The Saga

September 2, 2018, 2am in the morning - 

In any ventures, large or small, there are stories that can be told, of battles fought and dragons slain, it can all be very epic.  Even with charitable undertakings like feeding the poor.  One can easily imagine a saga told of how money was raised, supply problems solved, regulatory obstacles swept aside, and the happy results of disadvantaged people being fed, and their pleasure at that simple act of Christian charity.

Such a saga could well be told.  It could be told about a food pantry I started.  But it will not be told.  Not that saga.  Not anything happy.  Oh, people got fed.  That part is happy.  The rest was not.  Overshadowing any story that could have been told, is the story of how it was all almost destroyed, not by liberals, not by anti-Christians, no, not even by Satan.

It's the story of how I started smoking again after seven years.  How I relapsed and took a drink after nearly a decade of sobriety.  Oh, don't get me wrong, addicts must own their addiction, no one can "make" me drink.  I get that.  But if dealing with the alcoholism of myself and others for about a decade has taught me anything, it's that obviously some factors in life can make maintaining sobriety easier...

...or harder.  It is a terrible thing for an alcoholic.  One must deal with a disability that few understand.  Where folks like me start in a pit, and must climb twenty rungs just to get up to ground level.  Then hear from those who started at ground level and got a scant three rungs up talk down to you about "Why don't you try?  Why don't you make something of your life?  Why can't you be like me?"

You want to tell those only a few rungs above you, "Hey, I climbed twenty rungs just to be within earshot of you!  And if I were 'like you' I'd still be in that pit, only three rungs up!"

But worse are those who started near the top of the ladder, by birth or blessings, and when you climb twenty rungs out of your pit of addiction, you see them twenty rungs above you on life's real ladder.  And you see them, and want to be them, and you dig deep within yourself and climb that ladder.  You pass those folk only three rungs up, and you go another sixteen rungs beyond.  Now you are near those high up folks.

Are they happy to see you?  Some are.  Those who are confident that they deserved to be that high in life.  But others are not.  They view you as an upstart, a threat.  If an alkie can get near to their height, then how great was their height?  Instead of reaching a hand down to lift you up, they take a foot off their rung so as to kick you back down.

What's an alkie to do?  Well, hanging out with good and decent people is the path I had chose, years back.  Rather than just go to AA meetings, where everyone was on as low a rung as I was, I went to church.  Where many are higher up.  I had thus people to look up to, to draw inspiration from.  People who never drank, never smoked, and cared enough about goodness to attend church each week.  Who wanted to do good for goodness sake, and who wanted to aid their fellow man.

Or at least, that was the theory behind my church going.  Yes, yes, and my love of the Lord.  I mean that.  In fact, I've come to realize in my faith journey that I mean that in a far more sincere way then many I had looked up to.  This story is about a food pantry, and my trials and tribulations in it, and it's important that you know my other motivation.

I needed the guidance of those who were true Christians.  I thought they were to be found in church.  And yes, some are there.  But not so many as you'd think.  Certainly not so many as I had thought.

Certainly none in leadership.  Or so as to not overstate it, let me say that very few are in leadership.

So who then tried to destroy my food pantry?  And "drove me to drink", if you wish to be melodramatic about it?  Well, you'll know him.  His name is made up, as is the church name, but if you're a church going man or woman, you'll recognize him all the same.  He's in your church as I type.  He's in everyone's church.  Need me to narrow it down more?  Check your own church leadership - there he'll be.

Let's start in the middle, go back a bit, then catch up, then conclude the matter.  Sagas are to be epic and rolling, after all.  I'm writing this a few months after it was over, as I needed time to fully assess and grasp what all had happened.  There's a pack of smokes on my desk, and a half pint of brandy.

Thursday, May 31, 2018, seven minutes past midnight -

My phone goes off, and I sit straight up, startled out of sleep, but already automatically reaching for my phone.  My wife is even faster awake, suffering as she does from nervous tension, PTSD, depression and a variety of other ailments.

I tell her it will be okay, as I fumble with my phone.  But she knows it will not be okay.  We run two sober living homes, we live in one, and the other is next door.  Everything we own, everything we've earned, everything we have, all went into buying two condemned homes, fixing them up and using them to aid others wrestling with addiction.

For me, this is a way of following the twelve steps, where when we've made our own personal recovery, we try to help others.  For her, this is her showing her love of me, as she knows my heart.  And she also knows that me running these places is the only decent work I can have, as given the idiocies of my past active alcoholism, my minor - but frequent - run ins with the law make me ineligible for most any paying job.

I once got turned down for a Walmart job - ahh, then you know you've hit bottom.  That mistakes have been made.

She also understands that this is my way of trying to be a "real person".  Not the usual drones who only take and destroy, as active addicts and alcoholics do.  But a person who can help and aid and give to those who have nothing, and help them climb up out of the hole and have an easier time of it than I did.

And also to have the regard of those who Cyndi Lauper called "the fortunate ones", those who have real careers and produce and raise good families and are important in the community.  For reasons of wanting to be able to self-identify as more than just another barely recovered alkie, working the usual minimal wage, minimal life jobs that our society reserves for such, but to be able to think of myself as a member of the Chamber of Commerce, a pillar of the church, a person to be sought out for advice.

Prideful?  No.  Cowardly.  I wanted to see myself as good and able so that I didn't slip back and become hurtful and destructive and worthless.

If I'm well regarded, then I wouldn't want to lose that regard, and thus I was aided in not picking back up the bottle.  Likewise, and even more so, if others are dependent on me for aid, as are those we help, then I had yet another and even better reason to not pick up that bottle.

So a ton of reasons to be woke up at midnight.

Because sober living homes aren't easy to run.  Taking care of half a dozen alcoholics and addicts each day is not for the weak.  Hence my wife's fear of this midnight interruption.  We're full service, we're not just providing a bed and utilities and internet and laundry and food.  We give rides, aid in resumes and interviews, help get them IDs, settle disputes, advocate for them in court, give unofficial legal advice, listen sympathetically, counsel when we can, and more.

The settling disputes can be risky.  I've been beaten before.  Or had to hold an ex-guest for the police when I caught him crawling through our garden heading to our back door, he on crack and wearing only dirty shorts and nothing else.  He thought I wasn't home.  He knew my wife was.

And another time I got a knife out of a guest's hand.  And another time I had to deal with an ex-guest who camped in the woods behind our backyard with the stated intention of waiting till we slept to come and kill us.  Another time a drunken crack addict crashed my church to denounce me to the congregation as a fraud.  I had to get a protective order against him, after he had done that, and showed up several times at our door threatening to shoot us.

We have a friend who also runs halfway homes.  He is rich enough not to live there.  He lost a whole house - because he's not living right next door to keep the peace.  It sits empty now, some fire damage, all the windows broke, appliances sold out from under him, wires pulled out, copper pipes gone.  And he's in court forever, fifty grand and counting in legal fees, defending against the City of Springdale that does not desire such homes to exist.  We're glad he can afford it.

We can't.  We can't afford another place to live in even if we wanted to.  And even if we could, we still couldn't afford to.  Our non-profit prohibits salaries, wages or stipends.  It's our non-profit, we started it, and we put that in the rules.  We live as those we serve live, no more or less.  We are committed to that.

My wife was sure there was some fight going on next door.  And that a guest was texting for aid, not wanting to call and thus be overheard and known as a snitch.  I got the phone button pushed and - a text from Heather Dunner?  We've no guest named - oh, wait, the daughter of Ted Dunner?

Elder Ted Dunner of the Springdale First Advent Church.  Heather was his wayward daughter, a mini-skirt wearing anorexic pursuing some nursing degree on Daddy's dime.  She enjoyed making infrequent appearances at church to flaunt how little regard she had for our off-brand faith, secure in the knowledge that no one would complain - out loud - about the daughter of the church's self-described "largest donor".

"It's not the sober living home, it's Ted again.", I told my wife, not by way of assurance, but by way of letting her know that it was worse than a fight next door.  She shuddered and started to cry.  "Just leave that church!  I hate him!  I hate all of them!  Why won't they leave us alone?"  She had been baptized in that very church less than a year ago.  The woman harassing us was the granddaughter of the man who had baptized her.  And me, a few months earlier than that.

"Shhhh, give me a sec, honey." I said, reading the text.  It was a long screed.  She was complaining about a how a facebook group, Advent Missionaries International, had a post up in which her father was called out for his spamming and flaming of that group.  An admin had banned him, and she thought this was my fault, rather than the fault of her father, who made a hobby of such un-Christ-like flames.

She managed to also mention my alcoholism, how I was utterly failing in the principles of AA and how this was "her" church.  Well, it's her dad's, anyway, I thought.  I told my wife, "It'll be okay.  Ted's probably using his daughter's phone as we already blocked his number."

I lit a cigarette, which emphasized to her how false my words were, how it was anything but okay.  She knew that when recovered alkies were stressed, were pushed to wanting that first drink, they would often leap back to smoking as a last ditch effort not to pick up the bottle.  As a therapist friend of mine once told me, "If you drink, you'll also then smoke, but if you just jump to smoking, you might avoid the drinking."

So far that had helped.

We had already had to block Ted.  On facebook, and by phone.  He'd flamed and spammed my timeline, he'd flamed and spammed the religious groups we were in, he'd flamed and spammed my business page, and made vague little cowardly threats of how he didn't see a very happy future for me.  His son had, too.  Or maybe Ted was using his son's account when he was blocked.  Ted was a wealthy business owner in his fifties, but by his harassing screeches and stalky behavior, you'd think he was a 15 year old girl dumped by her first love.

So I had blocked him, his son (who enjoyed wearing a gun to church) and his wife.  All who would let him use their phones and profiles.  I had forgot the daughter, or we'd not be dealing with this midnight harassment now.  Try and picture what it would mean if a grown man messaged you at midnight with his daughter's phone.  Or, if he would wish to say he did not, what it would mean for him to have a daughter, twenty something, living on her own, working towards a higher degree - who then would choose to take the time to harass a married couple she did not know, just because she heard Daddy was upset with them.

Eerie either way.  I took a long drag on that cigarette.

Having been threatened plenty from relapsed guests we had to kick out, my wife and I had been more scared to be threatened by this small town millionaire who had plenty of resources to throw around anywhere he wanted.  We knew he was angry.  And we knew he was vicious.  We were well aware of the minister he'd drove out of the church a few years back and how he ran the church like his own personal fiefdom.

He ruled the church board by virtue of he being on it, his wife being on it, his business partner being on it, that partner's wife being on it, his mother-in-law being on it, his father-in-law being on it...you get the idea.  And did I mention he was the largest donor?  The Good Lord - and all who attended there - sure knew it.  Ted lost few opportunities to mention that.

I reviewed Heather's chief complaint.  Sure enough, a world-wide religious group had been flamed and spammed by Ted, and one of the administrators had deleted his personal attack upon me, blocked him and posted an explanation as to why.  As an admin of that group myself, I had the power to ask that admin to remove the explanation as to why.  You know, as we would not wish to do anything that might cast the faith into a poor light.

A rather noble sounding reasoning that is always used to silence a member's complaints about leadership, but never to rein in those in leadership who's actions warrant such complaints.

I texted Heather back, telling her truthfully that I'd already asked for that post to come down, but that now I would be requesting that it stay up two more days.  And that I was blocking her now.  I may not have been very polite in my expression of that, but unlike Ted, I at least was not threatening or harassing anyone.

As I then blocked her, I got no further message from her.  But I doubt if she had been planning to wish me a Merry Christmas, so that was okay.  Whoops, she had a second cell phone, and sent the same message again.  I blocked that number, too.  I lit another cigarette.

I soothed my wife for awhile.  I reminded her of all the people we were feeding as a result of our little non-profit having solicited and received the help of this local church.  You see, you can't be a food pantry unless you have a non-residential place for the food storage, and we only own two homes, no offices or warehouses.

July 18, 2017 - 

That was the date last year of the first $200 cashier's check we gave to the Springdale First Advent Church.  How proud we were.  The cashier's check was from our non-profit charity, it was the first time we'd had sufficient revenue to be able to do something like this.

About a year before the midnight message, we'd asked that church to assist our local charity.  We needed a storage closet in there turned into a mini-pantry, and they agreed.  We also agreed to do all the labor, cover the delivery costs ($150 per month) and kick in half of the monthly food purchase expenses, which came to $200 per month.  One month after we proposed it, they agreed.  July then was the first time we'd be expected to give that money, and give it we did.

And for the months to follow, for a whole year, we'd dutifully scrimped and saved and ate Top Ramen, all to kick in that $200 each month, to match the $200 the church kicked in.  It was 20% of our total revenue.  And by doing so, we were able to purchase and deliver food for 22 sober living homes, halfway homes and battered women's shelters each month.  Not many, perhaps.  About 80 to 100 people monthly.  And a few random families, as any who knew of us could call for a bag of groceries.

Oh, we had had fun doing this!  Even the preparation had been fun!  I had visited each of the food pantries that the large churches ran.  They all knew of the charitable work we did with our sober living homes and were happy to hear we were branching out to feed as well as shelter those in need.

We took pictures, and asked questions, and wrote down the answers, and typed it up in a report, all to have something to show the church board, so they'd know we were serious and not just two losers who's reach exceeded their grasp.  We wanted the church board to know and understand us as serious people, so they would take us seriously and be partners with us in this venture.

I set up an appointment with the Central Foodbank, the great warehouse where all the donated food from grocery stores and local, state and Federal agencies poured in, there to be distributed to any church or non-profit food pantry that could qualify.  They do not sell the food, not quite, but they assign a cost to the food that helps pay their overhead.  It works out to 19 cents per pound of food for meat, other things slightly lesser costs, bread and produce for free.

I went to their orientation, I spent a whole day in a six hour class to take the test that would let me get my State certification as a food handler.  I still volunteered at other food pantries to get a feel for how they worked.  I'd weigh the bags the other pantries gave out, I'd take out each item and lay it on a table and photo it, my wife and I would review those photos and weight, to determine how much our bags should weigh, and what they should have in them.

So much to do and learn!  What was the best food pantry inventory program?  Should we buy and install such a program, as some churches did, or have a web-based one, as other churches chose?  What would our hours be?  What day or days?  Who would know we were there, how would they know, who would we reach?

My wife and I had desired this for years, and so we thoroughly enjoyed this preparation.  By the time I was done, our report to the church board was as comprehensive as any church had ever received.  We could create a world-class food pantry, and at less than half the usual cost!  Our charity would have expanded as we'd always dreamed, and the church we had joined would benefit, too!

A win-win!  Win-win-win, when you count the poor who'd be fed!

How had it gone bad?

Late April 2018 - 

I guess I first saw it coming back in April of 2018.  The board meeting with no quorum, unless a few members of Ted's family being there counted, where they went ahead and agreed to put forth a list of "new" board members so that there could be a vote of approval from the congregation.

You see - or perhaps you don't - small town churches have to give lip service to democracy, but don't want some random influx of new members or unpopular old members to hijack "their" church.  So the board had previously created a "nominating committee" made up of some of themselves, and of course Ted's wife, and those had got together to pray to God so as to learn His will as to who should lead - at least, that's the theory.

In reality, the committee each nominated each other, then nominated their buddies, brothers, business partners, in-laws and such.

Having this list of names for new board members chose entirely by the current board members, the non-quorum board then - against their own rules - decided to have it put to an approval vote at the next Sabbath service.  Oh, some might say, "But we called some other board members and got the votes by phone!", but such then would be a "private" not "public" meeting, and forbade by their rules except under specific circumstances that did not here apply.

This "confirmation vote" should have been held for a church Business Meeting, which would have involved notifying all the members two weeks in advance.  But instead they wanted it done with no notice, the next Sabbath, shortly before the new minister was due to arrive, (denying him any input) and when only 25% of the membership would be there.  That being the average percent of actual attendees to total members in any church in the Midwest.  And the vote would only be on "Do you approve of the whole list?" with any dumb enough to say "No" having to stand up and be known as an un-Christ-like trouble maker.

And be known to Ted.  And we were learning what that meant - to be "known to Ted".

For "fairness", there'd be a second "confirmation" vote the next Sabbath service after that.  Which meant that in the first meeting they could say - and did say - that "This doesn't need discussion, it's only the first vote" and by the second meeting, they could say - and did say - "That this was already prayed over, so no discussion is needed".

Kim Jong-un should take notes.  And probably has.

