Appeal to UUs Interested in Article II Revision...

I'm going to be in the position to present--personally--some reactions and opinions to the draft revision to a member of the CoA.

I'd like to compile the things that are approved/disapproved or and the critique...

I have no idea how much time I'll get (but some, for certain) for this, and I don't know how much this "outside of channels" communication will matter.

But if you're interested... here's a chance.

Note: This is directed specifically to the revision of the draft (or what it should be, reasonably). I'm going to keep this to the topic, narrowly. Strictly salient posts about meaningful revision for good and useful cause--or I'll delete them.

Pitbull With Lipstick

Well, Sarah told us who--or at least what--she is, and what her role will be.

What she offered last night was a Bridge to Nowhere (the one she avidly supported until it got killed and is now insisting she actively opposed and helped kill), an America where there's not even a perfunctory effort at claiming to unite, but rather one which is securely under divide et impera.

Obama came out a few days ago, insisting that attacks on her family were inappropriate and off-limits. In thanks, he got the pitbull hanging off his arm, mocking everything he's done to serve America, essentially since he got out of law school. Nice lady, the Palin kids' mom.

Barack, if you need to remember who you and Joe are dealing with, look at the lipstick marks on the puncture wounds on your hand.

America, in the event that you believe that what the country really, really needs is someone who can field-dress a moose, you know who to vote for. Personally, I'd rather see someone who knew (before this summer) what the job of the Vice President of the United States is.

Ironic and Amusing...

at least to my friends and family.

And some others.


Created by OnePlusYou - Online Dating

I know that somewhere, my mother is in hysterics.

Criticizing "Inherent"

Currently, and in the just offered draft revision, of the UU Principles is the statement that we (the member congregations) affirm and promote... or (new language) covenant to honor and uphold (I like that new language):

the inherent worth and dignity of every person

I criticized "inherent" last night over at the Chaliceblog.

Chalicechick asked what the problem is with "inherent."

Lots. Rather than dump it all there in a reply that would get skimmed, I decided to post here (in a post that will get skimmed).

One criticism, pointed out in a conversation between services, is that "inherent" means that you have it, it's yours by your very nature... so... there's nothing anyone can do about it. You have inherent worth and dignity, and that is that. The most abused, oppressed, neglected individual has all their worth and dignity inherently and nothing anyone can do will affect that. So... why act?

Bill Schulz pointed out that there are only three philosophical bases on which we seem to find a foundation to rest human worth;

One is God; all God's children have worth and because it's god-given... but that one's been so shredded that we can put it aside (as a movement). We don't agree on the existence of god, much less divine nature, much less the details, and so we as a movement can't claim that (the culture is in the same boat) bedrock, and must look for another.

Another is Natural Law. Essentially, this is an argument that something in our nature is of inherent worth. It's not far from the argument made about god-granted worth--and no one has managed to weave together much of an argument for it. Assert it? Sure. But argue it and explain why? Nah.

(I'll grant here that I tend to feel that it is... but I grew up UU, and American, and liberal, and my feeling otherwise would be a shock. But having grown up with and integrated the belief doesn't make it true. It merely makes it what I believe--and want to believe. That's fine, but just asserting it is like asserting the divine right of kings; who says so?)

So, bereft of god-given and nature-granted, what do we have?

If worth doesn't come to us from some greater power, what and where is left?

Us.

Schulz points to the slow, steady struggle by humanity to assert that we have worth, and to assert it in larger and larger numbers and in finer detail. From The Rights of Man (well, from even before that) to the UN Declaration of Human Rights. And, he says, so far that has been a progression; we haven't (yet?) stepped backwards. We have worth and dignity because we, humanity, assert it and affirm it--not because it's inherent, but because we see truly having worth and dignity as being part of what makes being human possible, and that to deny that to someone is thus a crime against that person and a crime against humanity.

So having the Principles assert, affirm and honor the worth and dignity of every person would have meaning. It would put us firmly in the camp that we're actually in, and by removing "inherent" would actually create a greater call to doing social justice work, because what's so very important to us, to all of us, is delicate, precious and no one but humanity is or can.

For those who personally feel it's inherent, removing it doesn't deny that. It sets that theological assertion aside--and in doing so affirms to a larger group that they have the obligation to act.

In short? "Inherent" is a cop-out. And the phrase "inherent worth" is semantically slippery, too. Worth? Worth what, and to whom? Gold and jewels have no inherent value--but people value them enough to in some cases kill for them. We give them worth. "Worth" is an abstraction, a perception, like "tastes good." Does something inherently taste good? That's silly; we've all met people who dislike things we think taste wonderful.

Worth is an assertion of value--to some human being. Thus the errancy of inherency is demonstrated.

But I bet we have to have a great, freaking floor fight over it. There's a member of the CoA I need to talk with, because I'm really quite surprised at this whole draft.

Please, say it ain't so...

A pdf of the Principles, revised, has been released through Scott Wells. You can find that blog post and pdf here, at Scott's blog.

I've read the pdf once, and am referring back... but my initial reaction is one of disappointment.

Our principles (and related predecessor documents for the Unitarians and Universalists both) have been open to significant revision in the past, both as called for in bylaws and when the spirit moved. Given the effort put into this project by the CoA, I had expected (and heard things that led me to expect) significant revisions and changes--in reaction to the comments and criticisms that had been heard and collected.

What we got was some very slight editing (very) and a bunch of explication of the principles.

