January 2007 $5 Quaker Thought FRIENDS and Life OURNAL Today
The Iraq War and Its Implications for Quakers A Quaker Speaks from the Black Experience An AMONG FRIENDS independent • magazine serving the A Time of Renewal Religious Society of friends the time of this writing, Susan Corson-Finnerty is off getting som e vacation _Nand supporting far-flung family members, and she has asked me to fill in for Editorial her in preparing this column. Actually, this is only fair: for six weeks this fall, Susan Corson-Finnerty {Publislm- and Executi~ Editor}, I was out of the office, recovering from an operation, and she, ably assisted by Rebec Robert Dockhom (Smior Editor}, Rebecca Howe (Assistant Editor), Judith Brown (Pomy Editor), Ellen ca Howe and m any others, covered for me. T his break was by far the longest one I've Michaud (Book Review Editor}, ). Brent Bill (Assistant Book &vii!!u Editor}, Joan Overman (Book Review had since joining the staff of the j OURNAL in 1999. I come back with renewed com Assistant}, Christine Rusch (Mikstones Editor), Guli mitment and a heightened sense of the uniqueness of this very special magazine. Fager, Melissa Minnich, Mary Julia Srreet (Asristant Mikstones EdiiQn), Robert Marks, Nancy Milio, George The feature articles in this first issue of our 53rd year are a hard-hitting bunch. Rubin (News Editors}, Kara NeweU(Columnist}, Lisa Terry Wallace challenges us to be careful in what we say to others about Q uakerism Rand, Marjorie Schier (Proofoadnr), Parry Quinn (Voluntm), Emily Taber (Intmz} (p. 6). Then James Fletcher writes candidly about his experience as an Mrican Ameri Production can Friend (p. 9), giving all Quakers m uch to think about. Next, in our continuing Barbara Benton (Art Dirtctor}, Alla Podolsky series on "What Are Friends Called to Today," Maya Porter traces the roots of the {Assistant Art Dirtctor}, Perer Deirz (Wtb Ma1111ger) Advertising, Circulation, Development Iraq War back to the thirst for oil (p. 14), while Benjamin Vail raises moral questions Nagendran Gulendran (Advmising Manager), about the dependence of Quakers on cars (p. 16). Betsy Brinson closes the features Nicole Hackel (Circulation Assistant}, Gabriel Ehri (Dirtctor ofMark eting, Circulation, and Special Projects), with a look at the new movement of U.S. conscientious objectors to Canada, echoing Patricia Boyle {Database Manager), Margie Garrett the flow during the Viemam War (p. 18). (DetX!opmmt Coordinator), Kay Bacon, Ruth Peterson (Voluntem} The departments in this issue-as always--offer a rich reading experience. We are Administrat ion happy to announce this m onth a new column, "Earthcare," giving a Quaker perspec Marianne De Lange (Office Manager}, Tom McPeak (Accounting Services) tive on environmental concerns, notably those that are a result of our dependence on Board ofTru stees fossil fuels. In the fi rst one, Ruah Swennerfelt and Louis Cox zero in on the ethics of Barbara Andrews, Michael Baldwin, Jon Berry, Paul where the food we buy is grown (p. 22), an issue directly related to excessive use of Buckley, Katharine Clark, Karen Cromley, John DarneU, Mary Ann Downey (Assistant Clerk), Walrer petroleum. In addition to the usual m ix of regular departments, this issue brings a Evans {Trtasurtr), Linda Houser, Paul Landskroener large number of Repons and Epistles. I encourage you not to jump over them! They (&cording Clerk), Par LaVISCOunt, Linda Lyman, Jay Wade MarshaU, Ron McDonald, Larry Miller, Nancy include som e unusual reading and will help you put your finger on the pulse of Moore, Perra Perkins, Claire Reddy, Janet Ross, Susanna Quakerism tod ay. Thomas, Margery Walker, Catherine BeU Wetteroth, Elizabeth Years (Clerk) Nearly all of the writing in this issue of FRIENDS j OURNAL consists, as usual, of FRIENDS j OURNAL (ISSN 00 16-1322) was established unsolicited contributions. What a comment that fact is on the energy and health of in 1955 as the successor to The Frimd (1827-1955) and Frimds lnteUigenrer (1844-1955). our Religious Society! • FRIENDS JouRNAL is published monthly by Friends Publishing Corporation, 1216 Arch Street, 2A, Philadelphia, PA 19107-2835. Telephone (215) 563-8629. E-mail [email protected]. Periodicals postage paid at Philadelphia, Pa., and additional mailing offices. • Subscriptions: one year $39, rwo years $76. 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Please send submissions by February 1, 2007. Available on microfilm from BeU and HoweU Friends World Committee for Consultation (O ctober 2007): Information and Learning. This year is the 70th anniversary of FWCC. How has it contributed to the well-being PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER Min. 20o/o post-consumer of the Religious Society of Friends? We are seeking memorable recollections and other writings about FWCC. Please send submissions by May 1, 2007. Moving? Let us update Advance inquiries from prospective authors and artists are welcome. Contact Robert your subscription and address. FRIENDS jOURNAL, m6 Arch Sr., 2A Dockhorn, senior editor, at
2 january 2007 FRIENDS jOURNAL FRIENDS JANUARY 2007 JOURNAL VOLUME 53, NO .
• FEATURES • DEPARTMENTS Among Friends 6 Misunderstanding Quaker Faith and Practice 2 Terry H . Wallace 4 Forum Many common utterings ofFriends about our Faith are patently 21 Earth care untrue. Cultivating right relationship with our 9 A Quaker Speaks from the Black Experience food James Fletcher 22 Life in the Meeting There are fUndamental Friends principles that speak clearly to Things I ponder while sitting in meeting African Americans. Meeting for soup 14 The Iraq War and its Implications for Quakers 24 Reflection Maya M. Porter The elephant's song Embracing the Testimony ofSimplicity may be a prerequisite to folfilling the Peace Testimony. 26 Reports and Epistles Piedmont Friends Fellowship 16 Questions for Quakers about Cars Conference on Racial justice and Equality Benjamin J. Vail Epistle on global warming Dependence on fossil foel-powered vehicles is a huge moral issue for Sixth Pacific Northwest Quaker WOmen's Friends. Theology Conference 18 Making the Journey North (Again) FWCC-Americas annual meeting Betsy Brinson Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative) I 29th Some conscientious objectors are again seeking refoge in Canada. annual session Report from the registrars at Intermountain • POETRY Yearly Meeting, 2006 34 Books 20 City Fishing Alexander Levering Kern 38 Book Excerpt janet Kaljf a glimpse ofgrace Falling Salvific Whiteness Judith Kennedy Schuller 40 News 43 Bulletin Board 50 Milestones 53 Classified
Cover photo by Godot Praesta
FRIENDS J OURNAL january 2007 3 • FORUM
Quakers shouldn't preach to curb the paving over of our natural world? 1. The original decision was ad hoc, We can look to our own communities pertaining only to the 2004 Quaker sweat global warming and see much that could be changed now, lodge that was abruptly canceled as a result. but Friends tend to want to go global. The 2. Without a specific decision prohibiting Mary Ann Downey began the first article biggest change in my native Philadelphia's the Quaker sweat lodge, it retains its long in the October 2005 issue with the wry climate will be the introduction oflegalized established status as an esteemed Quaker observation that the only common thread in gambling which passed the Pennsylvania program and spiritual practice. her diverse meeting is "the desire not to be state legislature with barely a peep from 3. If there is to be a process to prohibit preached at." Fortunately for her, her official Quakerdom even though we have a the Quaker sweat lodge, it ought to be meeting isn't in Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. forthright testimony against all games of conducted openly and in good order. The same jOURNAL issue reprinted a June chance. Gambling will bring several big-box 4. Most, if not all, of Friends' spiritual epistle passed by a called session that slot palaces surrounded by parking lots and practices have antecedents in older preaches the word that Philadelphia Friends frequented by fume-spewing buses and cars. civilizations. Are we to relinquish our must now believe in global warming. The social climate will now say it's okay to practices whenever an individual from Ah, Quakers. We are ambivalent on rely on gambling for our public revenue. another tradition labels them whether we believe in God, how we know Public transportation for the elderly in misappropriation? Under what Jesus, and whether there was a resurrection, Pennsylvania is already subsidized by the circumstances is it not persecution for one but we're perfectly clear that global warming state lonery. That may be good for the Friend to anempt to extinguish another's is a fact. I haven't researched whether we had environment, but we're allowing poor spiritual practice? a position in the '70s about global cooling people spending their incomes on gambling I know George Price as a Quaker but I wouldn't be surprised to find it. We to pay for it. Are Friends happy with that following a path of personal integrity. In our were certainly all in a lather about nuclear state of affairs? Who knows. Gambling is Quaker sweat lodge workshop all of his winter, which hasn't been mentioned in my an old testimony that nobody pays anention actions and words honored the Native meeting for a decade even though our world to anymore. Americans who entrusted him with the is stilllinered with nuclear weapons. The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting epistle's sacred sweat lodge ritual. Personally, I am agnostic on global final exortation to Friends to live in an If there is anyone who wants to take issue warming. The science is, as the epistle rightly environmentally sustainable fashion flows with restoring the Quaker sweat lodge to full states, "detailed, technical, and not without directly from our current testimonies on status as an event at the 2007 FGC controversy." T he epistle also states that "we simpliciry and good stewardship. They are Gathering, I ask you to please manifest can see evidence of climate change." That's extensions of what we have always known; respec~ by publishing a signed statement of certainly the case as all we need do is look that we are taking care of a world that we yourv1ews. out the window and watch the skies change will never own and must leave intact for Chase Clement before our eyes. Where I look out the future generations. We don't need to believe Takoma Park, Md. window, glaciers once covered the entire in global warming to live more squarely with area. Perhaps it was the dangerous emissions the environment. of dinosaurs which melted them away and And if we are to continue to be a religion A Quaker tithe? exposed this new, dangerously warm terrain. and not a political action group, we don't But I don't want to argue the science in a TheJulyissueofFruENDS]OURNA4 need to sanctifY global warming or any other body of Friends. For that's what it is, an devoted to "Friends and Money," covered fashionable causes to make the environment argument over scientific data. Scientists in many topics relevant to the use of money, a pan of our spiritual lives. but not just Friends are in need of the field of climatology disagree and will Signe Wilkimon banle it out. Most Friends probably believe considering this issue. It applies to everyone, Philadelphia, Pa. in the theory of evolution but it doesn't rate regardless of creed, color, nationaliry, or class. an epistle, nor should it. We are a religion, . As Carolyn Hilles states, Friends do tend not a science class. It was just an ad hoc to avoid the subject. Have you ever visited a That doesn't mean we need to ignore the meeting and wished to make a conuibution environment. What do we know? To what decision and could not find a way to do it? For those can we testifY? Without guessing at what My first sweat lodge experience was of us who are convinced Friends and have may happen in 50 or 100 years, we can see George Price's workshop at the 2003 Friends come from a variery of faiths, we have things with our own eyes that need to be General Conference Gathering in probably learned that giving of our fmancial changed. The tailpipe emissions of our cars Johnstown, Pa. That week of study and means is one of the essentials in church and the particles from our smokestacks we participation gave me appreciation of the membership. My experience goes back to know now are causing both health and sweat lodge as a spiritual practice within the childhood in the Southern Presbyterian environmental problems. Our development context of Quaker worship. I was Church where we started early with panerns encourage more gas use, more disappointed to find that the 2004 Quaker envelopes to bring a small offering, mostly highways, and the desuuction of more of sweat lodge was canceled in Amherst afrer a pennies, to Sunday school each week. Later our landscape. Chemicals and pesticides used Massachusetts Native American objected to on, our envelopes were put in the offering in agriculture and lawn management end up it as cultural misappropriation. plate that was passed through each row in our streams. These are all current Though I support the decision to cancel during the church services-reminding us problems that Friends could address in our the 2004 Quaker sweat lodge out of respect that it was a way to give thanks for our own lives. Do I live in a way that is car for the feelings of people among whom we blessings and maintaining the church as well. dependent? Do I maintain my propeny Quakers were guests, I think that a few We had a responsibiliry to share along with without the use of chemicals? What do I do points need more consideration: every member, young or old. I have not been
4 january 2007 FRJENDS ]OURNAL aware, in three different meetings during my to seek divine guidance. I have found that, and/or time commitment for peace life, that any special effort was made to teach to get an answer, I have to ask a very purposes. How many cluster bombs have our children that sharing a part of their specific question. been bought with their tax money? Each day allowance would help the meeting in many Being a student of "A Course In I weep seeing the List in the New York Times ways, including supplies for First-day Miracles" and especially doing its Workbook of those killed in Iraq, particularly the school. Are we giving our children the since 1982 have helped me tremendously 18-20-year-olds. I cannot describe the opportunity to share in the care of with learning how to Listen to and receive. impact the deaths of hundreds of thousands meeting, not only with their allowances but oflraqis we have slaughtered has on me. also in participating in the monthly work Lisa Stewart What if500 Friends withheld $10-$100 days, especially in putting their classrooms Lake Worth, Fla. from their 2006 tax returns? What if more in order? did so next year? Throw sand in the wheels As I read the various articles I looked for Friendly Scrabble of the IRS. Put our money where our the word "tithing" and noticed it only once, collective mouths are when it comes to Peace but I may have missed a few. I was told on A friend kindly passed on the August Tax Fund legislation. That might get issue in which there is a "Pastimes" one occasion that the word "tithe" is not in Congressional attention. department, "Changing the Rules of the Quaker vocabulary. This I doubt, but I What are we afraid of? War tax refusal is Scrabble." I am reminded of how our own have found it helpful in thinking about my not to be feared. In fact, it has opened up for family did just that some 35 years ago when responsibility as a member. It is an old me whole new opportunities for service and we began the adventure of starting our biblical term and is worth considering. ministry. The FRIENDS JOURNAL query is also cooperative game company, Family Pastimes. Suppose you look at your monthly income "What are you called to today?" I propose a I wrote up the rules in our and decide a tithe of one-fifth can be paid Co-Op Games more obvious wimess to our testimonies. Manual so other families could try it. My on a monthly basis; multiply by 12 and the thanks to Alice and Bob Mabbs for giving us Perry TreadweU results may surprise you. The practice of a boost of joy to find another family on the Decatur, Ga. waiting until the end of the year to make a same path. We used to advertise for many donation may leave an unnecessary deficit years in the JOURNAL when we had a mail on occasion. We may give to other charities order service for the games. We have since Finding the Spirit in the and causes, but the meeting is our spiritual phased out the mail order part, but do sell home and ought to come first. We pay jOURNAL wholesale to retailers and also provide the club or other organizational dues as well as games as a fundraiser to various The October issue of FRIENDS JOURNAL attend meetings regularly bur often leave was too wonderful for words. It's clear that organizations. You can view our current the meeting off our list. Count your production at our informational site the collection of these articles was Spirit-led, blessings; money happens to be one of them.
" by Terry H. Wallace Friends often protest that the statements J ou've probably heard a conversation pretations that lead toward mindless faith like this between members and attenders and unmindful action-and even lead us examined here are of the modern, unprogrammed Religious to view people of other faiths as bigots. Society of Friends: Let us consider them one by one: signs ofan open mind, but such positions "What dn Friends believe? Or, 1. All religions are saying the same thing, basicaUy, what dn I have to believe to only in different words. This late 19th are actually as join Friends?" century platitude sounds pleasant and "Oh, dnn't worry. Friends have no gained much favor in the 20th century. It close-minded as those is fast becoming one of the key pious slo creed. You can believe anything you want ofa biblical literalist in our meeting. AU religions are saying gans of popular culture and civic religion. the same thing, only in different words. However, it is factually wrong and cuts off orfundAmentalist. There are many ways to Truth and aU any significant dialogue between the fol religions kad to God. That's why we see lowers of different faiths. the Bibk as just one great book among Clearly, Satanism, Shamanism, Pan ing differences. Devout Buddhists, Tao many. \.% see that ofGod in every theism, and other minor faiths are radi ists, Hindus, and Muslims will immedi person, that Divine Spark, that littk cally different beliefsystems, fostering sig piece ofGod, in each ofus.'' nificantly different behaviors (or "works") ately perceive the lack of knowledge and in their followers. Even ifone narrows the experience behind this position and re I to "WeU, is there anything have dn?" statement down to "all major religions are spond, "I beg your pardon! We definitely "You might say Friends are rugged basically saying the same thing," it still is are not just like you." What serves too spiritual individualists. However, aU not factually correct. Studies of Hinduism, often as an attempt to be nice and accept Friends embrace the Peace Testimony.'' Taoism, Islam, Judaism, and Christianity ing of people ofother faiths ends up being 'How dn you get anything dnne if quickly expose essential differences in off-putting and insulting. your meetings are foU ofrugged their understanding and experience of individualists?" God, their expectations of their followers, 2. You can believe anything you want as "Easy. \.% work by consensus in our and their outcomes. Such study can be an a Friend. This is one of the most regret business meetings. , arduous intellectual undertaking, but some table claims mouthed in Friends meetings help is available. For instance, Michael because, in reality, it is not true. One can This conversation reflects several per Green's "But Don~ All Religions Lead to see how the claim is a corollary to the spectives widely embraced by people in God?':· Navigating the Multi-Faith Maze is all-religions-are-saying-the-same-thing the United States in general, and by un a good starting point. And Christianity position, and such statements are made programmed Quakers in particular. Each and the Crisis of Cultures, by Joseph with the intention of putting newcomers view is often held and expressed by peo Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI), at ease. However, many liberal, unpro ple who consider themselves to be right brings significant added scholarship for grammed Friends meetings have a strong thinking, well-educated, and well-read those who desire to delve deeper. bias against Christians, against Republi individuals. Yet, when one investigates One of the most regrettable results of cans, against individuals who have scru each claim, one fmds each is based on the all-faiths-are-the-same position is its ples over abortion and gay marriage, and vague thinking, factual errors, and tendency to stop positive dialogue with some even voice discomfort concerning remarkable ignorance. They are misinter those ofother faiths. Rather than being an meeting membership for those of lower pretations of faith in general, and Quaker enlightened position that brings people of social classes. faith and practice in particular, misinter- different faiths together and honors their differences, its claim is that "underneath 3. Friends have no creeds. When Friends Terry Wallace is a member ofWarrington Meet the surface, you're just like us; we have of the past made statements against creeds, ing in Wellsville, Pa. He served as general editor nothing to learn from you." It is a claim what they emphasized was that creeds for the reprint ofGeorge Fox's eight-volume Works. that blinds its believers to very challeng- have no saving power. The mere declara-
6 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL tion that one believed the creed was beside a product of late 19th- and early 20th ers of the first generation rightly pointed the point of true faith. Quakers asserted century "polite mysticism," part of a out that the Word of God does not refer that what was really important was meet renewal movement among unprogrammed to the Bible, but to Christ Jesus (see John ing their Lord, bringing life under God's Friends. Its origins lie in Greek Neopla 1 and Revelation 19: 13). However, this will, and becoming a living witness tonism, reinterpreted to make early 20th truth in no way demoted the Bible in through words and deeds to God's pres century unprogrammed Quakerism more their minds to the status ofany other great ence in their lives. Friends of the past were intellectually acceptable in college and book, like Plato's Republic or Islam's not afraid to embrace doctrine. They university circles. It dominated thinking Qur' an. Quite the opposite! George Fox, wrote books filled with it, and empha in the first 50 years of the century, but that first Friend with his remarkable sized that the foundation of Quaker faith fared poorly in the vast bloodlettings and knowledge of Scripture, observed that he lay not in words but in a living relation genocides of World War II and the ensu had "no slight esteem of the Holy Scrip with the Creator. ing Cold War. T he idealism and rational tures, but they were very precious to me, A few years ago, the Outreach Com ity that undergirded Neoplatonic mysti for I was in that spirit by which they were mittee of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting cism proved of little relevance in the face given forth, and what the Lord opened in produced a Welcome poster and postcards of the cynicism and irrationality of me I afterwards found was agreeable to with what might be called the present-day Nazism, Communism, and nuclear war. them." Quakers asserted that the Bible creed of many Friends (italics are mine): The majority of Friends in unpro still was to be treasured because it con grammed meetings today are biblically tained "the words of God" and was vital Who are the builders of, and worshipers at illiterate, theologically unlettered, and un as a guidebook against which to check the this meetinghouse? Are we only a sect of the familiar with Friends history and spiritu rightness or wrongness of one's spiritual past or do we really still exist today? al experience. For instance, one often hears leadings. Even most non-Christian scrip We who have been called Seekers after unprogrammed Friends speaking of "my tures can't match the Bible's remarkable Truth, Quakers, and Friends, are members of Inner Light" and "your Inner Light," as if evolution, being the work of many hands the Religious Society of Friends. Yes, we are a over more than one thousand years: a sect, but we do not separate ourselves from the the Inner Light was something each of us world around us. possessed. Friends' original understanding book of books detailing the work of God we believe God is present in every person of the Light comes from John 1, where it in salvation history. and that peace is preferable to war. We gather is clearly identified with the work and pres in silent communal worship to wait on the ence of Jesus Christ-an understanding 6. All Friends embrace the Peace Testi Spirit of God. Sometimes it moves us in oth recognized for nearly two and a half cen mony. The claim that peace is the one erways. turies by Friends. It is only in the 20th essential Friends testimony is grounded in We have no formal creed, no ritual, dog century that "the Light" has been a fundamental misunderstanding ofQuak ma, nor liturgy. Instead, to help us follow divorced from Christ Jesus and reinter er testimonies. A quick review of Quaker divine guidance we pose, both individually preted to be much more comfortable, far history will establish that, after the first and corporately, searching queries; we strive to less active, and- yes-less intrusive and generations of Friends, a significant num trust to love, rather than react to fear. We work towards peace because we believe searching than it really is. ber fell away from the Peace Testimony. it is the only way. We are led to implement our The Fighting Quakers of Rhode Island in concerns for the equal rights of all. Many of 5. The Bible is just one great book the 18th century are an early case in point. us have been drawn to this religion-Quak among many. Individuals who make this According to John H. McCandless in erism- because of its dual commitment to claim mistakenly conclude that earlier None Were So Clear, even in the 1930s, far spiritual awareness and social action. generations of Quakers were saying that more Methodists embraced a pacifist These beliefi are not always easy to hold nor the Bible was not really important. Quak- position than did Friends (both propor- to honor with action but our search has led us to commit ourselves to them. Perhaps this approach of Friends could be helpful and meaningful to you. We welcome WE HAVE you to accept our invitation to search with us at this or any other meetinghouse or place. If NOSE\ you wish, please come to join with us for wor ship. Your children are also welcome either at ~ . meeting for worship or First-day school.
