PRELUDE, December 2004

FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR:

PROSELYTIZING & PARADOX

Some years ago, a Muslim friend invited me to dinner with her spiritual leader. We were barely into the main course before his assistant remarked casually, “Isn’t it wonderful that so many Christians are converting to Islam?”

Where I come from, them’s fightin’ words, but I managed to produce a small smile as I replied, “That’s funny, I often hear Christian missionaries gloating about how many Muslims have converted to Christianity. And didn’t the Prophet Mohammed, Peace Be Upon Him, claim to have taught the same beliefs as Judaism and Christianity?”

Our host politely changed the subject, but I have often wondered which is the true attitude of most Muslims, the respect their Prophet taught for his fellow “People of the Book” or the parochial cheering for their side in their competition with Christians.

The same question continues to trouble me about my fellow Christians—and about myself. Unlike Judaism, Christianity is founded on evangelism—proclaiming the Good News—much like many other faiths, such as Islam, the Bahai faith, and the Brahma Kumaris, but I fear that we often proselytize aggressively not only because the Great Commission says to “make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19), but also because our egos are caught up in this task. John Calvin claimed that conversion was always the result of “the secret workings of the Holy Spirit,” and I haven’t a clue what I said or did that prompted their conversion of those whom I have helped to convert from other faiths to Christianity, but I am also more than a little proud to have won a few for our side. Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.

All too often, I fear, we Christians do to Jews exactly what I resented the sheik’s assistant doing: acting as if they practice some sort of defective religion that has little to teach us? And if it annoyed me to have a Muslim express glee over Christians converting to Islam, what must it do to Holocaust survivors to see Christians try to convert their children and grandchildren? Besides, don’t we Christians claim to follow a rabbi whose “apostle to the Gentiles” claimed (Romans 2-11) that God’s covenant with Israel continued even as the Almighty revealed a covenant with all humanity in Christ?

As Monsignor Donald Beckmann remarked at a recent board meeting of the Long Island Council of Churches, our ability to both practice the Great Commission and to treat our neighbors with respect may depend on our ability to live with this sort of paradox. But then ours is a paradoxical religion: we proclaim that Jesus was both fully human and fully divine, that the Ruler of All Creation was born in a barn, and that the church is both the communion of saints and the fellowship of sinners. Perhaps we took more seriously the mystery of Christmas - that “the Word became flesh and lived among us . . . full of grace and truth” (John 1:14) — the secret workings of the Holy Spirit might even convert us, so that we might preach Good News with grace and truth.

Shalom/Salaam/Shanti/Pax,
Tom



A WORD OR TWO OF THANKS

FROM SARA WEISS, DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT

I was on vacation when the November newsletter was being compiled. Therefore we have two months worth of donors to thank in this issue.

Special thanks go to the following:

Congregational Church of Manhasset$2,000 General Operating
The Community Church of Syosset$1,500 General Operating
East Hampton Presbyterian Church$3,000 General Operating
Garden City Community Church$2,000 Emergency Food
JPMorgan Chase$1,000 Fall Convocation
King Kullen$500 Food vouchers
Long Island Cares, Inc.$1,500 Riverhead office
Presbytery of Long Island$3,000 General operating
Presbytery of Long Island$3,250 Emergency food
StarbucksCoffee for Fall Convocation
Suffolk County Youth Bureau$5,000 Riverhead office
United Way of Long Island$2,950 monthly allocation Sept./Oct.
Wantagh Memorial Congregational$1,500 Homelessness Prevention
We’re also grateful to the institutions that gave less, and we thank all the individuals who generously gave so we can help the least fortunate among us.

Most Urgent Need

Once again this month’s most urgent need is for MetroCards. We urgently need $300 to purchase MetroCards to help our clients get to job interviews, work, and to doctor’s appointments. The past few weeks alone, several of our clients missed job interviews and doctors’ appointments because they could not afford MetroCards. We can never keep up with this chronic and continuing need. Would you like to help alleviate this urgent need? Please call Sara Weiss if you can do so.

