It has been nearly a year since my appointment to serve Sunnyside Church and University Park Church was made.  This week I updated the congregations on our progress.  You can support the work of progressive Christianity in Portland with a gift to support our ministries.

Dear Members and Friends of Sunnyside Church and University Park Church,

We’re just a month shy of the one-year anniversary of the appointment that brought a United Church of Christ minister to serve Sunnyside Church and University Park Church, two Reconciling Congregations in the United Methodist Church.

Members of Sunnyside Church, University Park Church & Ainsworth Church read #OccupyTheBible.

At the Annual Conference of the Oregon-Idaho Conference of the United Methodist Church – held this June in Boise – our two congregations will be presented for a special award for the ways we have lived out this new partnership.

Together we’ve held joint services for Christmas Eve, Martin Luther King, Jr. Sunday, Ash Wednesday, and Easter. These services have drawn together far more people into our churches than either church could have ever done alone. Media attention has followed. At the same time, along with the people of Ainsworth United Church of Christ, we’ve held successful and well-attended adult education programs this past fall and spring using the books Remedial Christianity and #OccupyTheBible. We’ve used social media this past year aggressively to get out our message. We'll worship together again soon at University Park Church on June 16th at 9:30am, and then those who are able and interested will gather downtown with the Community of Welcoming Congregations to march in the annual Pride Parade. There will be no service that morning at Sunnyside. More information will follow.  

Now we are launching a new “partnership planning process” to more intentionally discover ways our two congregations can be in mission together for the benefit of the community as we preach a progressive Christian message of hope. We're also kicking off a Thursday morning Bible study for all interested members and friends for the summer months. 

During this past year we’ve also gathered for special social occasions – a summer BBQ and Christmas drop-in – not to mention potlucks at both churches. Pastoral care has been offered. Memorials have been held. We’ve had a baptism and welcomed new members at Sunnyside. University Park Church has done food drives for those suffering hunger and Sunnyside Church has teamed up with Bread for the World to ask Congress and the President to do more to fight hunger.

Members of both congregations became active this year in the effort to reduce gun violence and to promote marriage equality. 

In the midst of all this, we’ve wrestled with a challenge about how best to assist people experiencing homelessness around University Park Church (and fought off fines imposed by the city for allowing people to sleep on our campus). At Sunnyside Church, we dealt with staffing and building issues. The leadership of the congregation made the difficult decision not to renew to building user agreement for the Sunnyside Swap Shop, a much loved program, and the future of The Roost, the after-school program housed at Sunnyside, is in question after Camp Fire decided they could no longer be the sponsor (they’ll still be operating the hugely successful summer program at Sunnyside). All of this impacts us in many ways, including financially. We still have a lot of work to do. 

This note just touches on the many ways our two congregations have been in partnership and mission. As we prepare to move into a second year of ministry together there will be hard choices to confront about what it means to be church in our time. Hard doesn’t need to equate with bad, however. We need to be thinking in terms of what legacy we what these two churches to leave – what legacy we want to leave – for the next generation…and about resurrection, about how we bring new life to our work of proclaiming the Gospel. 

Sunnyside Church and University Park Church are blessed with tremendous lay leaders who care deeply for the church and for the common good of our community. Few churches are as fortunate. All of you are in my prayers. I invite your prayers as well as we move into a second year of ministry together.

Your pastor,

Rev. Chuck Currie 

 

University Park Church worships each Sunday at 9:30 am and Sunnyside Church worships at 11am.  All are welcome.

Dear Portlanders, 

There’s no question about it:  I love Portland.  It’s been true since moving here as a boy.  My life, in fact, has been dedicated to making our community a better place.  Portland’s rejection this week of fluoridation is far from cause for divorce but it does feed into the lover’s quarrel that is part of my relationship with this special place.

The fact is that fluoridation would have helped protect kids by increasing dental health.  The Clean Water Campaign, fueled by Tea Party money and some odd doctors (like the one who asserts HIV doesn’t cause AIDS), scared the city into believing that fluoride causes cancer and was bad for the environment.  In my 26 years of advocacy and ministry in Portland, I’ve rarely – if ever – seen a campaign distort and lie as often.