Ironically, a creed that claims not to be a creed is still a creed. The foregoing is very clearly a statement of belief, and Friends who fail to subscribe to it often find them selves quietly isolated from the meeting.
4. That of God in every person is that Divine Spark, that litcle piece of God, in each of us. This concept was antithetical to the thinking of original Friends and is FRIENDS JOURNAL january 2007 7 tionately and in real numbers). Twenty like so many others discussed here, by a Third, such positions may be rooted first-century Friends who espouse the slo failure to study both Quaker history and in, and fed by, our feelings of guilt over gan, "War is not the answer," are often Quaker doctrine. the sins of our own Western civilization. hard put to define what is the answer, rely For early generations of Friends, meet We feel bitterness over the sins of colo ing on partisan political arguments rather ing for worship with a concern for busi nialism, racism, and violence against non than divine commandments to support ness had nothing to do with consensus Western religions and cultures over the their stand. building. It consisted ofsee king God's will last five centuries, and that guilt too often The earliest Quakers had no checklist and allowing the meeting to be brought propels us toward a simplistic declaration: of testimonies, and they did not view into unity by the immediate presence and "We're not part of that! We affirm you. what became "the Testimonies" as a smor active power of God. This early under You see: We reject the faith and civiliza gasbord of behaviors from which they standing required each participant in the tion that failed in part and fostered those could pick the ones they felt like accept meeting to cast aside personal agendas, horrors." We use an opt-out strategy, thus ing. They viewed their lives-all their pet ideas, and political positions, and in avoiding the hard work of determining words and actions-as testimony, a wit so doing to seek the divine will. It was what remains good in Western societies, ness to the presence and power of Christ incumbent on all present to allow God to and what needs to be redeemed. And we Jesus within them. Instead of a smorgas challenge and change hearts and minds, simplistically embrace other cultures as bord of virtues-brotherhood, integrity, and bring a miraculous divine unity, good, failing to realize that nationalism, peaceableness, etc.--early Quakers viewed where before there were human strife greed, expansionism, and violence are not the entirety of their lives as being a seam and division. Western failings, but human failings. less and living witness. To divorce peace We're dealing with the human condition, from integrity, compassion, gentleness, What brought us to these not the Western condition. and truthfulness was to plant the seeds of unseemly misinterpretations? Fourth, such positions may also repre discord that led to violence and war. sent a positive veneer masking the post modernist political slurry so popular in 7. Friends are rugged spiritual individu university classrooms. Yet, the postrnod alists. The rugged individualism em W m;ght well ask why Ftiond. to ernist deconstruction of belief systems braced, praised, and fostered by U.S. cul day espouse such simplistic falsehoods. does not lead to a more tolerant and pos ture has thoroughly infected the Religious Let us examine several possible reasons, itive society. It simply strips citizens oflife Society of Friends, and nowhere more so while recognizing that they don't begin to saving and life-sustaining beliefs and val than in unprogrammed meetings. In those exhaust the possibilities. ues, leaving them confused and defense meetings one often hears regret, even First, most of the statements examined less against those who would exploit them. grief, over the disintegration of commu here allow the speaker to avoid any chal nity in U.S. culture. Ironically, many who lenge or conflict. The first three state join Friends these days are on a passionate ments examined above immediately cut The danger in misunderstanding search for community because they are off any further conversation or examina T Quaker faith victims of shattered relationships, broken tion of their claims. T hey are often Quak families, and an individualism that trumps er "code" for saying circumspectly, "I'm I he misunderstandings discussed here the most important social relationships of uncomfortable with religious discus often lead us to take positions and make marriage, family, and kinship. They feel sions," or "Don't bother me." Friends of claims that may well horrifY us when we like individual flotsam tossed to and fro on ten protest that the statements examined discover their true import. Peter Kreeft, a an uncaring societal sea, rough with com here are signs of an open mind, but this mercial exploitation and the chop and protestation is mistaken. Such positions undertow of banal appeals. Several years are actually as dose-minded as those of a ago I listened to a Friend's heartfelt agony biblical literalist or fundamentalist. They over the loss of community he had expe might well be termed Quaker unpro rienced, but was not surprised when he grammed fundamentalism. confessed that he was unwilling to give up Second, such positions avoid the diffi his "freedom'' in order to serve the expec cult and uncomfortable struggle of seek tations, limits, and demands of commu ing and finding God, and beyond finding nity. His spiritual individualism trumped God, seeking and doing God's will. Mod the requirements of the community. ern Friends revel in being "seekers," but are often quite uncomfortable with those 8. Quaker business meetings work by who claim to be "finders." Why? Because consensus. T his idea blossomed during the struggle to find God leads to discov the second half of the 20th century when eries about ourselves that are uncomfort many sociologically trained individuals able and disconcerting, and will demand glanced at the Quaker meeting for busi changes in our behavior that will draw us ness and noticed what they thought was a away from, and into conflict with, shal similarity to the process called "consensus low, self-centered, destructive, and unsus building." This misidentification arose, tainable popular cultures. Continued on page 44
8 january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL e history, role, and involvement as '~azing Grace," "Lift Him Up," and f African Americans in the Reli "There is a Fountain Filled with Blood," gious Society of Friends have been promised eternal forgiveness, new begin subjects of long-standing interest to me. nings, and eternal salvation through the Accordingly, I believe that it is only right ever-present grace of God. Afrer Sunday and fitting to take stock of where we have school, instead of leaving the church like been and where we may be going. I am many of the kids my age, I would go up speaking through the prism of my own stairs with my mother for the service. To experience, which is very Quakerly, since keep me occupied, she always brought we claim to be adherents of an experien along a little package of crayons so that I tial religion. My theme, "A Quaker Speaks could color copies of the church program from the Black Experience," is also the during the sermons. But every once in a title of a little book I co-authored with while, when the sermon was really going Pulitzer Prize-winning author Carleton with a lot offeeling, I would look up from Mabee some 26 years ago. The book is my coloring and listen. I remember in par about the life and times of a dear depart ticular one powerful sermon given by Rev. ed Friend (and friend of mine), Barring Caddell, my favorite Quinn minister, in ton Dunbar, who was instrumental in my which he thundered out, "A man must be formal coming to membership in the more than a walking appetite!" I have nev Religious Society of Friends. er forgotten those words, and they remain I say "formal coming to membership" with me now as part of my moral compass. because I believe I had temperamentally However, I felt somewhat alienated at become a Friend many years before my times from the church teachings I re formal membership in our Religious Soci- ceived in Sunday school. When I asked the Sunday school teacher what it meant when the Bible said that man was made in the image of God, he told me it meant that God looked like a man. I then asked him how God could be all-powerful and eternal, since a man's vision is limited to what is before his eyes and in front ofhim , and a man can't reproduce without the help ofa woman. He responded by telling me, "God moves in mysterious ways, His wonders to unfold," which was really just an adult's way ofsay ing, "Kid, shut up and accept what I say!" I raised similar ques tions about why the U.S. flag had to stand next to our church flag, and why, ifJesus and the Bible said, "Thou shalt not kill," killing was all right as long as your coun- try said you could do it. Most of all, I wondered why a loving God would speak ~ to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses '} thousands of years ago and then quit ~ speaking to anyone else since then. I won- ~ dered why God wouldn't speak to me. I remember climbing to the top of one james Fletcher is a member of College Station ety began some 32 years ago. I am not of the big hills surrounding our little town Worship Sharing Group in Houston, Tex. He is referring to some early Quaker ancestors nestled along the banks of the Ohio Riv treasurer for American Friends Service Commit in my family tree in 18th-century Ohio, er, which flowed through the valley below. tee, and has served extensively with AFSC, but rather to the fact that, in some ways, I lay down in the grass, closed my eyes, Friends World Committee for Consultation, and I believe I was always a Friend. When I prayed deeply to God, and asked Him, if other Friends organizations in work in the Re was little, I loved being a Christian He were truly God, would He please public ofSouth Africa. He is cofounder ofthe Fellowship of Friends of African Descent because it felt so good and true; I loved speak to me? I waited and waited, very (FFAD), and co-author oftwo books, A Quak my mother, whom I felt was a wonderful deep in prayer. But all I heard was the er Speaks From the Black Experience: The Christian; and I really loved the many old buzzing of the bees, the chirping of the Life and Collected Works of Barrington Dun hymns we sang in our family church, birds, and the sweet sound of leaves bar and Friends Face the World. This essay was Quinn African Methodist Episcopal, in rustling in the softly blowing wind. When adapted from a speech to FFAD in April2006. Steubenville, Ohio. Beautiful hymns such I opened my eyes, I saw only the bright
FRIENDS JOURNAL january 2007 9 blue sky and the sun in the distance. So I co become a Christian, co whom, afterwards, and others. He introduced me to the wondered what God this was that seemed the knowledge and understanding of princi many weighty Friends he knew, and so remote and inaccessible, that so many ples will not be wanting, but will grow up so explained what to me then seemed to be people talked about even though none much as is needful as the natural fruit of chis the strange practices, speech, and behav had actually seen Him face to face, other good root. And such a knowledge will not be iors that characterized Quaker culture. than Jesus and, of course, Moses. barren or unfruitful, afi:er chis marmer. And, most of all, he gave me a good ini I became further alienated by the idea tial understanding of the mysterious oper of a God who played favorites with the When I was considering becoming a ations of Quaker policies. peoples of the Earth, choosing one group member of the Religious Society of Barrington Dunbar died in 1980 while to be a "chosen people," and then, later, Friends, I had read deeply of the writings I was living in Boulder, Colorado. He seeming to favor Christians above other of early Friends, and attended Wilton often seemed like a lion in meetings, faiths. From this kind of theological (Conn.) Meeting, which then had Bob speaking with the spirit of an ancient approach, it is a simple matter in the Leslie as its clerk. Bob was wonderful at Hebrew prophet; but he grew increasing mind to make other distinctions among outreach. With fruitful persistence, he ly quiet in his later years. He was very God's creation, such as the elevation of helped me overcome my delays in attend- troubled when some members of his home white people above people of color. We mgmeeting. meeting in New York City seemed in should never forget that Western colo But I still had a major "stop in my creasingly to disregard him. He wrote to nialists, slaveholders here in the United mind" about becoming a member of the me about one member who referred to States, and even a number of religious meeting. The Civil Rights Movement, him as a "thorn in the flesh." When I denominations today have used verses in though beyond its high point, was still a wrote back to Barry and asked him how the Bible to justify black slavery, subjuga potent force, and another round of race he could still remain a Quaker in the face tion, and inferiority. As a young man, I riots had recently transpired. I did not of such treatment, he replied, "Because agreed with Malcolm X who said, "The want my becoming a member of the Reli they let me speak my piece." Unfottunate white man took the gold from our ances gious Society of Friends to compromise ly, there are a number of problems and tors in Africa, gave them the Bible, and my identity as an aware, black U.S. citi dilemmas Quakers face that make our then reduced them to slavery." zen, fully committed to the freedom and Religious Society less than the shining I began a spiritual pilgrimage that led liberation struggles of black people world example of the peaceable Kingdom ofour me to look briefly at the Nation oflslam, wide. I also felt that the Friends Peace Tes hopes and dreams. and then at agnosticism, Baha'i, and Uni timony would constrain me to be on the Despite our proud heritage as the first tarian Universalism, until I came to the sidelines rather than at the forefront in major Western Christian denomination Religious Society of Friends, and I knew this fight. to come out against slavery, and the many at last that I was home. If anyone ever asked me if I were a Christian, I always said "no" throughout this period, even a I did not want my becoming a member ofthe number of years afi:er I became a Friend, but eventually I came back to adopting Religious Society ofFriends to compromise my identity the Christian identity I had once dearly citizen. cherished as a child. I returned to it with as an aware, black U.S. new eyes that had been opened to read the Scriptures in a fresh and different way. As Robett Barclay wrote ofhis own con Barrington Dunbar was so central in contributions of Quaker abolitionists, vincement almost 330 years ago in An my life then because when I read his words, speaking out against slavery is not the Apology for the True Christian Divinity, his it was clear that he was a black Friend in same thing as supporting racial equality, systematic exposition ofQuaker theology: good standing who was not himself con and supporting racial equality is not the strained in the ways I feared I could be. same thing as living and practicing it For not a few have come co be convinced of He was one who could "speak to my con not only in thoughts and words, but in the Truth afi:er the manner of which I myself dition" by writing forcefully about con deeds and in everyday life. It is sometimes am in pare a true wimess, who not by strength cerns that were near and dear to my heart, difficult to struggle against white racism of argument or by a particular disquisition of but which I did not feel were uppermost from within the Religious Society of each document and convincement of my in the hearts and minds of white Friends Friends because so many Friends believe understanding thereby came co receive and bear wimess of the Truth, but by being secret I knew. I wrote to Barrington, who lived we have escaped the sin of racism. Pride ly reached by chis life. For when I came into close by in New York. We met and even and self-righteousness often blind us to the silent assemblies of God's people, I felt a tually became very special friends. I still the reality of it. Our affliction is best secret power among them which couched my remember the many wonderful conversa expressed by the title of a novel by Frank heart, and as I gave way unto it, I fOtmd the tions we had in his apartment, which was Yerby: The Odor ofSanctity. evil in me weakening, and the good raised up. richly decorated with African art and Certain unique aspects of our Quaker And so I became thus knit and united to sculpture. Barry was my Quaker mentor. culture can seem particularly strange or them, hungering more and more afi:er chis He took me along to meetings he had forbidding to a newcomer or attender. In power and Life, whereby I mighr feel myself with all the Quaker "alphabet soup the United Scates and Great Britain, many perfectly redeemed, and chis is the surest way groups": AFSC, FWCC, FCNL, QUNO, of these characteristics stem from our spe-
IO january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL ...... _ _..._ ...... 0 .... , ....._.. .. _ ...... ----- ..... ~- ----~~-~~ ------o-- ---1 -~- -, ----··· ·--- .. ··-- -·-; ---·-~ ~- --·-·-- a number of historical and cultural Anglo- Rhodesia because they couldn't stand to ment was ours! Saxon norms. Truly multicultural we are live in the new Zimbabwe. The govern Of course, I could go on about the not. Part of the beneficial impact of the ment enacted a number of reforms to help shortcomings of Friends and the many Fellowship of Friends of African Descent equalize the former radically unequal disappointments I've had. However, that has been to act as a force to change these social and economic situations of black would not do justice to the other side: tendencies. Some of these problematic Zimbabweans relative to white Zimbab those very special moments in truly gath aspects of our Quaker culture, past and weans. One of these measures was to ered meetings when, in the words of present, include: equalize the pay of schoolteachers. Previ- George Fox, "I felt as if I had come up • Tendencies toward excessive worship of through the flaming sword into the Quaker ancestry, history, and our garden of Eden in which all things alleged uniqueness as a people, the holi were made new, and the creation gave est or most respected of Christians, with off a new and beautiful fragrance." the corollary that you have to be very, One example of such an experience very good to be a Quaker. was the first meeting of the Fellowship • Certain cultish tendencies among Friends of Friends of African Descent at Pen in language and behavior. die Hill in 1990. That meeting was a • Our at times cultish commitment to tremendous outflowing of joy, celebra pacifism. tion, and exuberance. There was an • The special role of "weighty'' Friends. abundance of worshipful silence and • The increasing academic intellectualism sharing in word, song, and prayer. The among Friends, with an accompanying power of the Holy Spirit was over all. loss of that authentic life and power that It went on for hours. The clerks tried so animated early Friends and made three times to end the meeting, but the them quake. Spirit kept on flowing until it was ready, in God's own good time, to cease. I remember many painful personal Yet another special meeting for wor instances when I have come up against ship for me came, unintended, as our ~ aspects of Quaker culture. Some years AFSC delegation offour people found { ago, when I first brought my wife, Maria, ourselves about to be arrested in South ~ to a Friends meeting, I was hurt and Africa. We were stopped at Kalfontain ~ embarrassed when a weighty white station by the white Afrikaner security Friend, speaking to her about Quakerism, ously, there had been an extremely wide police for daring to ride in the black sec said, "You know, you have to be very gap in pay between black and white tion of the then segregated train. Scarnell intelligent to be a Quaker!" That was a schoolteachers, despite performing equiv Lean was an elderly white Quaker who real turn-off to her, and rightly so. Maria alent work. As a result of this and other was a member ofJohann esburg Meeting, is a Roman Catholic; and the term reforms, a number of black members of and the only member of that rather large "catholic" means "universal." But the white the Friends meeting in Bulawayo who meeting who came to ride the train with Friend's comment reeked of the smugness had been recipients of the scholarship us, although open invitations were given and elitist self-satisfaction that often char fund held by the meeting, now became to all. He was standing on the train, hav- acterize a number of people in our meet net contributors to this fund. ing given his seat to a black woman. ings, and are so far from the authentic Revolutionary social change was in the When the security police gave him an spirit of Quakerism. air. It was truly an exciting time to be in order to leave that section of the train and In 1980, I was blessed to participate in Zimbabwe. About 20-30 percent of the move to the white section, or else be a four-person delegation that American membership of the Friends meeting in arrested, Scarnell shouted out firmly that Friends Service Committee sent on a pas Bulawayo was black. The clerk of the he could not obey that order because he toral visit to the Republic of South Africa meeting, a white woman named Nancy had orders from a Higher Authority that in response to a previous delegation to the Johnson, told us that she was very embar he had to follow. When the policeman U.S. of white South African Friends, rassed that they did not have a much larg asked him to show him those orders, Scar- sponsored by Friends World Committee er black membership in their meeting. nell replied, "I can't, because they are writ- for Consultation. On our way to South She said she knew that to us, coming from ten on my heart." Africa, we passed through Zimbabwe. the United States, they probably seemed a T hen I felt a powerful meeting for wor This was right after the revolution that little backward in that respect, and that we ship beginning there on the train, right in replaced the previous white-minority were probably used to much higher levels the middle of a dangerous situation. In regime oflan Smith. of black membership in our own meet fact, it seemed that time stopped for us, The Friends meeting in Bulawayo, ings. I told her there was no need for her ancient Quaker testimonies came to life, Zimbabwe, had been mightily affected by to be embarrassed because, frankly, the and we were all oblivious to the situation the revolution. There were some white only places I'd seen such a high percent we were in. Each of us felt mutually sup Friends who had carried guns to defend age of black membership in Friends meet- ported and lifted to a higher plane by a