A great way to remember a loved one, whether deceased or living, is to give a memorial or tribute gift in his/her name. In your letter accompanying such a gift, please tell us who the gift is in memory of or in tribute to, and who is giving the gift. We will send a thank you letter to the contributor and to the family of the loved one in accordance with your instructions. Please send your contribution to the LICC: attention: Sara Weiss. If you have questions, call Sara for further information at 516-565-0290.



FALL CONVOCATION 2004 REPORT

“Helping the Hungry on Long Island”

This fall the Long Island Council of Churches’ Convocation focused on “Helping the Hungry on Long Island.” A panel of experts examined why hunger is growing among our neighbors, how local churches and charities are responding, and changes in public policy that could reduce hunger in our region. Panelists included lawmakers, representatives of churches and human service agencies, and several of our own staff who feed the hungry people each day.

Why are so many Long Islanders hungry? Carolyn Gumbs, our Riverhead office manager, attributed the increasing number of hungry people to the high cost of housing, medical care, and lack of adequate health insurance. The number of people coming to our Riverhead facility for emergency food has increased 25%, and we now feed 600 to 800 people per month. Jean Kelly, executive director of The Interfaith Nutrition Network (The I.N.N.) said that their network of 19 soup kitchens across Long Island now feeds over 5,500 a week, and those coming in for food are increasingly desperate. Other East End soup kitchens often feed more than 100 people per night and between 650 and 1,000 per month.

Dick Koubek from Catholic Charities’ Public Policy Action Network explained that increasing hunger is the result of Welfare Reform, a flawed definition of poverty, and bad public policies. He said that although Welfare Reform resulted in the closing of 60% of cases on the books, it hasn’t eradicated poverty at all. Instead, the burden of caring for the poor has simply shifted from government to charities and the poor are pouring into soup kitchens and emergency food centers. He also reported that over 100,000 Long Islanders who qualify for food stamps can’t get them. Years ago, those who needed food stamps were unemployed, but now that the poor are mostly employed full time, they cannot get to the Departments of Social Services during the hours that its offices are open.

Pat Acompora, Assemblywoman from Suffolk County’s first district, agreed that housing and health are major factors in perpetuating and increasing hunger on Long Island. She has pushed to raise the minimum wage, noting that “Nowhere in New York State is the minimum wage a living wage.”

How are congregations and charities responding to hunger? Jim Lull, founder of Bread and More, an Interfaith Nutrition Network (I.N.N.) soup kitchen at 1st Congregational Church in Riverhead, got his fellow parishioners invested in this particular hunger ministry by asking each of them to help the project in concrete ways. He asked all of them to bring unused utensils from home, for example, for “Utensil Sunday” and to put them in the Sunday collection plate. When Pat Accampora found extra turkeys, he asked congregation members to take one home, fix it, and bring it back for dinner on Wednesday night. He also found that by working ecumenically with the I.N.N. his congregation could expand from one night a week to three nights

Lorraine Whiffen from Island Harvest, a food rescue agency, reported that as needs have grown, they have shifted their mission from providing food for short-term emergencies to meeting ongoing needs for supplemental food. They are also doing more education and advocacy. When they learned that numerous school children who qualify for free lunches were too embarrassed to accept them, for example, Island Harvest began going into the schools to recruit elementary school kids to bring in food from their homes. This managed to increase food donations, get parents involved, and de-stigmatize hunger. As the kids studied the causes of hunger, they learned that it is not only ne’er-do-wells who are hungry. But also many working families like their own.

Jesse Glick from Church World Service reported that CWS has organized churches across the island in CROP Walks to feed the hungry, such as the Mini-CROP-Walk during our Convocation. These walks have raised nearly $1 million in recent years, including $250,000 for local hunger ministries on Long Island. Only in Africa and in the United States, he noted sadly, has the percentage of the population that lives with hunger grown over the past twenty years.

What changes in public policy would reduce hunger? How can we advocate effectively these changes? Bill Edwards from Bread for the World showed us how to do a letter writing campaign, described BfW’s legislative agenda for this year, and gave tips on how to write to politicians on very specific issues urging them to vote for the appropriate policy changes—which many attendees did during the lunch hour.