That board meeting in April had bothered me, but I was only at that board meeting to give my report on the state of the food pantry, this still being a project that our charity ran, with the church simply in the role of "assisting".  But it always bothers me when a place violates it's own rules.  And concerns me.  I am, myself, sinner that I am, full well aware of the "good reasons" for breaking your own rules.  Thus I am full well aware of how self-serving and disingenuous most of those "good reasons" are.

You see, our food pantry had come a long way by then, through many trials and tribulations.  I chuckle to myself to remember the first month, where we had to hunt down people to give the food to!  We sat there that first day, we'd agreed to be open one day a week, for two hours, the minimum required by the Central Foodbank.  I did not want us to bite off more than we could chew, and while we could always expand the hours if we found we needed to, cutting hours would be sad.

No one showed up, our church was well off the beaten path, and our only advertisement was that we were on the list of the Central Foodbank website, and I'd put the information on the church website and our own charity's website.  And on each facebook page.

But it was okay that none showed up.  I had anticipated that, and we knew what we really wanted to do.  Deliver food.  No other food pantry in town did that, I wanted ours to.  So we did.  Being in the sober living home profession, I knew quite a few of such homes.  I and the church member volunteers bagged up food, and we took the bags and delivered them to a few of such houses.

I had bags left over.  Those I gave out to those who I found standing in line at other food pantries.  But we grew fast.  By the end of 2017, we were aiding a dozen group homes.  I tirelessly talked to every person I met at AA and at the other sober living homes, to learn where others were.  Sober living homes are quite private, most people have no idea how many there are, there is no central list.

But eventually I had a pretty complete list.  Of all manner of group homes that needed food aid.  As most there have no car to drive to any other church's food pantry.  My plan had been that since we could not be the largest food pantry in town, we could at least fill a previously unfilled niche.  That since none of the major food pantries delivered, we could pick up the slack by aiding those who had never been aided before.

The Central Foodbank was ecstatic at this idea, and very happy that we were willing to go to such trouble as to track down, find these places and deliver to such each week.  Later, our local church leadership would complain about this, saying as Elder Dunner suggested to them, that I was only doing this as I was an alkie and wanted to help my own.

Which in a way was true.  I am an alkie, and I did wish to help others in my position.  But the way he said it sounded like it was dirty.

We stopped having trouble placing all the bags of groceries.  Early in 2018 we reached over 20 group homes of various types, and could deliver all the bags to them.  And if there were any left over, I personally knew enough active and recovered addicts and alkies to always have someone to drop off to on the way home.  And we were getting calls by then, so during the week I could deliver more food bags to various single mothers, laid off men, distressed families, etc.

Our food pantry accepted volunteers from the church, and they could participate in any facet of the operation that they cared to.  Only one couple consistently did so.  Past the first weeks last year, when a few others stopped by to see what we were doing, that couple was the only that kept showing up.  The rest of the church members were happy that the pantry existed, but seemed content to just know it existed.

May 4, 2018 - 

Shortly after that non-quorum board meeting, I got the call from the head of the nominating committee, to let me know what I'd been nominated for.  First, Deacon.  A meaningless nomination, I already was one.  Second, the sound system guy - it's crap work no one wants, but sure, I'd filled in a few times, I was up for that.  Third, "Assistant Community Outreach Coordinator".

Wait...what?

The Community Outreach Coordinator post was a board post, and one that had needed filling.  I can't say I was surprised not to get that post, but I was sad a bit.  I mean, given that there were probably few - if any - in that church that gave a "double tithe" and just as few - none - that ran the largest outreach that church had, I had felt a minor hope that such service would be recognized with a board position.  I mean, there were 19 board positions in a church that had about 60 people show up weekly, just by the odds, I'd have been pretty likely to get one.

But I also knew I was not popular with the board.  Oh, on the surface they sang my praises, I was doing such a great job growing that pantry, and so many more donations were coming in from the congregation for that pantry, that they'd be silly to out and out express their dislike.  I knew though.  I had made comments over that past year about my concerns about the church budget.  And more than a few absolutely hated that I was aiding addicts and alcoholics.  And yes, there was also animosity as I was doing so much, and that they then looked bad in comparison.

I remembered earlier that year, when the new minister had visited and attended a board meeting, how he was surprised that I, the still relatively "new" member, was leading the prison ministry, the internet ministry, the food ministry, and that we ran sober living homes in the name of the Advent faith.  Since then, I'd had to give up the Prison ministry.

Visiting ten or so different prisoners each month was not a problem, but that three of them were already members and wanted to take communion, and three more were not members, but wanted to be baptized into our faith, was a problem.  You see, only Elders can give communion, and only Elders can baptize people into the church.  And for month after month, from 2017 to 2018, over and over, I'd ask for one of the half dozen or more Elders laying about the church enjoying their titles - most on that board - to drive the 28 miles south to that prison and do what literally was their job.

You know, like Christ commanded them to.

Could they just make me an Elder and be done with it?  Ha, ha.  A member of the board - who resigned soon after - did suggest that.  Elder Ted Dunner's father-in-law lied and said that it wasn't possible for them to do.  I wasn't sad that they didn't make me one - but I was sad that it was such an obvious lie.  Those on the board that night who heard that lie, looked down, embarrassed, when they heard it.

As none would do it, and as they wouldn't let me do it, I knew it was over.  I could no longer come up with any excuses to those I ministered to down there, so I resigned and wrote each inmate to let them know that while I would continue to try and get an Elder to do the job of an Elder, that I myself could not give any of them the aid they so sincerely desired.

To this day, none of them have been visited by any Elder.

Now if you noticed, on those three things I was nominated for, "net ministry" was not one.  As it happened, the man who was on the phone with me giving me all this bad news was Elder Bob Davids.  One of the many Elders who had no time to visit those in prison but did now have time to take over the net ministry.  Well, fair enough, that was specifically a church ministry, but it hurt a bit.

You see, they'd not had a net ministry till I volunteered to do it, and I'd got the old website tidied up, got the church facebook page up, running and active, and got a lot of interest with my news and announcements, daily scripture posts, pictures from various church activities.  Now that it was up and running, Elder Bob figured he could wave the baton on that.  And being on the nominating committee, got to vote for himself - after Divine Guidance, of course - to do just that.

Given all that, not getting a board spot was not exactly heart attack inducing.  I was starting to see that not only did they really not like "those" people (alcoholics) but that they were starting to realize that I was one of "those" people.  I guess it was a testament to my ten years of recovery and hard work that they'd let my type get as far as I had.

But it still hurt.  I knew I'd earned a board position.  I knew that if God had been involved, He'd have known my heart.  I hated the part where they pretended that all names picked were due to "God inspiring them to select those".  Especially as they were all the ones selected.  The self-serving hypocrisy of it seemed breathtakingly obvious.

I consoled myself that the food pantry wasn't under control of the board, so not being appointed on the board was not a large deal.  Or was it?  I asked who was the Community Outreach Coordinator that I was to "assist" and was told it was Deanna Dunner.

Now why would Elder Ted Dunner's wife, who already had titles and a board position, get this vacant board position as well?  And why would she need an "assistant"?  I had my suspicions.  In churches not run by a clique of do-nothing Pharisees, but just by regular Pharisees, the one who held that title and position would normally run that church's food pantry.  Which a more appropriately managed and Spirit-filled church would already have up and running without needing a reformed alcoholic to come in and give them one.

I called Deanna Dunner, Ted's wife, to ask her what the position meant.  "It means I'm your boss!", she said, theoretically in good humor, and in the bright cheery tone that any church going Midwesterner knows means "I'm screwing you, but if we put a happy face on it, then it's okay!"  

She went on to elaborate, in the same cheery tone, and in the fashion of a person trying to get it all out of the way so this could be moved past, that Monique Phillips was also an "assistant Community Outreach Coordinator" so that now all the food programs could be "coordinated" more smoothly.  And in or out of church, "coordinated" in our culture has never meant anything but "controlled".

Monique and her husband were the ones who make up sack lunches for the poor every other Sabbath or so, and pass them out.  Yes, theirs was a "food program", but it was apples and oranges.  It had nothing to do with our charity's food pantry program.

Yet this well let me see how this was going down.  Our carefully built up pantry, from nothing to now serving 100 people a month, would now be Deanna Dunner's project.  Instead of this being a labor of love that my wife and I had sacrificed $2,400 of our $10,017 in the past year's revenue, it would be yet another of half a dozen projects that Ted's wife could pretend to run, while others did the work.

Ted being that self-described "largest donor".  Are you bored yet hearing that?  The good Lord knows we were.  

I talked to Monique.  She knew what the deal was, having been a member far longer than I.  And it wasn't lost on her that two assistants meant that we were each "Co-assistant Junior Advisors to the Baton Waver".  I wondered whether my hard work over the past year had got me the honor of being 1st or 2nd Junior Co-Assistant.  I had a mental image of those poor folks at McDonalds who are gave meaninglessly insulting titles instead of a living wage.  

Like the third assistant co-shift supervisor.  Where your "authority" is sufficient to do as you're told.  And to clean, any time you might imagine you had time to lean.  And if you don't get that joke, then congratulations on your incredibly blessed life.

Monique and I each decided that we'd decline such an exalted made up position in the church.  Me, for having no intention of placing our work under the authority of a woman who had not had anything to do with the food pantry the whole time it had been up and running.  Monique because she correctly assessed that she did not need managerial oversight in the making of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

My wife and I reviewed the minutes of the board meeting that had helped form our food pantry.  Yes, it was in the name of our charity.  Yes, the church was simply agreeing to provide specifically listed out assistance for that, in exchange for us then using the food program to promote the Advent message.  Which we had dutifully done with tracts from the church in every bag of groceries gave out.

We reviewed the finances.  Total costs of the program exceeded $1,000 per month.  The church provided $200 of that for food purchases and the $50 a month in pest control, though some would argue that they should have had pest control anyway.  We provided another $200 for food purchases, we provided the $150 in deliveries, we did the bulk of the labor and picked up $15 a month in costs for the online inventory site.

By any standard, we were providing well over half the total costs in cash, labor and kind for a program that we ran simply to feed the poor, and the church aided in to get their own name out.  For besides the tracts placed in each grocery bag, we had agreed to give the food in the name of the church.  Why not?  Jesus said to "Feed my sheep", He didn't say, "Make sure you've your own personal name on it."

And I had always knocked on each door announcing, "We're with the Springdale First Advent Church, with a food delivery!".  Why would that bother me?  I was a new-ish member, still excited to be getting the word out!  Given how excited I was to do that, it would take an enormous effort to kill my joy in that.

Well, their leadership - having no effort to show in doing the Lord's work - had plenty of effort to kill my joy in advocating for their church.

What were we to do?

May 13, 2018, 12:30pm after church - 

I spoke with Elder Ted Dunner, who had purported to be my friend this whole time.  True, since it was his wife doing this, and since we knew she'd hardly be at odds with her husband, this let my wife and I realize already that he was not a friend, but still, it was worth a try.

We remembered a year ago, when the food pantry had first been approved, that it was specifically not under the control of that Community Outreach Coordinator.  And Elder Dunner had wanted it that way, as he did not like the "colored" woman (as he referred to her) who held that board position and title.  He had told me, over and over, to not worry, that our charity's food pantry was not under her control, so I did not have to worry about her.  He advised me strongly to watch out for her, though, as she'd try to grab control, but that he had my back.

How comforting that had been for a couple new to the church, not knowing who was who or what was what.  He had pointed out a person he said was bad - though in reality, she was not "bad" but just someone he didn't like - and told us he'd defend us against her if she tried to take our pantry.

Now his wife had appointed herself to that slot.  Or to go with their narrative, she had been on a nominating board with her friends, and when they all prayed to God He told them to appoint each other back on to the board for yet another term of humble service.

What were we to do?

Most reading this would say, "Do nothing.  Who cares if some spoiled wife of a rich braggart wants to wave the baton and pretend she's doing the Lord's work, so long as the Lord's work is done?"

Under that plan, I'd have cheerfully stayed 2nd Junior Co-Assistant to her and continued the good work.  But I knew better.  Some can be smart enough to leave well enough alone, and know when they've won, but she wouldn't be one of them.  She'd have "Ideas".  "Suggestions".  "Just" some advice here, and "Only" some thought there.  It's like when a dog pees on a fence post - they don't really have to use the bathroom, they just need the other dogs to know what is theirs.

I'd dealt with such suggestions from others in the church at the beginning.  Those who wanted all the food to be vegan.  Or those who wanted to interview each recipient to make sure they "really" needed it.  And those who hated that I gave out food to recovered alcoholics and addicts - or "those" people as they referred to them.  And sadly, but almost inevitably, that I "might" be giving food to "homosexuals". 

I remember the first time I was asked, "Do you give food to unrepentant homosexuals?", and I had honestly answered, "I don't know."  I received a skeptical look, and so I followed up with, "I don't know, because I don't ask.  That's not actually allowed to be asked."

I shared with Ted my concerns.  First, that I was sad not to have been appointed to a board position, particularly the one that would deal with food matters.  He - the man who had pretended to be my friend for a year - didn't give any explanation as to why I would not have been.  He certainly listed no sins of mine that would have barred me, or any sins of mine at all.  He named no factors, legitimate or otherwise, that would bar me.  Later, when it went south, he'd try and come up with some, but for that moment, no reasons gave.

Instead he said in his good old boy drawl, "Well, I wasn't on the nominating committee, so didn't have any say, but I can tell you that years back when I was, if I heard someone wanted a title, I'd figure that was a good reason for not giving it to them.  You're supposed to want to serve for the love of it, not a title."

He was correct, he had not been on the nominating committee, the nominating committee picked by his father-in-law.  Just his wife and his friends were on it.  But no, not him.  The hypocrisy was still breathtaking.

I ignored that and continued with my second concern.  That he'd warned me not to have anyone take charge of the food pantry, and here it was now being spoke of as a church program to be ran by a member of the board.  My discrete way of saying, "Your wife".

He said, "Sounds like what I've been afraid of.  That you don't care to serve the Lord, but only care for titles."

My wife and I had not been so dumb as to not have already realized that Elder Dunner was not really our friend.  He and his wife had in the last year ignored our standing invitation to come have dinner with us at our home, which admittedly was smaller than one of his garages.  And he never invited us to his home, which was larger than both our houses combined.

Perhaps he was just a busy man, as my wife and I had for a long time tried to rationalize it.  And he was so wealthy, and we so poor, we told ourselves it was presumptuous of us to even think that could happen.  Wasn't it enough, we had said to each other, that when he and the other high ups went to a restaurant after Vespers each week that we were invited, too?

This sure confirmed that he was no friend.  Because if he had thought of me as any kind of friend, he'd have come up with some soothing line of crap, but apparently we were not worth even that.  He was acting as if I was an enemy to be vanquished.  Because his words had been a shot across the bow as to what I could expect him to say if I pursued this.

I was only worth that slap down, that warning shot.  I was not a real person.  I was just an upstart loser alkie, who had dared to aspire too high, and he was now letting me have it straight.  Mine was to shut up and perform, theirs was to sit in their high places and oversee all.  Because they were real people, and I was one of "those" people.

Could I have sought out the Head Elder next?  The Head Elder was 80 something, of rapidly declining health, and the father-in-law of Elder Ted Dunner.  He was generally regarded as an outstanding Christian, but I remembered my own interactions with him.

I had been tasked awhile back with salvaging and selling off anything from the soon to be torn down old church building to get a bit of money back for the church itself.  One fine Sabbath, a day that our church really, really seriously believes one is not to work on, this Head Elder drove up with 500 grocery bags in his vehicle for me to unload and take to the food pantry in the church.  I did.

Yes, I was aware that it was obviously the Sabbath, but I figured, one, he's up for it, so how bad can it be, and two, this fell under the "Lord's work" exception.  You know, like when Jesus told the Pharisees that it could be okay heal on the Sabbath.

Two hours later, in the middle of the service, I got a call from a scrapper who had been interested in buying some stuff from the old building.  He was only briefly down here in Springdale today, so it was now or never.  I said he could haul some stuff from that building, but I'd prefer he not pay me till tomorrow.  You know, so I'd not be sinning in buying or selling on the Sabbath.

He came by, I left the service to go next door and let him in.  He started loading up the stuff.  And because he was a kind hearted man, he gave me a post-dated check for the agreed amount.  Letter of the Law fulfilled, and the spirit - with the Head Elder's work of that morning as an example - fulfilled, too.

