Bev Brazier is a United Church Minister presently serving in Whitehorse in the Yukon. She served in Maritime Conference for many years.
I’m doing some research, and inviting you to consider taking part. YOU are ministry personnel or lay people active in congregations in 1988.
The background is this: it’s now been 25 years since 1988 and the conversation the United Church had at that time about ordaining self-declared homosexual people. (Can you believe it’s been that long???). As a result, I’ve been in conversation with people who were involved in their congregations then. It struck me that there is a wealth of experience and stories from that time, and it seems to me that they ought to be told, collected, and passed on.
Is this something you’d consider participating in?
It would involve, minimally, me sending out a series of questions. These are listed below. If you choose to, I’d ask you to take some time, and respond to each question as long or short as you like, (but I’m hoping for more than one or two sentences) and send your responses back to me by July 1.
Or you may wish to gather one or two colleagues to share memories and stories based on the questions I’ve asked, and sending me the gist of your conversations, any stories that should have a wider audience
In responding, please let me know if you’d like to go further with this by doing a longer, face to face or Skype with me.
I’m doing this completely on my own – it’s not for a course, or anything else. Once I collect the material though, it’s important for you to know that I’ll write it up somehow, sanitized to remove names and details that might identify people. I’ll share it somehow, seeking publication or some other way to get the stories out for a wider audience.
Take a look at the questions, let me know
- Will you do it?
- Any questions you’d add or change
- Will you share the request with others you know?
Thanks so much, Bev Brazier
PLEASE ANSWER THE FOLLOWING, TAKING AS MUCH TIME AND SPACE AS YOU NEED
I WOULD LIKE THEM BY JULY 1.
- Where were you in 1988 and what part did you have in your church? (choir member, elder, member of the congregation…)
- How long had you been there?
- Say a bit about your general experience of church at that time.
- Please describe at least two stories from that time that you would call positive or hopeful
- Please describe at least two of your worst memories from that time
- How would you say your own faith has been affected by 1988?
- How would you say we as a denomination have been affected by 1988?