FRIENDS JOUFNAL ]anuary 2007 II \...U.llLJ Vll.l\...\...1 UJ.\..11 \...VUUUUL\..U lUJ' J.J.H.,..UU) uuc:q:;Q d.UU WlUl\;U .)UI,..lUt:;\...UllUUll\... d.UU d..111U11111!:) UJd.l. '-JUU !J.d...) "'l'Un..\..11 l.V u.> 111. Jerry Herman, director of our AFSC political concepts like race and ethnicity, the past, speaks to us in the present, and South Africa program, and asked him to which are forms of idolatry present in will be speaking for all the future to come. give up his seat. When he refused, cau most religious traditions. Such an affirma These teachings shatter the chains of spir tioning the security officer that he would tion is non-idolatrous and removes our con itual servitude and imprisonment by be creating an international incident, the cepts of God and Christ from a focus on human construCts, and potentially free us officer told Jerry that he was arrested and human forms. from the spiritual colonialism historically took him by the arm. It was as if I was One of the reasons the Fourth Gospel imposed on people of color by Eurocen looking down on all thls from someplace is referred to as the "Quaker text" is that tri~ forms of religious belief and interpre above me when I heard a voice saying, so much of early Friends theology is raoon. "You can't arrest him, and if you do, you grounded in it. It is even the source ofour will have to arrest me too!" I was surprised name, "Friends," derived from Jesus' words Affirming the everlasting power of love, to realize that the voice was mine. inJohn 15:12-15: which speaks to the statement Martin Lu The officer said, "Okay, you're arrested ther King Jr. often made that "the moral too!" He then approached our two other This is my commandment, that ye love one arc of the universe is long, but it bends traveling companions, Lois Forrest and another, as I have loved you. Greater love hath toward justice." Ann Steever, also members of the AFSC no man than this, that a man lay down his life Validating the original Quaker belief in, and commitment to, the "Lamb's War," What are the fondamental spiritual principles ofthe the Scriptural basis for which is reflected Religious Society ofFriends that speak most ckarly to in Ephesians 6:10-17: the African American experience? Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but delegation, and Eddie Mvundlela, clerk of for his friends. Ye are my friends, if ye do against principalities, against powers, against whatsoever I command you. Henceforth I call Soweto Friends Meeting, and asked them the rulers of the darkness of this world, against you not servants; for the servant knoweth not to move as well. Like Scarnell Lean, they spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore what lord doeth; but I have called you refused to move. We were all arrested his take unto you the whole armor of God, that friends; for all things that I have heard of my together, afraid of what might come next, ye may be able w withstand in the evil day, Father I have made known unto you. but bound together and uplifted by the and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, love of God. What a powerful meeting for having your loins girt about with truth, and worship that was! Affirming the possibility and the reality having on the breastplate of righteousness: Experiences such as that make us elat of direct revelation of spiritual leadings and your feet shod with the preparation of the ed to be Friends. And in such moments, and Truth to individuals waiting faith gospd of peace; above all, taking the shield of we know we are being touched by the fully in the Light, and the power of spir- faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all hand of God. More than our advices and queries, and our social witness and activism, I believe the fundamental spiri tual principles that lie at the core of the Religious Society of Friends are the key to our future growth and survival. These principles are essential to true and effec tive outreach to seekers of all kinds and, in particular, to people of color seeking a right spiritual home. What are the fundamental spiritual principles of the Religious Society of Friends that speak most clearly to the African American experience? In my view, .., they are the following: ~ ;:t 'i' Affirming the fundamental, spiritual, ~ and everlasting nature of God and the ~ Christ of the Fourth Gospel-often ~ called the "Quaker text"-who was with ~ ~ God in the beginning. This grounds our ~ belief in a spiritually transcendent deity
12 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL of the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the pretations that have often been used to death removes the masks, they shall know helmet ofsalvation, and the sword of the Spir exploit and control us. One example of one another, despite the diverse liveries it, which is the word of God. such an interpretation was the white they wear in this earthly life." Western belief that black people had no I can think of no better spiritual souls, or needed to be converted to Chris What is our role as Friends of African expression than this for the holy narure of tianity. This belieflay at the root of Euro descent? Clearly, we have many responsi our fight, as Friends, against racism and pean conquest, colonialism, and the bilities as African American Friends, and, for peace and social justice. The concept enslavement of our forebears, and still as good Quakers, we may all have differ of the Lamb's War supports the ongoing buttresses contemporary beliefs in black ent views on what they should be. How struggle for liberation of oppressed peo inferiority. ever, there are a few specific roles I bring ples around the world from cultural and to your attention: economic domination by the ruling class Affirming the role of the Scriptures, but es of the white Western powers. The orig putting them in proper perspective. Ear To continue to pursue individually the inal Quaker concept of the Lamb's War ly Friends saw Quakerism as a third form unique spiritual path God has ordained also serves as a powerful antidote to the of Christianity, saying that Catholicism for each of us, living up to all the Light cultish commitment to pacifism that based its spiritual authority primarily on inside each one of us so that even more often lies at the core of the beliefs of many tradition, Protestantism based its spiritual Light can be given to us. Friends today. authority primarily on the Scriprures, but Quakerism based its spiritual authority To support one another as best we can in Embracing the reality of what early primarily on informed experience. our collective search for spiritual growth Friends called continuous revelation, and As George Fox said, '~d when my and advancement. Again, the Fellowship what some of us also see as "progressive hopes in all men were gone, I heard a of Friends of African Descent is one fine revelation." This opens us up to the reali voice saying, 'There is one, even Christ example of this, as are many other ty that there is always more to the book of Jesus who can speak to thy condition.' attempts to recognize the importance of life than we know, that there are truths yet When I heard this, my heart did leap with acknowledging the special spiritual power to be revealed, or truths already revealed joy ... and this I knew, experimentally." of our collective identities. of which we may not yet be aware. This These principles also undergird Quaker frees us from time-bound religious inter- universalism, which potentially frees us To define, write, speak, and otherwise from the limitations of a put forward our unique spiritual insights more confined and Euro and Quaker journeys. Quaker history as centric point of view, and it is written is overwhelmingly white and opens us to a greater and Anglocentric, and much more so than the more authentic dialogue reality of that history. The voices of with all the world's great George Fox, James Nayler, Robett Bar religious traditions. As clay, Isaac Penington, Willliam Penn, William Penn wrote, "The Thomas Kelly, and Rufus Jones must be pure-hearted, pious, and joined with the voices of Paul Cuffe, true souls are everywhere Sarah Mapps Douglas, Alain Docke, of one religion, and when Bayard Rustin, Barrington Dunbar, and
Continued on page 45
Pages 12 and 13: The Fellowship of Friends of African Descent during its 2006 gathering.
FRIENDS JoURNAL january 2007 13 THE IRAQ WAR AND ITS IMPUCATIONS FOR QUAKERS by Maya M. Porter
very day, the war in Iraq gets more deadly and less defensible. Regardless Eof what the U.S. government says, the war is about oil. President Bush sure ly went to war in the Middle East to pro L\T RY Tl:\11: I TUR\: TI IE KFY in m~ car ignition, tect the profits of the oil companies. But there is more to it than that. Much more. Wars throughout history have been 1:\'I:RY TL\11: I TUR\: UP TI IE TI ILRM< )ST~Ton fought to gain control of resources. In times past, that resource was frequently land, but in recent history, it has been oil. For instance, in World War II, Germany, I SUPPORT TI IL NEED FOR WAR. having no oil of its own, invaded Russia partly because Germany desperately needed oil to keep its war machine going. run our cars on gasoline, but rarely recog dependent on foreign oil, and while we Its ill-fated push toward Stalingrad was nize how many of the products we use get it from countries around the world, aimed at capturing Russia's southern oil every day are made with petroleum. The we must have access to Middle East sup fields. Japan, which also had none of the computer I'm using to write this, the rug plies. T his is not a matter of politics or oil it needed to pursue its war, bombed under my feet, the lamp by my desk, the corporate profits-it is a matter of sur Pearl Harbor primarily to destroy the air dishes I will eat my lunch on-at some vival ofour society. We, all of us, have cre craft carriers that were enforcing the oil point they all needed oil to be produced. ated a world in which we cannot live embargo imposed by the United States. And the lunch I will eat was produced on without oil and must get it largely from I cringe at the absurd profits big oil a mega-farm that required huge amounts countries where we need a military pres companies are making, but in a capitalist of fertilizer (made with natural gas), huge ence to ensure access. system, they have the right to make a amounts of diesel for the machinery to Hence the desperate, tragic attempt by profit, and having friends in high places plant and harvest it, and huge amounts of the Bush administration to control access has always helped corporations keep those fuel to drive the trucks that brought it to to the Middle East. Actually, this admin profits coming. But no company makes a me from the fields ofKansas--or the ships istration is only extending the pattern of profit if no one buys its product or serv that brought it from South America. previous administrations, which also ice. Oil is profitable only when the public Our current way of life is dependent understood this need. (For more on the buys it. on a constant supply of cheap oil. There subject of cheap oil and what its increas And that's the problem. We buy it. All is no way we can live without it, unless ing scarcity means to us, I suggest the of us do, because we have to. Our econo and until we develop alternative energy book TheEndofOil- OntheEdgeofaPer my has become totally dependent on sources that are massive enough, cheap ilous New World, by Paul Roberts.) cheap oil. Most of us have no idea just enough, and dependable enough to sus In an ideal world, all countries would how dependent we are. We know that we tain us. Many creative people are devel be sharing their oil cooperatively, peace oping these alternative energy sources, but fully, and at a fair price, for as long as it lasts. Unfortunately, we don't live in that Maya Porter, a .freelance editor and writer, is a at this time none of them can meet all of member ofFayetteville (Ark.) Meeting. She has those requirements, and cannot do so for world. We live in a world with leaders been a political and community activist for many years to come. who are aware only of how to get what many years. A slightly different version of this The United States' oil production they want with force, with or without article appeared in The Carillon, a magazine peaked in the 1970s, and the yield con diplomacy. And when the whole world for Quakers in Arkamas. tinues to dwindle every yeai. Thus we are wants Middle East oil, diplomacy fails.
january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL Being ignorant ofo r failing to meeting? How can we The nation's ability to produce had out trust any other options, the demand the end of a war stripped the public's desire to consume. Bush administration has no that is necessary to obtain Mass marketing and the promotion of choice but to use our military the resource we need to buying on credit changed the public's atti might to ensure that we have live? Is there some way we tude toward frugality and saving. But the a supply of cheap oil, as long can learn to live in today's more we consume, the more energy we as it can be pumped out of society without depend use and the more waste we produce. the ground. ence on oil? Does our The Quakers of the 1800s took seri Iraq is only one instance. Testimony of Simplicity ously their responsibility to raise aware As time goes by and our rela speak to that question? ness to bring about the abolition of slav tionships with Middle East As I understand it, ery. I believe that we as Quakers have an ern countries deteriorate still simplicity does not mean equally compelling responsibility to create further, there will surely be invasions of living without modern appliances, and I an awareness in our world of just what other countries. These wars will be neces doubt that this is the time to return to the kind of a society we have created, and to sary to sustain the civilization we know. horse and buggy. But there has to be a way help create another way of life. Therefore, as long as we participate in our to live that does not require fighting bru So where does that leave us Friends? economy as it is currently structured, we tal wars to secure the energy necessary to How can we fmd a way forward in this support the necessity of war. maintain that way of life. To prevent dilemma? First, I think we need to recog I believe that all of us, even we Quak future wars, we must be creative. We must nize our own roles in the problem. We are ers, are culpable in this. Every time I turn learn to live without oil dependency. not exempt from responsibility. We are
the key in my car ignition, every time I I see a direct connection between con part of the consumerist society, like it or turn up the thermostat on my furnace, sumerism and our dependency on oil, not not. Some of us deliberately consume less every time I buy food in the grocery store, to mention many other problems, such as than others, to reduce our personal foot I support the need for war. As much as I burying ourselves in garbage. We have not print on the world, but we have not dislike it, I don't see any alternative. always been such a consumerist society. escaped oil dependency altogether. I This raises some hard questions. How Consumerism developed as a conscious can we as Quakers protest the Iraq war effort on the part of business and govern while we continue to drive our cars to ment, starting around the early 1900s. Continued on page 46
FRIENDS ]OURNAL}anuary 2007 15 QUFSTIONS FOR QUAKERS ABOUT CARS by Benjamin J. Vail n a cold, rainy day in Maine tow truck. public transport his primary means ofget around Thanksgiving 2005, I got To be honest, I never enjoyed driving ting around. O rid of my car. Bright yellow anyway, and I only put about 50,000 The more I think about it, the more maple leaves drifted down with the rain- miles on the car over nine years. Though I'm inspired by his example. I also see par drops and stuck to the dark pavement. driving was sometimes required for my allels between car use and moral ques Despite the chilly gloom of the autumn work, for several years I questioned tions, because the car is linked to a whole weather, I felt a warm glow inside as the whether I wanted to own a car. Parking system of environmental and social vio tow truck pulled the sedan away. Finally I was a hassle, the gas cost a lot, and driv lence, at home and abroad. Since the ear was free! ing in the city was unpleasant. On the ly 20th century, trillions of dollars of I was moved to give up my vehicle other hand, it made grocery shopping and investment in public infrastructure have partly due to circumstance and partly due getting out of town easy. literally set the U.S. transportation system to the example of friends committed to Then, in 2004, a friend gave a speech in concrete. Now it is very difficult for car-free living. I currently live in Prague, against the war in Iraq on the steps of the individuals to fmd transportation alterna where an automobile isn't needed for dai Wisconsin state capitol that helped me see tives. While most in the United States ly life. So instead of keeping the car in things differently. He explained that as a may feel owning a car is necessary to func storage in the United States, I called the teenager, he had refused to go through tion within this system, that does not two rites of passage: he did not register for make the moral questions go away. It is a the Selective Service, and he did not get a personal lifestyle issue, but also an issue of Benjamin J Vail is an environmental sociologist and member ofMadison (Wis.) Meeting. He driver's license. He drew a clear connec social organization. currently lives in Prague, Czech Republic, where tion between these two decisions, which What are the moral issues? Car use has he is clerk of the Prague Worship Group, for him were actions of resistance against dire consequences for the environment and
16 january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL on the road. It is a system, but one in the United States due to traffic jams while In the 1700s and 1800s, Quakers moved which we each participate as individuals. commuting to and from work. to the forefront of the fight against slavery You are more likely to die in an auto in the United States. John Woolman and The Environment accident in the suburbs than from vio other activists confronted slave-owning lence in the inner city, Hawken asserts. Friends and urged everyone to think Can anyone doubt car use does vio Every year there are more than two mil about the moral implications of the sys lence to the environment? Car emissions lion traffic accidents that result in five mil tem of slavery, and their participation in contribute to global warming, acid rain, lion injuries and more than 40,000 it. By the time of the Revolutionary War, smog, and many human health problems. deaths. Highway accidents cost the nation virtually all Quakers had freed their slaves. The Ecologist magazine documents that more than $150 billion annually. By It was difficult to challenge slavery child asthma rates are on the rise, and tox 2020, traffic accidents are expected to because, as an institution, it was basic to ic dust from tires may cause diabetes and become the world's third leading cause of the functioning of society. The fight heart disease. New and expanded roads death, reports Resurgence magazine. against slavery meant economic sacrifices, divide the countryside, and noise pollu Most critically perhaps, car use today is personal inconvenience, and sometimes tion invades our neighborhoods. connected to economic exploitation and legal risks for many Quakers. But Friends The manufacture, use, and disposal of armed conflict around the world. Oil not only avoided complicity with the cars all produce deadly environmental companies and governments destroy slave system by boycotting products and burdens, as Paul Hawken and others habitat, oppress indigenous cultures, and emancipating their slaves; they actively point out in the book Natural Capitalism. undermine democracy and human rights resisted the injustice through political Think of the mining needed to get the movements to keep the petroleum flow action and the Underground Railroad. metal that goes into a car's body, and the ing. The Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska, We can see that in some ways, people other resource extraction required to geopolitical conflict in Latin America, the in the United States are enslaved to their make the plastic or leather interior, tires, murder of indigenous activists in Nigeria, autos and participate, however passively, in windows, and all the other components. the U.S. support of dictators in the Mid the exploitation of the Earth and other One of the worst environmental impacts dle East and Central Asia: all this is tied people through their car use. How do we comes from the auto body painting directly to U.S. motoring habits. And of react today, as individuals and as a spiritu process. The United States imports more course, there is the Iraq war and the per al community, to the structural injustices than eight million barrels of oil per day- petual presence of U.S. military forces in of the automobile system? Can we divest 450 gallons per person annually-to sat the Persian Gulf region that costs untold ourselves of the auto lifestyle? Can we wit isfy motoring demand. More than a mil tens of thousands oflives and hundreds of ness to alternative forms of transportation? lion wild animals are killed every week on billions of dollars. roads in the United States. Car disposal Questions and Connections results in seven billion pounds of unrecy Historical cled waste each year, Hawken says. A Parallel am fortunate to live in a European city he pre-Civil War system of slavery with good public transportation. Society in the Southern United States had l Prague is not bike-friendly, but the Tsome similarities, as an all-perva dense web of rail service, subways, trams, here are now more private vehicles sive system of exploitation and violence and buses means I don't need a car in my in the United States than registered that implicated even the unwilling, to the daily routine or to get out of town. In Tdrivers--over 200 million cars. modern U.S. car system. Slavery was a contrast, I know a car is considered nec Vast personal and social resources are sunk fundamental part of the national econo- essarv for mobility in many parts of the into the auto that c,llh:u States where public transportation ~d or nonexistent. When and if I :o the United States, I'll be faced s dilemma. Consider the advantages ofinvesting .y aim is not to point an accusing car-owning Quakers, but to sug in the future of FR\ ENDS we query ourselves as individuals _____ JOURNAL teetings about our connections to !ems associated with car use. It ith a planned gift, yo~ can helb ens~~ resource for Friends far into the futud re. 1y years for Friends to gain dari- that the JoURNAL contmues to e a vt . Accomplish these goo ow to act against slavery. It may W . . .tal gains and mcome taXes. :: for Friends to consider the 1 You also can realize saVln.gs l.n ca~l e for ourself and a loved one! ms of car use and decide on l things while providing lifenme m~m y uld like to see and mail this card, or call te responses. Certainly this is an ' - c . heck the ttems you wo u For more uuormaoon, cdin ll free at (Soo) 471-6863. •rayerful reflection and commu e. our Advancement Coor ator to . 0 gift uity illustration for the >Ston. a.J tahl gift lannmg a ann ; we can be inspired to find new, tc 0 our booklet on chari e p ill birthdates below lananasre for your w m 0 sample b equest o-o Birthdate: -----. Continued on page 47 F1 Name: Birthdate: ----- 17
• JJ_,_.: Zin: ____ Name:_=-=-=-=-=-=--=--=--=--=-~~-=--=-2-c=~'""" State: _____ T IN SEARCH OF REFUGE Making the journey North (Again)
across the room from me housed ac Toronto Friends House, also Betsy Brinson wears a military dog tag. helps these individuals and works to Later I learn chat he has establish favorable public policy. A brief photos by Laura Jones engraved it co say, "That of ing paper they wrote helps us understand God in everyone." It is a how much Canadian immigration policy spring day and, outside the has changed since Vietnam. They work meeting room window, call closely with the War Resisters Support tulips and newly flowered Campaign, a coalition of labor and reli trees speak co us in silence gious groups, veterans, and socialists, in a from the garden. In the room is a young soldier, Jeremy Hinz man, who is one of the cwo lead plaintiffs for the U.S. resisters in a case before the Cana dian government. His wife, Nga Nguyen, is enior Friend says, half-jokingly, upstairs in Religious Education with that every time the United States their three-year-old son, Liam. A goes co war, the Canadians gee co Jeremy is inspired by the lives and deal with ic. From the American Revolu writings of Dorothy Day and of tion, the French and Indian War, the Philip Berrigan, who went co prison Underground Railroad and the Civil War, for his beliefs. Another role model is petition campaign to Parliament, asking to Vietnam and now Iraq, there are con Chuck Fager, who directs Quaker House for a special status to be enacted if all legal sequences for Canada when those dis in Fayetteville, N.C. Jeremy and Nga appeals fail, as they are almost certain to senting in the United States pick up and began attending Fayetteville Meeting do given the present Canadian political move north. Canadian Friends have his when he was stationed in the 82nd Air leadership. Jane Orion Smith, CFSC torically offered housing, food, legal help, borne at Fort Bragg. After Jeremy, Nga, General Secretary, and Charlie Diamond, money, and moral support. Today U.S. and Liam moved co Canada, Toronto a Vietnam resister, attended the Friends soldiers moving in co Canada to keep from Quaker House helped Jeremy complete General Conference Gathering this sum being deployed to Iraq need the same. his application for conscientious objector mer to gather U.S. signatures for the peti Religious and peace groups, along with starus, which the Army claims co have lost tion campaign. (Readers can learn about individuals, are assisting some 25 or more during his tour of duty in Afghanistan. these actions at the CFSC website at resisters and their families in their claims During the Vietnam War, more than
18 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL Left to right from page 18: Peace Bridge into Canada Nga and Jeremy at his most recent refugee hearing Iraq veterans Against the War and U.S. soldier resisters join together. Quaker House Hotline counselors Steve Woolford and Lenore Yarger, shown in adjacent photo, handled over 7,000 calls last year.
