Right, Left and Centre: The Politics of Some Canadians: Chapter 41. Part Four.

    A Happy Couple in A Sometimes Conflicted Church. Part Four.


        As the Unitarian church progressed into the 1990's, the surrounding neighbourhood changed its character. Many Asian Canadians, who were Chinese in origin, bought up many of the nearby houses. Some of these new and old Canadians worshipped at Buddhist temples. Others flocked to the evangelical  and Anglican churches. Most of these churches preached an unyielding conservatism.
       Filipino newcomers meanwhile ended up in Catholic churches that had little time for women needing abortions or same sex couples. "We're just not wanted in this church," one gay man whose partner was HIV positive said about one Catholic church he used to go to. The Unitarian church welcomed many gay and lesbian people and contrasted sharply with other more conservative places of worship.
     The Unitarian church was at times also a haven for people with personal problems. "People come here who have problems," said Merva Cottle, a histologist or tissue expert, who taught at UBC's Faculty of Medicine. "Sometimes they solutions to their problems here and sometimes they don't. If they don't ,they often leave."
     A number of disturbed men showed up at the church from time to time and then left. One man who arrived in the 1980's, used to look obsessively at well dressed women who had dark or brown hair. He walked past one woman's house quite a few times. Then  he wrote a letter of apology to the woman. He then wrote a memoir of his time in the church and then left.
      " There's too much information in this work," a church member named Virginia said about the memoir. The memoir vanished down the memory hole. Yet Virginia soon left the church too. Another man showed up at the church with money problems. He was paid money by the church to officiate at some services. Yet then he went out into the larger world and clamed even more money from some other people. He also persuaded a church member who'd inherited money to buy him a car.
        This man vanished from the church also after someone disagreed with what he was doing.
       Some ministers ran into problems at the church and had to leave. Sydney Morris was a young Midwestern American minister who came to the church in the 1990's. She was forced out of her job after pressure from irate members. Another minister came but was also forced to leave. "Where's a Canadian minister?" one congregant asked. "They're all Americans coming up here." Another American minister showed up in the 1990's. Andy Backus was a tall American who had lived for some time in upstate New York. He put his Ph.D. after his name and this riled up some church members. The Vancouver Unitarians had many Ph.D's in their midst and most of these people didn't advertise their degrees. At last in 2002 the church got a permanent minister again, namely Steven Epperson, a bearded former Mormon from Salt Lake City, Utah.