Halfway through his loading, the Head Elder came over with a former Pastor as "back up", to chew me out in front of the two non-members loading their trailer.  For me violating the Sabbath.  What a stellar impression that made on them.  Oh, yeah, stuff like that really gets non-members interested in joining our church.  Uh huh.

I very quietly asked the Head Elder and his companion if they'd come to another room with me.  Instead of mentioning the Head Elder's earlier work of hauling stuff for a church activity - which was exactly what these two non-members were doing - I just explained that it was the only time they could pick it up, that it was not their fault for what I had told them they could do, and that I'd never let that happen again.

He scolded me the more, and walked off.  His former Pastor buddy left, too.  The non-members were very embarrassed for me.  One of them asked for the check back, I resignedly gave it to him, and then he wrote out a larger check, and still post-dated it, and said he was sorry he had caused me trouble.  I assured him it was more than okay, and that he should please not judge our faith on any one man.  He said I was more tolerant than he was.

Ever after, everyone knew, from the gossip of the supposedly kind Christian, the Head Elder himself, that I was a Sabbath breaker.  The whole board gossiped and murmured about it.  At any time I could have defended myself with the old anti-drug commercial line, the one where the dad asks his son who taught him to smoke pot.  And the kid cries out in frustration , "From you, okay?!  I learned it from watching you!!"

But I never told on him.  Well, not till now, as I write this.

So no, I did not then go and seek counsel from this 80 something "Patriarch" who really was nothing but Elder Ted Dunner's mouthpiece.

I went home after church, from after hearing Elder Ted Dunner's horrid reply to me.  My work of ten years, that should have culminated with a position commensurate with my service, was never to be, and more importantly, I'd probably be losing the food pantry.

I stopped at the grocery store on the way home, and bought a small bottle of brandy.  No, he didn't make me do it, my alcoholism is my own.  But yeah, his betrayal and the dashing of so many dreams, held for so long, did not leave me the strength to not buy it.  I guess I was just a weak-ass alkie after all.

What were we to do?

May 13, 2018, 7:20pm, at home, me having opened that brandy and drank from it, but no, I was not drunk or impaired - 

It's a myth that alkies drink to get drunk.  Some do, but it's not an invariable rule.  Many, including myself, drink to alleviate pain and distress and heartache.  No, it's not very good for that.  As they say in AA, "There's no problem so big that a drink won't make it worse."  Still, the measured sips from the brandy helped a bit.  It always does - at first.

The people I had looked up to and respected and admired the most, had now shown that they only had contempt for me.  That I had exceeded my proper place, that I was not worthy of working with them as an equal, that I should have been grateful that they let me even serve at all.

My wife and I discussed this betrayal, and how our "church friends" seemed to be anything but.  We realized that what we had been thinking was kindnesses from them at various times had probably been nothing more than that thing where a church tries to be friendly to folks, just to get them to join, participate and...contribute.  That need not be wrong, not necessarily, if they are then going to still be real friends, who just also happen to want you in the church.

But when instead the motive is just entirely for one to join and contribute, then it is very bad.  We'd seen others join, get friendship from some in leadership, then when that friendship went no where, leave.  We had chalked that up to maybe the potential members hearts weren't in it.  We now realized that we'd had more attention from those who pretended to be our friends, as we'd done more than those others.

That if some of the others who had attempted to come to our church had contributed and done as much as we, they'd probably have kept receiving enough attention that they could kid themselves - like we had - that they had "church friends".  We reviewed our "church friends".  It shocked us, and saddened us, to realize that we had never been to any of their homes, and only once had anyone come to ours.

We had previously tried to excuse this by telling ourselves that we were so poor, that no one wanted to be in such a poor house.  But we had still always been hurt by that.  We had tried to invite people over for just a cook out, figuring that this way they'd not have to enter our 450 square foot home, which we knew was smaller than some of their Master Bedrooms - er, Master Suites.  But that cook out would be between two sober living homes, and "those" people would be about.

So only that one couple one time took us up on that.  They probably warned the others.

We re-assessed such sporadic donations that some had gave to our charity.  There hadn't been many donations.  Which is really odd, when you think about it.  Two people had gave, Elder Dunner himself and his junior business partner.  $280 in Ted's case, $350 from his junior partner, a man we already knew to be more of a Christian than Ted.  Back when before we'd both been baptized.  Each time we were told to use it to help our charity.  We now supposed that they weren't giving to help the charity, but giving to help us.

Which...what can one say?  Was it just to make us feel welcome in the church?  Or did they think that we were just so poor that we desperately needed it?  Was it so we'd think well of them?  So that others would see them give it, as there were always some around when they quietly - but obviously - pressed it into my palm?

Whatever good or bad reason, it could not have been due to love of the work we were doing, or why such opposition to us feeding "those" people?  Why this sudden attempt to take what we had worked so hard for?  Were I to give a man $100 one day, and kick him the next, would he then be compelled to still call me friend?  I doubted it.  He might have no clue why I could do such a thing, but he'd still know that kicks hurt, and were wrong, and that they could never mean "friendship".

Where we had thought that we were somehow equals with those who also served the Lord, now we knew that we'd been viewed as "those" people, in need of a boost.  Well, it had helped, and we did with it what we were supposed to.  So there's that.  But I'd have preferred it to be gave differently, or not at all.  We were both embarrassed and ashamed that instead of they donating to a charity they found of value, they had apparently thought that they were giving us alms.

My wife and I then discussed the main matter, and knew that the church was in financial trouble, and had been for years under this "leadership".  And would continue to be in trouble, as the new board was nearly identical in membership to the old.  In fact, to say it was a "new board" would be like replacing a window or two in a church building and calling it a "new church".

What financial troubles?  Nothing very glamorous.  I'd love to say that it was due to they squandering donations on mink coats and limos, what an exciting saga this would be then!  But no, it wasn't any specific malice or avarice, just plain old incompetence, of the kind you always find when board posts are gave out not on merit, and certainly not by "Divine Guidance", but by good old fashioned nepotism.

And when that board, supposedly subordinate to the church membership, routinely used tricks of parliamentary procedure to quash any concerns of the members, then you can expect more financial troubles.  Why not?  Where there's no hope of any real accountability, why then expect people to be accountable?

I had not previously endeared myself to the board with my own knowledge of parliamentary procedure by which I'd caused a stir or two at previous Business Meetings.  Nothing large.  Little more than using such procedures to insure each member got to speak.  And they got around those attempts of mine, too.

The first time by yelling me down, and saying that I was bringing Satan and dissension to the church.  This right after I'd mentioned about how when you sought bids to present to the congregation for approval, you were supposed to present more than just one.  Especially for a job that involved so many tens of thousands of dollars.

The second time I made a motion to let everyone have a brief say at the next business meeting before we voted on tearing down the old church building.  That was hardly a motion they could out and out deny.  So they let that pass.  Then they didn't let the membership have that brief say at the next business meeting.  Elder Ted Dunner's father-in-law - the Sabbath breaker - held the gavel for each of those meetings.

Donations and tithes were down, reflective of a years long drop in membership, due in no small part to the type of crap that was being pulled on us now having been pulled on plenty of others in the past.  In fact, a new couple, transferring in from Montana, were as wealthy as the Dunners.  But they, seeing this food pantry saga, were not committing to joining Springdale First yet, they were pondering joining another Advent church across town.

And join that one they eventually did.  Another two members lost.  But at least their vast tithe would not then distract the new minister from who the largest tither was, huh?

Monthly bills for our church were around $5,000, monthly donations around $3,500.  The leadership insisted on the church operating as if they still had as many tithe-paying members as they'd had twenty years ago.  The eighty something Head Elder, up for working on the Sabbath if it suited his own purposes, was blathering on about re-opening the school, a thing that with hard work, an incredible new membership influx, and an entirely new "Non-Dunner" board, might just happen in fifteen years of unceasing effort.

In other words, it was never going to happen.

The Dunners, aware that the new minister might wonder about who was who and what was what, were speaking loudly about buying a building downtown to not only move the food pantry to, but to be a general charity clearing house.  Elder Ted Dunner spoke of getting "investors" and having "partnerships" and using tax exempt dodges involving the church.  I tried to advise him that there were a great number of difficulties to being truly non-profit, while also privately owned - as in that could not be.  I learned in discussion with him that he had no business plan, and past that, no real understanding of the differences involved in running a non-profit.

Fair enough.  I don't know about for-profit businesses.  Well, I do, but whatever.  I at least knew when I don't know something, he always figured that whatever it was, he was the expert.

My wife and I doubted that he planned to follow through on this pie in the sky idea.  An idea that I'd literally gave him months ago, though I'd spoke of a far more manageable and doable project.  We watched him trot this out to the new minister like he and his family were all about active and meaningful outreaches - even as he was busy killing the only active and real outreach that they had.

Sadly, the Head Elder and his wife - Ted's in-laws - and the Argroves (Ted's junior business partner and his wife) were roped into this fantasy project.  They should have known better.  Especially when he proposed that he could get investors to give him the money, buy it in his own name, lease it to the church for a dollar a year, claim then that this meant it was a church property and thus tax free, and then if it ever went south, give everyone their money back after he sold a six figure building that would only be in his name.  Yeah, what could go wrong, huh?

I sent them all an email, listing out the difficulties to overcome, the problems with tax exemptions, the seriousness of "fiduciary responsibilities", and finally advising that a church that had only three people to volunteer at the existing food pantry (me being one of the three) would be unlikely to have the dozen volunteers he spoke of actually show up.  Which made the whole thing quite risky.  To say the least.  I also pointed out that the building they proposed to buy was right across the street from a gas station that sold stems and brillo strips.  You know, for smoking crack.

That email was never answered.

My wife and I also discussed the supposed "reserve fund" that was regularly dipped into to make up the difference in their many budgetary shortfalls, though it was never really a reserve fund, but funds that had been gave for building improvements.  The building to be improved could have been the actual church building that had been abandoned due to lack of repairs and upkeep.  But instead, we met in the Advent school that had been closed for lack of funds, and let the old church crumble until it was in such a state of disrepair as to need to be torn down.

Thus has the Midwest been turned into a graveyard of empty church buildings waiting to be torn down.  Each dies not with a bang of corruption, but with the whimper of an unaccountable leadership insisting that they're not there to be "business-like", but to be "Christ-like".

Well, they're half right.  They sure aren't business-like.

We've gone from over 100 active members, to maybe 60 who might show up most weeks, and from a church and a school to the church torn down and we meeting in the closed school that will never re-open.  And still, instead of making substantive changes, they just dip, over and over, into the ever dwindling reserve funds.

The $200 church "match" for one of the months had been $25 short.  A paltry amount, no doubt, and we had been successful enough in our budgeting of the food purchases that there was over $1,500 in the food pantry account that the church oversaw.  But it was a sign of a lack of fiduciary care, and while the worldwide Advent church might have lawyers and accountants to make that not an issue, our little charity did not.  Having no lawyers, we must follow the law.  Not that we wouldn't anyway.

Oh, but let's pause for a moment, to explain that shortage.  As I said earlier, the congregation loved the food pantry program, as why wouldn't it?  Most of the "outreach" that leadership had jammed through for decades was stupid vanity stuff like sending postcards to everyone in a given zip code asking them to attend.  Cost - thousands of dollars.  Benefit - jack and crap, with Jack having left town.  Or a purchased video series to then advertise to the public.  Stuff about End Times.  They'd buy these DVDs that the producers could crank out for a dime a dozen.  Cost to the church - thousands of dollars per DVD series.  Benefit - Jack is still out of town.  And I'm thinking that Crap caught a ride with him.

So the congregation loved an actual outreach doing actual things.  You know - feeding His sheep, like Jesus commanded.  And they loved how I brought guests of our sober living homes to church, though apparently this distressed leadership.  So the members donated.  More than adequately.

The church was committed to putting $200 a month into the account.  Only $200.  For a food pantry program that by the time this all came out was a mid level program.  We weren't up with the big boys, giving out a 1,000 bags a month, but nor were we with most of the other pantries, giving out 25 bags a month.  100 bags a month was respectable, all the more for how little we were spending on it.  I wondered if the board knew the evenings my wife and I spent, planning how to get the most bang for the buck.  We spent less than planned on food almost every month we ran it.  Our reach was enormous for the money spent.  Literally tons of foods were being acquired and distributed in the name of that ungrateful church.

Or to be accurate, that ungrateful church leadership.

Anyway, any money donated to a church, no matter how ear-marked, is for the church to spend as it sees fit.  So if $300 was donated one month, the church only needed to put in $200 into the food pantry account.  And if $175 was donated another month, then instead of drawing from previous over-donations, it could be said that it was "short".  And since my laboriously derived economies let us have a surplus in that account, there was no need to make up that shortfall.  And if they wanted to look on the up and up, they could pretend that it was covered by the "reserve funds", not any previous donation earmarked for the food pantry.

Thus $100 over one month meant $100 extra for the church to use as they saw fit.  And a $25 shortage didn't take away from the $100 extra spending money, that came out of the "reserve funds".

Clever, huh?  Leaving more to fritter away on their own inane projects and bungled building improvements, anyway.  And the board that worried about whether I was accountable, sure never let me see those books, not so much as the monthly bank statement for where the funds for the food pantry were kept.  Ours was to be completely transparent - which was fine with my wife and I.  There's was to administer their own affairs without us peeking - that we were not so fine with.

You see, our small charity was accountable for the funds donated to us.  We were not to let such be frittered away like that church routinely did.  Had we continued to have say over our own food pantry, we might let that slide, as we'd be overseeing our own donor's dollars to some extent.  But if we were to have no say, while watching these routine fiscal irregularities take place, then that would be a problem.

What were we to do?

May 29, 2018, 9:20am

Well, I posted on my own facebook timeline, prior to Elder Ted Dunner's meltdown, and no doubt the cause of that meltdown, some of my feelings on the matter.  It wasn't all that.  I restricted myself to the unfairness of their process of board selection.  Nothing in it was false.  Probably why it made him so angry.

I did that only after much more prayer and discussion with my wife.  And after more drinking.  Daily drinking now.  And still smoking.  Still not drinking so as to get drunk, or even "intoxicated", as most people understand the word.  Compared to my previous active days, it was little.  But of course, a "little" is still too much.  My point only is that I was "sober" in the sense of never getting drunk on the drinks I did take.  I'd not want you to think the booze made me write that little article.  No, I was writing from the heart.

Those wrote out feelings of mine on my timeline in no way named the church or the faith.  It was viewable only by my facebook friends, of which Elder Ted Dunner was still, at the time, one.  Which then started his online and public harassment of me, he viewing it as a crime to in any way name any unpleasant truth, but no crime to have done those unpleasant things, or to harass my wife and I everywhere we turned.

That is how we got to Heather Dunner's midnight messages, two days later on the 31st.  Well, the 31st by seven minutes.

Which was why we stopped going to the weekly services, deciding it would be best to wait till the next board meeting, as I sure did not want to run into him or his angry armed son, or his midnight messaging daughter.  Small town midwestern churches.  Yeah, they're apparently as crazy as the liberal-biased movies portray.  And I am sorrier for that then you reading this can know.

I've tried to be inclusive in this story of my year and a half at this church.  But I could not possibly explain all the bizarre things that had took place, and so when such had little or no relation to the food pantry, I didn't write it here in this saga.  Or you'd hear of Mick and Lori, who were so angry to hear that I wasn't a Trump supporter that they withheld a food donation that they'd promised, and that I'd counted on, and then called my wife and asked if she wanted to live with them.  You know, so she'd not have to live with someone who'd dare to think differently than they.  And who was an alcoholic.

They skipped church for two months, hoping that it would force the church to kick me out.  That failed.

What fretted my wife the most though, was their invite for her to come live with them.  "Why would they think I didn't know you were an alcoholic?  And who are they to us?  Why are they doing this?"

Or the time a board member offered my wife a position, she said she probably couldn't do it, and then - ahh, nevermind.  My wife cried for days over the crap pulled on her by that board member, but it's not relevant to the food pantry.  Nor how my wife started with going to church each week and helped watch the kids, but now would not come for any reason.

I joined the church because I had had great experiences with some Advent followers in my youth, and because their initial love-bombing of my wife and I was so incredible.  So incredible that while I knew what love-bombing was, I did not think for an instant that it was that.  I stayed on later because they had not interfered with the food pantry as yet.  Good people they did and do have there - but I could see why so few joined, and why still fewer stayed.

Early June, 2018 - 

At that next board meeting I told them their choices were that our charity continued to run it's own charitable outreach, or they could run it all themselves without our aid, or they could cancel it entirely.