“We accomplished something that’s very difficult to do,” said Rev. Lorraine DeArmitt, the event’s organizer. “We empowered ordinary people to move from an understanding that while it’s important to donate clothes, food, etc., to one’s local food pantry, hunger is a systemic issue and here are concrete actions each of us can take to bring about the systemic changes that will eradicate hunger.”

As one participant observed, while we need to challenge those who have enough to give Thanksgiving baskets to those who don’t, we also need to develop ways to ensure that those in need this year don’t need a Thanksgiving basket again next year.



Ideas you can use:

Holiday Bulletins that Invite Visitors Back Again

The holidays are a time occasional worshipers and church-shoppers are particularly likely to make an appearance in your sanctuary, and they often are looking for a good reason to come back again soon. Many churches take efforts to make their worship bulletins for Christmas and Easter prettier than usual, but at Parkway Community Church (RCA) in Hicksville, they also make a point of giving visitors good reasons to come back again soon. In all too many parishes, a guest is likely to encounter, for perfectly good reasons, a church calendar that reads “No childcare today. No Sunday School next week. Church office closed tomorrow.” Such a schedule has a way of communicating, even in the liveliest of congregations, something like “We’re on our last legs.”

At Parkway Community Church last Easter, by contrast, visitors were handed an order of worship with an insert that

  • appealed for volunteers to help assemble and sort health kits for the ecumenical relief and development agency Church World Service,
  • invited everyone to a special event the next Sunday (the dedication of a carillon from another church),
  • told who had donated the most recent hymnal in memory of a loved one,
  • offered home-communion to any who were housebound,
  • invited all to Wednesday morning prayer and Wednesday night Bible study,
  • announced a new members’ class for anyone who would like to learn more about the church.

How might you let your guests this Christmas know about opportunities to worship, study, and serve in the days and weeks after the Feast of the Incarnation?


Party with the Poor

The Long Island Labor Religion Coalition recently urged folks who came to their prayer breakfast to bring non-perishable food and then hauled these donations to our Riverhead office. Are you having a holiday party sometime soon? Perhaps you’d like to use this occasion to invite people to give food for one of our pantries or another emergency food pantry in your area.


Be a Souper Hero

A growing number of churches are taking part in one of the simplest of all mission projects, the Souper Bowl of Caring. Started about 15 years ago by a Presbyterian pastor in South Carolina, Souper Bowl is extremely easy to organize: the church youth group asks each worshiper on Super Bowl Sunday (which will be Feb. 6 this year) to give at least one dollar and one can of soup (or some other non-perishable food) to feed the hungry. The youth collect this offering in soup pots, tally the donations, report them to the Souper Bowl headquarters (by phone to 800-358-SOUP, by fax to 803-419-7244, or online to www.souperbowl.org), and schlep the food and money to a local hunger ministry they choose. Naturally, we’d be delighted if you chose the LICC……



Worth Quoting

Rabbi Lerner on Christmas:

“As I’ve become closer with Christians who serve God and are deeply dedicated to building a world of love and caring, it’s hard not to share their pain at the way Christmas has been distorted…

"Like Chanukah, Christmas built on the earlier spiritual insight that at the darkest moments it was critical to keep the lights burning, and to celebrate the possibility of a world redeemed. . . .Imagine the pain of seeing their beautiful spiritual vision becoming the occasion for a societal wide orgy of materialism in which spending on gifts that no one really needs so far exceeds any expenditures that the society is willing to make on behalf of the homeless, the hungry, and those without medical care.”

--Rabbi Michael Lerner (RabbiLerner@tikkun.org), used with permission

Family Values:

The Housing and Urban Development Dept (HUD) has announced that it will be lowering the fair market rate for rentals. The fair market rate is used to determine the level of assistance a family receives from the HUD rental subsidy program (known as “Section 8”.) Those who receive rental assistance under this program will receive less at a time of fast-increasing housing costs. The HUD Section 8 reduction means that families earning less than $25,600 a year or single people earning less than $17,900 will have to make up the difference themselves. It means very difficult choices for the people involved. Funds to make up the difference, if they don’t want to end up on the street, will have to come from money now being spent on food, clothing, medical and other expenses.

