Hospital prayer room for gravely ill children plastered with LGBT flags

[IwantToRetire]

A hospital prayer room for gravely ill children and their families has been plastered with LGBT flags amid claims that the NHS is being hijacked by transgender ideology.

As part of a new inclusivity drive, a “sanctuary” at Edinburgh’s “Sick Kids” hospital, designed as a quiet space for those suffering trauma and grief, was taken over by symbols representing dozens of sexualities and genders.

The “spiritual care” facility previously described as offering room for “quiet reflection, prayer or meditation” was also rebranded a “chill-out zone” for Pride month, with rainbow-coloured signage directing patients and relatives to it.

The move has outraged some staff and family members of poorly children, with one clinician claiming a leading children’s hospital had been turned into a “social issues battlefield”.

Meanwhile, the family of a terminally ill toddler said they were no longer able to use the room to find comfort in their faith as it had become a “display of activism” which contradicted the teachings of mainstream religions.

The chaplaincy service at the hospital, one of the UK’s leading centres for paediatric care, is run by Maxwell Reay, a transgender man and activist who belongs to a fringe Christian congregation in Edinburgh.

Mr Reay, who has described being trans as a “gift from God”, is facing claims that he has breached rules which state hospital chaplains should not seek to impose their own beliefs when offering spiritual care.

Extracts from a Telegraph article reprinted in full by yahoo news https://uk.style.yahoo.com/hospital-prayer-room-gravely-ill-165852417.html

Scotland sure looks like it is trying to out pride everyone else!

So during pride it is more important that this elite group get to have a space to chill out than it is for grieving and desperate parents have a space to reflect or quietly pray? This includes parents of children undergoing risky operations, often hours long, waiting to hear if their child has survived, or if their cancer has spread, or if the the surgeon has saved their limbs.

I would have pulled the flags down.

I would have a lot more respect - that is, start having some - for the regular TRAs who pop up here if any of them had the decency to condemn this sort of shit. Just once, I’d like some acknowledgment from TRAs saying “yeah, that’s bad”. A rapist raping women in a prison. The photoshopped historical photo. The commodification of a grieving space for the families of dying children. But none of them ever do. There is zero decency with their movement. Zero empathy. Nothing is off limits from their cause. I can’t wait for this toxic movement to disappear from our society.

If they want a pride specific chill space then get one of the many rainbow organisations to pay for one to be create

How much space should the hospital give over to this? What about a vegan space? A communist space? Should there be a space for Scottish independence campaigners if their supporters paid for it? Hospitals should not contain any political campaigns.

It is. And it's a disgustingly cynical attempt to target the most vulnerable.

The health board initially suggested this meant child patients would be now asked for their pronouns and whether they would like to be addressed by an alternative name when they attend for appointments.

This is beyond appalling. Those poor families who are in the most tragic of circumstances being denied a safe space because of Trans lunacy.
The fact that this man was appointed hospital chaplain defies belief.

I'm not an activist but I can see how acceptance could help in these circumstances. Why can't you?

Tbf, I think all organisations are bad at decorating public areas. GP waiting rooms have miserable posters and leaflets and weird health ads on a loop on tvs that remind you of death.
School classroom walls are plastered with sensory overload.
I’m not personally fussed about flags in a prayer room as an ideological issue and I doubt any children who use them are either, but I do think on balance that a room for quiet reflection should be minimally decorated and calm in colour.
If I were to complain, I’d focus on the decor aspect rather than challenging ideology.

Children up to 18 !

@NotBadConsidering I agree and wonder if it's the constant characterisation of it being a 'community' that any sense of personal autonomy has vanished - you're either for us or you're against us.
This is (one of the reasons) why I think they whole identity politics and grouping together of people who 'share' something is so dangerous.

There are ways to show acceptance without over riding the needs of others. This display is not considering the needs of others at all.

How is this 'acceptance'? No really, how is it.

Gay and lesbian people spent decades trying to be seen as normal. All this does is 'other' them. When a child is gravely ill, nobody wants to think of what sex the vicar is having.

@Maddy70 that's always the idea, just in case one person may or may not be LGBTQIA+ ... we must cater for that real or hypothetical person... and yet still arguing that they come from a position of oppression.

I genuinely can’t see it all. Explain how. How, with Pride stuff everywhere else and multiple opportunities for people to feel “accepted” all over the country and western world right now, how is it important to make sure this one specific room is a place of “acceptance” too?

The whole point of rooms like this is that they are neutral spaces for people to use as they wish. They are carefully designed for that purpose. People are free to bring in their own symbols to use in any way that helps them. The room itself should be completely neutral. And to call it a "chill out room" is simply offensive.

Yes. It is not a ‘chill out ‘ room. That implies other uses. This is a room for allowing people to have quite reflection and sacred time.

Chill out room? What the fuck.

This ^^

I've tried to be charitable for a long time about lack of self awareness, emotional illiteracy, lack of empathy, lack of ability to consider anyone or anything else but self at all times, highly entitled demands with no intention of reciprocation because 'vulnerable population' yada yada. Last crumbs of 'be kind' socialisation still left in me.

But as you say, not one ever speaks out against it, and no one can be this completely devoid of such skills. Which leaves you with the grim wondering if it's not lack of anything, it's being done on purpose. Because twits like me have been stupid enough to enable it.

“how is it important to make sure this one specific room is a place of “acceptance” too?”

And there’s the thing. It’s not important. The only reason those flags are in that room, is because that room (and presumably the Chaplain’s office) are the only spaces that individual has the power to decide on any decoration. It’s an abuse of power. It’s what TRAs do.

Acceptance of what? Then trans umbrella covers drag queens and cross dressing men.

What if a person, like many people, vehemently disagrees with trans ideology and it's relentless political campaigning? How are they accepted?

Controversial political campaigning has absolutely no place in a room for grieving parents ffs.

And given the law as it stands, would you be okay with it being littered with adult human female stickers?

Or would you think that might be a tad inappropriate?

Chill out room? What the fuck

Exactly. ‘Chill out rooms’ were originally the alternative spaces in a rave or night club where ravers/clubbers could have a breather from their hard partying. Maybe the Chaplain feels that their time spent in the hospital is like some wild, banging party requiring a ‘chill out zone’…. I don’t think anyone else does.

FFS, what goes on in your head???

Do you think the child's sexuality - assuming they're even old enough to be thought of in those terms - has made any difference to the doctors and nurses treating their seriously ill patient? Do you think the parents' sexuality has? Do you honestly, for one moment, think there's any danger of a lack of 'acceptance' for a sick child or their parents in extremis, in the NHS of all places, an environment so draped in rainbow lanyards and trans flags every other day of the fucking year that it looks like Stonewall threw up on it?

Do you ever stop to consider the parents whose child is equally sick but whose faith means they find overt displays celebrating homosexuality uncomfortable? Regardless of whether you personally agree with that viewpoint or not, can you not agree they also deserve some "acceptance", in the form of a neutral, apolitical space where any and all belief can be accommodated and solace sought at one of the hardest times of any parent's life?

If not, you're the biggest fucking bigot here.

what a bloody motley crew

Is this the church and it’s congregation I’m looking at here?

For some reason, having seen that photo, I have an earworm of 'Lets do the Time Warp'.

This is a bit like people who 'bring their whole self to work'. As if we all need to know everything about a person in order that they can actually do their job.

This.

The way the room is welcoming to all is by remaining neutral.

The chaplain is showing poor judgement and a disturbing lack of compassion -they sound like the wrong person for the job TBH