In the wake of Portland’s lopsided decision to reject fluoride people across the country are asking if we reject science in the City of Roses – or more plainly: is Portland just anti-science?

The fear based campaign waged by Clean Water Portland was upsetting enough but the often heard statement by those who identify as progressives that putting fluoride in the water violated their personal choice to take fluoride was perhaps more upsetting.  Portland has never been about “me!” but about “us!”  Not so this week.  The common good lost out to a growing libertarianism that in this case put the needs of children last when they should have gone first.  That children should come first is a beadrock principle of my faith.  

Still, this is hardly the first time I’ve been disappointed in the city I love.  We don’t do enough to fight poverty – and North Portland and East Portland are too often ignored, like these parts of our city just don’t count.  Inequity flourishes here and if you are a person of color your chances to succeed diminish greatly.  We launch plans to end homelessness every few years only to watch homelessness grow. 

We say “Keep Portland Weird” because this is a unique community that has produced a special culture a little bit different than much of America and we can laugh at ourselves when watching Portlandia because there are times we’re absurd in funny, yet harmless, ways. 

But at the pot-fueled Clean Water Portland victory party, where reporters say the air was thick with marijuana from smoking activists protesting adding fluoride to the water supply because fluoride was harmful (the irony is worth noting), the city crossed a line from absurd to sad.

Say what you will about Clean Water Portland: Them folks got some pungent medical herb. #fluoride

— Aaron Mesh (@AaronMesh) May 22, 2013

In the end, we still have a dental crisis.  Portland children will still suffer.  Nothing changed this week – our dental crisis didn’t get worse but it could have gotten better but fears and lies and, yes, personal self-interest won over the common good. 

Still, Portland is better than this.  When confronted with difficult questions over taxes, schools, health care, LGBTQ equality and the environment we normally make the moral choice, even if it costs us more in taxes and upsets family, friends and neighbors.  We normally put the common good first when given the opportunity. 

I don’t fault the 60% of Portlanders who voted against fluoride.  Most people don’t pay close attention to these elections and if I heard the city wanted to add chemicals to the water that caused cancer the natural reaction, it seems, would be to vote no.  Those behind Clean Water Portland, however, - the activists and their financial supporterss, including the Tea Party and their allies – knew better and did great damage to Portland by waging a divisive campaign that hurt Portland’s children.  Don’t be surprised to see this coalition reform to try and to reshape Portland in their conservative / libertarian image that is fueled by a distrust for government, other institutions (including institutions of higher learning) and, of course, science. 

That coalition in no ways represents 60% of Portland.  One lost election doesn’t mean progressive Portland is lost.  What it does show is that our work to improve Portland just got more difficult.  Outside Tea Party groups are willing to foot the bill to take on what our city has generally held most dear. 

Fluoride supporters were wrong not to engage the public in an open and transparent process from the start on this issue, instead of trying to move this through the Portland City Council quickly (a move I endorsed).  The backlash is similar to when the Multnomah County passed an ordinance to allow gay marriage without a public process (a move I also endorsed), only to see voters outlaw gay marriage statewide in response.  Government works best when it is transparent.  We ought to learn this lesson.  Back room politics don’t work in Portland. 

Progressives also need to find a way to fight lies in ways that don’t just win campaigns but also strengthen the community.  As a minister, you might think this would be a skill I would have.  But plenty of times I reacted to the lies told in this campaign with more anger than light and that is just as damaging.  Lies shouldn’t be tolerated.  They should be called out.  But we can all find better ways to engage in the public square. 

For me, I love this city too much to give up on it.  I want my kids and the children in my churches to have access to the best public schools and to public health programs that help them thrive.  After all these years, after all these battles, my deep belief is that 90%+ of Portlanders want the same even if we cannot always agree on the ways to get there.  Good people can come to different conclusions on difficult issues.  Until Portland becomes the city it ought to be, I’ll continue my lover’s quarrel and will happily work with people of integrity – people who value truth – even when they disagree with my views.  After all, I’ve been proven wrong before and changed my views when confronted with good arguments based on reason and fact.  Democracy works that way when it is truthful and fair. 