Deanna Dunner instantly wanted to ask if this was because I'd not been gave a board position.  Right on cue, I thought.  Elder Ted Dunner and his whole family had been trumpeting that in gossip and murmuring for weeks, that this whole little spat was over my "inability to serve" and my "insistence on title and glory".

My wife and I had heard that crap, over and over.  It had been flamed and spammed on our business page, in church groups, on timelines, by phone, by angry raised voices, by sly whisperings, by midnight messages.  When we heard of our inability to humbly serve, we remembered when we moved into the second condemned house, with no electricity or running water, so we could start letting "those" people who needed a home live in the house that we had lived in, that was already fixed up.

Extension cords ran from the electrified shed out back to our electricity free hovel, so that we could charge our phones, have a light, a refrigerator and microwave.  I filled up milk jugs with water from a spigot next door so we could pour that into the toilet tank and thus be able to use the bathroom.  We got running water just before winter hit.  We didn't have hot water till the next Spring.  But those we cared for had everything we did not, and as we huddled under our blankets that winter, fully dressed, as we had no furnace, and yet we did not regret it.

The goal we kept telling ourselves - to reassure ourselves - was that they succeed.  That they have a chance to succeed like I did.  That they have more to life than homelessness and rejection.  We tell ourselves that to this day, any time things get bad.  That the goal is for them to succeed.

We told ourselves this a lot more during this Food Pantry Saga.

We remembered having no vehicles, for spending all our money on fixing up the second house, and me walking a couple of miles each day (my bike was stolen) to a job that I could get with my misdemeanor record, a bag boy job at a grocery store.  Ever been a forty something bag boy?  I wasn't too proud for that job, but I confess that the day someone I had known before my fall came in, my face flushed bright red for the first time in 25 years.  He courteously pretended not to see me, and went to a line that I was not the bag boy of.

Daily I stopped along the way to work at a fitness club, where for $10 per month I could get a hot shower before bagging groceries.

We remembered after our house was fixed up, the dinners that my wife would wake up and make when a guest, former guest, or not yet a guest knocked on our door late at night, knowing as street people always know who might give a hot meal when they'd blown all their money and food card on drugs and booze.  And the Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners she made for the guests.

We remembered cleaning up the vomit of a guest withdrawing from heroin.  The cleaning being of our own clothes, when while soothing her she'd involuntarily sprayed us with it.  We remembered the human feces we've cleaned up off the floors.  The giving out of fresh sheets, three times in a night, the third time with the first sheets that we had washed while the other two pairs were being soiled.

Ever sat up all night watching a man go cold turkey from heroin?  I would "there, there" him as he vomited.  I'd try to keep the terrible greasy sick sweat that poured off of him dabbed up with a wash cloth.  Then a hand towel when the wash cloth was soaked.  Then a bath towel when that hand towel was soaked.  Then the other three bath towels we had.  Ever had to throw out a mattress as the crap he could not keep in him gushed out, and soaked all through the sheets?  While assuring him that it was okay?

But we didn't know how to serve.

We remembered how when we had finally got a car that it was used to drive hundreds of miles back and forth to prisons, to visit those who needed to know they were thought of, and that there'd be a place for them when they were released.  And additionally in service of the church's "prison ministry", and you just read how that worked out.  Or we used it to give rides to a blind couple we know - and all their blind friends who knew we were reliable and would say "yes".

For weeks we had to hear how little we had in our hearts to serve.  We who ran the largest, and only Advent charity in Springdale.  Because when we had joined that church, we dedicated our whole charity to giving aid in the church's name.  And all our religious facebook groups, with membership numbering over 100,000 world wide.  We who had got the name of the church out in the eyes of the public like it had not been got out for years.

And board member and newly self-appointed Community Outreach Coordinator Deanna Dunner wanted to "just" ask if this was because I had not been appointed to their board.  Obviously that was a factor, and why should it not be?  If one not doing the work - her - can have the title, why could not one who was doing the work - me - have it?  But I was not so foolish as to admit that such could be a factor.  She who held two board positions and innumerable titles would have used any such admission as proof that I was title hungry.

I guess I was learning from these Divinely Inspired Christian Leaders after all.  Learning how to dissemble and sling bull crap, anyway.  A dangerous skill for them to remind me I had.  As I suspected - no, flat out knew - that I could do better at their sick power-play games then they could.

I went with the other - and honestly as legitimate - factor.  The routine financial difficulties of the church, including the latest one where a $7,000 sound system had been approved by a board member, but he goofed and it was the wrong kind of system installed, so they had to pay more to tear that out and put another similarly expensive one in.

A loss of $7,000 may not seem much to some here, I said to that board, but it represents nearly three times what my wife and I donated to the church during the past year, and who eats Top Ramen to donate $2,400 only to see all that and more just frittered away?

Elder Ted Dunner's business partner (a very junior 'partner', read "lackey") expressed his deep and righteous concern about how distressing it was for he to see me trying to have such absolute control of a thing, it did not seem very Christ-like.  He forgot to add that apparently his business partner's wife having such control would be just what he thought Jesus Would Do.

I pointed out that I was not proposing absolute control of anything, that our charity had started this and ran it all along and as it was the only program that had a surplus and as it was only growing and getting better, why change a working program?  And that the church treasurer had the only access to the funds, and that a full accounting of all done had been presented to the board each and every month from the start - so what was the trouble?

Of course, we all knew what the real trouble was.  It was that they who had led so long had done so little.  That they who had set themselves up in their high places to administer the donations of at least 75 people, had really nothing to show for it but that now there was only one building where there had been two, and now they owed half a million dollars when they need not have owed a thing, and now the supposed 'reserve' was lower than ever.

And here one repentant sinner, a loser alkie, one of "those" people, had started a program that was working and getting things done, and getting folks into church, and instead of it costing the thousands of dollars that their wastage and fritterings cost, it only cost the church $200 a month.  Obviously questions could be asked, hard questions, questions those receiving donations would not wish to answer from those giving donations.

But what if they could say it was their program?  That it was they who had done it?  Ahh, then that might stave off such hard questions.  It might make the new minister think that they were doing great, instead of running the church into the ground.  Not to mention giving them the glory that they said I so desperately wanted.  Makes sense, though - people judge others by how they know themselves to be.  So title seeking glory hounds would naturally imagine I must be one of their type.

They obviously couldn't conceive of me just wanting to serve, for the good reason that it's not just my job or career, but the calling my wife and I both chose.

And that's why their earlier betrayal had hurt so bad.  My wife and I, judging them by how we knew ourselves to be, had took their pretended friendship and their initial assistance in giving permission to start the food pantry and their donations to our charity, as proof that they also desired to serve those in trouble, those in need.  How wrong we turned out to be.

The board was wavering.  And Elder Ted Dunner didn't have his whole family there to outvote things.  What's the largest donor to do?  He called for an Executive Session.  This would make the public access board meeting private, and they could then consider my proposal without me.  And not be held accountable for any smack or lies told.  So I waited outside the former classroom that now served as the boardroom.

After twenty minutes, the church secretary came out and said that the board had reached no decision, but would consider it next month.  I knew that game.  A vote delayed is a proposal denied.  The more financially prudent minority faction of that board had long ago tried to vote funds to save the old church, funds that were available and would have saved it.  But Elder Ted Dunner and his majority faction of family and friends on the board did not want that, so the vote was delayed, month after month, season after season, year after year for five years, till there was no hope of any amount of money saving that poor old church building.

I went home and talked and prayed with my wife.  The next day, I emailed the board saying that now their choices were between they running the food pantry without me, or closing it.  And that my wife and I would on our own see to it that all those who had been aided each month would still receive food - just not from that food pantry, and not in the name of the church that wanted to run it into the ground like all the other good projects that were proposed and shot down over the years of Elder Dunner's reign.

It wasn't hard for us to find another church that was up for giving out bags of food for those sober living homes, halfway homes and battered women's homes that needed food.  I didn't seek to start or run another program, but only volunteered at an existing one, trading my labor for the bags of food needed.  Then after my work shift there, I delivered those bags.  I did that for a month.  I could have done it for years, and it still wouldn't be a "Saga", as some churches just take feeding the poor, including "those" people, as an "of course".

Besides a car, my wife and I had eventually been able to buy a van a few years ago.  We specifically had sought a van, to aid people in moving.  The best van ever, the Ford Econoline E150.  Most who we work with cannot afford to rent a U-haul, or have the credit or past that would have that company trust them with a truck.  Or in many cases, they'd not even have the license to drive such a truck, having lost it to DUI convictions.  We used the van to aid them.  And now used the van for food deliveries each week, quite lavish food deliveries, and at no cost to us besides my labor and time.

I did that for a few weeks, just under a month, and then the new minister called me.  He wanted to have me come in and sit down with Elder Ted Dunner, to resolve things.  I told him that it was unlikely that such a meeting would resolve anything, but that my wife and I would continue to pray for him, for when he would sometime in the future dare to disagree with Elder Dunner and learn the truth of what my wife and I had been subject to.

Including her visit to the ER to deal with her Dunner family induced panic attack.  Midnight messages might make for a great Lifetime movie, but they're a lousy real life experience.

He asked that I meet anyway.  While I knew the minister and Ted did not know or intend this, I knew that such a meeting just might help get us on a path towards regaining that food pantry.  It would depend mostly on whether Elder Dunner would show his true colors or not.  And I knew him to have less self-restraint than a candy bar eating little boy off his Ritalin.

I told the new minister I would be there.

June 20, 2018, 4pm, meeting of the new minister, Elder Dunner, and myself - 

We started with prayer, of course.  I wondered if they thought that I believed their sincerity.  I was willing to assume tentatively, subject to further data, that the new minister might be sincere, though I was well aware that such usually cater to the largest donor.  And you all by now know who that is.

As an aside, I should point out that my wife and I were of mixed feelings about the Dunner's philanthropy.  How to express our ambivalence?  Well, I had once been at a board meeting, the first one the new minister attended, but back before he had moved here.  I gave the food pantry report and in it mentioned that we would be aided if there were to be a freezer in the pantry.  But that such, even used, would cost around two hundred dollars.

Elder Dunner took out his wallet and tossed two one hundred dollar bills down the table.  I thanked him, the minister looked surprised and disconcerted, no one else did, having seen such grandiose displays before, and thanks to that, we got a freezer for the food pantry.  And it helped.  We could give more meat to more people.

So there's that.

But as I discussed with my wife later on, when it all went south, it made me wonder about the Pharisees of old.  Jesus had his disciples once observe a rich man drop gold into a begging bowl, and then a widow offer her mites.  Jesus said that the rich man gave a bit out of his plenty, but the widow gave all out of her poverty.  Yet from seeing the good the $200 did, it made me think that no matter how bad that ancient Pharisee was, the gold he tossed into the bowl must surely have done much good.

Can good things then come from bad people?  Does giving anything make one good?  Once Elder Dunner had fixed our van when it broke down.  It needed a $75 part.  He paid for it, and wouldn't let us pay him back.  Which was good, as it would have been hard to.  Were we thus ungrateful wretches to in any way go against him now?

I realized in that discussion with my wife that this is how too many good and decent people who go to church get roped in - by their own sense of decency and conscience.  Elder Dunner never gave money to do good, but only to look good.  Each time I'd ever seen him give, it was always where others could see.  As obviously I, at least, saw.  Including the silliness of pretending to pass someone money "subtly", but always in a crowd where others could not help but see.  He had done that to me, as I mentioned earlier.  He had done it to others.

Or Elder Dunner would wait till a board discussion said there was such and so shortfall in a project, and instead of this largest donor just making sure the church had money for such, he'd loudly announce to all that he'd cover it personally.  Sometimes he'd say it was he and his partner covering it, to not look quite so brash, but no one was fooled by that.  It was always so we could see who we needed to be grateful to.  Another story in the Bible spoke of this - of those who do their praying in public, that all may see they are holy.  And how Jesus forbade that.

The money he gave to the church and individual members - $100 here, $200 there, even $2,000 on something else - what was it to him?  I remembered how sometimes those we helped seemed to express inordinate thanks to us for what we regarded as very little.  Some would even cry.  How my wife and I realized a long time ago that our $5 spent to give a ride to a guest to his job interview seemed a very large thing to him, even if $5 was not so much to us.

And thus for all of Elder Dunner's public giving, he was from his millions giving out five dollar rides, same as anyone with a heart would do.

Well.  He's probably not reading this.  So back to it.  There was another crucial difference in Ted's giving versus ours.  He gave out such to be looked upon grandly.  We did not.  I'd like to think most do not, but sometimes I fear that most churches are like ours - funded by those who have vested interests in being looked upon in their high places, high places bought and paid for from their material abundance.  For besides giving to look grand, he clearly gave to have control.  Dunner's way - or the spigot can be turned off.

And I suppose as vices go, I'd rather see someone spend their extra on church titles than crack.  I guess.  But then again, which is truly more destructive to a man's soul in the end?  The crack addict at least knows he's a crack addict - does a Pharisee know that he is a Pharisee?  Since I started smoking, I cannot see the Dunners without they bringing up - each time - the idea of having a Quit Smoking program.  You know, because they smell the smoke on my clothes.

I wonder how they'd react if I suggested we start a "Quit Being a Pharisee" program?  Or is it only polite to say such things with some sins, but not with other sins?

But in any case, I do not envy God.  I would hate to have to judge what is in each man's heart.  Is this man or that man giving for the love of fellow man, or of himself, or as is likely, some sad mixture of both?

What of my own motives?  I tried to not to be prideful.  On my business cards for my own charitable business, it said "Program Supervisor" not "CEO" or "President" like some silly people with small time, small town businesses do.  But did that mean I was safe from the sin of pride?  Were my motives always pure?  Did I never seek any recognition?  Was it always bad if I - or any other - sought a little recognition?

Where did my desire to have charge over my own food pantry that I started differ from Elder Dunner's desire to have charge over the church he funded so lavishly?  Was there a difference?

Obviously yes, I do believe there is a difference.  Knowing my own heart, I know my motives, and while they are not pure as the driven snow, they are for my having trained myself during my recovery to focus on the needs of others.  And to put God first.  Doesn't mean I'm never frustrated, doesn't mean I'm perfect, but there'd be far easier ways for me to aggrandize myself than living in a sober living home eating Top Ramen.

Could I know Elder Dunner's heart?  No, not like God could and does.  But I'm turning 50 this year, so I'm old enough to know that this does not mean that I must always pretend that the other guy is innocent, just because I can't see into his heart.  I could observe actions.  The public doing of good works was an action, one that Jesus said not to do, and one that Elder Dunner indulged in frequently.

His bullying and lying and slandering were actions, and ones that could be easily observed.  Especially by us, as, oh yeah, we had to suffer through them.

His hammerlock on the board, and it having everyone beholden to him on it, those were actions.  And observable.  My wife and I came to know the truth, though it was hard for us to believe at first.  By any standard Elder Ted Dunner was giving a very small percent of his money, not to further Christ's ministry, but to further his Status and Reputation.  If socially that is a better vice than crack smoking, great, but it would damn him all the same.  And what kind of man becomes addicted to wielding power over others, to push them down so as to be lifted up higher in comparison?

I'll take the crack addict over such any day.  I get being addicted to physical pleasure.  Being addicted to hurting others?  No, that I do not "get".

Back to that meeting, three middle aged adults sitting in the empty church.  For you non-church goers, yeah, church life can be bizarre, if you do more than just attend each week.  In fact, the more you get involved in any church, the more strange things you see.  Like how America is a land of multiple court systems, including Ecclesiastical courts, yeah, just like Saudi Arabia has.  Less drastic penalties, of course.  But you'd be amazed how terrified a person could be of Excommunication, if the church was all they had, and all their family and friends were in it.  And if their income depended on it, like in Ted's junior partner's case.

This meeting was not a church court, though.  It was rather in the way of a preliminary hearing, or a "duty to confer" negotiation.  If it went well enough, nothing would need to go further.

If it went south, then a proposal to Excommunicate me - for my own, good, of course - could proceed, as I'm sure Elder Dunner would be up for.  It would take a vote of the church as a whole, but we've seen how easy that is to arrange.  "All in favor of trusting your Divinely Inspired leaders, say 'aye'!" and "Those who wish to side with a vile apostate and give up any hope for a happy church experience, and thus then suffer harassment and such by Dunner till you must crawl away in shame, say 'nay'!"