The Bible is quite clear on what makes a nation “great.” What makes a nation great in Biblical terms is the quality of its justice and its willingness to reach out and empower the poor. . . .

Our government stands in need of being converted and transformed. Mere lip service to “family values” doesn’t count for much.

--Ralph W. Mueckenheim, Hempstead United Methodist Church

WORTH READING:

“Does the Bible Justify Violence” by John J. Collins.
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2004. 56 pages, paperback, $6.

The “Facets” series from Fortress Press promises “brief, brilliant treatments of vital aspects of faith and life” and this little book certainly delivers just that. In the wake of the 9/11 attacks and continuing terrorism from Al Qaeda, Christians and Jews asked anxiously whether Islam fueled fundamentalist violence. Collins turns the question around and asks whether the texts that we revere might justify holy war.

He reminds us that the Song of Moses, found in Exodus 15, one of the earliest attempts to describe the Almighty, insists that “The Lord is a warrior” and that First Samuel 15 commands the Israelites to slaughter the Amalekites, every man, woman, child, ox, sheep, and donkey. Deuteronomy, “one of the great repositories of humanistic values” commands human sacrifice after combat. The liberation of Israelites and the subjugation of Canaanites, Collins points out, are two sides of the same coin.

Modern archeological evidence has raised serious doubts about whether there was a massive slaughter of city-dwelling Canaanites by these peasants from the hill country. For centuries, though, the stories of how God commanded an invasion of a promised land have been used by religious zealots to justify aggression. English Puritans, my own paternal ancestors, used a dubious interpretation of Scripture to portray themselves as “the Saints of the Most High” who were commissioned by God to treat the Catholics of Ireland the way the Israelites were said to have treated the Canaanites. A generation later, my people misused biblical texts to defend their murder of Native Americans, whom they saw as so many Amalekites who needed to be dispossessed of their land and, if they resisted, exterminated.

Different parties in a conflict often use the same narrative in the service of conflicting goals, Collins observes. In South Africa, the Boers applied the story of the Exodus to their life under British rule—and then African Nationalists applied it to their oppression by the Boers under apartheid. Secular, socialist Zionists identified with the Exodus in creating a haven for persecuted Jews in Palestine—only to have religious extremists use the same story to justify expansion into Arab lands in ways the original settlers found appalling. Conservative Christians use the same Biblical tradition to support Israel in a way that envisions the end of Judaism.

Books such as Daniel and Revelation that promise eschatological vengeance may have been “intended to encourage patient endurance,” Collins argues, but they often have been interpreted as calling Christians to “force the end” in such orgies of bloodshed as the Taborites in Bohemia, the Peasants Revolt, the Messiah of Munster, and the Puritan revolution in England. Even those who do not initiate violence seem to provoke it, as was the case with the Branch Davidians in Waco.

Collins ends by appealing to Christians to acknowledge what Gerd Luedemann has called “the dark side of the Bible” and to wrestle seriously with the biblical endorsement of violence. We demand that Muslims confront the aspects of their tradition that have fueled terrorism, he notes, so it is high time that we do the same with our own sacred stories. The Prince of Peace surely longs for us to do so.

--TWG—-



WORTH WATCHING:

“The Horace Hagedorn Story”

“The Horace Hagedorn Story” tells how this Long Islander has built a successful business on Long Island and has given away much of his wealth to local charities. You can catch it on WLIW/21 on Tuesday, Dec. 7, at 8 p.m.



WOULD YOU LIKE LICC REPORTS FOR YOUR ANNUAL MEETING?

The American Baptist Churches of Metropolitan New York recently asked for a brief report on the work of the LICC for their annual report book, a good way to thank American Baptists for their donations and to encourage them to keep giving. We would be glad to supply such one-page reports to all the congregations and denominations. If you would like one of these, please contact our Director of Development Sara Weiss (516-565-0290/saraweiss@optonline.net) or our Executive Director Tom Goodhue (tomgoodhue@optonline.net).



DID YOU KNOW?

