July 2007 Archives

The annual ConCentric conference and its associated meetings are coming up for the Continental UU Young Adult Network. With that in mind, here's the first of some posts on the subjects at hand.

When the young adults and their allies come together at ConCentric, there is covenant formed that binds us together as we do the spiritual work in our business meetings. Through the rest of the year, like any organisation the bylaws advise us as to how we should operate, and according to the bylaws, their amendment is the exclusive purview of the ConCentric business meeting.(Section 5.A.3.i)

Before General Assembly this year, I heard a disturbing rumour from one of the General Assembly Young Adult Caucus leaders. They told me that there were no plans to elect a YA Caucus Facilitator, as the SC was changing the makeup of the Conferences Planning Committee, and elevating the Deans of the three C*UUYAN conferences to full seats on the CPC, and getting rid of the intermediary Facilitator positions. This change to the committee structure isn't a bad idea in my opinion, but I do take issue with how the Steering Committee (who supposedly operates the elections at the C*UUYAN conferences) was going about this.

General Assembly is in June.
ConCentric is in August.
The SC is proposing an amendment to the bylaws that will change the makeup of the CPC (Section 7.A). There is at least one other proposal to change the same committee in different ways that is also being presented to the ConCentric body, which would retain the Facilitator positions. It's also not uncommon for the ConCentric body to make major revisions to resolutions and amendments before passing them.

So, knowing that it's possible the bylaws won't be amended to do away with the YA Caucus Facilitator position, or will pass a different one, why would the Steering Committee not hold an election that the bylaws require them to? Is this the SC members working in Right Relationship with the body of C*UUYAN?

I'd say not.

This all would have been very simple to do in a respectful and honest way. There was a ruling made at ConCentric 2005 in Boone, Iowa, that clarified that all newly elected C*UUYAN leaders take their offices at the end of ConCentric that CALENDAR year. Thus, a Facilitator elected by the GA Young Adult Caucus 2007 would take office after ConCentric 2007.
Similarly, C*UUYAN Bylaw amendments take effect that same ConCentric, unless specifically stated otherwise in their adoption.

The person running the elections during the GA Young Adult Caucus Business Meetings could have stated that pending the outcome of bylaw amendments, the Facilitator said Caucus elected may never take office, as there was a proposal to remove the conferences Facilitators from the CPC entirely. This didn't happen.

So, for members of C*UUYAN and members of Congregations who pay into the UUA which then gives grants for C*UUYAN to operate, how are we to trust what it is the C*UUYAN Steering Committee and Conferences Planning Committee do with the power we give them? These committees were elected in covenant to serve C*UUYAN, according to the bylaws and procedures we have put in place, and these committees have violated that trust, by not following those rules.

How can they gain it back?

In less than 24 hours, the new Harry Potter book will be being read in my household. Not by me of course, because Tessie reads a LOT faster than I do, so she's reading it first, but if I don't have it by my Monday shift at work, I'll be a little annoyed.

I have a prediction... it's not huge thing, but I think I can predict what will happen surrounding a couple people... or rather, one specific thing, and I'm going to make this prediction, and see how well I managed to do. I swear I've not read any of the early released information available anywhere. Not even a book review.

Remember the locket that no one at Grimauld Place could open? My bet is that said locket is the horcrux that was supposed to be on the island that Albus and Harry went to at the end of Half Blood Prince. This is nothing new, many people have made this connection already, as the letter to Voldemort was signed R.A.B, or Regulus Arcturus Black (how do I know the middle name of Sirius' brother is Arcturus? Look at the Black family tree in the film version of Order of the Phoenix, which is all canon information supplied to Director David Yates by Rowling herself).

The real prediction comes next: Harry is going to realise that he's had the locket the whole time, at Grimauld place, so he'll head off, relieved to have something to do, only to find that the locket is now missing. A bit of thinking then leads him to believe that Mundungus stole it, along with quite a lot of the other Black family goodies, during Harry's 6th year at Hogwarts. There may or may not then be a lot of Order action, trying to get to Mundungus in Azkaban prison to find out where the horcrux is, only to end up finding that he has no idea what they're going on about.

Then, Harry will realise that Kreacher the house elf probably took the locket and hid it away, along with a lot of other of his mistress LeStrange's precious things, to keep Mundungus from stealing them too, so Harry really did have the horcrux available to him the whole time.

Oh, and Kreacher will feel AWFUL for having helped the Potter boy.

New place to live, new jobs, and new ideas have made me realise I need to make a few changes. Nothing too major, just breaking things up a bit. The reasons will all be made more evident when I can actually talk about some things I'm not allowed to talk about yet. SSHH!