One Step At A Time

Accessibility Floor Mats Adorn the
Floor of UUFCC

On the home page of its website, the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Centre County (UUFCC), located in State College, PA, includes the following statement: We welcome participation in our services and activities by all persons without regard to age, ancestry, color, disability or handicap, national origin, race, gender or sexual orientation.

And guess what? They mean it. When you walk into their beautiful sanctuary, one of the things that you notice are several spaces among the rows of chairs with blue mats placed on the floor. Printed on the mats is the wheelchair logo, the universal symbol of accessibility. The floor mats are attractive and blend seamlessly with the dark blue of the surrounding chairs. More importantly, they signal to the congregation and to those visiting that this is a place where all are welcome; that we have room here for all.

The Fellowship’s Minister, Rev. Mark Hayes, says, “Rather than shuffling chairs around, we wanted to be more intentional and more welcoming.”

Their intentionality extends also to those with hearing disabilities. The sanctuary has a two level looping system, which enables anyone with a hearing aid to listen clearly and free of other distracting noise in the environment without the use of a separate receiver and headset.

UUFCC is just one of many Unitarian Universalist congregations that are committed to greater comfort and inclusion of people with disabilities in worship and congregational life. The Unitarian Church of Barneveld, located in Central New York State, is a small congregation with a very big heart. In the spring of 2012, they dedicated their recently completed ramp access. The ramp, which provides access to the lower building’s social area, was built with donations from members and friends, UU related funding, and hours of volunteer labor. For the time being, access to the building will only allow individuals to hear the worship service, but the good people of Barneveld are not done. Phase two of the plan will be the installation of a lift from the ground floor to the sanctuary.

As journalist and social activist Dorothy Day wrote so eloquently, “People say, 'What is the sense of our small effort?' They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time." The people of Centre County and the people of Barneveld, one step at a time, are building monuments to our faith and to our commitment to be a religion for all.

Thanks to Ellen Asprooth, St. Lawrence District Reporter, for contributing to this blog.

Mark Bernstein
CERG Growth Consultant and UUA Liaison to Equual Access