"Beyond Categorical Thinking"

"Beyond Categorical Thinking," by Everardo Aguilar

Good morning! I’m Everardo Aguilar one of the Beyond Categorical Thinking facilitators for today’s workshop. I want to thank you and your search committee for inviting us to come visit your congregation this weekend. I am a member of the First Unitarian Universalist Church of San Diego and I bring you greetings from your friends down south.

I have served as a volunteer Beyond Categorical Thinking (or BCT) facilitator for about 13 years I have visited many congregations in many different parts of the country. I am honored to have the opportunity to assist, in a small way, congregations engaging in the search process for a new minister. Under the best of circumstances, searching for a new minister is a daunting task. It’s an exciting and stressful time. In a congregation this large, I believe you have more than 400 members, the search can be especially difficult because every member has a vision of what the perfect minister should be and the Search Committee has the nearly impossible job of finding this person. Often when a congregation is in the search process they are looking for “the one” minister who will finally help the church reach a state of Nirvana. We can finally grow and be more diverse. We can finally address some of the expansion needs of our church. We can finally have a better (fill in the blank) program. It is as if the new minister will be the messiah that come and fix everything that needs fixing.

No one person can ever hope to embody what everyone wants or thinks they want in a new minister nor can any one person solve all of a church’s problems.

Another BCT facilitator I’ve worked with used the following story to illustrate the point. I am paraphrasing because I haven’t been able to find the text, but I think my recollections will do.

Once there was an old monastery. The monastery had fallen into disrepair, the vineyards were overgrown with weeds, where there was once livestock only a few sheep and chickens remain and the once fertile fields were now barren. There were only a handful of monks now, all of them very advanced in age. Even through they rang the bell every Sunday for mass only one or two more souls would join them, if any one did.

The monks were in despair and had resigned themselves to wait until death would finally put an end to their slow decline and grant them eternal peace. Just when they were at their lowest, they all suddenly sensed a new presence. Every so often a rabbi from another village would come and take refuge in the hermitage in the woods near the monastery. When the rabbi came this time the monks sensed him. They decided to seek his counsel and the Abbott went to the hermitage to speak to the rabbi. The rabbi was a wise man of God and the Abbott hoped that the rabbi could give him counsel that would help him revitalize his dying monks. The rabbi welcomed the Abbott into the hermitage and they greeted each other warmly. After some prayer and meditation together the rabbi asked the Abbott what brought him to the hermitage. The Abbott told his story to the rabbi. The rabbi just closed his eyes and shook his head. “The same is happening to our temple,” said the rabbi. “Fewer and fewer people are keeping the Sabbath, there are empty seats at the Temple and no one is studying the Torah. I wish I had some advise for you but I have none.” They then embraced and wept together. After a time the rabbi stood up and began to walk out of the hermitage for his evening stroll. As he was walking out the door the rabbi turned to the Abbott and said, “among you is the messiah,’ and then he left.

The Abbott was puzzled but the rabbi had already gone into the woods and out of sight. The Abbott returned to the monastery and the small band of monks gathered to hear what the rabbi had said to the Abbott. The Abbott just sighed and repeated what the rabbi said, “among you is the messiah.” The Abbott then retired to his study. The other monks pondered what the Abbott had said.

“Among you is the messiah”, surely that means the Abbott, he is our leader, a true man of God, and surely he is the messiah among us. But then maybe it’s Brother John, he is the eldest among us and truly the wisest. Could it be Brother Michael? He tends to the few animals we have left and has always had a strong connection to God’s creatures. It can’t possibly be Brother Marcus! In his old age, he’s turned into quite a curmudgeon but you can always count on him to be honest and to speak his mind. Could it be me? It can’t possibly be me, could it?” So the monks were left wondering who among them was the messiah?

Since they had no way of knowing who among them was the messiah, they started treating each other with a profound sense of respect and reverence that they hadn’t had for each other for a long time.

Even thought the monastery was in disrepair, occasionally people from the nearby village would still come to the monastery and have a picnic in the gardens or walk on the grounds. People began to notice a sense of reverence and peace when they came to the monastery and soon more and more people started coming more often to enjoy the grounds. On Sundays, people began coming to mass when the bells tolled. Over time, the people began volunteering to help the monks repair the buildings and tend to the gardens and grounds. The monks even added to their number as some of the men in the village joined them to live a life devoted to God. The monastery was once again and continues to be the spiritual center of the community they served all because among them was the messiah.

