Forrest Church Has Died

[democrat2thecore]

Rev. Forrest Church, Who Embraced a Gospel of Service, Dies at 61

By WILLIAM GRIMES
New York Times
September 25, 2009

The Rev. Forrest Church, a longtime pastor at the Unitarian Church of All Souls on the Upper East Side who spent the last three years of his life, after being told he had terminal cancer, articulating a philosophy of death and dying and a complete expression of his liberal theology in two books, died on Thursday in Manhattan. He was 61. The cause was complications of esophogeal cancer, said his wife, Carolyn Buck Luce.

more: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/nyregion/27church.html?ref=obituaries

Very sad. Only 61. For me, he was what Christianity is all about. What a great guy.
Forrest was the rock of the great All-Souls on the Upper East Side.
He was the son of the great former liberal Senator from Idaho, Frank Church. Forrest wrote a biography about his dad called Father & Son and was every bit as liberal as Senator Church.

A great loss. RIP, my friend.

[babylonsister]

1. He sounds like a very fine man, and too young to go. My sympathies

and thank you for sharing his life with us.

[democrat2thecore]

2. Thank you. Forrest was such a kind and gentle man and...

Many will remember him holding court in long (and very intellectual) discussions about life and progressive issues. He was just so smart, so alive - it's hard imagining him being gone so young. I said this in 'Latest Breaking' that if there IS a God - Forrest had to know him because it seemed he knew everything. Did I tell you how smart he was? :) A walking library died with Forrest.

[democrat2thecore]

3. I meant that post as a reply to babylonsister (sorry) -nt

[pinto]

4. The real thing. RIP.

“I don’t come thundering out of the pulpit with the quote unquote truth,” he told People in 1996. “I am involved in a search, and all of my conclusions are tentative.”

He set up a shelter for homeless women in Harlem, started a scouting program for boys and girls at a welfare hotel and organized free lunches and dinners for the homeless. In 1985, early in the AIDS epidemic, he organized a task force to place placards on buses and subways reading “AIDS is a human disease and deserves a humane response.”

He also wrote nearly two dozen books, many of which applied his theology to everyday life. They included “God and Other Famous Liberals” (1991), “Life Lines: Holding On (and Letting Go)” (1996) and “Lifecraft: The Art of Meaning in the Everyday” (2000).

“Much more than a parish minister, he was a writer, thinker and public intellectual of consequence,” Dan Cryer, who is at work on a biography of Mr. Church, wrote in an e-mail message on Friday. “In the ’80s and ’90s, he was a key national spokesman challenging what he depicted as the religious right’s hijacking of flag, family and Bible. He was an eloquent public speaker and commentator on radio and television who also wrote books of enormous spiritual power and who, as a historian, showed great insight into the nuances of church-state relations in American history."

[democrat2thecore]

7. "...public intellectual of consequence" - That's The Truth!

Some great quotes in your post. Thanks!

[Vidar]

5. RIP Rave. Church.

[Vickers]

6. I'd never heard of him, and I'm not particularly religious, but

"Unitarian Church of All Souls" sounds like a church I'd want to go to.

Rest easy Rev. Church.

[Wilms]

8. His dad, Frank Forrester Church III, was a US Senator and a good guy too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Church

[democrat2thecore]

9. Absolutely - Forrest wrote a biography of his dad (Father & Son)

Frank Church was fearless..... and his son.......well, apples don't fall far from the tree.

[Festivito]

10. Tried to clean up the CIA. Something we need to do now.

Only, this time we need to clean it completely along with the other intelligence agencies.

[democrat2thecore]

13. I've often wondered what Senator Church would think of all this today. His famous quote inside

Senator Frank Church once said, "I don't want to see this country ever go across the bridge... I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision, so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return."

Great Father and Son. Senator Church lived to be only 60, Forrest lived to be 61. Very sad.

[Octafish]

20. He warned us about what would happen if NSA/CIA turned their powers on We the People...

Sen. Church said the nation would no longer be free -- because the Intel agencies' snooping powers (in 1975!) were such that no political opposition to the government could form. The government would know who knew whom, what they were planning and where they were meeting.

Frank Church and the Abyss of Warrantless Wiretapping

[Manifestor_of_Light]

11. One of the great unitarians of our time.

I remember when his dad was on the Watergate Committee.

:cry:

[TreasonousBastard]

12. At our local UU church we talked about him-- many there knew him...

and he had a great effect on them.

If only he had such a great effect beyond the church...

[DFW]

14. He used to spend the day at my house when I was a kid

His father and my dad were friends, and I remembered him due to his unusual name. But he was four
years older than I was, and when you're six years old, that's like a generation gap, so we never
really became friends. Until this post, I never knew what had become of him. He would have made
his father very proud.

[democrat2thecore]

15. Read this from Forrest Church

from What I Believe
http://allsoulsnyc.org/publications/sermons/fcsermons/what-I-believe.html

Or this (the man was a deep, deep thinker):

[DFW]

16. Pretty amazing stuff

I wish I had kept in touch, especially as I am always in New York a couple of times a year.

Thanks for that.

[democrat2thecore]

21. You're welcome. "Pretty amazing stuff" is a good way to put it -nt

[Delphinus]

17. Oh my - yes.

To live in such a way that our lives will prove worth dying for.

Wonderful!

[IDemo]

18. A PBS video profile of Rev. Church from February-

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/episodes/february-27-2009/forrest-church-profile/863/

[Octafish]

19. A truly great man.

His father was a great man, too.

Prayers, love and infinite thanks to the Church family.

May we continue their works.

[DFW]

22. I just stared and stared at one of his quotes from the NYT article

“I don’t come thundering out of the pulpit with the quote unquote truth,” he told People in 1996. “I am involved in a search, and all of my conclusions are tentative.”


I have always used as my signature line a quote from France's André Gide that translates out to "Believe those who seek the truth. Doubt those who find it." Pretty much a paraphrase. It seems like Forrest Church was a man very much on my own wavelength.

*on edit: Gide said "Believe those who seek the truth." Forrest Church said "I am involved in a search." Ergo, a man who deserved to be believed.

[democrat2thecore]

23. You knew him as a kid - little to know you both would have much in common

And what a great quote, I agree.

[DFW]

24. I did know him, but hardly remember him

He was just the son of one my dad's many friends named "Senator," which I used to think was a common first name
among grown-ups, since so many of my dad's friends were introduced to me that way. But I remembered Forrest for his
unusual name as well. I vaguely remember him as a nice guy, but too old for me to have much in common with as a
playmate, and when your age is in single digits, that is about the only criterion you have when being introduced
to other kids. I did remember them as being from Idaho, a place I vaguely understood was "far away." Today, I don't
think of any place on out planet as being particularly "far away," but I have still never been to Idaho.

How odd to think that I had met someone with whom I obviously would have a lot in common philosophically, and yet
whose life and mine passed each other by like ships in the night when it could have really made a difference to us both.

[Duncan]

25. thank you Forrest Church

For being an eloquent voice of humanity.

Thanks D2theC for posting.