Hello

Hi Eva (and everyone else)!
Delighted to see this and hope you get the support you deserve. Am working in Sheffield and have a particular interest in joint working between mental health services and faith communities. I would be interested to know if anyone has used service user insights into this?
Best wishes
Julian

Hello! Thanks for registering!
Eva

Hi Anna

HELLO.... I AM A CHRISTIAN AND I SUFFER FROM DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER...... IS THERE ANY OTHER WHO SUFFERS THIS....

Hi My name is Sue and I am from the diocese of (Far) North Queensland in Australia.
Although we have excellent inclusive Anglican ministry in the rest of Australia as far as I have experienced in 43 years in the Anglican church, I have noticed in our diocese, since I moved here 2 years ago, open racism (against Aboriginals) and , particularly, discrimination against those with mental health issues.

This harassment has not only included shamelessly crossing names offered on volunteer lists but has even included ostracism (telling everyone not to give a lift to the victim), defamation (paid ministers warning everyone not to talk to the victim because they are a liar) and even (criminal) stalking within parishes (asking parishioners to watch homes to report to the minister which adult is coming and going from another adult's house). Racist jokes denigrating Aboriginals abound, and those with white skin and Aboriginals in their family are accused of being "too sensitive" if they feel offended.

Stalking and ostracism and defamation is deliberately influenced by not only the paid ministry but has been condoned by the bishop, who quotes "special circumstances" about Aboriginals and those with mental health issues. Disclosing any mental health issue here results in widespread "warnings" against the individual, ("Watch out , don't talk to them, they've got mental illness") led deliberately in secret meetings held by the Archdeacon, (who disclosed his advice to me himself months later), with no discretion or privacy offered in return for such trusting formal processes to report any injury from harassment which has included hateful threats from paid ministry.

Protesting against such ostracism brings about ordained ministers freshly "graduated" from part-time certificates literally smiling while they supervise parishioners, to whom they have (necessarily) gossiped and whom they have asked to arrive without notice, standing over and screaming at any protesters, in front of witnesses, on consecrated ground, demanding for them to leave "their" church. In the meantime, the dioces response to formal protest is to remove keys and voluntary status from any volunteer who complains and send friends of the bishop to solicit complaints against whomever protests, whilst he sends them letters to excommunicate them from the church and has the paid "professional standards" (ie child care worker) inform adults they will be arrested if they attempt to receive communion.

In the meantime the diocese has been refusing any opportunities for (sermons) ministry to (even real graduate and real experienced) Aboriginal ministers, in favour of white certificate holders, despite the fact that resident Aboriginals not only far outnumber the whites in this area but also preceded them by 30 000 years.

Formal protest through the Anglican church also brings about months of repeated misinformation about non-existent harassment and discrimination prevention policies at diocese (and state) level, disturbing criticism and libel from paid but entirely unqualified "professional standards" staff who actually pretend for months they are ordained, to the extent of having complainants call them "father" and offering prayers to "heal" those who have actually ask for practical professional response, and who treat those who complain as if they are children, arguing that natural justice is not available and that current statutory laws don't exist or apply, and who even deliberately send the police to adult parishioner's homes entirely without notice (or of course permission) due to entirely false written reports they send.

Formal protest at national level brings about repeated insistance that a psychiatrist's opinion "must" be sought verbally, to determine "officially" as to whether the complainant is "sane enough" to complain, whilst at the same time offering stubborn refusal to read injury reports from the same medical specialists they demand to "confirm" a "fitness to complain" with before accepting complaints from adults, as soon as they find out any professional treatment for harassment injuries has been sought.

There is no legal assistance and no advocacy in the region, so there is no government help to turn to except to keep on fighting virtually alone, as those who have seen what has happened to others are either too afraid or already too (easily) misled by "those in charge" to speak against harassment discrimination. I have spent months to succeed in having the safety department insist on the parish instating harassment prevention, but the diocese has refused to institute harassment and prevention discrimination prevention that exists in most other dioceses' policies, and has entirely resisted (though promising) to investigate the matters I have formally complained about through prescribed processes now for over 10 months, following informally complaining since before December 2011, with only punishment, ridicule and hatred as a result.

I would love some written support from (any of) you to keep the fight going against harassment and discrimination and stigma currently widely used as justification to cruelly and deliberately mistreat those with mental health issues, and those who like me who have been deeply wounded by not only witnessing prolonged cruelty against others but now also against myself

I denounce the concept of treating fellowship as any "favour" whatsoever to the 1 in 4 people who suffer from mental illness, and I denounce the programs the Anglican church have here (designed and run by ministers with no professional medical psychiatric practise qualifications nor experience) for volunteers, which teach complete amateurs to "diagnose" "disorders", and which also imply regularly in their content that every one with a mental health issue, eg. depression, also hears voices and suffers delusions. I particularly oppose the vile habit of my parish and its ministry to turn visiously against anyone who tries to make a stand for what I know is right in the church I grew up in: inclusion of any and all with the same confirmed or potential faith.

The main reason that I can notice here that this environment has festered is that a degree in Theology has not been required in this diocese (now for decades) in order to be paid for or ordained for ministry. This standard was apparently "loosened" so that Australian Aboriginals (with a proven cultural statistical challenge to literacy) would not be discluded from the opportunity to ordination: after all, they have the elements of brotherhood and sharing firmly within their native tradition and custom. However the only people who seem to have been advantaged by these loosened standards are all white, all apparently old friends of the bishop, and all seem to be retired from paid professions not even involving any relevant adult leadership experience, whilst in the meantime real graduates of Anglican and Christian colleges all over Australia go without a parish or even a deaconship.
Any word of support or prayer would be welcome. How much, after all, can one Koala bear?