The primary goal of a minister is two fold.  To avoid it ever going further, like to a real church disciplinary hearing.  But to have it go further if the largest donor could provide a good enough reason, and/or if I was as truly bad as claimed.  I knew this.  Elder Dunner definitely knew this.  The minister, as is usual with ministers, would know it, but not think of it in those terms.  Or at least not ever admit he did.

If you hadn't noticed, I was raised in church, and had attended tons of diverse churches in my life.  This was the first one that I had tried to make a sincere effort in, to rise up and be able to aid others, to truly serve.  Another reason for my deep and bitter sorrow over this - to you the reader - tempest in a teapot.

What such meetings do is allow the minister to hear both narratives, see which one holds up better, and then try and construct a third narrative that lets each side be able to live with it.  I do not take away any bit of respect for how hard that job can be.  He does want the largest donor to be happy, obviously.  But yet to be fair, any good minister also wants the lower down member to be happy, too, if that is possible without upsetting the large donor too much.

Ministers know what the Elder Dunners do not care to know.  That large donors are great for when you need a new steeple, but for the day to day, month to month bills, it's the rank and file of minor and mid-level givers that ultimately keep a church afloat.  And volunteer for the grunt work more.  For it's a rare church "leader" who cares to roll up his sleeves.  Not when opening a wallet is so much less a caloric effort.

The minister asked me if I had any ideas on resolution.  I resisted the urge to just plead, "Oh, please, just let us have our pantry back!"  I knew that wouldn't work, though it would have sure made Ted's day.  Had I gone that route, I'd have got that pantry back - but with we donating to that church again, fifty more rules, a "co-partner" to aid me, a shift in who we fed, and a plateful of steaming crap to swallow.  Served by Chef Ted.

Asking if I had any ideas on resolution was not a gift, by the way.  By asking me first, I was supposed to do what is called "bidding against myself".  I would then be tricked into offering my conditions for returning, and then they could negotiate off of that, downward, of course.  And I might not have asked for as much as they'd be willing to offer.

Instead I told the new minister that it was resolved as far as we knew.  Our charity had, without missing a single week, managed to continue to feed all who needed food, and that it looked to us like the Springdale First Advent Church had decided to end the food pantry that was now "theirs", as no one in the church had ordered any more food, or showed up on the days that were required by the Central Foodbank that provided the low cost food.

This let the new minister know at once that we weren't going to bargain for that which had been stolen, and brought him up to speed as to whether the Dunner's had made any use of that pantry since we'd left.  They had not, and it was important the minister know this.  Now he'd know that it would be on the church to persuade me to take the pantry back, not on me to beg them give it back.

I could see he understood my meaning.  I could see that Elder Dunner did not.  These players have been playing among their own uneducated selves for so long that they overestimate their skills in these matters.  So far so good then.  But I felt no joy at this or any of it to come.  Some battles you are disgusted to have to fight in, and you feel dirty even if you can win.  And I was as yet a long way off from "winning".

Elder Ted Dunner's first statement was not an apology for his wife having so thoroughly dropped the ball in feeding the poor.  It was that me thinking it was resolved and over was fine, and all they needed from me was the computer that the church had paid for.  A lie, right out of the gate.  The church food pantry account had paid for that computer, but such was donated to by the church and our charity.  At best he could claim for the church a half ownership of that computer.  And realistically, a lesser percentage than that.

The astute reader should notice that in him agreeing that it was over, and not offering any explanation for why the pantry was now dead, that he was well demonstrating that he did not care for the good of the church, or the good of the now closed food pantry, or for any real healing with me.  An actual Christian would have led with giving an explanation for the pantry sitting unused, then expressed regret that I was not up for it, then might even ask if there'd be any way that it could be started again.

The leap to "gimme back the computer" showed a frightened and blustering bully boy who was nervous about me, who felt that my presence, my works, and my ministry were some kind of threat to him, and he was showing palpable relief that it could be as easy as just making me give back a random toy, then me leaving the playground where he'd remain Sultan of the Sandbox.

I advised him that I had planned on bringing up the division of the assets of the food pantry at the next board meeting, as obviously our charity had provided more than half of the total costs of it.  But that we had met as our own board and decided that we would forgo any split of the money in the church food pantry account, that we'd forgo the refrigerator we had donated, and make no claim to the freezer that the church (Ted) had donated, but we did want the $150 used laptop and the inventory list.

Which we already had in our possession, having needed both to continue giving food to all who needed it.

Elder Ted Dunner, easily worth a couple of million dollars, though "only" a few hundred thousand if he wishes to lie, ruling a church with a $5,000 a month budget, looked at the man who had gave the widow's mite for a year, to the tune of at least $2,400 and said, "No.  That computer is ours."  Bear in mind that given the worth of his time, he's costing himself more than $150 just sitting there arguing this with me.  Another "action" that I could observe, my blindness to his "true" heart notwithstanding.

(Math nerd explanation - if he earns as little as $400,000 per year, when he goes about like it's millions, then $400,000 divided by 52 weeks and then divided by 40 work hours in a week comes to $192.30 per hour.  And he's at a two hour meeting - $384.60 of his time - arguing about a $150 used laptop.  Oh, and let me save him some trouble.  He'll have to claim that he only makes $156,000 a year - then his two hours of wasted time would equal that $150 computer.  To quote his favorite President - "Sad".)

He did then wave away the issue of the inventory list, saying I was welcome to that.  He was under the false impression that the church had a copy, but I knew they did not.

I said that issue of the computer would ultimately be for the board of the church and the board of my charity to work out, not him, but that if it had to be fought, we could legitimately seek more than just that computer that had been bought used.  And that we needed that computer, and the inventory list, so as to continue to minister to those that the church had apparently already decided not to minister to.

Understand, please, you reading this, that I've now made plain that the computer is of little worth, that we've donated far more than it's worth, that it is of no good to the church, and the poor can't be fed without it.  Guess whether he'll still argue?  If you assume he's Christ-like, you'll be dumb, and guess "no".  If you've caught on to how his heart is, from my described and provable actions of his, then you'll guess - correctly - that he'll keep arguing.

Elder Ted Dunner kept arguing.  He said that it was my ministering to "those" people that had made the board not desire to leave me in charge.  They wanted to aid the deserving, not alcoholics and addicts.  He said that he was one of the main ones to advise not leaving me in charge.  I said that while that was sad, I had been pretty sure of that already, closed meeting or not.

Ted has now admitted a personal motive for deliberately destroying a church program.  No, do not get your hopes up that the new minister will now say, "Ah, ha!  Well, I can't let that happen, so we're giving the pantry back!"  No, Ted is still the largest donor.  But he's showing a terrible narrative here, one so against his own interests that the minister could see that Ted was speaking truly.  As in truly bad about himself.

The minister kept those thoughts to himself (which I only assume he had because he's a man of learning) and asked about the inventory list, not understanding what it was.  I said it was the list of names of those we ministered to.  Their names and addresses.  He had thought it was the food inventory, and so had been curious as to why I'd want it.  I explained that the food inventory was gave to the board each month, and that there was no inventory of food past just a tally of what was bought.  That's how every food pantry in town works.

Elder Ted Dunner, impatient, said again that he didn't care if we had the inventory list, they had one, too.  Again, I knew they did not.  How telling that his Community Outreach Coordinator wife did not know that they did not.  If feeding the poor had been any of their concern, they'd have discovered the lack of that inventory list of names and called me a month ago.

We argued still longer on the $150 used laptop issue.  Elder Dunner wanted to parse the percent of what my wife and I had gave, and at one point I said the obvious, that however great or small of a percent we gave total, that $2,400 is $2,400, and it would not be unreasonable that if they walk away with the $1,500 plus in the bank and the entirety of the pantry with it's appliances and food, that we might part with one lousy used laptop that couldn't be pawned for more than fifty bucks.

The minister seemed to be getting concerned about Elder Dunner's insistence.  Perhaps he was a math nerd like me, and realized that even his own time was starting to become a noticeable percentage of the worth of that el cheapo computer that I already had.  Or more charitably, he simply knew as any man with a heart would know that this was a tawdry and un-Christ-like debate.

I had to argue it because we literally needed that laptop to minister to the poor.  If you're on Team Ted, then ask yourself what possible good reason could be gave for he arguing still for us not to have that?

The new minister kept trying to say that it would probably be okay, that it would just require board approval.  I knew the board would approve.  Dunner's boys they may well be, but they're pretty good at reining him in a bit on these type of issues when he clearly goes overboard.

But argue we still did, and at one point Elder Ted Dunner, representing the Springdale First Advent Church, said, "Why don't you and me step outside?"  You know, like Bugs Meany would say to Encyclopedia Brown, or if you never read that children's book series, like any schoolyard bully would say to the nerdy kid.

In the still silence that can only come when an Elder and board member of a church threatens to beat up a member of that church, I said to the new minister, "Do you understand now?  This is what I spoke to you of.  This is why my wife had to be in the Emergency Room."

The new minister gave Elder Dunner a look and said firmly that he was sure the computer could remain with us, but that again, they'd get board approval at the next meeting.  Ted, realizing that what he threatened had not been very Christian, grudgingly agreed that it could be approved at the board meeting, and that he'd not oppose it.

Just kidding.  He realized no such thing.

Instead he sat in stony silence, only barely realizing that he'd lost that one somehow, and so he moved on to other crap.  No doubt this man who regularly referred to African Americans as "colored folk" figured the new minister was a liberal homo for not backing him up on his plan to beat me up in the parking lot.

He instantly shifted to a complaint about my old facebook post, which he said had been publicly critical of the church.  And that it aired church stuff publicly, and that was just wrong.  I replied that I had named no names.  The minister said he had received a copy of it, from the Dunners, but had not read it yet.  I said it was critical of the procedures, and the failure to follow even those poor procedures, but that it was not up any more.

Elder Dunner said he had a copy of it still, as if that meant something when I wasn't denying it.  I pointed out that I had screen shots of all his flames and spams.  His public ones.  Where he was airing church stuff.  In world wide net groups and my business page.  The new minister sensed a stand off on that.  Obviously Elder Dunner would like me counseled, but given his own crap, that'd be a tough sell.

The minister carefully said that it was generally regarded as wrong to publicly air church affairs.  I said again that my post was down, but I had always been of the opinion, and was still, that if leadership didn't want bad things said about it, they could stop doing bad things.  I asked, which would be the better way of having no criticism about leadership?  For members to be forced to be silent as to what they saw?  Or for leaders to stop doing bad things that could be seen?  The new minister wisely said that he was glad the post was down, and hoped that there'd be no more opportunities for such again.

Was it then over?  No.  Elder Dunner needed to discuss a variety of other things.  Was one of them that he was sorry for his bullying and harassment of my wife and I?  Of trying to steal that which was not his?

Ha, ha.

No, first he said that no one had tried to take my pantry.  That in the Executive Session the whole board was puzzled at my demands to be left in charge, because they had never had a single thought of taking it.  I said, "Well, it would have been handy then for one of you to have come out and said you agreed with my request, instead of deferring it a month."

He said that he'd been the one to make them do that.  I started to place bets with myself on how much idiocy this new minister could tolerate from Ted.  I was betting that it would be a lot, given that he'd not chastised Ted for the earlier threat to beat me up.  I won that bet.  The minister just listened.

Remember, in church world, the job of this minister is not to rule on the merits of our respective cases, but to figure out what will keep the most revenue coming in, with the least folks upset, and that it look to have some semblance of being What Jesus Would Do.  If he was a court judge, I'd already have been awarded compensation and damages, and Ted would be escorted by the bailiff to a small cell where he could cool off.

Sometimes I find it sad that our civil and criminal courts, terrible as they can be, are more likely to be "Christian" than what transpires when churches seek to adjudicate matters.  If it's member versus member, there might be justice, but when it's leader/largest tither versus member, well...not so much.

I said that what Ted said made no sense.  If neither the board or he wanted to take the food pantry from me, then he stating that he'd made them gave the lie to that.  He said, irrelevant to that, "You still think I control the board?"  I said, "Well, as you just said you made them delay when that could only hurt the church, yeah, I'm still saying that."

He asked, like it was some devastating verbal blow, "Then how do I control the board, when I'm only one member of it?"  I said, "You mean besides having your wife, your business partner, his wife, his son, your mother-in-law, your father-in-law, and such on it?"

That's where he then backed down and admitted he had a lock on the board, right?

Nope.

But it's when he knew I'd just won the first few rounds with the minister.  What's a Pharisee to do?

So with no pause, he accused me of theft, embezzlement and fraud.  From the food pantry.  He said he had proof.  I knew I had done none of those things.  So I knew he had no such proof.  But I was shocked.  Briefly.  Then I remembered the ancient Greek legal axiom of, "When you have no case, abuse the plaintiff."

Nice one, Ted.

I hadn't expected him to pull that, not in that outrageous fashion, at least.  Not with an out and out lie.  I desperately wanted a drink.  And a smoke.  Drugs were starting to look good now, too.  Spoiler alert, I didn't then later do drugs.

He made his disgustingly false accusation, and I sat very still and remembered how in my twenties, long before I succumbed to alcoholism, when I was an armed bank guard in Alaska, charged with delivering money and gold around Fairbanks in one of those armored trucks, and the Vice President of the largest Credit Union in Alaska came up to me.  We had just delivered some money, and had gone through all the elaborate signing procedures that always accompany the handling of tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But they were running low on five dollar bills at one of their branches.  And he tossed me a bag of $20,000 in fives and told me to get over to that branch fast.  The Teller Supervisor piped up, a nervous old lady who's main job was to make sure every procedure was followed to the letter.  "He hasn't signed for it!"  The Vice President looked at her and said, "It's Dean!", and she said, "Of course, I'm sorry!  Just habit!" then turned to me and said, "Get going!"

I've always remembered that as one of the proudest days of my life.  I don't care if one of you real people, one of you high ups, one of you fortunate ones, thinks that's pathetic.  I'm no big-wig, and it made me proud.  I might have later become an alkie, I might later have had stupid - and non-theft - run ins with the law.  I might be all manner of things, but I was never a thief.  I had thought, over the past ten years of my now shattered recovery, that I had lived my life well enough that even if folks could give me grief over some of my past idiocies, that I had somehow rebuilt my reputation.

That a person of stature or worth could look at me, and safely toss me that bag of fives, and know it would get there.  Well, maybe people of stature and worth can.  I surely hope so.  But here was Elder Ted Dunner, with a completely made up story, making sure that the new minister would not be one of them.  Because an accusation of theft from an Elder and board member is like - I don't know.  Impossible to defend against?  I mean, how to deny it, once said?  The presumption must be that no one of such stature would say such a thing without proof.  So how to be ever fully trusted again, once it was brought up?

Damn him.  Damn him to hell for his stupid and childish lies.  A petty, arrogant, bullying bastard, so cowardly and trembling over losing the slightest smidge of control over this nickel and dime church in the ass end of nowhere that he'd unzip his pants, whip out his reason for owning such large caliber guns, and piss over every bit of self-worth I'd tried to build up for a decade, just to remain King Turd of Crap Hill.

And damn me.  For in my own stupid vanity having thought that he and his junior business partner had ever been "friends" of mine.  For having let my hopes of being a real person kid me into thinking that could be.  An alkie I had been, and apparently an alkie was all these types were ever going to see.  No homes bought, no successful business built, no projects done, no outreach created could wipe away the Scarlet Letter of my A for Alcoholism.

They were better, I was worse, and if I forgot that, or rose high enough to cast that into doubt, they'd aid me at once in finding my place back at the bottom.  Ten years.  Ten years of unceasing work, and this was my reward.  Not to be welcomed into their ranks, praised as a reformed sinner who'd tried to make up for it, but as just a fly to be swatted, should it dare to think itself a man.

I remembered that first condemned house bought, mercifully before I knew my wife, where there was not only no electricity or plumbing, but no roof.  I slept on the floor of the basement, me having only recently been homeless, so the rain would not soak me.  I owned nothing but that $8,000 house and a fierce determination that I'd never be homeless again.  That one day I'd arrive.  All I had hoped and dreamed of was to be able to be a real person, of worth and note, and now I was sitting here, listening to this double digit IQ betrayer destroying what should have been the culmination of a decade of unrelenting effort with lies that a child should have been able to see through.

The new minister earlier that year had been amazed and impressed with my activities.  And thus had regarded me with respect.  That would now be a thing of the past.  Activities stripped away from me, positions made impossible to fill, my own outreach stolen and myself branded as a pride filled glory hound for daring to offer the least squeak in outrage.  That was just up to now.