  • On Sunday, October 31st, the Garden City Community Church hosted two women from the Middle East at its weekly forum. Nadua Sarandah, a Palestinian, lost her sister who was killed by an Israeli army person. Her sister had degrees from Harvard and Johns Hopkins and was a Public Health consultant trying to save and prolong lives in Palestine, East Jerusalem. Robi Damelin, a Jewess who moved from South Africa to Tel Aviv in 1967 ( from “the frying pan into the fire” as she said) lost her son, killed by a sniper when he was in the army, which he fiercely did not want to join. Robi had worked hard in the anti-apartheid movement and for Mandela in South Africa before moving to Israel. Both women in their grief found the Parents Circle, a group of more than 500 bereaved Israeli and Palestinian families who share their grief and are working for peace and justice in their land. They both spoke very movingly and eloquently of their losses and the hard work but absolute necessity of forgiveness. They said peace will only come by a grass roots movement and they begged women in the USA of Christian, Jewish and Muslim faiths to get together and dialogue as the way to understand each other and work for peace. That is the way to help them and to bring about peace and justice in Israel/Palestine. They were also going to the Islamic Center that morning and to the Temple Beth El the next day.
    --Mary Dewar

  • Because of the contract between MCI and the Department of Correctional Services, families must pay phone bills 630% higher than what the average consumer pays for a collect call - adding up to hundreds of dollars a month for the friends and family of New York State prisoners in phone bills. Some of this money goes straight to the State of New York --with a 57.5% kickback on each call, the state has made $175 million in profit off of this backdoor tax on prison families since the contract started in 1996! If you feel this is unjust, the Rev. Rose Ann Vita, pastor of Incarnation Lutheran Church in Bridgehampton, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the Prison Families Community Forum, and Prison Families of New York urge you to call Governor Pataki at 518-474-8390 and ask him to end this.


NEEDED/OFFERED

Needed:

Blood Donors:
Blood donations often slow down as people get busy for the Christmas/Chanukah/Kwanza/New Year/Epiphany season. If your congregation is having a blood drive, we would be glad to publicize it to help you find more donors.
Wading River Congregational Church, for example, is have a Blood Drive on Saturday, December 4 from 8:00am-12:00noon! Healthy people between 17-76, weighing at least 110 lb, who have not donated in the past 55 days are eligible. Roll up your sleeve and save a life!

Secondhand Computer:
East Hampton United Methodist Church needs a computer with Windows 98; they already have a usable monitor and printer. Please call 765-6231 if you have one to donate.

Help with Shelves:
The LICC is seeking a volunteer who can help put up donated shelving at our Riverhead office. If you can lend a hand, please call 631-27-2210.

Classroom Space:
HALT, a not-for-profit program that helps men avoid committing violence, would like to rent a classroom or meeting room in a church/synagogue/etc. one evening a week (anytime after 6 p.m.) somewhere in Western Suffolk along the South Shore. If you have space to offer, please call Annabelle Logo-Predric at 631-360-2270.


Offered:

Baby Crib:
The LICC's Riverhead office has a baby crib to give away. If you know anyone who could use it, please call 631-27-2210 or drop by 407 Osborne Avenue (at Lincoln, opposite the Polish Town Civic Assn.).

New video in the LICC lending library:
“Bonhoeffer” the 90-minute documentary by Martin Doblmeier, in both VHS and DVD formats

Help avoiding violence:
HALT, Help Abusers Learn Together, provides group counseling for men who are verbally or physically aggressive in intimate partner relationships and similar groups for adolescent boys 13 to 17 years old. For further information, please call 631-360-2270 (English) or 631-360-1506 (Spanish).

Furniture:
Don McEwen has furniture to donate to a family in need: Kelly green club chairs, white wrought iron deck chairs, and an AM/FM/stereo in a cherrywood cabinet. The items need to be picked up in Hempstead by the first weekend of December, call 516-481-8524 or email quiltinsal@aol.com if you know someone who needs them.

Folding Tables:
The Presbyterian Church at Northport is changing folding tables and has about 12 OLD ones that may be useful to someone somewhere - and can probably deliver them. They warn that these 12' tables are heavy and cumbersome! Contact Jim Burke, rebelkey@optonline.net.