since today is the day for meeting for busi ness. Liam bounces around, happy to see everyone. Jeremy helps dean up in the kitchen. Nga talks quietly with her new friends. Later I meet with Jeremy and then Nga to record their story for the GI Rights Oral History Project. The young family entered Canada in January 2004, afrer Jeremy refused deployment to Iraq. ~"' The purpose of our interview is not to ~ talk only about their legal appeals. Instead ~ ;:t we talk about being Quakers, what com ~ munity means to them, their role models, ~ reading and writing, daily living, and ~ hopes for the future. ~ Jeremy works as a bicycle messenger in someday like to earn a master's degree in more comfortable with his grandson's downtown Toronto. He and his family Religious Studies. Toronto has become a advocacy. Jeremy's mother has become await the next step in their legal challenge. home for the family and a place they hope active with Military Families Speak Out In the meantime, Jeremy volunteers with to stay. in South Dakota, while his grandmother the War Resister Support Campaign and Jeremy's decision has not been easy for only wants what is best for her loved ones. serves on the Quaker Meeting Refugee his immediate family back home in South Nga is the daughter of Viemamese Committee, which assisted 600 refugees Dakota. His grandfuther, a Korean War refugees. Her dad was a mechanic at the from all over the world last year. Jeremy veteran, found it difficult to understand at U.S. embassy in Saigon during the war. fears that if the Canadian courts refuse ftrst. He has been shunned for his grand Nga and her family arrived in South him refugee status, he will be returned to son's actions by other walkers at the mall, Dakota from a refugee camp in Laos the United States, tried by a military tri where he goes each day for exercise. But when she was two years old. They are bunal and sent to prison. If, instead, he is he traveled to Toronto to visit the young allowed to stay in Canada, he would family this past summer and appears to be Continued on page 48 FRIENDS JOURNAL january 2007 19 CITY FISHING
The acrid scent of mental road kill Who knows now who measures floats from snow heaved streets. the heavens and earth I dodge familiar potholes yet lose who sets the stars upon their course arid find myself consumed who holds the snows in the storehouse of night? in the mire of discontent until These ways are not our own, I spy that strange town character. these waves and billows shall pass us by. You know the one. The village idiot They cannot drown, or even shake, or messiah in disguise, the searchlight reaching deep his Spanish moss beard anchoring to find me out. a quiet kind of face Alexander Levering -Alexander Levering Kern Kern lives in bobbing beneath a fisherman's cap. Somerville, Mass. He sails purposefully now, as always, beside Norton's Woods, parting the leaves. He could be anyone for all I know. FALLING SALVIFIC WHITENESS A Greek Orthodox priest, a carpenter or Jesus freak. A pied piper, If we will, we can sense sailor, scholar, hippie, or fool. the million rows of blue needles Maybe a Sufi dervish frozen under last night's snow, attuned to the inward song we can sense the sky thickly powdered whirling whirling on the holy, darkened arms of pine. without ever spotting a point. If we will, we can be mesmerized As I pass him by, Bob Dylan assails my car stereo, by this pendulum of high-nature silence, whining like a jester possessed our heads falling heavy like huddled bear dreaming. as the soul sisters chime in on Precious Angel with that trembling line, so fine: If we will, we can bore with this slowing, sleeping Shine on ... shine on. to the center of these things, we can save ourselves And somehow the stranger, the day, the life I've from the churning out chosen, of all the stuff of our wheeling, irongrid wills. all conspire to persuade me: Let down your nets once more, - Judith Kennedy Schuller after a night of nothing. Judith Kennedy Schuller Look up from the undertow into light. lives in Marietta, Pa.
20 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL • EARTHCARE Cultivating Right Relationship with Our Food by Ruah Swennerfelt and Louis Cox
ohn Woolman urged Friends to consider that we had taken an important step in mak Could we eat bread? Fortunately we found whether their lifestyles might be nourish ing our food supply more secure by making it two local growers of wheat, and for those of us ing the seeds of violence. Heeding this less susceptible to disruptions that are likely to who don't bake our own bread, a bakery Jcaution, we have been prayerfully consider occur because of the impending peak in world agreed to provide bread using local wheat. ing our daily complicity in our government's petroleum production. 'J:"here was a long list of foods that aren't pro- policies that are promoting war and Many of us, rightfully con ecological mayhem. This year, as part cerned about the host of untest of that journey, we became "localvores" Taking the ed synthetic chemicals used in (consumers of mostly locally pro conventional farming, have duced food) for a month to encourage Eat Local learned to seek out organically us to consider how our dietary choic challenge grown alternatives. But with the es may be affecting peace, justice, and average food item traveling ecological sustainability around the 1,500 miles to our tables, we world. In the process, we found ways of eating have been steadily losing a vital connection that were not only more responsible, but also with the farmers who grow, graze, or process physically, socially, and spiritually satisfying. our food. Meanwhile, organic farming has Most food production today involves the been shifring to large corporate operations intensive use of fossil fuels in many forms that are still using lots of fossil fuels to culti (typically requiring ten petroleum-based calo vate and ship the food, including an unbroken ries of input for every one calorie of food ener chain of refrigeration, until it arrives on our gy output), and our country's growing depend plates. In addition, today's foods labeled ence on fossil fuels has given rise to military organic don't necessarily fit what generally has invasions and wars. Also, scientists have deter been a consumer consensus on what "organ mined that the COz created by the burning of ic" means. For example, the image of happy all these fossil fuels is a major cause of global hens or cows in open fields with plenty of warming and harmful climate change. room to roam is not the reality at large organ Aren't we, as Friends, called to disengage ic farms. The words "free-range" in the USDA ourselves from this destructive system, not standards means only having access to the out only through energy efficiency and less driv doors. As described in The Omnivore's Dilem ing, but by eating food that is grown closer to ma, an investigation at a large organic chick duced in New England such as: nuts (and nut home and with less energy-intensive methods? en farm revealed that "access" was a small butters}, salt, pepper, spices, bananas, oranges, We got involved in our community's "Eat opening in the barn onto a small outdoor area. chocolate (what a disaster!}, coffee, teas, bak Local" challenge last winter, when a Friend The overcrowded chickens didn't use that ing powder, baking soda, and on and on. All from our meeting told us about a gathering of opening since food and familiarity were who took the Eat Local challenge opted for folks who wanted to support their local food inside. In facing this dilemma we lean towards the "Marco Polo" exception of spices, and economy. Even though we grow a lot of our choosing local over organic in order to have some of us opted for the "caffeine-addicted" own food, we supplement that food with store some influence on how our food is produced. exception of coffee and tea. purchases. Our Eat Local group set up a com Our Eat Local challenge was part of a But this exercise wasn't really about deny puter discussion list and website to facilitate growing "Beyond Organic" movement that ing ourselves. It was about being creative networking as we identified local food pro seeks to raise the ecological and health stan when familiar ingredients weren't available, ducers and shared tempting recipes. dards ofproduction by cultivating personal re and often discovering that the results were More than 130 people in our area, the lationships with local producers and, through much tastier than that to which we were Champlain Valley, ended up taking the "Eat our informed food purchases, "voting" direct accustomed. All organizing meetings began Local" challenge, in concert with more Eat ly for practices that have a potentially lower with a local-foods potluck, at which we tried Local challenges and several similar groups in environmental impact than organic foods that experimental d ishes, shared recipes, and other parts ofVermont. We ended up not only are intensively processed and transported learned about the availability of local foods. boosting our struggling local farm economy, long distances. It was similar to our "meeting for eating" but also recovered a sense of community, of For the past ten years we have been bal Friends poclucks. For our turn at providing place, and of good nutrition that have been ancing an anempt at homesteading (growing refreshments afrer worship that month we relentlessly undermined by the current system our own food, living off the land, coming to offered current-season apples, local cheeses, of mass food production. Many of us also felt know the place where we live} with our work sweet cherry tomatoes from our garden, and for Quaker Earthcare Witness. We thought we apple cider. Ruah Swennerfelt is general secretary ofQuaker were doing a preny good job at it-until the Ultimately, we found that the Eat Local Earthcare Wz'tness, and Louis Cox is its publica Eat Local challenge showed how much we still challenge was about relationships. It was tions coordinator. Both are members ofBurling needed to change to be bona fide localvores. about searching within ourselves and our ton {Vt.} Meeting. This is the first in an ongoing What would we use instead of olive oil or communities for the resources that give true series of''Earthcare" columns. any commercial oil? What about wheat? meaning to our lives. 0
FRIENDS ]OURNAL}anuary 2007 21 • LIFE IN T H E MEETING Things I Ponder while Sitting in Meeting by Philip H. Gulley
early every Sunday morning we have ing someone has forgotten to speak. They are rhe way rhey speak of others, we would fmd visitors to our Q uaker meeting for embarrassed for rhe poor soul. But after a bit, their behavior appalling and ask rhem to leave. N worship. They enter the front door rhey notice our calm and settle themselves But because rhey are electronic visitors and tentatively, peering around our 1892 Indiana into rhe stillness. At least most of rhem. A few because we confuse celebrity for knowledge, meetinghouse, taking in the oaken pews, rhe grow agitated, unnerved by rhe silence. They we receive rhem gladly and pay to do so, bow fine cracks in rhe horsehair plaster, rhe carved leaf through a hymnal, clip their fingernails, ing before our flickering altars. Their fury seems pulpit that rests on a six-inch plywood base, or study rhe occasional car passing by outside, innocuous at first, but it turns out we weren't raised when Gene Lewis, 6'4", was our pastor wondering what odd collection ofpe ople rhey immune and their rude disease has spread. in 1957. The pulpit had been made in rhe ear have stumbled upon. Others come in search We Quakers joke about striking back, of ly 1900s, under rhe ecdesial leadership of of certainty and leave disappointed that we're televising our meeting for worship. One hun Sarah Woodard, 5'2". not more doctrinaire. dred and twenty Quakers sitting on oaken A Regulator clock hangs next to rhe door. But in the past decade, a rheological tem pews in an 1892 meetinghouse. A little Dick Givan winds it each Sunday morning. pest has churned the surface of rhe Quaker singing, a dab of preaching, then 20 minutes Once, while I was preaching, Dick realized pond. The same issues that roil rhe waters in of silence wirh viewers whacking their televi he'd forgotten to wind it and, never one to every other denomination have stirred ours- sions thinking they've gone on the blink, jab shirk his duties, proceeded to do so. He was, gay marriage, rhe authority of Scripture, on bing at the volume button on their remote, for many years, rhe Chief Justice of rhe down rhe litmus list. W hile we are not their anger mounting. Supreme Court oflndiana. Since Quakers are strangers to conflict, a sad trend has lately I'm not sure how we appear to our visitors, wary of honorifics and titles, believing rhey emerged-a rising reluctance to labor thought whether rhey are put off by our low church confer a privileged status, Dick keeps it sim fully and prayerfully over difficult matters. We simplicity or charmed by it. I can usually tell ple. "Call me D ick," he says. come to our meetings wirh minds made up, who will come back for another visit. Men There is a general lack of awareness about firm in our ways, fixed in our positions. wearing ties seldom return. I'm the only man Quakers. We are evangelically bashful and too It had long been our practice to listen care- in my meeting who wears a tie, mostly to keep thrifty to advertise. Consequently, my congregation off-balance. I ignorance about us abounds. The sit on the liberal side of reli customary responses when people gion, at God's left hand, but discover I'm a Quaker are: (1) I dress conservatively and, con thought you all were dead; (2) Aren't sequently, am hard to pin down. you like rhe Amish?; and (3) The oat People carrying big Bibles meal people, right? usually don't come back. We Though the Bible warns against have perfectly serviceable pride, we Quakers take a certain Bibles in our pews and see no pleasure in our eccentricities. Anyone need to arm ourselves wirh can be a Baptist, but it takes a real additional copies. This strikes character to be a Quaker. We don't some visitors as theologically vote on church matters and mistrust suspect, that we're not suffi would-be bishops. When we don't ciently biblical. O ne Sunday, a agree on a matter, we talk about it, man visited carrying a Bible so ~ sometimes for years. Every now and large it needed built-in wheels. ~ rhen, a Quaker might overestimate He didn't make it halfway ~ his importance and grow officious, ~ but he is politely ignored. When ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~==~ I'mthrough emb arrassedmeeting tofor admitworship. it, ~ unsuitable persons are nominated to ~ but when I saw him, I was positions of spiritual leadership, a reminded of Little Red Riding Q uaker never says, "You've got to be kidding." fully to opposing points ofv iew, to discern rhe Hood and rhe wolf "My, what a big Bible you We might want to, but we never would. Spirit's nudge in rhe spoken word, to wait have," said litcle Red. ''All rhe better to bludg Instead, we smile and say, "That name would patiently for guidance, not acting until clarity eon you," answered rhe wolf not have occurred to me." That is hardball, was reached. T hose days are fast retreating. Men who are handy wirh tools think twice Quaker-style. Steeped in rage radio and guerrilla evangelism, about returning. They spend rhe hour study I watch rhe visitors during the silence. we have replaced talk with tirades and com ing our old meetinghouse, envisioning a life When we fall quiet, rhey look around, think- promise wirh ultimatums. It is a dark day time of indentured servitude stretching before when even rhe Quakers are infected wirh rhis rhem. We reel rhem in slowly, first asking rhem Philip H Gulley is pastor ofFairfield Meeting pox of discord, this puffed-up posturing that to replace a fuse. When they agree, the hook in Camby, Ind. He is the author ofseveral books knows wirh brash exactness rhe will and mind is set. Within rhe year, we'll have rhem balanc including Front Porch Talks and Just Shy of of God. ing precariously on ladders, painting soffits and H armony. This essay will be included in his If rhe ranters who fill our airwaves sat on reroofing rhe meetinghouse. If rhey should fall forthcoming book Porch Talk. our front porches, speaking of our loved ones from rhe ladder and perish, we Quakers do a
22 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL wonderful job with memorial services. of homemade pies. I once conducted a funer Ifyou are fonunate enough to expire in the al service and had 13 members of the de bosom of a Quaker meeting, you will receive ceased's family join our meeting the next week. a send off like no other. Dozens of people will In the 21st century, this is what it means testifY of your fme qualities, whether you had to be Quaker in our neck of the woods any or not. We'll bear your casket out the retaining some traditions, while jettisoning meetinghouse door, down the stairs, across the others. It remains to be seen whether we have road to the cemetery, where you'll be lowered distinguished correctly between the essential carefully in the ground. Then your loved ones and the trivial. I ponder these matters and will gather in the meetinghouse dining room more while sitting in meeting, the Regulator and partake of meat loaf, green beans, orange clock subtracting the minutes until we shall jello with carrot slivers, iced tea, and a variery meet the Lord. 0 Meeting for Soup by Eileen Flanagan WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER.