Now I also got to be branded as a thief, a thief of my own ministry, a ministry that not only had I worked my butt off on, but still was working hard on, week in and week out, taking only a break to come here and have my reputation slammed into the dirt.

By this Divinely Inspired Servant of the Lord, this Pillar of the Church, this Board Member, this Elder Ted Dunner.

This largest donor.

Of course, angry denials get a person no where, and probably were what he'd hope for.  I mean, I get it, he knows he lost, so now he's going to salvage this with making sure that no matter what the future holds, I'll never be trusted again.

So I politely asked him for this "proof".  Sure enough, he had no proof of anything, but was sure that someone had donated money to me once that did not get to the food pantry fund.  He said the donor may have been from out of state.  I said that some do give me donations, and such are turned over to the church treasurer, his mother-in-law.  He said she never got it.  I again asked, "Got what?  From who?  How much?  When?  Check or cash?  What is the person who donated claiming?"  He had no answers to those questions.

I was thus to prove that I had not stole an unknown amount from an unknown person at an unknown time and an unknown place who was not apparently complaining.  Pause in reading this, and figure out how you'd prove that - whatever "that" was - didn't happen.  I repeated the questions.  He still had no answers.

He still loudly insisted I was a thief, though.  The new minister, instead of closing him down for such a stupid and baseless accusation, chose to try to support him in it, by asking me if perhaps I had just directly spent the money on food without sending it through the church account.  So much for my tentative trust in the sincerity of the new minister.  By offering me that out, by providing me that reasonable explanation, he was really confessing that he could believe such a story.  I sat grim faced, taking a moment to make sure I did not throw up.

I suppose the new minister hoped I'd gratefully seize upon that "kindly" explanation of his, and thus damn myself as a thief.

Yet perhaps I'm too hard on the minister.  I mean, what was he to do, call out the largest donor as not only a liar, but a stupid liar?  I say a stupid liar, as Ted had forgot to come up with any plausible story to make it seem the least credible that I could have stolen a thing.  But maybe he knew it didn't have to be too plausible, just enough to put me on the defensive, and smear my name.

I explained to the new minister that such was not how it worked, that our food was bought on credit with the church account later paying for it.  And that all donations received went to that account.  And that at no point was any donor named who had gave money that had not arrived.  Surely, if there was a theft, there'd be someone - besides Elder Dunner - complaining of having been robbed.  He didn't answer that.

Wow.  Could the new minister seriously believe this?  I mentally groped for straws to grasp.  I hit upon a possible one.

I related the story to him of how one of my guests, who had once come into a $1,300 tax refund, feared he'd relapse before he could take the bus to his family in another state the next day.

So he'd gave me $1,200 in cash to hold, no receipt, no proof.  His instructions were that I was to hold it for the night, and not give it back to him no matter what, till the next day when he would leave.  I understood and agreed.  Sure enough, around midnight, he was back for that money, having relapsed and spent the $100 he had kept on cocaine.  Probably crack.

I refused.  He yelled, he screamed, he woke both houses, he put my whole enterprise in an uproar, the neighbors were disturbed, and he had the police out, so they could make me give the money back.  I told the police that I had put it in the bank, and he could have it tomorrow when the bank opened, not sooner.  That was a lie, the cash was hid in my refrigerator, but I had no intention of letting that poor guest blow $1,200 on more drugs.  Even if it meant a night for me in jail.

The police left, as I wasn't denying I had it, and I wasn't saying I'd not give it back.  The relapsed guest left, loudly expressing his hate of me.  The next day, I could have used that hassle as an excuse to keep the money.  Why not?  If stealing is what I'm about?  A relapsed crack addict would have no hope in a contest of his word versus mine.  Heck, I never had to admit to the police that he'd gave it to me in the first place!

I instead called him up the next morning and said that I had withdrawn the money, and would meet him anywhere he liked to give it to him.

I picked him up, and gave him his money.  He at once gave me a $100 bill back, and said that he was very, very sorry, and he hoped I could forgive him one day and that he understood if we never wanted to see him again.  I told him that day was today.  He was forgave.  That I'd been where he'd been, and fully understood.

He never took that bus trip after all.  A month later, he asked if he could stay with us again, and we said yes.  He's still living with us, in the house my wife and I live in, as I type this he is downstairs.  I let the new minister know that if he wanted to, I could have him speak to that guest.  If it would aid in determining the truth of things.

Ted loudly wondered what that had to do with anything.  The minister shot him an odd look, like, "Really?"  But Ted was oblivious to that, and continued to insist upon my status as a thief.  The minister, though not that pleased with that, continued to let him blather on, not sticking up for me, a baselessly accused member.  I idly remembered that "Pastor" came from a word that meant "tending to the flock", as in keeping it safe.  I guess this new minister had never learned that in Seminary.

I was really only here in the forlorn hope that the church would turn out to be cool, that somehow they'd come around.  The plans I had made that involved less of Christ and more of my hey-day of being able to close business deals no matter what the cost, now seemed more appropriate.  I had not wanted to go there, but with the poor needing food, and I needing my incredibly beaten soul to be able to resist this tag teaming crap and get on a path where I could hope to heal, I figured, "Okay.  Gloves off.  They're both immoral pieces of shit.  No sane adult would put anyone through this.  It's go time."

And damn any of you reading this who are now aghast that I thought a swear word to myself when my own minister was standing by as an Elder of my church ground me into the dust.  I had a flash from childhood, from my favorite show, where Dr. David Banner, physician, scientist, would turn into the Incredible Hulk after having been goaded beyond all endurance.

I ended my contemplations and said, "Elder Dunner, it sounds then like you need to take all this evidence you say you have to the State's Attorney's office and submit it to him.  He may then secure an indictment of me, and I will stand ready to turn myself into the authorities when a warrant is issued for my arrest.  When that all falls through, as I am innocent, I will ponder what court actions I need to initiate, given that I'll have been falsely accused by a representative of the Springdale First Advent Church, and with our minister's tacit acceptance of that slander.  I imagine such an action would be against you two personally, and the corporate entity of this church.  Possibly the Conference, too, as they have apparently not forbade you two from doing this, and I certainly doubt you're fearing punishment for this meeting with me today.  Or maybe they'll distance themselves from your conduct here today.  Maybe they'll punish you for having been so un-Christ-like to me, and so far from the principles they hold dear.  We'll see."

Yeah, I "hulked out", but I'm still a nerd.  No brawls outside for me.  I'm a litigator, not a fighter.  And more a word spinner than a litigator.  As I was more than happy for these two Pharisees to learn.  What did the evil Principal say in "The Substitute II"?  "Power perceived is power achieved."  Yeah, I know I'm a nerd.  But watch and see how these bullies reacted.

The new minister found his voice again at once and said that there was no need to bring courts into anything, and hushed Ted Dunner up.  That subject was dropped.  Not with any admission of it being crap, not with it being retracted, but just dropped.  I've yet to hear from either of them any more on that.  I guess that's how divinely inspired Ministers and Elders handle things - falsely accuse a repentant sinner who joined their church little more than a year and a half ago, then instead of apologizing, count "not pursuing it" as a gift that I could not possibly have hoped to deserve.

And should be grateful for.  I wasn't grateful.  I was sick that only a mention of court got the "Lord's servants" in front of me to back off.  As I knew it would.

Because besides doctors, it is church leaders who fear lawyers and court the most.  Like cockroaches, the light frightens them, and there is nothing so well lit as a courtroom.  When I was an active alcoholic and addict, I'd fear such light myself, now I had to sit and watch these two get nervous about it.  That saddened me.  And made me sick to my stomach.

You reading this, you judging the truth or falsity of my story, this saga, bear in mind this - the accusation was that some poor person had tried to give money for the feeding of the poor.  And that I had stole that money, robbed the church and took food literally from the mouth of the most needy.

Why didn't they then pursue it?  And as they did not, why did they then not apologize?  If they thought I did it, they should have pursued it no matter the cost to them.  If they thought I did not, they should have said sorry.  Yet like the lying cowards both then proved themselves to be, they neither pursued it, nor had the grace to offer even a fake apology.

I sat silently waiting.  On a folding chair by a folding table in a large empty room, the other two in folding chairs around the same table.  The room being what we used for a sanctuary, potlucks, and everything else.  Still in the old closed school.  I contemplated how a church with so many good people could be in this sorry financial and spiritual state.  I contemplated how so many other churches in America were in that same sorry state, those who had not already closed for lack of membership or funds or both.

I realized that it was not for the rank and file membership being mindless sheep.  I knew they were not that.  It was for they having dedicated their lives to the church for so long that their only friends, their only support group, their only safety net, their only social outings, were the church.  So they had to kiss Pharisee ass, or they'd lose their entire life, at least the part that gave their physical life meaning.

But me as a new member, I was not reliant on them for all that gave my life purpose.  I certainly had become surprisingly reliant on them for a great deal of my purpose, and I started to realize that such was an error.  That looking up to them for inspiration may have led me down a wrong path.  Bottom line, though, I'd been alone in that roofless house a decade or so ago, and now I had a wife with me and a thriving business.  I could go it without them.

I knew I loved Christ.  And I didn't need their approval to love Him, or to feed the poor.  At this point, I almost started to pity them.  But I knew it wouldn't stop me from what I'd now do.  Which was to "negotiate", not by being so foolish as to ask for my pantry back, but to just stay rolled over, till they realized how terrible they were looking in the eyes of others and surrendered.

Meanwhile, that fool Elder Ted Dunner wasn't done with his increasingly desperate attempts to make me look small in the eyes of the new minister.  While there were never any segues, never any continuity to his statements, he managed to bring up all manner of things.  His sadness that a friend I had been bringing to church wasn't coming any more.  This was supposed to make the minister think I was a bad person for not bringing a potential convert to them any more.  What it really meant was that my friends knew what had been done to my wife and I and had no intention of ever coming again.

Elder Ted Dunner apparently figured this made me look bad.  In reality, a place he never visits, it made him look bad.  The minister just sat and listened.  I could have said that my friend stopped coming for the good reason that the leadership was a pack of hurtful fools who stole my pantry.  But what would that have gained me?  Not my pantry.  Up till now, I'd had a respect for the truth, even an hour ago I might have said that.  Now I said, "Ahh, it's just because he has friends in another church, so he's hanging out there, no biggie."

My antagonists let that one go.

Elder Dunner said he heard that I engaged in poor business practices.  I briefly recapped our workings and advised that annual reports were on file at the Charitable Trust Bureau of our State.  He accused me of poaching guests for our sober living homes from others.  He got this because he had heard me speak once of having passed out my business cards at a rehab.  I explained that rehabs and sober living homes are different things, that first people go to rehabs, then sober living homes.

He said that it still sounded like I was stealing clients from other facilities.  The minister just listened, which I am sure was all Ted wanted him to do.  Listen and think that where Ted could fart smoke, there must surely be some fire.  I said that while we could agree to disagree, Ted was welcome to contact the Better Business Bureau and get any concerns he had off his chest.

The minister shook his head minutely at Ted.

Then I had to hear about how Dunner had found a website in which my ex from over a decade ago had said bad things about me.  What my disastrous previous marriage in my days of active addiction had to do with anything, I don't know.  Oh, wait, yes I do.  It had to do with this Elder desperately needing me to be discredited in the eyes of the new minister, so that the light would be off of how he and his wife had killed the church's only real outreach in twenty years.

I listened quietly to more of my past sins laid out, some few real, many more imaginary.  All from the not so credible source of my ex.  I wondered if this church leader had ever read about a guy named Jesus, who died for our sins, with me being one of those sinners He died for?  It did not seem so.  Every sin, every criminal act, every mistake, every bad I'd ever done, the result of what must have been one thorough and costly investigation into my personal life by Ted was trotted out for the new minister to hear.

All pre-baptism.  Which as even most non-Christians know, means they don't count.  A sinner, even me, is allowed to repent.  And I had by any standard spent quite some years in repentance, nothing he named was fresher than a decade.

The minister was getting antsy again, and tried to end it by going on and on about some spiritual matter with appropriately lengthy anecdotes to illustrate whatever non-point was being made.  I understood that ritual, it's not unique to him, but is a ministerial device to get each side to have to shut up and listen for a long time and hopefully not then resume whatever crap they were spouting before the minister started talking.

How little he knew Ted.

Remarkably, church finances were brought up next.  By Ted.  Not a subject I would have thought Ted would be eager for, but then he's a man of great confidence in his own intelligence, though I've yet to see any reason for him to hold that belief outside of his business interests.  And it's one of those businesses where juggling and dancing financially is not regarded as any bad thing.  Though in my experience, such juggling and dancing only lasts for that person's lifetime, at best, leaving nothing but debt to the heirs.

Time will tell.

In any case, he wanted to make clear that the church finances were in perfect order.  I instantly pointed out the obvious, the $5,000 monthly outflow and the less than $5,000 inflow.  Not a lot of ways of explaining that away.  And that there was now one building where there had been two.  And that we were half a million in debt.  And that we were operating out of the 'reserves' that weren't really 'reserves'.

He realized his mistake in starting up this subject with the man who had the only 100% attendance record at the board and Business Meetings.  And who knew how to read a financial report.  He expressed that he was upset that I had an opinion on this, when I wasn't attending.  The minister reminded him that I was still a church member, even if I had missed a few weeks.  Ted then made the less than brilliant counter-argument that the lights were still on.  He pointed to the lights so that the minister and I could see that they were on.  We each looked up.  Yes, they were still on.

I wondered to myself what it would be like to go through life so stupid.  And wondered at how our society arranged itself, so that such an utter buffoon, even with initial advantages in life, could command so much money with so little intelligence.

I pointed out that even if we call building funds 'reserve funds' that when they are used, they eventually run out, and then what?  His rebuttal was that my wife and I often had trouble meeting our utility bills for our charity, but again, the church lights were on.

I pointed out that we were a small non-profit, largely self funded by my disabled wife and I, not a church drawing upon the pocketbooks of 75 tithers and donors, and that in any case, we also kept the lights on each month, and every month, fed and sheltered half a dozen men, and weren't in any debt, let alone half a million dollars in debt.  That all our properties were owned, not borrowed off of to keep the lights on.  And that we went from one house to two, while the church went from two buildings to one.

"So you admit you have difficulties?" was his reply.  And then he launched into a speech about how only the treasurer and minister could see the donor list, and if the minister would look at it - the minister interrupted to say that he never looked at such - "but if" Ted continued, if the minister looked at it, he'd see that Ted was the largest donor.

It was hard for me to believe that the minister had not already heard that many times in the scant time he'd been in Springdale.

What can one say to so many words that have so little to do with anything?  Already knowing what was likely to happen at the next board meeting, I asked the minister what any of this talk about church finances had to do with reconciliation and resolving things.  He agreed that it had nothing to do with that, and spoke at length again.

Then he did the thing where we would each answer a series of softball questions about Christian brotherhood and church unity and so by easy stages be led up to all forgiving all.  Having been raised by a father who was on the board of my childhood church, and who later had been a minister, I knew this ritual, and went along with it.  I wasn't there for trouble.

Instead I courteously apologized to Elder Ted Dunner for any upset I might have caused him in the course of all this, he accepted my apology.  By the rules, he had no choice but to.

But he had the choice of making no apologies back.  And so he chose not to make any apologies.  What, were you expecting to read that he had apologized for being a thug?  And for he and his wife being godless Pharisees?  For his adult kids being ungovernable stalky little bitches?  (Again, quit worrying about a swear word in my head, and worry about the crap being spewed by those who dare to presume to speak for our Lord.)  And for he trying to have stole that which he hadn't been able to create in twenty years and that I had created in less than twenty months?  You must have then just skipped down to this part.

We hugged it out.  I could almost do it with a smile, knowing the screwing that he'd be getting at the next board meeting.  But I still felt to sick to my stomach.  It was never supposed to be this way.  He gave me some manly back pats.  I returned them, while contemplating the next board meeting, and what would happen then.  I knew I'd pretty much already won, the minister might even suspect it.  Now it was only left for someone to tell Ted.  But if no one did, I'd be ready to.

It would be hard for me to believe that any of the three of us present took stock in that hug, but who knows, ministers love such displays, and tend to at least pretend to believe them.  I knew Elder Dunner did not, and I'm pretty sure he knew I did not.  Not that he'd care either way, but who knows, he definitely loves to convince others - and thus himself - that he's the hero of any narrative and a good guy in everyone's eyes.