New Multi-Faith Education program: “What’s My Faith?”:
The Long Island Multi-Faith Forum has made nearly 120 presentations of its “Building Bridges” in local churches, synagogues, temples, Bahai and Unitarian Universalist fellowships, workplaces, and schools. The Forum would be glad to send such a panel, in which representatives of several faiths describe how they live their beliefs in their daily lives on Long Island, to your community. Recently, though, the Forum’s Education Committee has developed another program specifically for those who think they already know something about the religious diversity of our region. It is called “What’s My Faith?” and follows a game-show format in which audiences try to guess the religion of mystery guests. To learn more about either “Building Bridges” or “What’s My Faith,” call 631-665-7033 or email jbsuplee@aol.com.

Emergency Home Repairs for the Physically Disabled:
The Long Island Housing Partnership (to which the LICC belongs) and the Long Island Builders Institute have teamed up with volunteers from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and other groups to help with emergency repairs for those who are physically disabled. To suggest someone who needs this assistance, call Peter Elkowitz at the LIHP, 631-435-4710.

Small Electronic Organ:
The organist at First Presbyterian Church in Glen Cove, has a small electronic organ in her home she would like to sell. It is a 1995 Ahlborn-Galanti SL300 3-manual electronic organ in excellent condition. It could serve well as a home practice instrument or for a small church or for the chapel of a larger church. Contact Maureen Husing at 516-628-3930.

Parsonage for Rent:
First Presbyterian Church of East Moriches has a two-story Victorian in historic district of East Moriches - next to the church, across the street from a Methodist Church, short walk to town and excellent schools. Four bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths, formal foyer, living room, dining room, full kitchen, pantry, laundry room, full attic storage, front porch, back deck, circular driveway and one car garage. Available January 20, 2005 - $2,200/month. Call Phyllis Singler 281-2300 Ext. 103, or e-mail psingler@att.net.

Guest preachers:
  • Our Executive Director, the Rev. Tom Goodhue, is available some Sundays this winter for guest preaching. You can reach him at tomgoodhue@optonline.net or 516-565-0290, ext. 206.
  • Alric Kennedy also does some guest speaking and preaching; you can reach him at alrickennedy@optonline.net or 516-565-0290, ext. 294.
  • The Rev. Dick Ploth, a member of the LICC Board and the Presbytery of Long Island, is available for guest-preaching and supply-preaching. You can reach him at 631-734-2587 or lyndik@optonline.net.
  • Dr. Eugene Purvis, a Conference Evangelist for the AME Zion Church and a member of our Public Issues Committee, is available for guest preaching. He can be reached at 516-623-0716.
  • The Rev. Robert Terry, a semi-retired UCC clergyman, is available locally for guest-preaching, supply preaching, and interim pastorates. His wife Sue is a graduate of New Brunswick Seminary and a licensed preacher in the United Church of Christ. You can reach them at gterrys@aol.com or 631-751-1170.
  • Jesse Glick and Kathy Burton from Church World Service, our partners in disaster response, would be glad to preach or speak about the work of CWS. Call 888-297-2767 or email jglick@churchworldservice.org.
  • Tom Lyons, a member of Mt. Sinai Congregational Church (UCC) who is active in the Heifer Project, would be happy to speak or preach in local churches. He can be contacted a 631-928-4317 or lyonheifer@aol.com.
  • The Rev. Randall Broger, a member of the Presbytery of Long Island who trained in interim ministry at Princeton Seminary, is available for guest preaching, supply preaching, and interim pastorates. You can reach him at randallb1@usa.net or 631-589-2923.


JOB OPENINGS

  • Presbyterian part time Minister for small Nassau North Shore church - Please mail resume to Glenwood Presbyterian Church, 71 Grove Street, Glenwood Landing, NY 11547

  • Organist - Sunday mornings, Glenwood Presbyterian Church (Nassau North Shore) - e-mail resume to kamcdona@optonline.net or call Kevin 516-672-0290.