rarely help out with First-day achool, but children eager to suggest alternative ways to PEACEFUL PRMNTION IS. they needed a substirute one Sunday, so I divide the soup. It was just like an adult Quak ! volunteered. In the days leading up to my er meeting for business: wonderfully inclusive Free "Peaceful Prevention" big teaching gig, I received two phone calls and frustratingly time-consuming. booklet or "War Is Not the from our very efficient coordinator and e I pointed out that if the discussion went on Answer" bumper sticker mails from four members of the Religious too long we wouldn't have any time to make Education Committee, including an attach the soup, so one girl suggested they all put See www .fcnl.org ment with my lesson plan all spelled out. So their heads down and raise their hands to or call 1-800-630-1330 it was pretry funny when another teacher and show which option they favored. She ex I finally sat down with the kids, and the les plained that putting their heads down would son plan was derailed within a few minutes. keep people from just copying their friends, Friends Committee The stated objective of the lesson was "to like the girl at her school who always copied on National Legislation explore how the choices we make about our her. I affirmed that would be a quick solution, food affect our relationships with the Earth, but asked if anyone could explain why Quak each other, and with God." We were given a ers generally don't vote to solve such problems. series of questions to discuss, with pieces of A nine-year-old whose family is relatively new paper with large cookies printed on one side to Quakerism gave a wonderful explanation of BENJAMIN to record our answers. We were then supposed how Quakers try to listen to that of God in to make vegetable soup, after reading the book every person and find a solution that everyone The Meetinghouse Mouse Stone Soup (the moral of which is that people can be happy with, rather than voting, which should share) . might leave tl1e losers unhappy. by Benjamin, as told to Clifford Pfeil, Before I even asked the first question about Eventually we made vegetable soup. Sever with illustrations by John D . Gummere food, the seven-year-old daughter of the al children, in their excitement over being giv If you remember the Benjamin stories woman who had designed the lesson raised en knives, chopped the carrots before they her hand and suggested that we give our soup were peeled. Others complained that they in past issues, you will be happy to the homeless families that will be staying in needed more space on the cutting boards. The to share them-now in book form our meetinghouse soon. Many children nod kindergarmer with the potato struggled with with your children, grandchildren, ded in agreement, but then someone else the peeler, so the potato went in lase, leaving and Friends! reminded us that there was a business meeting us a few minutes before the soup was actually happening that day, and maybe the people edible. We sat down in a circle again to see if Available for $6 staying for that would like our soup. The we could fit in any of the official lesson. plus $2 shipping and handling woman who fixes the food for the business We never did get to use the papers with the meeting was walking by, so she was called in cookies printed on them, but the children ($3.50 for shipping and handling outside for a consultation. We were told that the busi themselves brought up the cruelry of large U.S., Canada, and Mexico) ness meeting had plenry of food and that we slaughterhouses, the destruction of the rain from the FRIENDS jOURNAL office. could certainly freeze our soup fo r the home forest in order to produce hamburgers, and less families. But then someone else suggested the evil (and deliciousness) of fast food. that we should get to taste the soup before we Somehow the lesson, like the soup in the give it to the homeless families-meanwhile, book and in our kitchen, turned out all right. several other hands had gone into the air from Even more miraculously, the children mostly cleaned their bowls of the samples they were Eileen Fkznagan is a member ofChestnut Hili given, broccoli and all. The rest was saved for Meeting in Philadelphia, Pa. This piece is excerpt the homeless. 0 ed ftom her blog,
FRIENDS ]OURNAI..january 2007 23 enclosure. ~urely, she thought, snea tearn a lot from observing how the mother elephant The ElephantJs "talked" to her calf. She sat for the week, notebook in hand, tape recorder running. But each day she felt Song more discouraged. Though the mother stroked her baby with her trunk and nudged by Jim Atwell it around a bit, she made few sounds. In all The oldest Quaker school in the world, those hours, the biologist heard nothing sig William Penn Charter School embraces nificant to record on paper or tape. The week over, feeling defeated, she was tradition and welcomes innovation. was lunching alone at a favorite diner, Scorchy's Metropolitan Cafe in Oneonta, flying home to her university. In the plane, she I New York: good food in a friendly place, thought again of something that had drifted plate-glass windows opening onto Main and into her thoughts all through that week in the Essential Quaker principles and practice Chestnut, waitresses who like to joke and play elephant house. It was a childhood memo guide Penn Charter, a Friends school mother. (Once one of them pointed to three ry-of sitting in church on Sunday, hearing by birthright and conviction. Within a lima beans still on my plate and said sternly, the organ play, feeling the deepest pipes' vibra diverse community, we engage students "Eat those, sonny, or no dessert." At 58, I tions through the bench back and seat. What, in a stimulating and rigorous educational was delighted.) she wondered, had kept bringing that to her program. We foster academic discipline and In the next booth at lunch, rwo couples, mind? Then it struck her. inteUecrual curiosity to prepare graduates college kids, were slouched around for higher education and for life. the debris of their meal, talking. Or 3000 West School House Lane, Philadelphia rather, three were being lectured by the fourth. A thin boy, he'd wedged 215.844.3460 himself in the booth's corner, one www.penncharter.com arm along the bench back. Dark, unkempt hair, intense eyes. Smug, cynical grin. ~ I know him. I've seen him hun williamPenn dreds of times, sitting in the back of Cliarter my classes over 30 years of teaching. School (I could even guess the paperbacks stacked next to his bed.) H e's the guy who has all the answers. The smart kid, world-weary at 18, who's got it all figured out. Almost surely, as he matures, he'll change-unless IDewr~ he falls in love with the pose. Then he might be selling the same line at 60, in bars. faertif~ They'd been talking about reli gion, and what he was saying I've ~ J\{a[Y~ichman heard 100 times, too. Car~reP@J "Screw belief," he said flatly. www.mtcalligraphy.com "That's for kids. All there is, is what you can see, what you can figure out, 10 Union Street, Greenfield, MA 01301 and what science can prove. You're a (413) 529 9212 E-mail: [email protected] fool if you pretend there's more to reality than that." On a return visit to the roo, she set her Well, I'm retired from teaching, and I equipment to record at a much slower speed. n£ --'1\c shouldn't have been eavesdropping. But I real Then, back at her lab, she had the technician QUAKER SCHOOL ly itched to tell him about the elephant's song. play the tape back much faster than the at HORSHAM I'd heard about it on National Public recording speed, raising the pitch of anything Radio, maybe four years earlier. A young grad on it. And majestically it emerged: a pro uate biologist was doing research on animals' foundly deep, rhythmic rumbling. For the A FRIENDS ELEMENTARY communication. She'd read that an elephant whole time the researcher had sat there, the AND MIDDLE SCHOOL FOR had just given birth at the Portland, Oregon, mother had been communing with the calf, BRIGHT CHILDREN WHO Zoo. Her big chance, she thought. She got the crooning to it-but in pitches far below the LEARN DIFFERENTLY Zoo's permission to spend a week in the ele range of human hearing. Something beauti phant house, seated just outside the animal's ful , full of meaning, had been going on; but it 3 18 Meeting House Road, Horsham, PA 19044 had been completely beyond her human 215-674-2875 • www.q uakerschooL or ~?, jim Atwell is a member ofButt ernuts Meeting capacity to sense it. in Oneonta, N Y. If I were still teaching, I'd tell that story in
january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL every comparative religion class. For it's a great metaphor, isn't it? It sets out hUm.ans' narrow slot in the vasmess of existence, and reminds us what a limited bit of it we acrually grasp. Everything in our mind, we're told, has entered through our five senses. But the ele phant's song reminds us of something about those senses: how cramped is the scope of their operation. Our hearing, it says, is far more limited than that of some other animal species, who perceive pitches far above and below our narrow human range. And many can smell more smells. And see more sights. But go further. Step for a moment beyond the five animal senses, those five dim portals. What other qualities, I wonder, does reality have---ones we can't name because we've never known them? Ones we can't know, since we lack the equipment with which to perceive them? And there's more to humans' limits. What our poor, narrow-span senses do receive, they pass on to our brains to interpret. Brains are amazing in what they can do. But we also know their limits. Like our senses, they're good only as far as they can go. What, then, about reality beyond the lim its ofhuman senses and human mind? (Call it Reality with a capital "R," to distinguish it from the little bit we can grasp.) What about Reality that looms hugely beyond our capaci ties to experience and comprehend? Of course, I could say that, since we humans can't grasp it, such Reality doesn't exist. But it seems more reasonable, less child ishly arrogant, to acknowledge that, yes, it's Make your out there, but beyond us. The first step towards wisdom, the ancients principles a reality. said, is humility: admitting our ignorance. I'd like to have told that to the dark-haired boy in the diner booth. I'd liked to have said Speak truth that life is pale, foreshortened, ifone pretends that it isn't lived in the shadow of m ystery. to power. I'd like to have said that any religion is an expedition into the unknown that is literally beyond us. And whatever the inadequacies of this religion or that, one must recognize the value, the human necessity of the attempt they all make. For having grasped that Reality is Intern at FCNL in Washington, DC. mostly outside the power of our senses or mind, a serious human has to take a stance. People needed to assist lobbyists with research, technological support, And that is what belief is. citizen education, and policy reform campaigns. Modest salary, But I didn't tell him. I left a tip, paid my bill, and closed Scorchy's door behind me. life changing experiences, start in September. I was pretty sure that boy didn't yet have ears to hear with. Some additional years, some life lived, may stun him out ofsmug disbelie£ FRIENDS C0MMriTEE ON He may yet end up on the great quest, perhaps Friends Committee on National Legislation never really hearing the elephant's song, but PFC acknowledging it. Listening for it. 0 245 Second St, NE, Washington, DC 20002 Website: www.fcnl.org/younglinrern.hrm UNL NATIONAL LEGISLATION
FRIENDS ]OURNAL ]anuary 2007 25 • REPORTS AND EPISTLES
Piedmont Friends life journeys and their struggle to be whole in grams designed to introduce people to issues a world that denies their basic nature. We were of race abound, but it is harder to find oppor Fellowship touched by their presence and rendered by tunities, especially among Quakers, to explore their sharing. together with other experienced and persistent This year's theme at the annual retreat of In the afternoon, the adults participated in folks, and get beyond the most basic knowl Piedmont Friends Fellowship, held at Quaker a Bible study, again led by Christina and edge, analysis, vision, and strategies. Lake Camp, N.C., from May 5-7, 2006, was Zachary. They reminded us that, "ifwe under Third, I loved the welcome packet that "Facing Discrimination: Living our Lives with stand that the Bible is a book about God and included "advice for mutual respect and sup Integrity," with a specific focus on Friends God's relationship with people, then our port," which included very specific conse who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and other sexu approach to the texts of the Bible should be quences for inappropriate behavior. Having al minorities. PFF faced a difficult decision framed as such. Our foremost question must attended many workshops and forums on about returning to Quaker Lake this year, be: 'What does the text say about God and racial justice, I know some people (including after North Carolina Yearly Meeting (Friends God's relationship to people?'" As a group, we myself) come with the expectation that all United Meeting) had denied use of the Quak had a lively discussion of the biblical passages participants are beyond racist behavior. We are er Lake facility to Friends for Lesbian, Gay, that are usually cited in diatribes against always disappointed. It shows intelligence and Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Concerns homosexuality. We hope that this discussion compassion on the part of the planners to pre (FLGBTQC) for their midwinter gathering in will continue in our meetings. pare for mistakes. 2007, based on the sexual orientation of the On Sunday morning, our meetings for So many benefits before we even got to the group and the fear that it would create divi worship and business were deep and moving. conference! Held March 31 through April 2, sions within the yearly meeting. In addition, The Middle School Young Friends had wor 2006, at Burlington Conference Center in for the first time NCYM asked PFF to pay a ship-sharing to reflect on the weekend, and we New Jersey, Friends from Philadelphia Yearly substantial fee as an "outside group." At the received their report with joy. The teens had Meeting first conceived this conference, then representatives meeting that made the deci each written a haiku to express some of their engaged New York, Baltimore, and New Eng sion to use Quaker Lake camp this year, con thoughts about the weekend. land yearly meetings as parmers in producing siderable grief was expressed over the treat We were blessed by the presence of several it. Ninety-two participants came, from all four ment of our gay and lesbian brothers and sis Friends visiting us for the weekend: Deborah yearly meetings, as well as Friends from Indi ters, who have been treasured members of our Fisch, clerk oflowa Yearly Meeting (Conserv ana, Atlanta, the West Coast, and England. meetings, and ofFLGBTQC in particular, an ative) and FGC staff person in support of the About one-fourth of the attendees were organization that has been a source of!eader Traveling Ministries Program; Barbara Friends of color. We ranged in age &om late ship and spiritual depth to Friends General Williamson, from Richmond, Va., represent teens to elder, and some folks had to be turned Conference and its member meetings. At ing Quaker Earthcare Witness; and Gary away for lack ofspace. present, we feel called to continue to labor Briggs, representing FLGBTQC. We bumped into some challenging mate with NCYM over its policies. Our weekend was Spirit-filled and full of rial the first evening. During a sharing about Our theme was evident in all of our week love. We send our greetings to Friends our vision of a future without racism, a white end activities. We began on Friday night with throughout the world. Friend said she thought the future should be a lively paper-and-pencil "scavenger hunt" designed only by people of color. Another activity led by Christina Repoley and Zachary -Virginia M Driscoll, clerk European American responded that she felt Moon. We used a series ofquestions about the hurt by this exclusion. I felt the first Friend Bible and Quaker history to meet each other was addressing the fact that whites have over and develop fellowship. The Saturday morn Conference for Racial whelmingly used our power and privilege to ing program included both teens and adults. set the global agenda, and that we need to step Out of the worship, Cheryl Bridges &om New Justice and Equality back to allow others a voice and a vision. While Garden (N.C.) Meeting led us on the Quak The full name of this conference was the it would not, in my view, be correct to elimi er Testimony of Integrity, which we believe "First Annual North American Conference nate white people entirely from this process, includes the concepts of honesty, wholeness, for Racial Justice and Equality within the Reli the spirit of withdrawing from the center and God-centeredness. We compared the gious Society of Friends," and the first thing I seems useful. Such sentiment is almost guar effects of the day-to-day behavior of hiding loved about it was this name. The words "First anteed to discomfit white people, who auto that we were straight versus hiding that we Annual" reflect a commitment and a call to matically, unconsciously, tend to expect to hold were gay to highlight the complexity of decid continue the program until completion. The center stage in life. Following the exchange of ing who is safe to know what. Cheryl shared focus on racial justice and equality within our messages, ministry was offered that helped draw her spiritual journey as a lesbian Friend and Religious Society was music to my ears. As a us all close together again. The underlying asked us to be allies at all times. Since gay and lifelong Friend, I've found many white issue, though, was certainly not cleared up in lesbian people make up only 10 percent of the Friends reluctant to consider that we ourselves one evening, and will need more work population, positive change will require every may be unconsciously perpetuating racism. Over the course of the weekend, we one's help. We were blessed by Cheryl's open Quakers are one of my most important com worked in small and large groups, sometimes ness, honesty, clarity of speech, organized munities, so it is especially among Friends that with a worship-sharing format, sometimes in presentation, and willingness to live her life I want to participate in creating racial harmo discussion mode. Again, the planners showed with integrity, even though her message is dif ny and love. wisdom in arranging a time for Friends of col ficult for some Friends to hear. T he second thing I loved was that the or and white Friends to caucus separately to We were blessed to hear from a panel of organizers stated that the conference was "not consider the question, "What support do you three gay and lesbian Friends, affiliated with appropriate for individuals who are just begin need to do the work?" Some wondered why FGC, FUM, and Conservative Friends. They ning an exploration of the issues or are seek we should divide up by racial identification. each spoke honestly and deeply about their ing a basic education in white privilege." Pro- Among Quakers, particularly, there is o&en
26 january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL Keep your copies for reading, reflection, and referral. FRIENDS JouRNAL is a major Share the ideas discomfort with such separation. I think, for some it is a painful reminder of racist segrega forum for Quaker thought and Quaker life in tion, which is quite different from a tempo rary separation, agreed to by all, for the express the 21st Century. It's a helpful reference for Keep the copy purpose of healing. Others feel they can only conversation and contemplation. Don't wait. unlearn racism in the company of people of different racial backgrounds. One white Subscribe today to the journal that tells you Friend I know asserts that Quakers should Subscribe now always have the courage to speak plainly and what Quakers are thinking and saying. truthfully to everyone, and therefore should not need to converse separately. While it is ultimately true that we are all ofon e spirit, and D I'll rake 12 monthly issues for $39, please. D Lock in my rare for 2 should be able to act from that truth, my expe years-24 issues-for just $76. Overseas subscribers please add $12 per rience is that, at this rime, many of us haveJO trouble achieving such a place of unity. It year for postage. seems very helpful, strictly for the short-term, to devise occasions for going apart from one D Check enclosed D Please bill me D Charge my MasterCard or VJSa another to work through especially painful or • CardNumber ______Fxpirationtla.u ____ complicated concerns, always with the goal of • $ l reuniting in greater love, truth, and faithful- ~ ness than before. A problem that often arises Na.m~ ------when white people gather to work together against racism is that we tend to get bogged Aaa~: ------~------down in process issues or petty concerns, nev u er really getting to work. My impression at this c~------conference was that most of the white caucus C'J groups went to work well. For fastest sertlict, log on to