What I like about this story is that it speaks to the power of community. You as a spiritual community have the opportunity to be your own messiah. Do not expect the new minister to come and transform you into the church you want to be. Rather that’s a process you do for yourselves but the new minister can help guide you along. I think it was Gandhi who said, “be the change”. By being the best congregation you can be, you will attract new members and a new minister who can help you along your path.

I encourage all of you who can to come to the Beyond Categorical Thinking workshop this afternoon. I think you will find that it’s a unique opportunity to not only air your concerns but to give voice to your hopes and dreams for the future of your church as you search for your next minister. If you cannot attend the workshop, I encourage you to reflect on what you would hope for in a new minister and share your thoughts with the Board and the Search Committee. After all, among you is the messiah.

"Bumper Stickers: A Being Out Story," by Deb Hillgartner

Good morning.

By a show of hands, how many of you have a bumper sticker on your car? I love bumper stickers. They are a great way to let other people know a little bit about you. I tend to like ones that are funny – and the more irreverent they are the more I love ‘em. Plus I love to watch people’s faces in my rear view mirror as they read mine.

I bought my first bumper sticker when I was 12. It said “Eat beans, America needs the gas”. I was crushed that my dad refused to let me put it on his car. When I got my own car it took about a week of people honking at me to figure out that my best friends little brother had put a sticker on the back that said “honk if you’re horny”. I loved it. Bumper stickers are fun. That is, they’re supposed to be.

Fast forward to another car about 13 years ago, I was waiting to make a left turn at a major intersection near my home in Las Vegas. It was a beautiful day that day – I had the windows down so it must have been spring or fall.

As the light changed the car directly behind me sped up and passed me, on the right, which was frightening enough, but as it passed I heard the occupants yell out the ‘f’ word – not the 4-letter one we are most used to, but the other ‘f’ word, the one that rhymes with maggot. My first reaction was to look around me to see who they were yelling at because, of course, they couldn’t have been yelling that at me – I’m not one of … those. I’m a lesbian. Then this cold, gut tightening, wave of fear rolled over me as I realized that, yeah, they were yelling at me. My car was covered with rainbows.

Because coming out can be such a liberating experience, some of us tend to go a little overboard with wanting to share the fact that “I’m gay” with the entire world. I had a rainbow license plate cover, a long rainbow stripe, a dog shaped rainbow and two cat shaped rainbows – and that was just on the back bumper.

By the time I realized that I had been the target of homophobia, the car was long gone. It was only one wave of fear and I shook it off fairly quickly and put it down to an isolated incident. Later, over dinner, I told my best friend about it. He was sympathetic and said “maybe you should think about getting rid of some of those rainbows. They really do make your car a target for that kind of hatred”. But, I said, I love my rainbows. They let others, in the know, know who I am. It’s not as if my bumper stickers were politically radical or in your face, like some of the ones I have on my car now.

They were just rainbows.

I didn’t dwell on the incident. I didn’t remove any of my bumper stickers and to be honest, I more or less forgot about it, until about a year later, when it happened again. It was at night and the occupants of the other car not only shouted that ‘f’ word, this time they added the other ‘f’ word, the 4-letter one, into the mix and they threw at my windows what I later determined were ice cubes from a soft drink. It did not sound pretty hitting my car.
This time as the cold, gut wrenching wave of fear rolled over me I knew immediately that they were directing their hatred at my car, at me.

My friend was more emphatic this time. “Get rid of those bumper stickers – next time it might be something worse than ice cubes”. I thought long and hard about it and I decided that I wasn’t going to remove them. I’m not ashamed of who I am. It’s scary, but I refused to be intimidated. How dare they make me, or anyone else for that matter, feel like this simply for being who I am. It was then that I truely realised that I’m proud of who I am. This, of course, was not always the case.

Pride is one of the first lessons we learn in life. Most of us remember childhood moments when our parents or guardians were proud of us … for bringing home an A, for hitting the ball or catching the ball. Many of us also remember feeling shame when we heard the words “are you proud of yourself now?” for breaking a rule, forgetting something or just not doing something well.

Those of us who were beginning to realize that we were ‘different’ were hearing other messages of shame, that loving someone of your own gender was wrong, something you couldn’t talk about and certainly not something to be proud of. Even when our parents didn’t mean to be hurtful, the message that we were expected to follow in their heterosexual path was still there – ‘when you grow up and get married’, ‘when you settle down and have kids’. The message I heard that was never said aloud was that my parents would be extremely disappointed in me if I never got married (to a man) or had children. I’m sorry Mom & Dad.
The gay rights movement, according to Wikipedia, has three main premises: that sexual diversity is a gift; that sexual orientation and gender identity are inherent and cannot be intentionally altered; and that people should be proud of their sexual orientation and gender identity.