  • Chaplain - The Altenheim Community, a health care and retirement community in Indianapolis founded by the United Church of Christ, is seeking a chaplain. To apply, contact Randy Hornstein (rhornstein@uchinc.org, 317-788-4261). Further information is available at www.altenheimcommunity.org.


World AIDS Day events



BULLETIN INSERTS FOR REFLECTION ON RACISM

The LICC is observing a year of repentance and reflection on racism. We urge you to print in your Sunday bulletin these inserts:

(Publish the weekend of December 5)
EVERYDAY HEROES ... SOMETIMES

They were the heroes of 9/11, New York City firemen who risked and lost their lives to save others. Images of them entering the burning twin towers, as thousands fled, will be remembered for generations to come. They were everyday heroes. On 9/11, a person's nationality, race or religion mattered nothing. We were a blessed people, dwelling as one in the horror of that awful attack. Some years earlier, it was a different story. I had put my home up for sale in Deer Park. On a beautiful fall afternoon, a New York City fireman came to see the house. He was African American. I showed him the home, we talked for a while, and then he left. Soon after, one of my neighbors rang my doorbell. In a friendly but serious tone, he told me that he saw a black person looking at the house. "You’re a nice guy," he assured me. "I wouldn’t want to see happen to you what happened to that other house nearby, after they sold to blacks." "What was that?" I asked. “Someone burned the house down," he said. So much for everyday heroes.
--Richard Koubek

(Publish December 12)
Short but Poignant... Racial Profiling

A friend of mine, who is Hispanic, was mowing his lawn when a car pulled up, and the driver offered him work as a landscaper.

Tokenism at Its Best

In my misspent youth, I fell in with a couple of far left groups that were going to save humanity (preferably by overthrowing the oppressive system). In their eagerness to show the absence of prejudice, if a person of color came to more than one of the meetings they fell on him/her gleefully and appointed that person to a position of leadership.
--Richard Goodman

(Publish December 19)
"She Does Not Speak English”

Seventeen years ago, I was in my thirteenth year of employment as a laboratory technologist for a well-known medical lab on Long Island when I was denied a promotion under the pretense that "She does not speak English.”

As furious as I was, I kept my cool and decided to take action because I knew that on paper this would be one more rationalization that would perpetuate the charade of institutional racism against another person of color. At that time I had already been in the United States for seventeen years where I completed high school and two college degrees. For about seven years, my English proficiency was not a question or a handicap when I was training other English-speaking employees or attending conferences (in English) for work. It took me a year to bring this to the proper channels and to prove that I was truly qualified, and that my immigrant status was not going to be used as a reason to exclude me and continue such unfair practices.

--Maryse Emmanuel-Garcy

(Publish December 26)
YOU ARE MY BROTHER/SISTER

"Jesus said, Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 18:3) I can well imagine why Jesus wants us to be as children - innocent, without prejudice or guile. My 3 1/2 year old granddaughter taught me this lesson recently.

My friend’s grandson was visiting from PA and since he is an only child, he told my granddaughter he would be her brother and she his sister. Anna accepted this and two weeks after, her Mom's friend had a boy from the Fresh Air Fund visiting for the week. While at the pool, Anna hugged him and said, "Jamal, will you be my brother? I already have one brother and you can be another."

Children see no differences and really there are none. We are all God's children, trying to live the best we can. Often we're successful, other times we have to work harder to be who God calls us to be.

--Carol Cella

(Publish January 2)
Can I Have Your Medicaid Card?

About eight years ago, I took one of my daughters to a Catholic health clinic located in a mixed neighborhood on Long Island. When the intake nurse needed my health insurance information, she called on us. As I approached her, she looked at me and said: "Can I have your Medicaid card?" I paused for a moment, opened my wallet and handed her my card which I am sure was identical to her own Health Insurance card since we happened to be working for the same organization, the Diocese of Rockville Centre. She took the card and continued business as usual not even acknowledging her action. That afternoon I decided not to say anything to her. I knew I was dealing with the white supremacy culture in which the intake nurse (a white female) assumed that I had a Medicaid card because I am black. It was distressing that the intake nurse would assume that I had a Medicaid card because of the color of my skin.