Your neighbor,

Rev. Chuck Currie            

My latest in The Huffington Post:

"Star Trek Into Darkness" does what Star Trek has always done best: holds up a mirror to the United States and asks, "Are we the moral people we want to be?"

Star Trek Demands Path out of the Darkness

Photo credit: http://www.startrekmovie.com 

Portland has rarely witnessed a campaign as needlessly divisive as the fight over Measure 26-151, the effort to fluoridate the city’s water supply for the common good. I strongly support this effort and as ballots are out, and as many remain undecided, I want to take this one last chance to explain why.

Portland faces a dental health crisis that impacts our city’s children – and disproportionally impacts communities of color. Just compare Portland – which doesn’t fluoridate the water – and Seattle – which does. In the Portland Metro area, 21% of children suffer from untreated dental decay – a 40% increase over the Seattle area. The CDC calls fluoridation one of the greatest public health achievements of the last century. 

Opponents have questioned whether or not we really face a dental crisis. Some have suggested children can access free dental care at school or community clinics. The reality is quite different. Such care is scare and hard to access. In the social service agencies and churches that I’ve worked in for the past 26 years, I’ve seen plenty of people suffer from lack of adequate dental care. Fluoride won’t solve every problem – we do need a comprehensive solution to all our health care needs – but fluoridation will make a profound difference that is affordable now. 

We also hear a lot about how fluoride is a chemical – a risk we just cannot afford – but fluoride is not, as one person wrote me, a by-product of nuclear waste. We already put chemicals in our water to destroy harmful bacteria. This is no different. Opponents have told me that fluoride will cause neurological damage, kill cats and dogs, and destroy plants. But every other American city that fluoridates is still standing. One of the primary financial backers of the anti-fluoride campaign is a doctor who has said HIV does not cause AIDS and tells parents not to vaccinate their children. Every major medical and dental group in the United States and Oregon has endorsed fluoridation because they know it is safe and beneficial. 

Another funder of the anti-fluoride campaign is an out-of-state Tea Party group. The Tea Party believes strongly in personal choice (except regarding women's health care). We ought to be most concerned with the common good. That should be true on everything from gun control to fluoride. When you make a choice that leaves children in jeopardy what kind of choice is that? What are we saying to our city’s kids?

Portlanders should trust the medical community – along with equity groups – that have advanced fluoridation as a common sense public health measure that will help children and the elderly. Or we can give into fear. I think the world of Portland. We are a good and decent people, and good people can come to different conclusions on difficult issues.

So I hope you vote YES on 26-151, but however you vote I hope you consider the facts and don’t give into the fear, false science and push polls out there.

Rev. Chuck Currie

My latest on The Huffington Post:

"Judy Bright -- a certified nurse midwife, advanced nurse practitioner, public health administrator and my mother -- died before she could take advantage of Obamacare, but as an advocate for public health and someone with a pre-existing condition, she knew the difference it would make for millions of Americans."

Why Judy Bright Supported Obamacare

News that the IRS targeted conservative organizations for special review as part of the non-profit certification process is deeply concerning.  It reminds me of the Bush-era IRS investigation of the United Church of Christ.  The Obama Administration needs to quickly fix the problem but much of this is the messy result of the Citizens United court decision and thus the fix will require an overhaul of corrupt campaign finance laws.  The Washington Post notes:

Campaign reform groups have been pressing the IRS for several years to conduct greater oversight of nonprofits formed in the wake of the Citizens United case, given that many have become heavily involved in elections.

“But this isn’t the type of enforcement we want,” said Paul Ryan, a senior counsel at the Campaign Legal Center. “We want nonpartisan, non-biased enforcement.”

Our government should work better than this.  No one should be targed simply for their political views.  At the same time, our election system should not be the rigged, corrupt system put in place by Citizens United.