I have been involved with one incarnation of Tapestry or another since sometime late in 1991. While there have been many themes and trends during that time, two seem to be fairly consistent. They are: first, from time-to-time, individual congregants complain about how someone uses the congregational e-mail list to express political or other controversial matters and second that at some point the observation is made that those who are “right of center” in political/religious/social and/or fiscal philosophy are marginalized by our language and underlying assumptions. The more things change, the more they seem to stay the same!
Clik here to view.
The e-mail Ripples
Recently, the first consistent theme showed up with respect to the use of the “Tapestry all list.” Our president and minister sent out the usual admonition and pledged to have the board discuss the guidelines and the etiquette of using the e-mail list. I therefore do not intend to dip my oar in that water until such time as the board renders its opinion on that topic. I doubt that it will startle me, whatever it is.
On the second topic, I would like to offer a (surprise!) technological solution, and while it may actually come to bear on the first leitmotif, I will focus on the second. Here is the issue as I see it: By their very nature, many UUs are considered by others (and some consider themselves) to be liberal in politics, social values and religious views. Many UUs seem to assume that the same is true of their fellow congregants. I often hear the sentiment that it is good to be among “like-minded people” when someone is asked why they love Tapestry. Yet there are among us those folks who, while desiring a liberal spiritual home also have a more conservative or central political and social values view. I happen to put myself in that category. Actually, I’m not sure I’d fit neatly in that “box” either, but it is likely a better fit than liberal in all aspects of my world view. I have been known to take what some consider a conservative view on one issue and a much more liberal view on others. My “conservative” clients and associates consider me liberal. Many at Tapestry would say I’m conservative – I guess that means I’m a centrist?
So, a partial solution to all of this might be to use our new Tapestry Blog on the website. Thanks to Scott Ramirez for setting this all up, he has done an entirely credible job. But what is a “blog” and why might it help? The word blog is short for web (meaning World Wide Web on the internet) and log, as in a text log of events – thus web-log becomes blog. It is nothing more than a place where one can easily post (put on the web site or blog) ideas, opinions, essays, short stories, etc. Connie Pursell has an excellent blog (http://cpurselljesuscat.com/) where she posts her essays. It is well worth reading. You may be familiar with other blogs as well like the famous Huffington Post or maybe you follow the Redstate blog (okay, bad joke – maybe you never know). Simply put then, a blog is a place where individuals and organizations can become authors and publishers and put their “stuff” out to the public.
You can find the Tapestry Blog simply by going to the tapestryuu.org web site and “clicking” on the blog menu button. Here you can read the opinions of fellow congregants and perhaps leave a comment. Here, if you are so inclined, you can state your own opinion (of course in a way which models our UU Principles) on matters of importance to you and be secure in the knowledge that you won’t be “pushing them” on others. A blog is “pull” technology in the sense that if I want to read the blog, I have to go to it, it isn’t sent to me directly (usually.) I have put a few posts up on the blog. Some I suspect will be a bit controversial for some of us. Why not have an open and transparent discussion – through comments – about those topics? Or, perhaps I misjudged and the topics are not controversial and do not require a comment! One never knows. That’s the beauty of the blog.
Clik here to view.
We can do this!
So far there are book reviews, political opinions, science articles and a few miscellanies on the blog. Scott Ramirez, Phil Trask and I have done the most posting. Personally, I’d love to see more of us authoring and many more of us at least commenting from time-to-time when the spirit moves us.
The Tapestry blog is a “safe environment” for those who do not now use blogs but might want to learn some of the ins-and-outs of doing so. The process is easy. If you haven’t done so yet, just register on the site and you will be able to comment on the blogs that are there. If you want to author a blog post, just let the publicity committee know (send an e-mail to publicity@tapestryuu.org) and someone will change your registration to allow you to author blog posts as well as comment. If you want help registering, let the publicity committee know and someone will help you.
The Tapestry Blog is a great way to respectfully express opinions, offer insights, have an on-line discussion and learn more about your fellow Tapestrians. This blog is open to the public and so it will give prospective visitors a view into the many different world/political/social/religious views in the congregation. For that reason, it would be good to have many of us participating and not just a few. So there’s the challenge. Remember . . . .
Cogito ergo blogo!