“God bless you,” he said sincerely, and added, “Pray for me. My name is Frank.”

I encountered Frank after finishing my workout at the YMCA. His beat up station wagon was next to mine in the parking lot. This man of Middle Eastern or Indian heritage looked no better off than his car, and his cigarette smoke wafting through the open windows of my own car made me less than amiable. I climbed into my car as Frank attempted unsuccessfully to start his. Begrudgingly, I asked him if he needed help, but hoped that the answer was no.

“My car won’t start,” he replied.

“I don’t have jumper cables, do you?”

“No, but that’s not the problem; something is wrong with the gas tank,” he confided. Frank confided in me about a few things, such as staying in the YMCA shelter with his family, struggling to meet the expense of even those meager accommodations, and the further complications presented by a car that would not work. There were more details to the conversation that escape me; I was too much on edge to pay attention closely. I offered to bring him somewhere, but he shook his head despondently. He seemed not to know what he really needed and that was good enough for me. Like Pontius Pilate, I washed my hands of the situation and started to leave. That is when he said:

“God bless you.”

Just hearing those words, divorced from intonation or facial expression, I would have thought Frank was being sarcastic about my obvious desire to leave, but he genuinely meant what he said. For some reason, my reluctant offer to help was an extraordinary gesture to him. One wonders what kind of gestures he normally receives.

This happened during the week of the Republican National Convention where the President cited a 5.4% unemployment rate as evidence that the economy was in better shape than it had been in decades. This statement came a week after the Census Bureau reported that the number of people in poverty, and uninsured, had risen yet another year. The seeming incongruity between these two statistics deserves closer scrutiny.

The population has been growing at a current rate of about 200,000 a month, and jobs must be added at a rate of 150,000 a month to keep pace with this growth. The amount of jobs added in August was 144,000, less than needed just to keep pace, yet the unemployment rate decreased by one-tenth of a percent. Consider also that over 900,000 jobs have been lost since the year 2000, while the population has increased by over 4 million, yet the current 5.4% unemployment rate is better than the average unemployment for the past three decades. These numbers do not add up because unemployment is self-reported. When prospects for employment are bleak people stop reporting that they are looking for jobs. If the current unemployment figure does not indicate the best availability of jobs in decades, as it most assuredly does not, then it indicates the bleakest job prospects in decades.

Given the intricacies of conflicting economic indicators, people in a democracy have a natural bias towards believing what their leaders tell them about economic health. This is especially true of people who already support the other policies of their leaders. Many fundamentalists will believe this Administration’s economic prognosis because of strong concern and support for their social agenda. Gays and lesbians may be less likely to believe the Administration’s economic prognosis but, like the fundamentalists, they have focused more on the social agenda.

Ironically, the opposing sides of the Administration’s social agenda, which includes the issue of same-sex marriage, are united in their concern for economic injustice. Fundamentalists are champions of mission work to help the poor; gays and lesbians sympathize with the plight of an outcast segment of society. The blue-collar and liberal segments of society unite in concern for economic injustice, yet the social agenda engrosses these broader cross-sections of society as well. This conflict suits the corporate world and the wealthy just fine. When the opposition has greater numbers, an effective strategy is to divide and conquer.

The impact that economic injustice has on a social agenda presents another irony. Fundamentalists are concerned about the increase of broken families in our society, but poverty will stress and break a family more surely than the hot button issues of the Administration’s social agenda. Gays and lesbians have been victimized, but a society made increasingly mean through the widening gap between rich and poor will continue to victimize marginalized segments with greater ferocity.

Sandwiched in time between the depressing economic news and the Republican National Convention was an informational meeting sponsored by the Litchfield North Association of the United Church of Christ, presenting both sides to a resolution supporting same-sex marriage. The vote among the UCC Connecticut Conference occurs on October 16. The autonomous, congregational structure of the UCC results in an eclectic membership. Gays, lesbians, and fundamentalists are amply represented, as are most other cross-segments of society. The same-sex issue promises to be as divisive for the eclectic membership of the UCC as it has been for our country, despite enlightened efforts at conflict management and resolution.