28 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL doesn't work, replace them. AQuake r boarding and day high school where.. . We urge Friends as individuals and as ... personal transformations take place meetings to engage the conversation and to ... each person seeks to live with full integrity stay with it. Meetings should institute quar terly threshing sessions to discern how we are ... distinct ways of learning are honored led corporately to act. Some of the changes that concern us deeply we cannot escape. But others we can if we act responsibly now and into the future. The con sequences of not acting are unthinkable for us, our children, and our grandchildren. eting School Friends, we urge you to attend to our call. For the love of everything you hold most dear, please take up this concern now and carry it back to your meeting. Many references are available on this top ic, including the blog A Musing Environment at MEDFORD LEAS AT MEDFORD MEDFORD LEAS AT LUMBERTON • Beautiful arboretum settings · Dynamic, active community life · Wide choice of home designs, including our newest offering of homes, R U S H M 0 R E C R 0 S S I N G ·Superior health and wellness care services with a unique "patient partnership" approach · New financial plans for both campuses MEDFORD LEAS A nationally-accredited, Quaker-related, not-for -profit community for older adults, with campuses in Medford and Lumberton, New Jersey 19 71 - ~oo6 CELEBRATING 35 YEARS OF TRADITION AND IN NOVATION The purpose of the advertising for Rushmore Crossing is to solicit non-binding reservations. The non·binding reservation is not a contract and may be cancelled by the prospective purchaser at any lime, without any cause. Any money paid shall be refunded to the prospective buyer upon request and cancellation of the non-binding reservation. Call Boo.J:3J.+:3 o '2 or\ isit our \\cbstlc: \\\\\\ .nwdl"ordlcas.org FRIENDS ]OURNALjanuary 2007 31 In a discussion regarding conscientious Over 200 Friends attended the meeting. Our young Friends invigorated us with objection, we heard concerns from Friends in Because of the location, more Central Ameri their presence. Grade school Friends queried Bolivia. These perspectives from Bolivia and can Friends than usual were able to be full par us about our understanding of miracles: "Do other Latin American countries helped North ticipants. Friends from Guatemala, El Sal miracles still happen? Have you ever experi Americans see that they weren't alone in their vador, and Honduras participated in some or enced a miracle?" The Young Friends group peace concerns. all sessions, and local Friends were bused to carried deep concern for those served by the Occasional power outages, trickles of the hotel on Sunday morning for our final Alternatives to Violence Project and Friends water, and nor-so-warm showers were offset meeting for worship. Peace Teams, as well as for care of the Earth. by fellowship with Friends from all over the Our theme was, 'To each is given the man Callie Marsh led our morning Bible study, Americas, the lush tropical setting, and the ifestation of the Spirit for the common good" sharing insights from Michael Birkel's Engag mid-afrernoon siesta time with the option of (1 Cor. 12:7). The hope that we would move ing Scripture: Reading the Bible with Early a swimming pool. one step further to becoming a true Section of Friends. Before meeting on First Day, Arthur The highlight of our second trip to the Americas was fulfilled. Meyer Boyd from Friends Committee on Chiquimula was a message from Duduzile -Nancy Yarnall National Legislation contributed perspectives Mtshazo, of Central and South Africa Yearly on how we are called and what sustains us in Meeting and clerk of Friends World Com Nancy Yarnall, FWCC western field staff, is a our calling. mittee for Consultation. As a young woman, member of Bridge City Meeting in Portkmd, Afrernoon interest groups and workshops Dudu found Quakers different from other Oreg. Other staff ofFriends World Committee explored a wide variety of topics and concerns, white people. She was astonished ro be served for Consultation, Section ofthe Americas, con including U.S.-Mexico border issues, Middle tea in the same china cup and saucer as every tributed to this article. East conflicts, FCNCs advice on approaching one else and nor in the jelly jar customarily legislators, the Alternatives to Violence Pro given to blacks. She felt that in South Africa, ject, developing and nurturing new worship both the older and younger generations owe a Iowa Yearly Meeting groups, and approaches to outreach. We were debt to those who had been students during treated to mountain dulcimer music and the anti-apartheid movement. They led the (Conservative) 129th Friendly folk dancing. Group singing was way, and many even sacrificed their lives. Annual Session popular with the stay-up-late crowd. The third evening, we divided into small Love was the first miracle, and it continues er groups to attend special evening services More than 125 Friends gathered from July to unfold before us each day. In our final wor that local Friends had planned for us. We 25 to 30, 2006, for a spiritual feast around the ship we were reminded to "Be still, and know went to six churches of National Friends theme "Caring for Creation: How are we that I am God." Church, three churches from Holiness Yearly called?" at Scattergood Friends School near -Deborah Fisch, clerk Meeting, and Ambassadors Friends Church. West Branch, Iowa. We were glad to welcome We found our hosts warm and welcoming, members of the Laughing Waters Worship delighted to spend their Saturday evening Group in Minnesota, visitors from other Report from the Registrars sharing their churches with us. At the end of yearly meetings and Quaker organizations, each service, local Friends gave us gifts to and many first-time attendees from our at Intermountain Yearly remind us of our visit. own meetings. Meeting 2006 FWCC had received a formal invitation Business highlights included the report from the independent Junta Mensual de Ia from Scattergood Friends School (this meet The following report was given by my co-reg Iglesia Evangelica Embajadores Amigos ing's primary outreach effort), reports from istrar in June at Intermountain Yearly Meeting (Monthly Meeting of the Ambassador Friends Junior Yearly Meeting and Young Friends, a at Ghost Ranch in Abiquiu, New Mexico. It Evangelical Church) to host our meeting. The reading ofour queries and selected replies, and needs some context: Migrant workers and border Junta Anual de Amigos de Sanridad (Yearly epistles from far and wide. We strengthened concerns have been issues troubling the hearts of Meeting of Holiness Friends), also from the our commitment to making the Scattergood many Friends in this meeting for a number of Chiquimula area, helped with local arrange campus more physically accessible. The Disci years. we take these matters very seriously. Some ments. Our confidence in local Friends was pline Revision Committee presented the final ofus have tried to offer immediate and substan justified, and their work exceeded even our version of the section on the yearly meeting's tial help to those who come to this country, some high expectations. history, which was approved along with a sec times iUegally, in search ofwo rk we need to have T he majority of the 20,000-plus Friends in tion on f.Uth and testimonies. done, especially crop saving. Guatemala belong to the Iglesia Evangelica Evening programs included an engaging That's halfof the context. The other half is Nacional Amigos de Guatemala (National report from rwo members who attended last that, during yearly meeting sessions, the registrar Evangelical Friends Church of Guatemala). summer's World Gathering of Young Friends customarily gives a report that includes a lot of Although not affiliated with Section of the in Lancaster, England; an account by Anna statistics-the ages ofthe oldest andyoungest per Americas, many Quakers from the National Sandidge of Friends Peace Teams' work in the sons in yearly meeting, how many Friends came Friends Church joined us, and the buses we African Great Lakes Region; and suggestions from each monthly meeting, how many states used were owned by a member of National from Ruah Swennerfelt on how Quaker andforeign countries were represented, and so on. Friends Church. Earthcare Witness might help us care for Cre When the co-registrar began to read his Guatemala Monthly Meeting (an English ation. Discussion with a panel of Scattergood report, Friends turned to one another in puzzle speaking meeting affiliated with Pacific Yearly students and staff from the 1940s to the pres ment, looking around in wonder and surprise. Meeting and including staff of the Guatemala ent reminded us of the richness the school Slowly they began to chuckle. Then they began to Scholarship and Loan Program) arranged the brings. Our last evening together, as always, laugh. Then they recognized the beauty of the airport-to-hotel transportation and tours was a family activity- this time, the ever-pop report, as I hope other Friends wilL I myself was before and afrer the annual meeting. ular talent show. happy and proud to be co-registrar with the 32 january 2007 FRIENDS jOURNAL "Lee has authored a very writer ofthis historical t:Wcument. He assured me that I could handle it as I would, even offer itfor important book that examines publication. That is what I am &Wing. many important subjects - PhyUis Hoge relevant to successfully Albuquerque (N Mex.) Meeting managing a business I have some numbers for you, some statis enterprise in today 's complex, tics about this gathering. There may be slight errors, although we've been diligent, tried to difficult environment." be thorough and accurate. -Daniel Bauer DBA We have 73 Quakers registered at this year Dean, W Fielding Rubel School of Business ly meeting: 60 adults, 7 Senior Young Friends, Bellarmine University. Louisville, Kentucky 4 Junior Young Friends, and 2 i.nfunts. Of these, 11 are from Albuquerque-9 adults, 1 JYF, 1 This book is about ethical principles in infant; and 13 are from Mountain View business, and translating those principles although some of the documentation from into ethical behavior in the workplace. Mountain View is not entirely reliable. This is It's about how people need to form a real problem for the registrars-you can't peaceful partnerships so that everyone trust the documentation. Some of it's incom comes out a winner. plete, some of it may even be false. As a regis Lee B. Thomas, trar you just have to use your best judgment. Jr. is a longtime Hardcover, 152 pages, $16.95 As I said, there are 13 Quakers registered businessman and from Mountain View. I know, these numbers founding member of seem low, but we're only counting real Quak Louisville Friends Order online at ers-at least second or third generation Meeting, which www. butlerbooks.com birthright Quakers. There are, of course, new celebrated its 50th comers who have become documented Quak year in 2004. or call 502-897-9393 ers. We considered counting them, too, and in some cases we did, but we couldn't see our way to unity on a policy. One problem is that it's often very difficult to tell them apart from the undocumented, those people who just come to meeting because they think they want or need some thing we have. This would be okay, if they would just do the right things: attend regularly, go to busi ness meetings, caii a clearness committee, *All graduates accepted to college become members, and pay their assessments. Too many ofthem just don't want to do that. *Self-directed, lifelong learning It's a real problem. Sometimes in Santa Fe, on First Day, there's no place to sit because the *Sha e. FRIENDS ]OUFNAL}anuary 2007 33 BOOKS ..... ~ ..... ·ll<.l "!/ • PROVIDENCE Sons of Providence: The Positive Parenting for a Brown Brothers, the Slave Peaceful World: Trade, and the American A Practical Guide for the Revolution ...... First Twelve Years By Charles Rappleye. Simon & Schuster, 2006. &aerleaa .._latlea By Ruth Tod Gaia Books, 2005. 143 pages. 400 pages. $27/hardcover. .._.... . $14.95/softcover. Moses Brown's name is familiar to Friends especially for the Friends boarding school i~ CHARLES R APPLEYE Rhode Isl~d th~t ~ it. Friends are probably The Kids' Guide to ':ot ~ ~iliar w1th his brother, John. But inves uganve J OUr~alls t and editor Charles Rappleye er p ~b li.cl_r broke ~rom each other in spite of Working Out Conflicts: has delved mto the Brown family letters and Johns vtctous public attacks on Moses and his f~ ll ow abolitionists in the press. Time after How to Keep Cool, Stay paper~ to reveal a fascinating story of the love nme, Moses would come to John's assistance. and nvalry be~een these two very different Safe, and Get Along John would promise to reform but never did. brothers, sheddin~ . new and tragic light on The brothers did agree on some things, although By Naomi Drew. Free Spirit Publishin~ 2004. slavery and the ongms of the United States. 156pages. $13.95/softcover. ~had Brown was the first Baptist pastor of not al~ays on means. Both supported the br~ w1th En~and, but while John instigated Anyone who has witnessed what usually Providence, Rhode Island. His great-great happens when are two kids and only one bummg ~e Bnosh Gaspee, Moses tried to bring there grandsons, John, Moses, and their two older toy knows that peaceful conflict resolution ~e two ~1des to mediation. Both cooperated brothers continued their father's diversified isn't a natural for most children. m ~obby~g to have Rhode Island College sit gift shipping and mercantile business with a dis Unfortunately, many children don't receive astrous 1764 venture into the slave trade in ed m Provtdence, and contributed to irs financ ing. ~hey were part of a family firm that start ~e tools ~ey need to go beyond the fight-or which over half of their desperately miser~b le flight reacoon to the negotiation stage of con human ca_rgo died. Nine years later, after the ed wtth chandlery, moved into iron foundry, and evenrually established one of the first com flict resolution, because many parents and death o.fh~s wife, Moses became a Quaker and mercial banks. Moses went on to hire Samuel teachers haven't had much training in these freed ~s stx slaves. Thus began his long strug areas either. gle agamst the slave trade. He wrote the bill Slater and essentially underwrote the foundation ofNew England's textile industry and the start Adults often use their authority to solve passed in 1774 by the Rhode Island General each conflict that arises instead of teaching Assembly that was the first ever to ban the of the I nd ustri~ Revolution in this country. Sons ofProvidence charts the opportunities children the steps they need to learn to resolve import of slaves. Thanks to Moses' lobbying fu ture conflicts on their own. Ruth Tod's Pos efforts, first Rhode Island (1 788) then Con to stop 0~ slave trade in its earlier stages, opportu~nes that were lost surprisingly often itive P_arenting for a Peacefol World provides n ec.ti c~t .and Massachusetts (1789) prohibited by the vtgorous work of John Brown. It is a strateg1~ that par~nts can use to help children the1r cm~ns from participating in the slave learn skills that will serve them for a lifetime. trade. H1s efforts culminated in 1794 when painful story of greed and lust for power and short~term profits that are familiar to todays The book is organized into chapters that the ~.S. ngress passed an act prohibiting headli~es. John was the archetypical entrepre describe .essential qualities for living peaceful the carrymg on of the slave trade from the ly: learmng to feel comfortable with them United States to any foreign place." neur, mdependent, individualist- the robber baron; Moses the idealist who repented his ~elves, communicating clearly and calmly, car . These were essentially meaningless victo mg for others, making good choices, and con n es, however, because the laws were openly own early .involvement in slavery and worked to outlaw It-the archetypical social reformer. necting what they do in their families with fl out~d , and New England slaving increased what they do in the world. . The author ~ives only a minimal explana- steadily. The most vociferous supporter of the lorful message blocks help the reader slave trade w~ John Brown. He was very dif no~ of Quake~ tsm . But Friends can bring the~r own quesoons to a reading of this fasci navigate through the book quickly and stay ferent from hts brother. John is described as focused on the message. charismatic, vindictive, opportunistic, impetu nanng and well-written story. Was Moses a naive dupe co continue trusting his brother Tod includes an explanation for a popular ous, strong-~illed , and very shrewd. He strategy for conflict resolution called the "I" became the nchest man in Providence, with and ~opmg that John would in time pay attenoon to the Light in his conscience? How weal~ based on the ~ys candle factory evaluate Moses' urging of the aboli and tr?n foundry, and ~1s own successful pri ~o ~e vateenng, war profiteermg, land speculation, nomsts not to press in court for full damages and, most of al.l. his shrewd trading in what ~':de: the law? Why didn't Moses, strong abo linomst that he was, seem to notice that the ~ver ~ould yteld the most--occasionally mcluding slaves and the China trade. H e lob cotton for his mills was grown by slave labor bied against his brother's bills and managed to and the looms were tended by child labor? gut other attempts to regulate or suppress the And~ perhaps most importantly, do we have blmd spots today because of our own slave trad~. Althou~ slaving was only a small economic positions? part of. hts merc:ru:ule ~mpire, political sup port of It became his n:aJOr focus and passion. -Marty Grundy The author delves mto the sibling rivalry Ma~ G"!ndy. a member ofC!eveiLznd (Ohio) that seems to have fueled each man's passion. Meettng, ts the author oJThe Evolution of a But they also cared for one another, and nev- Quaker Community. 34 january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL Resident Life Its not like home, it is home 0 0 0 statement, an approach that can be practiced as role playing in small and large groups. The goal is to first help the child express what he sees or hears; then how he feels; and finally what he needs. Teaching the "I" concepts to a group of children creates a plan for dealing with con flict; and even limited practice with imaginary problems can produce amazing results when real conflicts arise. In the heat of the moment, the children may have to be reminded how to proceed; but with some reminders, the strate 0 0 0 at the most affordable rates gy can replace aggressive physical or verbal backlash in a short time. Eventually it can A Quaker Sponsored Retirement Community become a natural response. 6300 Greene Street • Philadelphia, PA 19144-2596 Although Positive Parenting can be read in a relacively short time, the strategies are 215-844-0700 explained thoroughly, and it is quite possible www.stapeley.org that adults who read this book to help their children will discover strategies they can use in their own lives. The Kids' Guide to Working Out Conficts: How to Keep Coo~ Stay Safe, and Get Along is equally helpful and should be required read ing for middle school students and the people Free E·Mail Newsletter: who work with them. Author Naomi Drew provides an easy reading, high-interest approach that includes Quaker Etonomists on the Issues! kids' own stories in addicion to a variety of explanations and strategies to help students deal with problems that cause conflict or result Do you want to know what some Quaker from conflict. economists, deeply concerned about peace, A chapter about bullying explains the dif ference between teasing and bullying, know justice and helping the poorest of the poor, ing when teasing goes too far, and under think about various economic and political standing why people pick on others. Most issues? And, why they think some well kids know if they're being bullied, but some meaning perspectives are on the wrong track? times they don't recognize the behavior in themselves. So learning "how to stop bullying Try reading The Quaker Economist, a free weekly online news if you're doing it to others or if someone is commentary on peace, justice, energy, trade, globalization, and doing it to you" is important. The book isn't about conflict avoidance, other aspects of world affairs. It's provocative, pragmatic and different. the chapter about bullying gives simple cips to Over 145 letters have now been published and appear on the help kids help themselves if they're being bul lied in addicion to an approach that describes e-mails of nearly 1 ,000 subscribers world-wide, mostly Quakers. courage for helping others in nonviolent ways. "Fact Boxes" throughout the book add bonus information. An example is the fact box that says, "One of the most common reasons To see them an online, visit http:/ /tqeoqoaker.ora. people lose jobs is their inability to get along To substrlbe, send an e-mau to [email protected]. with bosses and other people they work with. By learning how to work out conflicts now, you'll be getting great practice for being sue- FRIENDS ]OURNAJ... january 2007 35 cessful on the job." That's one of the reasons that Jeff Keith's glosses over the consequences of the decision The Kids' Guide also emphasizes the "win book, Inmate 31114: A Draft Resistance Mem to become a conscientious objector. In the win'' advantage of conflict resolution. No one oir, is so valuable for teaching about conscien introduction, Keith writes that he spent close has to lose when people communicate and tious objection. to 30 years to decide if the time was right to resolve conflicts with compromises and Keith, a convinced Quaker &om Rockville, publish his memoirs; the peace community is understanding. A simple six-step plan creates Maryland, became an early Vietnam-era draft lucky that he has given us his story. a win-win guideline: resister at age 19, serving time in prison &om 1. Cool off. April1965 to May 1966. His engaging recol -Adam Waxman 2. Talk the problem over using "I" messages. lections provide a vivid window not only into Adam Waxman, a member of Chestnut HiO 3. Listen while the other person speaks, what life was like for him in prison, but also Meeting in Philadelphia, Pa., is a senior at and say back what you heard. the struggles he went through in coming to his Guilford College in Greensboro, N C 4. Take responsibility for your part in the decision to go to prison rather than to register conflict. for the draft. 5. Brainstorm solutions and choose one This is more a political memoir White China: that's fair to both of you. than a spiritual one. Constructed FOREWORD BY PHYlLIS TICKLE 6. Affirm, forgive, thank, or apologize to from extensive journals and letters Finding the each other. written while he was in prison, Divine in the Simple rules for the guidelines include Keith doesn't spend a lot of time WHITE telling the truth; being respecrful; anacking talking about his spiritual forma CHINA Everyday the problem, not the person; not allowing tion as a Quaker or the discern blame, name-calling, or negative face or body ment path that led him to the paci By Molly Wolf ]ossey-Bass, language; and working together toward a fair fism that landed him in prison. Yet 2005. 211 pages. solution. his focus on the human side of his $16.95/softcover. The book also provides other action plans leading and his day-to-day experi I rarely stand in line to for anger and stress management, becoming a ence makes the book richly acces get a book autographed, better listener, and keeping an open mind. sible to many different audiences. but this one I did. Molly Lists of other books and websites for addi Most interesting to me were his Wolf uses whimsy and wry humor to write about the tional study are included at the end. experiences before entering prison, ~folly Wolf The Kids' Guide is for kids, but it provides and his struggle to follow his con- "truths of heart and soul" in the nuts and bolts necessary to build a peace science. Keith's parents were not seeing God in everyday ful world far beyond middle school. Friends, and his father was "appalled" by his life-the good and the bad of it. She says that statements at his trial. Surprisingly, Keith "we have to take this world as God takes us, -Diana Hadley describes the local Quaker community as not bright and dark together." She writes about being as sympathetic as one might expect; chocolate, babies, ducks, leaves, trees, and Diana Hadley is director ofIndiana High School eventually, however, Quaker support (along milkweed, and about Martha Stewart as "an Press Association and teaches an Introduction to with encouragement &om his family) outside extremely ... misguided spiritual guru." Peace Studies course for Fmnklin College. She is the prison became invaluable to him. Wolf is a bit curmudgeonly, and I mean a member ofPlainfield (Ind.) Meeting. The bulk of the book includes Keith's rec that in a good way. She offers comfort to the ollections of his time in several different pris afllicred, but afllicts us comfortable folks, ons in Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Vuginia. especially when we're feeling pretty good Inmate 31114: A Draft It provides an enlightening look into prison about ourselves. '"They'll know we are Chris Resistance Memoir culture along with Keith's specific experi tians by our love': I don't think so," she writes, ences as a draft resister. He describes the dif "Not on the basis of our behavior." She does By jeffKeith. Xlibris, 2005. 168 pages. ferent communities that developed within n't shy away &om tough topics, either. When $20.99/softcover. the prison, including a number of draft Wolf considers suffering, she says, "The "Today, I speak with you about a radical resisters. Interestingly, the imprisoned consci answer, I suppose, is that God doesn't see dis idea," said Lt. Ehren Watada as he stood entious objectors are overwhelmingly Jeho comfort quite the way we do. I do not believe before the national convention ofVeterans for vah's Witnesses. for a moment that God wills suffering; what Peace in August 2006, just days before he While the book is accessible and useful as God wills is our ability to bring something would go before a military tribunal to find out a teaching tool for young adults learning meaningful out of suffering. But at the same whether or not he would be court-martialed about conscientious objection, readers should time, I do believe God does not put a partic for refusing to deploy to Iraq. know that there is a lot of adult content here. ularly high value on comfort." "The idea is this: to stop an illegal and Keith is a rape survivor, and his memoirs com A Canadian Anglican, she writes with a unjust war, the soldiers can choose to stop ment candidly on his experience of the sexual spiritual sensibility and sensitivity that speaks fighting it." pressures of prison life. His quoted writings to Quakers' conditions. It's a book you'll turn A number of soldiers, sailors, and other reflect sometimes jarring attitudes about to again and again for insight and the many military personnel have gained headlines and homosexuality, even though Keith tries to sep little gems sparkling among her prose. visibility for the peace movement by refusing arate his experiences while in prison from his to serve in Iraq, citing either moral or legal rea current views on gays and lesbians. -j BrentBiO sons. Most of the media attention surround Overall, Inmate 31114, while recalling J Brent Bill, author ofMind the Light: See ing these cases has focused on the political events from 40 years ago, remains useful and ing with Spiritual Eyes, attends Plainfield aspects of the story, while ignoring the per timely in an age where war and those who resist (Ind.) Meeting. sonal consequences of a resister's decision. it are often seen through a media lens that january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL LonnectJng rn enas • Lrosswg lultures • Lnang1ng uves Vincula a los Amigos • Atraviesa Barreras Culturales • Cambia Vidas Friends World Committee for Consultation SECTION OF THE AM ERICAS Comite Mundial de Consulta de los Amigos SECCION DE lAS AMtiHCAS Ed & Helen White, North Carolina YM (FUM). met at the Friends World Conference in 1937 Friends World Conference, September 1937, Swarthmore & Haverford Colleges Celebrate FWCC's 70th Anniversary! September 15-16, 2007, Swarthmore Friends Meeting, Swarthmore, PA FWCC Section of the Americas and Swarthmore Friends Meeting invite you to celebrate FWCC's work of spanning the rich diversity of regional cultures, beliefs and styles of worship. Save the date! ALL FRIENDS ARE WELCOME AT OUR ANNUAL MEETING Providence, Rhode Island, March 15-18, 2007 Information and registration at www.fwccamericas.org or contact the office Northwest Regional Gathering, March 2-4, 2007 Friends World Committee for Consultation Reedwood Friends Church, Portland, Oregon Section of the Americas 1506 Race Street, Philadelphia PA 19102, USA Information at www.fwccamericas.org 215. 