database without calling an all-Parish meeting! Turned out the problem could be solved by me giving her the addresses of 10 people. Wow. Does that deserve the name of underbelly? Gracious readers, you tell me.
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5 comments:
That seems a pretty extreme way to get the information. My question is: How did the removed persons feel ro react to the situation? I mean if they didn't care, then it's their business right? Plus the directory has got to be managed by someone and with some sort of rules and regs.
wow, maybe its the water. you didn't even get the greatest liturgical hits of 1977 recently found in the library. Wait twenty years and we could donate them to a nursing home. I posted a poem but I'm not going to link as it would make you less anonymous.
Leah
Most of the removed persons would not have known, since they have gone on their merry ways. Most of the ones that were returned to the list probably will not know, as someone has to care enough to pick up the directory and these people were determined to be not involved. It would have been sad if someone felt left out because a mistake was made. But it could have been handled in a loving, caring way instead of by dropping a nuclear bomb.
By determined to be not involved, I don't mean they had the determination, but that various factors were examined: like no one had seen them, or heard from them, etc.
One further clarification: this parishioner was in the process of "helping" to create the parish phone directory. Nothing was finished, so again, no need to approach the problem as a battle, when it could have been approached as "let me understand why the database has given me this list and what can we do about it."
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