The poor is one cross-segment not amply represented in the UCC, indeed, they are underrepresented in virtually everything except bread lines. Yet the Congregational branch of the UCC has an admirable history of supporting the most downtrodden of society. Remember the Amistad. One hopes that this unity in support of the oppressed still exists. Unfortunately, the poor cannot speak for themselves, especially in affluent UCC churches, and those who might speak for them are debating social agendas. The UCC may not want to be a microcosm of the divide and conquer milieu that corporations and the wealthy have imposed on our society (via control of the media), but that is what we are becoming.

If you think the UCC must be vocal advocates for the poor in today’s society you should visit the UCC Connecticut Conference web site and research their resolutions that cover economic injustice since the year 2000. You will find there are none. There are a disappointingly small number of such resolutions before 2000, but this would be prior to the current Administration’s success at distracting the nation’s focus from economic injustice to a controversial social agenda. Addressing a controversial social agenda that has become the focus of society is not imbued with either extraordinary vision or courage. Tackling economic injustice though society ignores the issue is imbued with both. Religious organizations above all should be the lights that shine on issues of economic injustice during the darkest times of neglect. The UCC Connecticut Conference is not now such a light.

While you visit the UCC web site, read the Open and Affirming statements. As a manifestation of Christ’s love UCC members are encouraged to support certain types of causes, but the causes of the poor do not make the list. I realize the Open and Affirming statements were crafted specifically in response to the stigmatization of gays and lesbians; that is precisely the point. When it comes to being stigmatized, gays and lesbians have nothing over the poor. Just ask Frank.

Answer this important question for yourself. You have two couples move in on either side of you. One couple is the same sex, the other couple smells from a distance. Which one do you invite to your house for dinner first?

This is the paradox I present when people suggest that abstaining from the same-sex marriage resolution to focus on economic injustice would amount to “ducking the issue.” If your own personal demons would prevent you from ever inviting the same-sex couple to dinner, then perhaps this claim holds true. However, people in affluent areas are more reluctant to invite the couple that smells. This “out of sight” (or smell) preference for the impoverished explains why the distraction of a social agenda works so well. We need to ask ourselves what is the real issue we are ducking.

This is why I cried when I drove home from the YMCA. I have gone on mission trips to help the poor, both in this country and abroad. I am aware of the strategy to divide and conquer. I know the paradox of the two neighbors. I know, too, that had a fundamentalist or gay man been parked next to me with engine trouble I would have shown less reluctance to help. But, hey, at least Frank was appreciative of my reluctant gesture.

“God bless you,” he said, implying that a reluctant gesture to help is better than no gesture at all. What does that mean for our society? Or for the UCC?

The UCC needs to combat economic injustice in defiance of those who would divide and conquer. Here is one suggestion. The UCC Churches should refuse to vote on any UCC resolution, same-sex or otherwise, until sufficient resolutions, plural, have been proposed to address economic injustice. This does not call for window dressing resolutions, such as supporting the concept of health care for all. What we need are resolutions that call for a sequence of actions. Furthermore, I propose that UCC Churches do not divide over social agendas until after they have unified over their own courses of action to address economic injustice.

Ecclesiastes informs us that for everything there is a time. Regardless of the good intentions and practices of conflict management, the same-sex resolution will divide. It already has. For those who thrive on economic injustice, this division will be tantamount to a conquest. We should not forever “duck the issue” of same-sex marriage merely to avoid division, but right now is not the time to allow conquest by a greater societal ill. Of course, should UCC Churches fail to address economic injustice, they might as well divide now over a social agenda, as there is less purpose to being unified. We have the Amistad to remind us of our past resolve to put the most oppressed first on our agenda, precisely when society would prefer to ignore their plight. Do we have any like cause for our future?

Kirk Sinclair
Norfolk, Connecticut