Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Support All Faiths

Support all faiths


I grew up in a religion where part of our religious education was to go visit other churches (and a synagogue) to be part of a service and talk to either the leader of the faith and/or kids our age about what their religion meant to them. We were encouraged to embrace other religions as part of our larger community and not fear or hate other faiths.

I grew up and still am Unitarian Universalist.

The same faith that was targeted in the Knoxville, Tennessee church shooting on Sunday, July 27th. Two parishioners are dead and others are still in the hospital.

According to the Knoxville News Sentinel web site, the gunman left a "manifesto" in his truck in which stated he "targeted the church, 'because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country.'" He went on to say that "he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them in to office."

I am a proud Unitarian Universalist and love the church where I am raising my family. I have never for a minute thought that this was an act of bravery, that there were fellow Americans who hated us so much that they would enter one of our churches - during a children's music performance - to kill us.

So now I ask you, all of you, regardless if you have a religion or are a non-believer, regardless if you are a liberal or a conservative, regardless if you live in the North, South, East or West, to consider writing a post about what living in a country that (is suppose) to support religious freedom means to you. Even if you don't practice a religion, or don't believe in a higher power, that right still applies to you. And put the above button up for a while. We all need to remember that our country was founded on the principle of religious freedom.

And that includes hearing children sing songs from "Annie" in a Unitarian Universalist church.

For more information:

Unitarian Universalists Association
Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church

Please consider sending them a card or note, maybe even from your congregation:

Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church
2931 Kingston Pike
Knoxville, Tennessee 37919

7 comments:

painted maypole said...

what a horrible, horrible, tragedy. liberals ruining the country, eh? when was the last time a liberal went into a place where conservatives were gathered and opened fire? ack.

I'll see what brews in my brain, if a post rises or not....

jodifur said...

That's terrible. I had not heard about that. When will we learn to just accept each other?

Flower Child said...

thanks for posting on this - I knew you would. unreal. I wrote something too. so unbelievably mad.

Jan said...

I was sorry to hear this. It shouldn't matter who we vote for and where we worship. The two should not be tied together. (((HUGS)))

Korie said...

I had heard about the shooting but I never heard what type of church it was or the shooter's reasoning (or lack of really). I'm so sorry. As someone raised Jewish I certanly understand the anger and feelings of injustice caused by the targetting of your religion by madmen and killers. I will definitely be thinking of a post to go with this button.

Goofball said...

that's scary to think that people can be so afraid by liberal open-minded people.

it's scary that such a thing can happen.

I will post this button for sure!

Kate said...

Wow, I didn't hear about that. That's terrible. What's wrong with people?