I went home.  Told my wife all about it.  She shuddered when hearing that Elder Dunner asked if I'd step outside with him.  She cried at the part where he brought up all my past sins to try and discredit me.  She knew for how many years I'd tried to be a better man.  We discussed just never going back, and relying on the other church I'd found to get food for the poor.  But we knew we could do more with the old pantry, at least in terms of being able to grow more.  We definitely agreed to never donate to Dunner's church ever again.

She thought this would mean that I'd not get the food pantry back.  I told her that we'd not only get it back, but that I'd be making those dumb pieces of self-righteous hypocritical crap pay us for it.  She understood what that meant.  Previous to all this, I'd have kept paying forever, as part of our giving back to the Lord.  Not now - at least not through that particular church.  Any member of that church reading this can thank their leaders for that change in my attitude.

She asked if it would be better to try to find a sincere church.  I said we weren't big enough to yet, and that as money and position attracts Pharisees like crap attracts flies we'd do better to stick with the devils we knew.  At least until we were larger.

She was happy about us no longer donating to Dunner's church.  And it was so clearly his church.  I mean, he threatened to beat a member up in front of the minister, and as of this writing is still an Elder and member of the board of that church.  Clearly then such behavior is acceptable - when one is the largest donor.  Guess the minister may just have looked at that donor list after all.

Are you wondering why I felt it was possible to have the food pantry back?  Well, let us say that while Ted is an S.O.B. and as clever as any cornered rat, he's not quite so familiar with church boards and church ministers and church congregations as I am.  Even with his thorough attempts at controlling the board, I knew there'd be wiggle room.  I knew the minister wasn't thrilled with his performance or narrative.  And my wife and I knew that the minister would no more wish to lose such a major program - and proven donation generator - than he would wish to lose Ted.

I also knew the congregation was not happy at my lack of attendance, or the pantry sitting idle.  And that there were jack all in the leadership or the congregation who cared to donate time and labor in my absence.  And each other member of the board was a Pharisee, save perhaps one lady, and they'd need to be able to convince themselves they were on the side of angels, whichever way it went.

And given what we knew Ted's narrative to be, what we knew ours to be, and how we knew the new minister would already be "advising" him a bit, then we bet the other board members wouldn't want to fall on their swords for Ted and Deanna's over-the-top vanities.  And by the time Ted's wife heard about his goofs at the meeting - which we bet the dumb lug would tell her of, she being kind of the "brains" of that sad combo - he'd be getting "advised" by her, too.

In other words, the new minister and Ted's wife would be likely telling him that they had to figure out a way of getting me to accept the pantry back.  We knew they'd still be wanting to do it so it was technically a church project - but they'd be up for making concessions to be able to say, "See?  We didn't hurt those two new members, they're happily still running the pantry!"

We also had one invaluable thing on our side - we were, in actuality, right.  So concessions were possible.  Deals might be made.  I knew this.  Ted, as yet, did not.  But he would.  My wife and I talked late into the night.  We knew we had to stand fast on but two things.  No money gave to that church to be frittered away any more.  And to not ask for the pantry back, but force them to offer it to us again - as it was 99% certain that they would.

We wondered how long after the next board meeting, that Ted would realize that when this was all said and done, "his" church would then pay us to run the food pantry he tried to steal, while leaving me in complete charge of it.

July 16, 2018, 6:30pm at the church board meeting - 

At the next board meeting, they voted that I could have the inventory list and computer.  Elder Dunner didn't argue - the minister, Dunner's wife, or both must really have told him how stupid his opposition to that sounded.  We knew this must have happened, as he who had threatened to beat me up last time, now was the one who was heartily and cheerfully proposing that I not only have those things, but all the frozen food in the pantry to distribute.

You'd have thought we were best buddies, to hear him propose this.  I made a mental note that it confirmed he'd been strong armed, and that my wife and I had been right to figure that there was still a chance here.

We'd known how the food pantry could be got back with they paying for it.  By the rules of churches, all churches, nothing can be proposed or denied without their being a godly reason.  And Ted would never be able to out talk me.  And the minister, while failing in his duties to me at that meeting, would be enough concerned about the Dunners and their alleged control that he'd not entirely be on Ted's side.  He'd do what any minister in America strives to do - walk the middle.

And the middle would be all we'd need.  Ted's Sabbath violating daddy-in-law had already resigned as Head Elder for reasons of health.  He and his quashing of parliamentary procedure on Ted's behalf was not an issue any more.  And none of them could have warned the minister about my knowledge of that procedure - because that would have gave away that they knew how they abused it.

It was all planned out, I had reviewed how it would go a dozen times.  Ted, I knew, had reviewed it not at all, and would assume that his cronies and his loudness would be sufficient.  My wife and I had even discussed the chance of a board member discovering they had a conscience.  An outside chance, to be sure, but you never know with Christian churches.  We knew we could at least count on some of them feeling uneasy about Ted's theft, and more so, about having to take some of the blame for Ted's actions.

They - like Ted - enjoy looking good, too.  If he failed them in that, they'd be edgy, and willing to shift around a bit.

But my, oh my!  Guess it wasn't such an outside chance after all!  Every church has it's Elder Ted Dunner, that's why church membership all across America has plummeted for decades.  Not the liberals, not the homosexuals, not the Jews, certainly not Hillary Clinton.  Not even the high flying national leadership with their salaries and offices and secretaries and airplane rides.

No, it's the local leadership of any church that kills it.  As I'd wrote in that article that set Elder Dunner off, when the members aren't allowed to meaningfully vote with their hands, they end up voting with their pocketbooks - and feet.  As in donating less - and as in inevitably leaving.

But every church also has one good and true Christian in their local leadership.  More in the membership, but at least one in leadership.  Mostly not much more than one, but at least that one.  They do good and they do harm.  Good in that they are good and decent Christians.  Harm in that then their virtues cloak the vices of their fellow leaders.  A guy like Elder Dunner can't retain his high place so long without at least the appearance of good, and the cover of a truly good person goes a long way to that.

At the Springdale First Advent Church, the one true Christian just so happened to be Elder Dunner's mother-in-law.  A finer lady you'll never meet.  Eighty something, but with the energy of a woman in her sixties.  She's the only one in that leadership that I've ever heard offer a sincere apology for a mistake.  No, not the schmaltzy faux apologies of Pharisees, the "I'm sorry for if you misunderstood me".  But a real one.

I knew that because it had been me she'd apologized to.  Me, the least of the brethren, and with the worst record of sinning, at least the worse admitted record of sinning, and only having been in the church a few months at the time.  And for you non-church goers, if you ever go to one long enough to meet such a real Christian, then you'll get why fools like me keep trying to attend such places, places that are, as this article shows, often times very destructive to those seeking to live better.

She was at that board meeting and after the vote to let me have the computer and inventory so that I could continue the work without them, the discussion turned to what to do with the food pantry.  I had not expected her to be there, given that her Sabbath breaking husband was still recovering from surgery.

But she did show up, and spoke up, and gave them an epic tongue lashing!

You know those remonstrations that involve hearing "Shame!  Shame upon you!"?  Yeah, something like that.  Her first words were, "This breaks my heart."  I believed her.  Then she flat out said that I had created the food pantry, that it had been my work and mission, and that they had took it from me and drove me out.  She said "I hope the Lord will forgive us, for our selfish - that's not the word - but for our having to have this our own way."  She then castigated them for being upset that I'd feed alcoholics and addicts, and said that we all needed to remember that we were all sinners in the eyes of the Lord, and that she wanted to challenge everyone to have more mercy.

Wow.  I know I felt better hearing that vindication, and a vindication from the best of them.  Obviously I was the only one in that boardroom that felt better for having heard that, but boy howdy, I sure did feel better.  And my careful plan to beat these bastards would sure be easier now.  Said bastards being each busy giving a good imitation of a dog that's been caught with his head in a spilled bag of Purina.

Instantly her daughter - Deanna Dunner - saw the wind shift, as did Elder Ted Dunner who must surely have received a kick to the shins from under the table by her.  They both jumped into the silence left by that epic speech with generalized wishy-washy expressions of sadness themselves.  About how they had never had any intention of trying to run any food pantry, no intention of anything bad at all.  Their entire motivation had only been goodness and light, and Deanna for one was bitterly sorry about...about...

About how badly her family had treated me?  About her pathetic power grab, with running a food pantry sadly counting as "power" in this small time church in the middle of nowhere?  About her incessant desire for yet more titles and glory to validate her job-free life?  About her murmurings and gossip about two members who had done no wrong?  About her husband's threats and lies?

Ha, ha.

She was bitterly sorry that she had been so badly misunderstood!  And if only my wife and I had better understood where she was coming from, this never needed to have happened.  Though regrettably some times procedures did dictate certain policies, including how various programs are or aren't governed and overseen...

Yeah, did you see that?  Lead with the professional Christian apology, then morph it right back into it still needing it to be the same crappy way her and her fellow Pharisee hubby had wanted it all along.  This goes with her and Ted's narrative - they want me to run it, just "for the church".  They'll win if I say "no", because then they can say, "See, we tried to have him run it, but he's too darn prideful!" and if I say "yes", then they've at least got it as officially under the church.

Her husband, the largest donor, had the gall to try to agree with his mother-in-law's speech, even while saying that she was mistaken in thinking anyone had wanted to take the food pantry.  Yes, yes, even though his wife had just kind of implied that there was a "taking" of a sort going on.

Yeah, my wife and I were right.  There was wiggle room aplenty here.  And we knew why, too.  We had heard that Elder Dunner and his wife had tried to get other members to agree to run the food pantry.  And not a one of them had said "yes".

They all knew what was what.  That and the only two members who had cared enough to volunteer to aid me with the pantry over the past year were real Christians, and thus had not only refused to be on the board for, well, forever - and that should tell you all you need to know - but wouldn't be up for running my project.

Deanna Dunner's mom - the lone Christian on that board - roused herself again and gave a second, shorter speech.  But just as powerful.  And just as scolding.  That seemed to have a bit more effect, as by the rules, her daughter's crappy and self-serving justifications and her son-in-law's lies should have gone unopposed.  You know, in the name of avoiding "contention".  Clearly this woman was in it to win it.

The board, seeing the wind shift yet more, and seeing the Dunners backing off further and speaking now of their desire that there be some way I'd come back and run the food pantry, started tentatively expressing their own alleged desires for that very thing.  I felt like I was in a chess game against a child who was still learning what moves a pawn could make.

Ted Dunner's business partner - still the greatly junior partner - looked outraged.  A man of no small amount of morality, I could only wonder at what ethical hoops he had been made to jump through so as to have backed up his Master's pantry-grab this whole time.  But he had jumped through those hoops, and had participated in speaking of how power hungry I was for wishing to run the food pantry I created and grew.

He spoke, in righteous annoyance, that no, the board had all along fully intended to take the pantry, there was no misunderstanding, because it was a church rule that they run such things, and that this was really about me not being able to just serve.  Oh, my.  What a buffoon.  Like a good collie dog, he had certainly well learned his Master's desires, but also like that loyal dog, was not mentally equipped to deal with his Master's shift in attitude as quickly as we all would have liked him to.

Including his Master.  Who was not pleased to have his doggie jog his elbow on his about face.

But really, what's a poor dog to do when told to "fetch" and then when two feet up in mid-leap after a run of twenty yards, just about to bite the thrown stick, be told to "play dead"?  I almost felt for him.  I thought that Dunner had owed him a warning, but then again, since Dunner was playing that he'd never done any wrong, he could hardly warn his junior doggy that he might need to shift on a dime to keep his 'good guy' rep intact.

I first thanked the junior doggy for acknowledging what I suspected, that yes, the board had specifically tried to take over the pantry that all now were saying that they had never desired.  A stony silence greeted that deadly verbal shot of mine.  Mr. Junior Doggy had definitely let the cat out of the bag.

Bad doggy.  Careful little doggy, or you'll lose your year end Christmas bonus!  (And by Christmas, he was, in fact, let go as "partner".  Yeah, that's how businesses are ran by God-fearing Christians.)

Thus the new minister had to jump in with a long and rambling speech about how sometimes things started being organized one way, for one reason, but then really had to be another way, for another reason.  The long and short of that ten minute snooze fest was that the food pantry was supposed to be under board control all along, but that such didn't mean taking it, but more coordinating...but was still okay, and no harm meant, and now, and huh?

Yeah, he was covering for Mr. Junior Doggy's lapse in judgment at speaking so plainly.   And trying to put a good spin on how yeah, the board had in actual fact stole a food pantry that a charity had created.  But not stole.  Oversaw.  For, like, reasons and things.  Good reasons.  For whatever it was they didn't try to do but kind of did if they had done it.  Which they didn't, though yes, that was needful.  But not really.  Kind of sort of.  It was pretty pathetic.  But such are board meetings, and such is how controversy is calmed among our Spiritual Leaders.

I spoke up swiftly when he was done, so none would feel the need to try to re-argue that.  I told the board that I might be willing to run the food pantry again, but not as a part of our charity.  That our charity would not be in any way subject to this board in any way, shape or form.  I would now only run it as a church member.  I said that there was no rule at all that a church had to have control over what another charity did, so they never should have tried.  But they did, and it was done.  And we'd not be kicking in any more money for it.

Note that this was me responding to their offer by saying that I "might" take it back, but only if they paid me to, with the reason for that being their own lies and sins.  It also meant that it would shift the debate from "whether to give him his pantry back" to "how much we'd pay him to take it".  The old "will that be check or cash?" close, where you assume the sale so as to force it, so familiar to salesmen and businessmen.

(And that, Mr. Largest Donor, if you're having someone read this to you, is how you really negotiate.)

The minister had to speak again, mercifully for not so long, to smooth over how I'd just said that it wasn't really a rule that they had to control it.  With he trying to claim that a rule we all knew didn't exist existed, but no one was trying to enforce it, but that yes, it was needful, but no, no harm and it would not be enforced in the enforcing of it.

I let that crap pass, it was just him applying ointment to the wounded egos of a pack of Pharisees.  It occurs to me that our churches - all denominations, creeds and brands - must truly hate their leadership.  I mean, think of the difference between the ordinary sinner - the alkie, junkie, adulterer, thief, killer, arsonist, etc. - and those who commit the sins of the Pharisees.

With every other sinner, you comfort them by saying that Jesus loves and forgives them, they need only to turn away and salvation - with it's heavenly reward - is theirs!  Yay!  But with Pharisees, you comfort them by saying that Jesus loves them, that they've done nothing that needs forgiveness, that they're doing a bang up job, and that they should keep up the good work and in no way change ever!

And we know where that ticket will take them, don't we?  Hint:  There's no air conditioning.

Yet I think that we all deliberately condemn our Pharisee sinners to hell because while we don't mind correcting regular old sinners like rapists and druggies, we do mind correcting Pharisees.  Why?

Because we all know better from bitter experience with them.  The regular sinner knows that he's a sinner.  Not the Pharisee.  So while the regular sinner will at least grudgingly acknowledge that you're right, even if he's not ready to change, the Pharisee will not only deny that anything he's doing is a sin, but will then forevermore chase after you, and argue with you, and accuse you of contention and chasing away the Spirit, and talk bad things behind your back, and make your life a living hell, and try to drum you out of any positions you have, and even try to have you removed from the church if all else fails, until you finally relent and either move far away, or say, "Nah, you're a great guy, my bad, please forgive me!"

Which while great for these sinners (in the short term) was terrible for any church.  And it's members.

My wife and I had had even more discussions on all this prior to the meeting I was now at.  How the money we had spent had been hard to come up with when we thought that the leadership of the church was good and decent, and since they now were so manifestly not, why would we continue to crimp and save?  Especially as we'd proved that we could feed the poor without kicking in $200 per month?  Being permitted no say, and with it clear there'd be no chance of ever having a say, we were "voting with our pocketbooks".

Golly, if only someone had posted an article on facebook warning them of how disenfranchised members tended to do this.

We already knew, before that board meeting, that the Dunners would let us have the pantry back, and we could probably have it back as our own charity's project, if we insisted.  But if we insisted on the title, like they were prone to covet, then they'd expect us to resume paying that $200 per month.  Not a chance.  So while they were all there worried about me holding out for having my food pantry back in official name, I was only there to get to run it again - with they paying for it.

And it was telling that the leadership was more than up for me running it again, especially as just a member, which they were taking as a big concession on my part!  Those dumb asses thought that meant a win for them.  That they'd conned me into doing the "Christian thing" and submitting myself to serve.  With them getting to lead!