241. 7250, [email protected] www. fwccamericas.org FRIENDS ] OURNAL }anuary 2007 37 In Brief where in the world desire the same things although the religious and philosophical love, compassion, mercy, and kindness." assumptions of Buddhism and Quakerism The Mindful Quaker: A Brief Buddhism cultivates these and other qual differ, their ethical precepts or testimonies, Introduction to Buddhist Wisdom ities through spiritual practices such as medi and their practices emphasizing silence and for Friends tation, mindfulness, and the WayofTea (Cha stillness, have much in common. "In meeting, do), and this pamphlet demonstrates how waiting with silent expectation on God, open By Valerie Brown. Pendfe Hill Pamphlet #386, these highly developed Buddhist approaches ing to the loving presence of God, which is 2006. 36pages. $4/softcover. and techniques might be useful and meaningful always available, is similar to the creating of a Valerie Brown begins this introduction by within the context of our own Quaker f.tith. spacious and receptive mind in meditation telling us that she learned from her travels with In simple but eloquent language that that is fertile ground for peace, equanimity, in many different cultures "char people every- should speak to Friends, Brown conveys how, openness, and balance." • BOOK EXCERPT would take in a Jewish girl named Rosa. Why an interrogation myself, bur was terribly nerv Janet Kalff A Glimpse yes, we would take her, and so she came from ous-if they didn't believe my story, they could of Grace Rotterdam-a pretty girl of about 20. Our have easily executed both my husband and neighbors saw her now and then, but we myself He was in Vughr concentration camp by Dialogue requires an intense faith in man, faith in explained to them that a doctor had sent her then, and they needed only to send the order. his power to make and remake, to create and recre to Apeldoorn for her health, and we had agreed Well, Rose did tell them my name, bur ate, faith in his vocation to be more folly human. to rent our spare bedroom to her. Apeldoorn was instead of coming to me, they went to my - Paulo Freire known for its good climate and greenery, so they mother-in-law, who was also known as Mrs. anet Ka1ff and her husband, Anton, are believed the story. The children liked her, and Kalff. I'd instructed Adriana, "Remember: if Quakers from England who originally we all got along, so everything was fine at first. there should ever be any trouble with Rosa, met at Woodbrooke, a Quaker college in But then the Germans moved the entire the story is that a doctor sent her here for her Birmingham. In the early 1930s, the Kalffs governmental infrastructure &om The Hague health, and we helped her find a place to room. J But we never for one moment guessed she was moved to Apeldoorn, a city in the center of the to Apeldoorn in order to be further inland and Netherlands, where they helped to establish the therefore better protected in the event of an Jewish; if we had known that, we wouldn't Dutch Society of Friends. During the Nazi oc Allied invasion. At this time we received a have had anything to do with her." Yes, yes, cupation, Anton became involved in the Dutch notice asking us to biller our spare bedroom to she understood all that. Or so we thought. resistance, helping to locate safe addresses for one of the civil servants who was being relo When the interrogators arrived, the pro onderduikm-those who "dived under," this is, cated. Opposite us was a big building where prietor of the boarding house ran up the stairs went underground- and delivering clandes he was to have his office, and all his underlings to my mother-in-law crying "Mrs. Kalffi Mrs. tine funds to the families ofrailway workers who would be there as well. Well, we couldn't Kalffi Two men are here to question you. walked off the job to try to cripple the Nazis' refuse unless we had a very good reason, and Remember that story!" But my mother-in transporting of munitions. Over the course of we didn't know anything about this man-he law, who was, of course, an old lady, couldn't the war, the Kalffs took in two Jewish onder could have been a Dutch Nazi. remember a word of it. It just flew our of her duikers: a man named Wolfgang Kotek early So we decided to send Rosa to the board head. Soon the men entered her room: a Ger on, and later, a young woman named Rosa. ing house where my mother-in-law Adriana man in uniform, and a Dutch Nazi. The My meeting with the Kalffs occurred lived. We explained our situation to the woman Dutch Nazi did all the questioning-the Ger serendipirously when they graciously offered who ran the place; she was sympathetic because man just sat there and listened. to act as interpreters for my interview with she was up to her neck in the Resistance. But Adriana was a very religious woman, and their neighbor Laura van der Hoek, also a she said, ''I'll take her on one condition: if while one of them was lighting a cigarette, she longtime Quaker. Unlike Laura, the Kalffs there's ever any trouble, if she's ever questioned, said a little prayer: "Dear God, please tell me have nor received the award from Yad she must say that she was sent here by you." what I should do!" And, according to her, God Vashem, the agency in Israel who has made it "Yes, yes, we're prepared to answer for her," told her to tell them the truth. So when the their mission to honor people who helped I said. Dutch Nazi began to question her, she said, "All Jews during the Holocaust. However, Wolf Well, a few weeks later, my husband was of us, myself, my children, my son and his wife, gang Kotek honored them directly by plant arrested. He had a small photograph of the are completely opposed to the way the Jews are ing two trees in Israel, one for each of them, Queen on his desk at work, and his boss, a being treated, and we feel it our Christian duty through the Jewish National Fund. My time Dutch Nazi, reported him. And then Rosa to do all that we can to help them. My son and with the Kalffs was brief-only a shared pot was arrested. She had been told never to go daughter-in-law took in this girl, knowing she of tea. However, I took from it the following out on the street, but she fell in love with a was Jewish, because of their strong convic unforgettable story, as told to me by Janet: young man living there, and she wanted to tions. And now this has happened." buy him something for his birthday. So she "Where does your daughter-in-law live?" We were living in Apeldoorn with our two went out one day, and, because she looked She gave him my address. young daughters when a certain doctor who Jewish, she was immediately picked up. "And where is your son?" Well, his being in happened to be in the Resistance asked us ifwe It was hard to accept that the Nazis had Vught wasn't a very good recommendation. This is a chapter from The Heart Has Reasons: Anton, and now Rosa, in their clutches, bur A silence fdl in the room after she'd told Holocaust Rescuers and Their Stories of there was nothing I could do. I also realized that the whole truth, and she sat there trembling. Courage, by Mark Klempner. (The Pilgrim Rosa might give them my name, fur she wasn't Afrer a long pause, the Dutch Nazi said, very Press, 2006. $24/hardcover). ©2006 Mark the type ro stand up to a Nazi interrogation, and politely, "Madam, I have an old mother, and Klempner; reprinted with permission. she'd have to rdl them something. I prepared for she thinks just the way you do. You'll hear 38 january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL The practices of Buddhist meditation and Quaker worship, while not by any means identical, she concludes, are consistent with one another in that they cultivate qualities that both traditions consider essential. -Kirsten Backstrom Kirsten Backstrom, a member of Multnomah (Oreg.) Meeting, is director ofCompass Points. nothing more about it." We all went into hiding for a few weeks because we were afraid they would come back after us, but they never did. In fact, Anton was released from Vught a short rime later. I visited Janet Kalff again a couple of years ago, and, at the age of98, she repeated the sto ry to me in almost the same words. When I asked her what became of Rosa, she gave me a sad look, and took a thin gray sheet of paper out of her drawer-a letter from Rosa that had been written in Apeldoorn prison. She explained that this letter, written just a day before Rosa was deported to Westerbork, was the last anyone had ever heard of her: I believed, but wasn't certain, ofmy foith in God during difficult moments. But now I realize that every human being has to accept what comes. IfGod wants the best for me, He will help me, "An Adventure for the Summer . . . but I must prepare myselffor the worst--not the punishments, not even the torture that I expect to Memories for a Ufetime" endure, but my own se/frqJroach and regretfor my Unique multicultural communities where every child feels important foolishness. And I shiver to think that totaUy innocent people might now face great difficulties and dangers because ofme. So perhaps it is right CAMP REGIS APPLEJACK TEEN CAMP that I should suffer the same fote that so many oth Co-ed 6-12 Co-ed 13-16 ers have suffered. Forgive me, dear, dear, people! The Little plant that I have in my cell, bought for my sweethearts birthday, bends over more and Family owned and operated, specializing in first time campers. Friendly Quaker more, owing to lack ofsunlight. I haven't reached leadership since 1946. Mature, nurturing staff, close supervision, ratio 1 to 3. that stage yet. Certainly, I am bowed, but I shall Rustic cabins with fireplaces overlooking a majestic Adirondack lake. not break. Nothing they can do can really touch Warm, supportive, relaxed environment where the fun never stops. Over 50 me. But thinking thingr over and remembering activities to choose from including sailing, water skiing (superb 3/4 mile the many friends I made, people I loved with aU private waterfront), all land sports, tennis (7 new courts), music, dance, drama my heart, then . . . no, I will think of them (large theater), art, gymnastics, wilderness canoe and mountain trips, nature/ another day. But what ifthere is not another day? IfI should read these pages years from now, I ecology (farm with animals), mountain biking, and much more! would laugh at their sentimentality. "Last words Teen Adventure Programs include tours to Canada, Cape Cod, and Maine. ofa girl in the foll bloom ofher youth. " I will 4- and 8-week sessions available with introductory 2-week program for stop now. Who these words are for, I don't know. younger, first-time campers. ACA accredited. For video and brochure: Someone will read them someda~whoever you are. I hope the Ktzlffi will read them, and espe Michael F. Humes cially the old grandmother, who I pray for every 60 Lafayette Road West day. just one more thanks for all the love and Princeton, NJ 08540 understanding I have been given. (609) 688-0368 Your deeply sad, but gratefol, • www.campregis-applejack.com Rosa 0 FRIENDS ]OURNALjanuary 2007 39 • NEWS Indiana Yearly Meeting is engaged in a year long "Call to Prayer" to find unity in response to the desire ofsome meetings, known as the Sacraments Pilot Group, to observe the out ward symbols of the sacraments, especially water baptism and the Lord's Supper, in their Quaker, co-educational, meetings for worship. During their July 2006 college preparatory school yearly meeting sessions, Indiana Friends could for pre-kindergarten nor reach unity on the concerns of the Sacra through grade 12 ments Pilot Group, so they approved a pro posal to "embark on a one-year directed srudy on what it means to live sacramentally." Susan Lower School Kirkpatrick, clerk of the yearly meeting, said 228 Old Gulph Road the "Call to Prayer" will encourage prayer in Wynnewood, PA 19096 monthly meetings and at the yearly meeting 610-642-7575 level. "Twice a month, prayer sessions will be open to anyone interested at the yearly meet Middle/Upper School ing office. We also will encourage the srudy of 1101 City Avenue writings by Quaker authors, such as Thomas Wynnewood, PA 19096 Kelly and Richard Foster. This can make us 610-649-7440 more fully aware of and committed to the faith witness of Friends," she said. Both Susan Kirkpatrick and Doug Shoemaker, general superintendent of Indiana Yearly Meeting, Friends' said only a small number of the 66 monthly C E N T R A L meetings in yearly meeting are expressing a concern for the visible observance of the sacra www.friendscentral.org ments in their meetings for worship. "Some pastors say they have people telling them that observance of the sacraments means a lor to them. 'Do we cell them that they can go to the community church for that, and then can come to worship with Friends?' these pastors ask," Susan Kirkpatrick said. Doug Shoemak Warm and welcoming, always. er commenced that discussions of these con cerns "have been ongoing for three years." In Kendai-Crosslands offers attractive, his "Good Morning!" column in the Commu affordable floor plans in studio, small nicator, the Indiana Yearly Meeting newsletter, one-bedroom, and one-bedroom units he wrote, "My continued prayer is that we will to enjoy along with spacious commu find creative ways to live in unity while invest ing our greater energies to devdoping strong nity grounds, choice of dining areas, and healthy meetings, making disciples, and and a fully-equipped, professionally developing leaders. " Susan Kirkpatrick staffed wellness center. Full residen expressed the hope that "this concern can tial services and lifetime, restraint-free make Friends more aware ofw ho they are and health care. why. This concern also can be very divisive in yearly meeting. We hope and pray that it does not come to that," she said. -the Communi ~NDAL-CROSSLANDS cator, and interviews by telephone with Susan Kirkpatrick and Doug Shoemaker cr}ommunities The 2006 Gathering of Europe and Middle East Young Friends (EMEYF), April 13 to FSA QUAKER-RELATED • NOT-FOR-PROFIT 18, was held for the first time in Spain. It was ...... A~'~'~ For information or a tour, call historic in many respects. Irs theme was 610.388-7001 •1-800-216-1920 "Cross-Culrural Spirituality," following from the great diversity encountered at the World P.O. Box 100 • Kennett Square, PA 19348 www.kcc.kendal.org Gathering of Young Friends in the UK in 2005. Participants came from all corners of Kendai-Crosslands Communities welcome Europe and beyond, making for an enriched EQUAL HOUSING residents without regard to race, color, religion, OPPORTUNITY cultural and linguistic exchange. There were sex, sexual orientation, or national origin. Young Friends from Russia, Hungary, Finland, Sweden, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, january 2007 FRIENDS jOURNAL Nurture the Future rr.;:.a Belgium, the United Stares, and Britain. Friends were challenged to explore and con li!l!l from both our relationships co the Chrisrain of Qu(lk.erism . roots of Quakerism and our relationship {or Remember FCC In Your Will lack) co other faith rradirions. Harvey Gilman i l . .i spoke about what it is like ro come to Quak erism from a non-Christian culture and reli gion (in his case, Judaism) and the time it nurtures a vibrant future for takes to adapt ro the particular Quaker sub Quakerism by providing spiritual and practical culture and language. The question was posed resources for individuals, of just how inclusive Quakers are in our lan meetings, and the Religious guage and culture to those who are not from Society of Friends as a whole, middle class, Anglo-Saxon backgrounds. One of the highlights of the gathering was the opportunity to meet and worship with local Friends and ro learn about the role Quakers played in Catalunya during the Spanish Civil War. Thanks to Rosa Serra, who is writing the very first PhD thesis in Spain on Quaker involvement, this almost forgotten hisrory is now being brought ro light and pre served. -K£zthryn Lum, Friends World News 2006, FWCC A conference entitled "Children of Impris oned Parents-European Perspectives" was held in Paris last May. Organized by the European Committee on Children Of Impris oned Parents {EUROCHIPS) and Federation des Relais Enfants-Parents, the conference aimed to raise awareness on a national and European level about the impact of impris onment on this group of children. Each year an estimated 7,000,000 children are separated from an imprisoned parent within the Euro pean Union. The conference highlighted the urgent need for a collection of statistics on children of prisoners, and the need for more Summer Camps research inro the imprisonment of parents. Stressed was the need for prisons ro take into that Specialize account the interests and views of children and their imprisoned parents when imple menting policy. It is hoped that work inro the in Kids legal aspects will continue and that "good practice" evolves and continues to be Five Quaker-based overnight camps exchanged between the various organizations working in the field. - Around Europe, Qytak and the Barn Day camp for girls er Council ofEuropean Affairs, june 2006 and/ or boys ages 4-17 Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Farm & Wilderness. met with Quaker and other religious leaders Unplugged and Unforgettable. in New York City to discuss the growing ten sion between Iran and the United States. On A summer of rugged excitement. Fun. September 20, 2006, 44 leaders of the "Abra Cooperation. Skill-building. harnic faiths," including four American Individualized attention. Friends Service Committee leaders and a Self-awareness and self-expression. nuclear and disarmament lobbyist from Nurturing and supportive. Friends Commitree on National Legislation, Adventure and Community. gathered for a meeting initiated by Ahmadine jad, with the help of Mennonite Central Committee. The Quaker United Nations Office provided Quaker House as the location for preparation and post-meeting debrief1ng. FRIENDS ]OURNALjanuary 2007 Personalized Care in the The Quaker leaders came away believing that Quaker Tradition the president is a person of deep faith. Accord ing to nuclear expert David Culp, FCNL Since 1896 remains concerned about Iran's imprisonment of political dissenters, religious intolerance, and position on Israel. But, he says, A Quiet, Ahmadinejad was convincing on nuclear Home-Like Setting in a issues. "As a former engineer, he believes that nuclear fuel is the cleanest fuel there is and Beautifully Landscaped . . . is critical for the future development of his country," reports Culp. Ahmedinejad suggest Atmosphere ed that the UN's Commirtee on Disarma ment in Geneva might be one forum for addressing the nuclear weapons impasse. He • Private Rooms, Suites and • Recreational Activities proposed that Iran would open its nuclear Apartments facilities to inspections if the United States • 24 Hour Security agreed to do the same. Neither country has • Assistance with Activities of Daily • Some Financial implemented the Additional Protocols to the Living nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty requiring Assistance Available additional inspections; FCNL wants them to • Em ergency Response System do so. Yet, Culp observes, what is striking "is • Three Nutritious, Home-Cooked For information please the pride U.S. officials take in insisting they will not even talk to Iran . . .. If the United Meals Served Daily in Elegant cal1 856-235-4884 States continues to insist that no dialogue is Surroundings 28 Main Street, possible ... war is the likely alternative." Although they were not fully satisfied with • Linen and H ousekeeping Services Moorestown, NJ 08057 Ahmedinejad's answers to their questions, Paul Lacey of AFSC reports, "We learned these issues can be discussed . .. when they are presented in a respectful tone and in the con text of embracing religious commonalities around morals and principles. It is hoped that this will build into an ongoing series of meet ings with the Iranian Mission to the UN and with the president and other officials in Tehran." - The Quaker UN Office and American Friends Service Committee's Central Africa office co-hosted a seminar on "Q uiet Diplo macy and Public Advocacy' for civil-society leaders from Burundi, the D emocratic Quaker Values Republic of Congo, and Rwanda. The semi Academic Excellence nar was planned at the leaders' request as they Coeducational seek to strengthen their collaboration and Age Three-Grade Six communication with policymakers in the aftermath of the genocides of the 1990s. Through seminars like this one, Q UNO and AFSC are laying the groundwork for the new ly formed United Nations Peacebuilding Commission. The PBC will build on such efforts with post-conflict programs like disar mament, demobilization, and reintegration activities in Burundi, as final talks progress Learning for Life, Learning with Joy with the remaining militia, the Forces of National Liberation. - Quaker United Call 610-642-0354 for more information Nations Office or visit our website : www.friendshaverford.org Despite setbacks like the violent kidnapping of four members in Baghdad and the subse 851 Buck lane • Haverford, PA 19041 quent murder of Tom Fox, Christian Peace maker Teams have continued their work in conflict areas across the world. In Palestine 42 january 2 007 FRIENDS JOURNAL CPT have monitored the treatment of Pales FRIENDS FKDUCKARY tinians at Israeli military checkpoints and roadblocks; provided daily accompaniment CORPORAT I ON for Palestinian children walking to and from school; and provided briefings and updates for international journalists, embassy officials, and fact-finding groups. In Colombia, where both leftist guerrillas and right-wing paramil itary groups use violence to maintain, consol idate, or wrest control of markets and territo ry, CPT and other human rights and peace groups have set up a nerwork of sites called "Humanitarian Spaces." CPT have helped patrol these spaces-visiting rural communi ties; monitoring the activities of the gasoline cartel and its paramilitary protectors; docu menting and speaking out against the negative effects of coca fumigation; and reporting inci dents of abuse by the Colombian Army to U.S. and Canadian embassies, media, church es, and human rights nerworks. While tem porarily limited in their public wimess in Baghdad, CPT-Iraq has assisted with training a Muslim Peacemaker Team in Karbala and has begun similar work in Naja£ CPTers have accompanied at-risk Iraqis who are seeking information from authorities, or for giving testimonies to international groups. CPT has also worked on the Arizona-Mexico border, giving limited emergency aid to migrants. Responsible Investing, Planned Giving They have joined the political resistance to harmful immigration policies and enforce Friends Fiduciary Corporation (FFC) is an independent ment; monitored Minutemen, vigilante teams, and Border Patrol agents; and provid Quaker nonprofit. Our sole mission is to assist ed basic nonviolence training for local legal Friends meetings and organizations in the stewardship observers. -CPT Year in Review, FY20 06 of their financial resources. BULLETIN BOARD PROVIDING FINANCIAL SERVICES G UIDED BY • FRIENDS TESTIMONIES AND CONCERNS •Janu ary 31-Deadline for proposals for papers, workshops, and panels for the Friends The Consolidated Fund, a socially responsible investment fund Association for Higher Education conference for Friends Meetings and nonprofit organizations in Richmond Ind., June 14-17. See F RIENDS ]OURNALjanuary 2007 43 Misunderstanding Quaker Faith GuideOne Insurance is America's leading insur continued ftom page 8 er of religious institutions, and has been pro Catholic author and professor of Philoso tecting Friends houses of worship and schools phy from Boston College, relates a truly for more than 20 years. In fact, since 1979, mind-opening discussion in one of his GuideOne has been the Friends Insurance classes between several Catholic students, Group property and casualty insurer of choice. a Jewish student, and a Muslim. The Jew To arrange for a FREE premium quotation, and ish student noted that the college had removed all the crucifixes from its class to learn more about GuideOne Insurance, call r. 4 rooms and immediately identified the 1-877-448-4331 ext. 5429. Gu•deOne· fns u r~nce reason: the passage of government regula tions allowed church-related colleges and universities to receive government money if that money was not used for overtly reli gious purposes. One step in being less overt was Boston College's removal of the cru Olney Friends School cifixes that once hung in all its classrooms. When a Catholic student observed Barnesville1 OH Est. 1837 that another good reason for the removal of the crucifixes is that they might offend Good schooLG ood friends. people of other faiths, the Muslim could contain himself no longer: "That reason • Intellectually challenging ing treats people of other faiths, like my self and my Jewish friend here, as bigots. • College preparatory It assumes we will be offended: that is, that we are bigots. While we do not believe • Coeducational boarding Jesus was the Messiah, the Son ofGod, we and day high school do believe he was one of the greatest prophets. And while we do not use sym • Supportive Quaker bols like the crucilix in Islam, if a govern community ment attempted to remove a symbol of Jesus' importance to Islam, we Muslims Core values: would stand between the government and Integrity, equality, peace, it and declare we were ready to be martyrs simplicity, respect for the to prevent that from happening." environment and the individual. What! We try not to offend others and discover we're assuming they're big ots? We strive to be open-minded, only to find we're dose-minded? We claim to have no creeds, but obviously do? We say we cherish one another in community, but are so individualistic that we are un willing to assent to the common under standing, discipline, and willing self-sacri fice that can make community possible? How can this be? It can be, because, as good therapists know, we are creatures remarkably adept at hiding from the truth of our condition. Facing our condition can be extraordinarily painful, but it is necessary for true understanding, right ordering, and redemption. 