I thank God for giving me the confidence to believe in myself and not in what other people label me. However, I still choose to speak up most of the time when I find myself in a similar situation because I can assure you that being silent is not the best remedy for this chronic disease.

--Maryse Emmanuel-Garcy


HELP REDUCE MEDICAL EXPENSES: RECYCLE MEDICAL EQUIPMENT

The LICC has long advocated universal medical coverage and has long tried to help those in need find the help they need. One simple step many congregations have taken to save people money and reduce waste is to set up a lending library or closet of reusable medical equipment and supplies. You may only need crutches, a cane, or a wheelchair for a short time while you recover from an injury, for example, so why buy one or let the one you already bought go unused? Here is information the LICC’s Public Issues Committee has gathered about local churches that lend medical equipment. They’d be glad to lend items out and glad to receive donations, but you might want to call first to see if they have the supplies you need—or have space for the hospital bed you would like to give. Do you have additions or corrections for this list? If so, please call Neka Wilson at 516-565-0290.

  • Rev. Laurie Cline
    St John Lutheran
    2150 Centre Ave Bellmore
    516-785-4331

  • Rev. Perry Kirschbalum
    Saint John's Lutheran Church
    1 Van Roo Avenue
    516-379-3858

  • Rev. Barbara Melzer
    Woodbury United Methodist Church
    577 Woobury Road
    516-672-7179

  • Rev. Thomas Smoot
    St Paul’s United Methodist
    288 Main ST. Northport
    631-261-0804

  • Rev. Betty Lines
    Bay Shore United Methodist Church
    107 E Main Street
    631-666-7194

  • Rev. Sean Murry
    The Community Church, UCC
    36 Church St Syosset
    516-921-2240

  • Christine Harvey
    St. Elizabeth Ann Seton
    800 Portion Rd. Lake Ronkonkoma
    631-737-4416

  • Ann Druckenmiller
    Our Lady of the Miraculous MedaI
    1434 Straight Path, Wyandanch
    631-643-7591

  • Rev. Thomas Phillip
    Community Presbyterian Church
    2101 William Place, Merrick
    516-378-7761

  • Loretta Stelter
    St. Patrick’s Church
    630 New York Ave. Huntington
    631-673-5378

  • Francine Jennings
    St. Dominic
    93 Anstice ST. Oyster Bay
    516-922-4488

  • Madeline Swarckof
    St. Vincent De Paul
    1346 Broadway Hewlett.
    516-569-0834

  • Sister Kathleen McCarthy
    St. Ignatius Loyola
    20 East Cherry St. Hickville
    516-935-8841

  • Rev. Jack K. King
    United Methodist Church
    160 Main Street. Southampton
    631-283-0951

  • John M Clark CSW
    St. Peter's Parish Social Ministry
    1327 Port Washington Blvd. Port Washington
    516-883-0365

  • Rev. Harold Lay
    The Parkway Community Church
    95 Stewart Ave, Hicksville
    516-938-1233

  • Fran Leek
    St Hugh of Lincoln Church
    21 E 9th St. Huntington Station
    631-271-8986

  • Marie Flabuly
    St. Joseph’s Church
    120 5th St Garden City
    516-747-7120

  • Sr. Mary Seton, CSW
    Our Lady of Mercy
    500 South Oyster Bay Road, Hicksville
    516-931-1306


AND A FINAL PLEA:

Contributions to the LICC are urgently needed to continue these under-funded programs:

  • Women at the Well support groups that keep women out of jail,
  • chaplaincy at the Nassau jail and juvenile detention center,
  • the Multi-Faith Forum, which promotes understanding between Christians and non-Christians,
  • and "to be used where needed most," the best of all designations.

If you can make a gift, please do!





The Long Island Council of Churches is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit. All gifts are deeply appreciated and are tax-deductible.

Tom Goodhue
Executive Director
Long Island Council of Churches
1644 Denton Green
Hempstead, NY 11550
voice: 516-565-0290, ext. 206
fax: 516-565-0291
email: licchemp@aol.com

Web: www.ncccusa.org/ecmin/licc

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