But like I said, I knew they'd found no other member to run it, and none of them wanting to do the work, they were stuck with having me do it one way or another, or telling the membership that they'd failed yet again, and killed yet another outreach.  And my wife and I were the first new "real" members who'd joined them in years.  Our absence of late must have been raising all manner of distressing questions from the membership.

Deanna assured everyone again that she had no desire to run it, she didn't know how to run it, etc., etc.  We all nodded.  Being "Christ-like" as churches define it means that you always agree when someone spouts some bull crap that allows everyone to put a good face on things.  As if the defining aspect of Christ's teachings was "hypocrisy".

But she'd locked herself in now to not interfering, and I figured I could work with that.  Or at least make a bloody stink later when she would no doubt find some way of interfering.

Oh, but then that funding.  Were some catching on to this?  Maybe!  The church would now have to pay twice as much - $400 a month instead of $200 a month.  They were debating that now, too.  They moved back to the safer subject of a possible vote on me getting to run it, which everyone was taking as a done deal by now.  Well, except for that very upset looking junior business doggy - er, "partner", of Dunner's - who had the same "I'm betrayed" look on his face that I had had on mine when this all started.

Did he like how it felt, I wondered?  I'm a man who's been known to cry at Lifetime movies, and given my profession, I've a larger bit of empathy than is usual.  The men I help usually only take my advice to heart when they can see the tears in my eyes when I counsel with them.  But I had no moistness in my eyes for Mr. Junior Doggy.  Bad doggy.  He'd betrayed me.  Then he'd betrayed his Master.  Then his Master had betrayed him, and I was to weep?

I remembered when he and his son, before I had officially joined the church, had showed up with tools and a part and fixed my wife's brakes, saving us an expensive repair bill.  That had been a major factor in us each getting baptized there shortly after.  We thought it meant that we'd found a place of fellow Christians who loved their Lord with all their might, and loved their neighbors as themselves.

We'd learned since that our being about to join had really been the major factor in such a favor.  For where was that "friend" when any first sought to take from us our dearest project that we'd worked so hard for?  Where was that "friend" when we needed any moral man to say, "This is not right."?  Perhaps he had wanted to.  But when Elder Dunner said "Sic 'em", he had gone tearing towards us, yipping like the lap dog he had proved himself to be.

And you know those little ankle-biters, they never stop for their Master changing their mind.  A swift kick is all that backs them off.  Well, I'm a cat lover myself, so kicking doggies doesn't fret me too much.

I felt no moistness in my eyes for him, or any of the other "Pillars of the Church" before me.  I knew them to be the ones that have destroyed Christianity in America.  So certainly do they know that drugs and homosexuality and porn and booze are sinful - and so blissfully do they not know that the worst sin of all is that of being a Pharisee, of corrupting the very Bride of Christ Herself, the Church Incarnate.

And Christ's Bride is not my church or your church or any one particular church.  It is all His churches, across all time and space, as C.S. Lewis once wrote.  And these were the prideful little Pharisees running it into the ground, same as all their prideful counterparts in most every other church in America.

I could see that they wanted to vote on it now, I could also see Dunner's junior yapper did not want to.  I figured they needed another push.  Well, pushes I had, this project had been a large part of my past year's charitable efforts, you can be sure I thought of all angles and possibilities before arriving that evening.  They were so used to seeing me as the "reformed alkie", as one of "those" people, that they forgot - if they'd ever known - that doctors and lawyers and politicians can all succumb to that disease, but that we're still all those professions, and we still have minds.

They saw an alkie.  They did not see the military veteran, the former cop, the one time licensed and bonded bank guard, the homeowner, the business owner, the father, the family man, the any of the other things I had been and was still now.  Charged with aiding in sinners coming to the light, they only saw the long dead sins.  Responsible for the spiritual salvation of the church they purported to "serve", they overlooked that sins are washed away in the blood of the Lamb - a Lamb I could well see that they did not know.

They had seen in me another of "those" people.  They should have seen the guy who had been a homeless bum and lifted himself up to membership in the Chamber of Commerce in a decade.  By force of will.  A will they were meeting now.  I could make them let me run it as my own charitable outreach again - but then I'd have to pay $200 a month.  Better to retain full control, or as much as I cared to have, and let these dumb asses pay.

"You guys take your time on voting about whether I can run this as a member, and how it will be funded.  And to save you from going into Executive Session (my little jab at Elder Dunner) I'll just go home and be with my wife now, and you can get back to me with whatever you decide.  After all, if it's "no", I can keep doing what I'm doing now with that other church."  A bluff, as I hated having to work for others to get half what I could get if they let me run my own pantry again.

But it let them know that I didn't need jack from them, and if they needed me, they'd pay.

It wasn't like any of them had done a smidge of due diligence to catch on to my bluff.  They truly were work-averse.  Most only came to one out of three board meetings, tops.  And even that exhausted them.  They were up for being whited sepulchers, for receiving the praise of men for how holy they were.  But they were in no way up for anything that smacked of "effort".

Mr. Junior Doggy barked of his distress that I could so easily do this with another church.  Like that made me somehow wishy-washy in my faith.  Ted and the rest of the board were thoroughly wishing he'd just shut up and "heel" by now.  I reminded him - and the rest in ear shot - that Jesus said to feed his sheep, and if one church wouldn't, then we still weren't released from that command.

True, you reading this know that I was screwing them in a by now routine business negotiation.  But these Pharisees had taught me the importance of using a dollop of Jesus-lubricant for all such screwings.  It made it less painful to them.

After all, that's how they screwed the membership so much.  And certainly how they'd tried to stick it to my wife and I.  Who would lowly little me be, to not follow the lead of such godly men and women?

Elder Dunner piped up.  He wasn't going to let me make the grand exit, with this unresolved.  Now joining me in kicking the crap out of his own little doggy, he wanted to tell me, in front of everyone, that he did want me to run the food pantry, and that they'd probably be voting for just that.  But he had one condition.  I knew he expected me to wince, like it would be some burdensome condition, but I knew what the condition would be, the kind only a grandstanding faux Christian would think to ask publicly.

"Yes, Ted?", I asked.  "You gotta start comin' to church again!", he said.  And yeah, he really talks that way, because that's his good ol' boy persona that he cultivates.  I agreed, like it was a large concession.  It was then generally acknowledged that they'd vote that way as soon as I left.  As to the funding, Deanna made one more mention of it.  That they'd still have to figure out where - and if - those funds could be came up with.  I said, "Well, it can't be a rule that it's a church project without it then being deserving of full church funding, so I figure that will work out okay.  But let me know.  The poor will be fed either way."

Translation:  I can find another church, you've no hope of finding another productive member.

I'm sure that annoyed the Dunners to no end.  That I could continue without them, but they could not continue without me.  Guess they picked the wrong alkie to harass.  But the sickly sweet smile stayed on her face, as she gave me her own parting jab of, "Okay, but no more stuff on the internet!" like that was said in humor.  As if her own husband was not far, far guiltier of such than I or any ten other members had ever been.  I knew her even more for a viper now but instead of giving her the angry reaction she yearned for, I only said, "No problem.  I'm tired of facebook anyway." and I wished everyone a good night and left.

The minister called me shortly after I got home.  Obviously the vote had gone as I had hoped.  Everybody won.  "Those" people would still be fed, a win for them.  The food pantry was now a church program, not a part of our charity, a win for the board, they could say it was theirs now.  Morons.

But we still actually ran it, subject to an oversight that after all the crap everyone had gone through would be light and tentative at best, a win for us.  And we paid nothing, another win for us.  The church would fund it's "own" project.

And I won, as I then went home, and "celebrated" by drinking the remaining booze in the house, woke up the next morning with a hangover, and have not touched a drop since.  Why would I?  All I had wanted was to feed the poor that I was already ministering to with our sober living homes.  Now that I had that, what would there be left for me to stress about?  Dumb that board might be, but it would be a long time before they'd reach out their hand to touch that outreach again.

Well, there were some losers.  The poor abused membership laboring under this clique of Pharisees had just been charged a $200 a month fine, for that Dunner-run board's vanity and incompetence.  They used to have a vibrant food program for the cheapest cost in town, but now they would have to pay full price.  Guess they'll have to dig a little deeper.  Or maybe Elder Ted Dunner will pick that extra cost up, I mean, after all...

...say it with me...

...he is the largest donor.

September 5, 2018, 3:10am, the epilogue - 

July 17 being my new sober date, I now have 49 days sober.  And every sober living house in Springdale gets plenty of good food, canned goods, produce, meat and such.  I cannot say that I run that pantry with the same joy I used to.  Oh, the actual distribution of the food, I love that.  But I'm missing the joy I used to feel at having created a project, a part of my own charitable outreach, that I could freely and joyfully place in service to the church that I loved.

Because I did not and do not love that church any more.  Instead of being partners with them in doing the Lord's work, they are but an enemy to get around, to be watchful and wary of, so that the Lord's work can continue not because of them, but in spite of them.  Each task I perform, each labor in this service, is not something that I know will gain me the respect of good and decent leaders, who will see my efforts and be pleased at my growth.

No, each labor and each task is done with the sure knowledge that those in power are resentful of me, and have sought to harm me, and will seek later - when they foolishly feel it to be safe - to harm me the more.  I am aware of their murmurings and gossip.  I am aware of them laying the groundwork for a future attempt.  I even know what form it will take - where they'll start loading on extra things, invent reasons for some more "oversight", try to shove in minor procedural changes here and there, in some vain attempt to induce me to quit.  Or failing that, to make it obvious that they're in charge.

Already I've heard it said that I'll never have any leadership position in the church ever, as the Dunners pointed out that no matter what good I do, I clearly don't get along well enough with the other board members to make that practical.  And Bob Davids, who coveted my internet ministry, he has spoke of "secret" concerns about me, so bad they can't be mentioned.  But not bad enough for any of them to manfully counsel me on, and thus aid in saving my soul were such "secret sins" true.

Oh, and it's said that I'm still such a new Christian - as if my join date to their church was my start of my relationship with Christ, I who had started my own Christian outreach long before coming to that church that had none.

My future then at the church is already killed then, and so naturally I take no joy of it in the present.  I had enjoyed it in the past.  For one year, the tenth since I had set the bottle down, I had felt a joy that I can't have any more.  Of working and growing, up and up, knowing that I was getting closer and closer to having arrived.  Right up to that phone call denying me anything I had worked for, and taking away such that I had, I could feel that joy, and see that I was almost there.

Well, they have their games, pertaining to retaining their status and positions at all costs.  And I had my new game now, pertaining to getting to feed the poor in spite of them.  I am sad that what could have been done joyfully by all must now be tolerated grudgingly on all sides.  Such is the path they chose, though, and such was the response I had to it.  Perhaps I should have simply left.

But honestly, my wife and I had talked of that, but where would any other church be that wasn't run - in the main - by the same sorry Pharisees?  Any new church is started by true believers, and is poor, and remains good and noble till the founders die.  By then there is monthly money coming in, and plenty of folks trained to look up, and thus as surely as flies seek crap, so do those who seek power and status and funds without work and effort buzz in.

I stay then.  Will I remain sober?  On that score, I know in my heart the answer is yes.  I know that alcohol is "cunning, baffling, powerful" as they say at AA, but I also know my heart.  I know the terrible betrayal and sadness that prompted me to slide.  And I know what my wife told me that let me know that I'd never have to slide again.

She had said, "Yes, you rose high.  And I know you wanted higher.  You thought they were it, and hoped to be invited to join them.  But you made a mistake.  Those church people weren't worth you trying to imitate them.  They were never as high as you, you meant your charity, they never did.  You passed them long ago, and it frightened them when they saw that.  That's why they did this.  You don't need to aspire to them.  Just be proud of what you've accomplished, that they never could."

I agreed with her.

April 18, 2020, the latest and last update -

I've still not touched a drink since.  So I've "years" of sobriety under my belt again.  The board of Springdale First Advent Church did all that I knew they would to make it likely that I'd still drink, but their crap actually just was pivotal in helping me grow and be better. 

Having to anticipate their attempts to close the pantry made for a better pantry.  A year ago, with no vote or public discussion, they defunded the whole thing.  I think it was hoped I'd get angry and go away.  Instead, I had already worked hard to secure a variety of free food sources, by qualifying for USDA food and having a couple of grocery stores directly donate food each week. 

When they announced it to me, instead of being angry I simply said it was fortunate that I had learned to economize so well that with the remaining $1,800 in the account, that such would last for years.  You could tell that wasn't what they wanted to hear.

So I had continued with my other preparations, to move the pantry to a new church.  A larger church, better funded and managed, and one they'd hate - as this church would accept the "homosexual" and the "drunkard".  Which, if they'd only ever read their Bibles, the Apostle Paul himself encouraged the churches he started to do.

Sure enough, a month back, it turned out that "Oopsie", the "leadership" had tanked the paperwork that the USDA requires, and thus the USDA would no longer give us free food.  Because discriminating against people by withholding food from them for their "sins" is against the law.  I knew this.  I had warned against it.  But they - knowing how bad it would look to do that openly - took a sidewise short cut by simply not turning in the signature sheets required.  Thus they could tank the program without it looking like "sins" had anything to do with it.

But I'd already previously got them to agree to 490 Outreach starting a "sister" pantry and using the same space.  With the understanding that when that came online so to speak, that we'd have 90 days to relocate.

After last months latest attack, I called for the meeting to discuss parting of ways, and mentioned the ninety days leeway we'd have.  The board promptly sent a formal letter back saying I'd have less than a month to leave.  I'd also mentioned the division of mutual assets.  Including the money in the account, of which we simply had offered that they keep it all if they'd still be running a pantry, or we'd take it all if they were closing, or we'd go halves if they'd be doing some smaller pantry.

They said they'd be doing a pantry that by their description would be so small that it would really just amount to giving a random bag of groceries out to a needy church member every other month or so.  But they insisted on keeping all the funds. 

They also said they wanted the computer back.  I wasn't at that board meeting, using the Corona virus as an excuse, they met by "conference call" and forgot to include me in it.  But I can guess who still wanted that computer. 

I told the Pastor that we didn't have that computer any more, and that the board had already voted for us to have it.  He said he didn't remember that.  I guess he has so many discussions with members where an Elder threatens to beat the member up that it all becomes a blur after awhile.  Uh huh. 

I told him the date of the meeting, the time the meeting started and at what minute in the meeting the board did in fact vote me the computer.  By that I figured he'd infer I had video - which I did - and back off.  Instead, he sent a new letter from the board saying that while their minutes showed different, I could nonetheless keep it.  That didn't sit well.

I called him and told him so.  That taking off my local non-profit hat, and putting on my member hat, this kind of CYA lying about all matters was why the church was losing members and revenue and buildings and programs in the first place. 

I let him know that while he'd piously said in the letter that they could not release any church funds to us because they'd have to ask each donor if they minded, they'd apparently forgot that our local charity was the largest single donor to that pantry.  And if a settlement previously reached over the unjust taking of a pantry was then broke - as they had repeatedly - then it reverted back to the original case and became a matter of suit again.

I offered an out.  That they take the half - approximately $750 - and instead of directly giving it to our local charity, that they instead let our charity shop at Central Foodbank and the bills - up to $750 - be paid by them.  Thus no money would come near the hands of a person like me, and the original intent of the donations would be exactly fulfilled.

Or if the board preferred, they could defend against a suit for at least twice as much as $750. 

He said that such was the most un-Christ-like thing he'd ever heard.  I said that I could be over with Murine and warm water in five minutes, because he must surely have one heck of a hearing problem if those robbed wanting less than half their money back to be put directly in use for food for the poor was the worst he'd heard in his tenure there. 

He was inclined to argue further.  I wasn't.  Avoiding such negativity is part of my sobriety.  I said that I'd said all I had to say, and that he should get back to me with his decision as soon as possible.  And then I hung up.

I already know we'll be okay with or without that money.  Because we already are okay.  We've another location, and soon that will be formalized, probably right after the Covid-19 crises is over.  We're all good now.  Our own pantry, no one trying to steal it, and while the bad church is still busy bankrupting themselves, we've grown these past years from two houses to three, we've double our bed capacity, where we had six guests now we have thirteen, and our pantry serves hundreds of people per month.

Regardless as to their sexual orientation or sobriety date.

I guess this tale isn't quite over.  But the last of it will be over whether we get that $750 or not and what we'll do if we do not.