Nothing in the new material (or the editing) appears to even attempt to address the very serious critique of "inherent" in inherent worth and dignity of every person. Yet I heard it raised in my home congregation from a life-long, third-generation UU on philosophical, moral and practical grounds as well as reading Bill Schulz's blistering critique in UU World. (I also got to hear him, in person, dismantle the argument for inherency and found it devastatingly persuasive--and haven't seen anyone put up any counter-argument other than that it's a historical nod to universalism... which (historical nod) is thin stuff as far as arguing for a moral statement.)

Nothing makes this appreciably more inspirational--I doubt that this will increase the number of UUs who want the principles read to them on their deathbeds by even 1/10th of 1 percent. The language of the principles wasn't poetic, still isn't, and the explication certainly isn't. It reads like the output of a committee.

Nothing is new. This is warmed over leftovers. This is not a bold statement, reframing UU principles in new and insightful ways nor does it boldly assert a new vision of a farther horizon of the faith.

At the moment I'd urge a vote against, simply on the grounds that we should not indulge in deluding ourselves that this revision is.. well... a revision. The General Assembly's time in Salt Lake (and beyond) would be better spent on other matters. Just declare this a false start. Let others try again.

Obama's acceptance speech at the DNC...

My, that man gives a fine speech.

I'm looking forward to reading the whining about it.

Still unbelievable...

In America, today, an annual income of $150,000 is rich. Not wildly, mind-blowingly rich, but rich. That's a weekly paycheck of almost $3,000--before taxes--while the median income would provide a weekly check of about $850.

What does John McCain think the break point to rich--just in income--is?

$100,000--per week.

If you make two and a half times--in a week--as much as the average American makes in a year, John McCain thinks that you're rich. If you make less than that, you're middle class.

The median income earner--firmly middle class, by definition, being right in the middle--makes about three times what the minimum wage earner does. Rich--at $150,000--means that you make about ten times what a minimum wage worker does.

At McCain's barely rich number?

333 times as much.

McCain's barely rich earner makes more than 33 times as much as the real barely rich person. Given the same distribution as really exists, the (mythical) median income earner in John McCain's (fantasy) world earns about $1.4 million per year. And minimum wage would be $250/hr.

And Peacebang wonders why there are some people who are hostile to the rich? It's not the mere wealth. It's the cluelessness and the arrogance--and the effect that cluelessness and arrogance has on the rest of us that stirs it. It's the class warfare that's waged as a normal daily thing on those who aren't making enough money to even exist in McCain's world.

Unbelievable.

McCain's interview with Warren:

Warren: Define rich. Everybody talks about, you know, taxing the rich and -- but not the poor, the middle class. At what point -- give me a number, give me a specific number -- where do you move from middle class to rich? Is it 100,000, it is 50,000, 200 [thousand]? How does anybody know if we don't know what the standards are?

McCain: ... [elliptical chatter]... "I don't want to take any money from the rich. I want everybody to get rich.... [more off-topic chatter]... So I think if you're just talking about income, how about five million.

Hear that, America? If you're only making a million bucks a year in income, you're working poor in John McCain's book.

Those of us who make something within sight of the median income ($42,000/yr) aren't even in sight of the poverty level.

More sometime after I pick my jaw off the floor.

Out. Of. Touch.

This so quickly after talking about renegotiating the water compact with other states, in Colorado--which is akin to urinating on a high voltage line.

Utterly. Out. Of. Touch.

Opinions wanted

(Yes, I'm really not blogging as often as I intended. More later. Maybe. No promises.)

That said, I've a question for all three of my readers regarding expectations for public behaviors.

What needful activities should be discreetly performed in public and which should be banished to a public bathroom (or not) and why? I have in mind here things like nursing an infant or giving oneself an insulin injection.

You're free to provide explanations, caveats and qualifiers. Please consider the range of public restroom experiences, gender issues, specific locations (restaurants, parks, theaters...)--the whole thing. Compare, contrast....

This just in from North Texas...

I'm dawdling my way to class in Chicago next week, rather than flying cross continent home, spending a few days and flying back to Chicago. It might be a little less un-green than doing so, but I'll admit that my impulse was to avoid long hours in a 737--and to grab the chance to visit friends and relatives I've not gotten to see in years. I'll admit to not having foreseen that each of them would want (well, understandably, I suppose) to explore my choice to go into ministry. I guess I'm practicing the long version of the elevator speech, among other things. But it's all good; these are all folks I've known most of my life and are important. I can understand them wanting to know what I'm doing and why... and wanting to understand something of my religion.

Warning to anyone mulling over the idea of seminary and ministry:

Be prepared. Your decision to do so will mean that people who you've never shared one word about religion with will ask you to say grace (and the answer, uh, my family never said grace and I feel kinda awkward... is not acceptable. Figure it out. Have something that you can offer. It can't be any worse for you than it is for me. I'm just now figuring out that any minute now someone will ask me to pray with them... ack).

But that's not the point of this post. Pardon me for that wild tangent.

This is a political observation... or started out to be... and I'm going to drag it back to that now. My uncle is pretty conservative. I don't think he was when younger, but my grandparents were Nixonian cloth coat Republicans, and maybe that's some of it. Or maybe it's having lived so long in Texas... or something. Probably all of it and then some. But here I am visiting with people who have a panoramic photo of the inauguration of George W. as governor. This morning's coffee cup has the Presidential Seal on it, with "West Whitehouse, Crawford Texas" on it.

Ack.

But my family's not inclined to mince around issues, so of course we talk politics as well as religion. This guy's seriously thinking about voting for Obama. Not only that, he doesn't think that it's delusional to imagine that Texas is competitive and could vote for Obama. People, he says, are pissed off, unhappy and disgusted.

Pinch me. The other staunch conservative in the family--in Alaska--talked to me last year about his support for a living wage and national health care and his fury at Bush and the GOP.