A year or so after the 2nd incident in my car, I was driving down The Strip, this time with 3 heterosexual friends who were visiting from out of town. Again, it was a lovely day, with the windows rolled down when a car sped passed us (the cowards) with the occupants yelling out the same two ‘f’ words.

This time, I felt nothing. My friends were horrified. They were frightened. They got angry – at me! “How could you put us in this position?” they said, “what were you thinking?”. I asked them if they were mad because some idiot assumed they were gay too. They said, “Of course not, we don’t care about that”. (They are very good friends). So I asked them, “Well, what is it – why are you so upset?” And they replied “because it’s not fair, it’s not right, because it’s frightening”.

That’s very true, I agreed, and yet something like this happens, more often than not accompanied by physical violence, somewhere, every day, and what are you going to do about it?
During World War II, when the Nazis occupied Denmark and required all Danish Jews to wear yellow Jewish stars on their sleeves, the Danish King and all his family immediately started wearing yellow Jewish stars on their sleeves and soon the entire population of Denmark was wearing yellow Jewish stars on their sleeves.

As much as I would love to see a rainbow sticker on every car, I realize that’s just not going to happen. But my friends eyes were opened just a little more that day and that made me feel good.
So, I’m a youth advisor, I teach Our Whole Lives and I co-facilitate Beyond Categorical Thinking workshops. I do it because I believe it’s really important for people to hear our stories. Even to a group of UU’s who may feel like they’ve heard it all before - because sitting next to you just might be someone who hasn’t. And just because we are Unitarian Universalists and we are a Welcoming Congregation doesn’t mean that homophobia or heterosexism is gone.

The Rev. Keith Kron says that “to teach people how to be less homophobic you must first teach them about vulnerability. As we let ourselves become more vulnerable, somehow we become stronger in the process”.
One last sticker story: In 2005 I attended General Assembly in Fort Worth. In order to make my new generic black suitcase a little easier to pick out on the baggage carousel I put a sticker on it. This sticker was one from the Human Rights Campaign. Perhaps you are familiar with it. It’s not large, only about 3 inches square and it has no writing on it. It’s very simple – a yellow equal sign on a blue background. When I returned to Las Vegas and pulled my bag off the carousel the first thing I noticed was that my sticker had been defaced. Written, with a bold black marker, on the top bar of the equal sign was the word Lesbians. On the bottom bar was that maggot rhyming f-word. I was stunned. Talk about feeling vulnerable!

Since we can no longer lock our bags, I shuddered to think of what I might find inside my bag. Fortunately, everything was intact, my bag had not been opened.

The following day I went online and wrote letters to both airports, Las Vegas and Ft. Worth as well as to the airline describing what had happened. They were all quick to respond. I learned that the airport has nothing to do with baggage handlers and that the baggage handlers are not employed by the airlines but by some other company that is contracted out. It appeared, for a while, that no one was taking responsibility for what had been done to my bag.

Then I got a call from a representative from the airline. She listened to my story. She was very sympathetic. She assured me that the airline does have a non-discrimination clause in their hiring practice and even that some of her best friends are gay. And then she sent me a voucher for a one way ticket anywhere that airline flew, good for one year but subject to so many date restrictions I was never able to use it. But it was the thought that counted.
When I came out 20 years ago I would never have called the airlines or the airports. But by telling my stories, by making myself vulnerable, I have found that I have become a stronger person as a result.

I’ve gone through two cars since the one with all the rainbows on it. With both of them, the first thing I did, before I even took them to the dmv to get registered, was to put a rainbow sticker on the back. I’ve also learned to put my stickers on a magnetic strip so I can change them out from time to time. My favorite during the election was “Republicans for Voldemort”. No one has yelled at my car, no one has thrown anything at me. One person did honk to get my attention and then gave me a thumbs up. I like to think it’s because the times have changed for the better, that people are more tolerant these days but I know that’s not the entire reason. I’m very aware of how lucky I am and that the worst thing that ‘s happened to me being out is having ice cubes thrown at my car. Maybe … it’s because my rainbow is a little overshadowed these days by a much larger, more intimidating sticker that says “Get a taste of religion – lick a witch”!

I look forward to seeing all you later this afternoon, in the Beyond Categorical Thinking workshop. Thank you.