0 A small farm home camp in the North Carolina mountains Under Quaker leadership for over 50 years boys and girls ages 7-12 3: 1 camper/staff ratio www.campcelo.com 828-675-4323 44 january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL From the Black Experience continued from page 13 others. To paraphrase Fox, "Some may say Barclay sayeth this, and Penn sayeth that, but what can we say? Are we not also chil dren of God?" Updated! In addition, we have no choice but to Ule're Going to Meeting continue the long march through Quak for Worship er institutions, so that the full weight of by Abby A. Hadley, illustrated by Diane Edwards Lavoy Quaker concern, focus, and resources is A fresh and more durable brought to bear on the many needs before cover adds co the appeal of us to advance true racial equality and this favorite fo r young child ren and new readers. social justice both inside and outside the Quaker Press of FGC, 2006 rpt., 32 pp.. paperback $10.00 Religious Society of Friends and all its institutions. New First Day School Resources for Youth: It is a special point of pride to me, as an African American Friend, and as a Practicing Peace: Teaching Young board member and treasurer of AFSC, Children the Quaker Peace Testimony by Jean Watson that in a moment of maximum need for McCandless the citizens of New Orleans whose homes QP of FGC, 2006, 146 pp.• looseleaf $25.00 were destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, co ...' ~ AFSC wire-transferred $ 1 million for Living Our Faith: -.:~... immediate relief to those in dire need, and The Bibkand then donated $250,000 to support the Friends' Testimonies by Gwen Halsted and Mary Kay Rehard African American-led consolidated appeal QP of FGC, 2006, 166 pp., looseleaf $25.00 launched by Tom Joyner. These actions showed Friends at our best, living our social testimony. Finally, we must not only increase our access to existing Friends funding Inside each child: awe r }, ) L ,· ,~ ,-~ . fJ.· ,-~ /. +-. sources, but also develop independent / U f/ u- ~~ W fxr funding sources, philanthropies, and 7 vv, foundations to fully empower our visions. We have come a long way, but we still have a long, long way to go. An old Chi nese proverb cautions us, "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step." Friends, we have taken many, but as tiring as the work may seem at times, this is our calling, and we cannot stop until the worldwide family of Friends becomes truly reflective of the worldwide family of humanity. We must set the highest goals we can. If we aim for the stars and miss, at least we may reach the moon in the process. We must always remember that what you get makes a living, but what you give makes a life. For to whom much has been given, much is expected. And, most important of all, we must never, ever give OPEN HOUSE Saturday, January 13th, 10:00 a.m. up on the fight and the faith that has Monday, February 19th, 9:00 a.m. brought us so far, remembering always that, as Jesus says in John 15:18, "If the 0 world hate you, ye know that it hated me spirited Quaker education since 1799 before it hated you." 0 Westtown School pre-K-8 day I 9-lO day & boarding I 11-12 boarding Westtown, Pennsylvania 19395 610-399-7900 www.westtown.edu FRIENDS JOURNAL january 2007 45 Implications of the Iraq War continued from page 15 believe we have a responsibility to take a stand, to make an impression on society at large to change its ways. This will require a concerted group effort, in addi tion to individual efforts. One avenue ofapproach is through the of Quaker Institute for the Future (QIF), a (j) Broadmead think tank that carne out of the June 2003 Pendle Hill Gathering on Economics and QS2/tl~ inclusive healthcare, maintenance~free garden apartments, Friends Testimonies. According to its and interesting friends are a way of life at Broadmead. Enjoy an website, january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL Questions for Quakers about Cars continued from page 17 creative ways to limit our involvement in the car culture. Lifestyle changes like car Friends Academy pooling, bicycling, and walking would be Founded 1876 Located on scenic Long Island, a start. If more of us resided in proximity • less than 30 miles from New York City. to our local meetinghouses, fewer Friends would need to drive on Sundays. Already meetinghouses are centers for many di Celebrating our 125th Anniversary verse activities. Imagine if we could drop in more frequently and casually by living nearby. Such "re-localization" can strength en community bonds. Institutional action such as getting involved with local land use and planning boards and with municipal councils could help. T he business of car sharing-a kind of short-term car rental that makes cars available on demand without the burdens of ownership-has proven successful in many cities like Boston; San Francisco; Founded in 1876 by Gideon Frost for "the children of Friends and those and Madison, Wisconsin. similarly senlimented," Friends Academy is a Quaker, coeducational, inde The search for alternatives continues, pendent, college preparatory day school serving 750 students from age three and maybe we will need to accept some through the twelfth grade. The school awards significant financial assistance. inconvenience and make some sacrifices, as Woolman urged of his contemporaries Friends Academy • Duck Pond Road • Locust Valley, NY 11560 in a different era, in this struggle against Phone: 516-676-0393 • Fax: 516-671-2025 • [email protected] transportation-related injustice. At virtually every meetinghouse on Sunday morning, you will see a parking lot full of cars--often bearing bumper stickers against war and other injustices. "Sometimes I feel as if we We should ask ourselves how the car itself may contribute to the very problems we have our own life-time seek to resolve. 0 learning establishment:· -AFoxdale Resident RESOURCES Opportunities for growth abound at Foxdale Village, Quaker Earthcare Witness: a community where each resident is encouraged to live 500 East Maql)n :\\cnuc • State Collc~c . PA 16HOI • www.fmdalcYilla~c.or~ For more information call (814) 238-;)322 or (800) 2'53-49'51 FRIENDS ]OURNAL january 2007 47 Making the Journey North continued from page 19 grateful to the United States for giving bolic "Peace has No Borders" meeting them a new start. Her parents' first lan between the resister soldiers, the Iraq vet guage is Viemamese, while hers is English. erans, and other antiwar activists. Meet So a language barrier complicates her abil ing just across Lake Erie from the United ity to really know what her parents think States, the Iraq Veterans Against the War about Jeremy's decision to desert the U.S. walked across the Peace Bridge and into Army. Nga and Liam returned home to Ft. Erie, a Canadian park, for a day of live when Jeremy was stationed in conversation, music, and planning. This Afghanistan, and it was stressful. A former is the same bridge that many Viemarn The critical balance between Head Start teacher and social worker, Nga resisters crossed on their way into Cana academic rigor andjoy in learning recently completed her first Alternatives da. Laura Jones came to Canada on this to Violence Project (AVP) training week same route with her husband almost 40 end. She is happy to be a full-time moth years ago. She recalls that they followed sev er, and has made new friends through eral carloads of Quakers, who were taking Liam's playgroup. money to Canadian Friends Service Com The War Resisters Support Campaign mittee for peaceful uses in Viemam. Toron ABINGTON FRIENDS SCHOOL is only several years old and works out of to became Laura's permanent home. Hav A coeducational ~uaker school a small office donated by the local labor ing attended the Fayetteville, N.C., peace from preschool through grade 12 council. In a short time, they have pro rally in March 2004, where she and her duced a website ( Pre-K through 12 17th & Benjamin Franklin Parkway Philadelphia, PA 19103 215-561 -5900 ext. I 04 • www.friends-select.org CREMATION Friends are reminded that the Anna T. Jeanes Fund will reimburse cremation costs. (Applicable to members of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting only.) For information, write DORIS CLI KSCALE 414 Foulkeways Iraq Veterans Against the War and U.S. soldier resisters join together in the Peace Has No Borders Gwynedd, PA 19436 picnic, June 17, 2006. january 2007 FRIENDS JOURNAL Join us t.or these Winter workShops ... Register Online: www.friendscouncil.org January 17-1 9, 2007 Mindfulness Wed....Oay 5pm • Friday Noon Skills for Powerful Learning & Inner Peace This workshop, led by Irene McHenry and Richard Brady, develops a series of skills that cultivate inner awareness, the capacity for learning, concentration power, relaxation for reduction, and physical and emotional well-being. Quaker Education: Exploring Philosophy & Practice in Today's World Fe~~~~~~.~--2J.r~£0 7 Led by Paul Lacey, Clerk of the AFSC Board and professor emeritus of literature at Earlham College, and Irene McHenry, Executive Director of the Friends Council on Education. Designed for teachers, administrators, and trustees to talk together, explore questions, and develop some answers about how we can respond to current world situations through Quaker education. Both worksh?f>S are beins held at Pendle Hill, Wallingford, PA. Go to www.fr~endscounc ,l.org for further information, directions and registration. @r i ends~uncil on ~ucation With rolling hills, peaceful streams, and rich history, the Phase II expansion of Kendal at Lexington will also broaden your view of retirement. Reservations are now being accepted for our new spacious apartment and cottage homes. You choose the neighborhood and living space you'd like-even the view. Call us (800) 976-8303 or email [email protected] to make an appointment to discover for yourself ~NDAL why leading magazines name Lexington, Virginia one of the top six places to retire. af Lexington Lexington, Virginia www.kalex.kendal.org FRIENDS ]O~AL]anuary 2007 49 "-" I vv I I ~ L l vV L Friends School ~ Death minority inspector at the polls in Upper Dublin Township, Pa. She was an attender at Gwyn ned (P~) "the small school that Beal-Matgaret Alice Sampson Beal, 87, ~n Sep Meeting, where she served on the School Comnut tember 24, 2006, at Friends Homes at Guildford, tee. Betsy was predeceased by her brother, Charles D. makes big people" in Greensboro, N.C. Margaret Alice Sampson was Strayer. She is survived by her husban~i, George C. born on January 16, 1919, at Guilford College, Corson Jr.; daughters, Tacy B. and Julta R. Corson; N.C., the first child of Edwin James and Rosa sons, Benjamin C. and Nicholas WC. Corson; Mary Forsmer Sampson. She graduated ~rom Guil four grandchildren; and nine nieces and nephews. ford High School, then from McClungs Busmess Irwin-Richard Maris Irwin, 88, on March 29, College in Greensboro. From 1936 to 194? s~e 2006, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. Dick was born worked for Nelson Insurance Agency, was acave m on August 23, 1917, in Philadelphia, Pa. J:Ie grad the YWCA Philo Club and the National Secretaries uated from University of Delaware, and m 1943 Association, and served as president of the Greens married Jean Pusey in Avondale, Pa. After graduat boro Association of Insurance Women. In 1949, ing from Medic:U College, he prac she married Franklin Dauphinee Beal, a chef, Hahne~::m". ticed general medicme I!l Media, Pa.,. for five years. whose work took the couple to various resortS and, In 1951 , following a residency 10 pediatncs, he and Greene Street Friends School in 1952, to Goldsboro, N .C. They returned to his family moved to West Pal~ B~ch, F!a., _where 5511 Greene Street Greensboro in 1958. Margaret was a lifelong mem he established a private pracace m pediatrics. In Philadelphia, PA 19144 ber of New Garden Meeting in Greensboro, recip 1954, he was drafred by the U.S. Navy and served ient of the 1991 Eliza Armstrong Cox Fellowship, • as C hief of Pediatrics and Lieutenant Commander and a member of the meeting's Literature Com Pre-K through Grade 8 at the Navy Dispensary in Washington, D.C., until mittee. She ordered Sunday school curriculum Founded in 1855 1956. After retiring in 1976, he worked for ten material for 20 years, taught the First-day preschool years as a pediatrician with the Palm Beach Coun class for 10 years, and led the Annie E. W illiams ty Health Department, providing healthcare access Please call TODAY for a Circle of the United Society of Friends Women for to children in the community. He and Jean were tour. 215- 438-7545 18 years until her death. A member of a Guilford founding members of Palm Meeting, estab chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star, she served Bea~ lished in 1955, composed mamly of northern on the advisory board of a Greensboro Assembly, Quakers who wintered in Florida. After reti~emen~, Order of the Rainbow for Girls, serving as Mother he and his family enjoyed many summers m ~eu Advisor of the assembly in the early 1980s, and home in North Carolina. T hey traveled extensive Grand Mother Advisor in 1984-85. Margaret was ly, always returning with slides for the m_eeting's a member of the Masonic Jewels, a Girl Scout Guilford enjoyment. He enjoyed electromcs, and leader, a carrier of lunch trays at Friends Homes, gar~enit_lg, COLLEGE music. Dick is survived by his wife of63 years, Jean and a volunteer docent at the Friends Historical Irwin; a son, Richard Irwin; a daughter, Patricia Luby Casey Campus Ministry Visitors Collection at Guilford College, retiring as a docent Ring; and five grandchildren. Noel Paul and Betty Stookey emerita. She was predeceased by her husband, Jan. 27 Noel Paul Stookey Concert Franklin Dauphinee Beal, in 1987. She is survived Smith-Hazel Cronk Smith, 89, on March 3 1, by her daughter, Margaret Gertrude Beal; her 2006, in Ellettsville, Ind. Hazel was born on Janu Jan. 28 College Meeting for Worship, led by brother, Joseph E. Sampson; her sisters, ~io let ary 12, 1917, in Plainfield, Ind., tO Quaker parentS, Betty Stookey, with music by Noel Paul. Sampson Keener and Dorothy Sampson Ftelds; Howard G. and Netta (Moon) Cronk. She attend and numerous nieces and nephews. ed Earlham College, where she met Raymond <_:;. Q!lalur Education Sinu 1837 Smith, whom she married in 1938. They settled m 5800 West friendly Ave • Greensboro, NC 27 410 Carson- Elizabeth (Betsy) Strayer Corson, 67, on Bloomington, Ind., in 1946. Hazel was a home 336-316·2100 • 1·800-992-7759 • FAX336-316-2?54 September 19, 2006, in Abington, Pa., ofadvanced maker and active volunteer. Most of her commu www.guilford.edu breast cancer. Betsy was born in Princeton, N.J., nity efforts over nearly 50 years were in service to the only daughter ofJoseph R. and Lois E. (Curry) Church Women United and Monroe County Strayer. Betsy graduated from Princeton High United Ministries (MCUM). She was one of three School, where she played clarinet in the marching women asked by MCUM to organize O pportuni band and field hockey on the All-State New Jersey ty House, a nonprofit resale shop for low-in_come team. At Smith College she majored in history and families. It opened in 1968 and she ~onanued spent her junior year abroad at University of Gene working there until her health tt.. Bloom va. She earned a Master's ofArcs in Teaching from pr~ented ington Meeting inspired her spectal devotlo~. She Radcliffe College/Harvard University. In 1962, she was one of six Friends who founded the meetmg m married George (Skip) C. Corson Jr., of Plymouth THE FRJENDS CAMP IN BUCKS COUNTY 1950; and it was Hazel who, in 1968, spotted the Meeting, Pa., in the Princeton U~iversity C~apel. house and land for sale that became the present Her teaching career included servmg as _a gUide at meetinghouse. Over the years,. she s~rved Bl?om iWO WEEK SESSIONS Fairmount Park Houses under the ausptces of the ington Meeting in many ways, mcluding servmg as June through August Philadelphia Museum of Art, teaching world his clerk of the Committee on Ministry and Counsel. tory at Waltham (Mass.) ~d Wiss~ckon (~a.) Through the many national :;md in_rernatioll:al SLEEPOVE~ <: AM.P High Schools, and conducung spectal edu~aon issues of the 1970s, one of Hazels steadtest roles m for Boys & Girls ages 8-13 \ classes at Springfield Middle School near Philadel the meeting was to remind Friends, by phia, Pa. She volunteered with third- and fourth her -~ ple, not to neglect local social concerns. Raised m Campers d\Oose* thei*r *own* activities* and..., Live grade studentS at the Alexander McCall School in a programmed Meeting, Hazel_ came to fee_l at and play in a friendly, diverse community. Philadelphia, taught in the environmental educa home in unprogrammed worshtp. Her conmbu tion program at Upper Dublin Township's Robbins CAMP ONAS INFO DAYS tion in worship was a quiet focus that deepened the Park, and tutored adulrs in English as a second lan Sat. February 3 and Sun. March 4 - 2pm silence. Hazel was predeceased by her husband, guage. An avid reader and longtime member ~f the Raymond Smith, in 1997. She is survived by her FOR INFORMATION, CALL 610·847·5858 Chesmut Hill Literature Group ll, she enJoyed sister, Barbara Diehl; her cousin, Harold Thomas, 609 Geigel Hill Rd., Ottsville, PA 18942 crossword puzzles, swimming, tennis, sailing, hik who grew up in her parents' home; and by numer [email protected] • www.camponas.org ing, travel, and summers in Moultonborough, ACA Accredited Camp ous other cousins, nieces, and nephews. N.H. Bersy was proud to serve for many years as a january 2007 FRIENDS j OURNAL Supporting a return to hope that we can have that. And for that I response to the book. She accuses editor thank you. David Boulton and his contributors of Quaker roots RichardS. Wigton trying to redefine Quakerism and rdigion Middletown. Pa itself. She bemoans the colerant spirit that I must say the October issue of FRIENDS allows such heresies to fmd a home within jOURNAL was one of the best that I have ever our Rdigious Society. In actual fact, read! It was truly an inspiration. There was Be sure to read this Boulton, and this book in general, speaks article after article encouraging us to deepen If you only read one thing this fall-or the mind of many of us in the Religious our spirituality and spread the good news of Society of Friends today. These Friends Quakerism. I hope to see more issues like this year-read the article in the October issue by Kat Griffith, "Conversations &om demonstrate that letting go of literal, that one! denotative, supernarural interpretations of ~e Heartland." It is a stunning story of a As a recent convert to the Quaker faith I religious language can help to open us co was drawn to the idea that God speaks to hberal Wisconsin Quaker's conversations about politics and values with the the deeper, connotative, life-enhancing, and each of us directly if only we will just sit and life-changing power of religious language listen for that still, small voice. We all can fundamentalist Christian mothers in her homeschooling group; how she has been and experience. experience God directly without the aid of I'll grant that some of the contributors in clergy or pomp and ceremony. challenged, deepened, and transformed; and how she has come to see the essentials of this book do, in my view, fall short in some As a number of the articles pointed out, respects. A few are, indeed, guilty of Quakers have a lot to offer this suffering Quakerism more dearly in the process. I can't say enough good things about it. (Then excessive scientism, failing to recognize that world. So why aren't we more eager about human experience exceeds-and will sharing what we have found? Are we treat yourself to the lead article by Pat McBee, which is also excellent!) probably always exceed-the scope of embarrassed about "God talk"? I certainly science, and that religious metaphor has an hope not! Our founders certainly weren't. Pamela Haines Philaddphia, Pa. important role to play in our effort to deal I am drawn to those who advocate a with the totality of our experience as return to our Quaker roots. Lloyd Lee humans. Although the lyrical exuberance of Wtlson's book Essays on the Quaker Vision of Another Look at Godless other contributors refutes Marty Grundy's Gospel Order is a must read for those who assertion that neither transformation nor joy Marty Grundy's wholesale rejection of want to learn how that could be brought are to be found in this book, I confess that I Godless for God's Sake (Books, Fj Nov.) about. I want a dynamic faith that wants to have difficulty finding rapture in the deserves a more nuanced response than her change the world, and your articles gave me thought, for instance, that the atoms that ( Quaker Roots Run Deep. ince the mid-1700s Quakers have been changing seasons w ith temperate winters, and moving to North Carolina. Before you make a stimulating quality of life in an active Quaker Sa retirement decision, plan to visit community. The area is home to several Greensboro, North Carolina and find out why Q uaker meetings as well as one of the so many Quakers have settled here. You will nation's most well respected Quaker institutions, find Friends Homes, Inc. owns and manages Guilford College. Call (336) 292-9952 two outstanding continuing care retirement for more information or to arrange a visit to communities. You w ill enjoy the beauty of four Friends Homes. FRIENDS HOMES, INC. Providing Retirement options since 1968 EQUAl HOUSING www.friendshomes.org OPPORTUNITY FRIENDS ]OVRNAL january 2007 51 form my body once formed dinosaurs, or lives of all obedient seekers. These Friends' that "the energy of the universe flows testimonies do not reflect the experience or through me" (whatever that means). But testimony of most Friends, especially the throughout much of this book, I fmd a spirit premodern testimonies of early Friends. But that speaks to my condition, recognizing, as they do reflect a uniquely Quaker way of one contributor puts it, that we "live on the being religious within a postmodern, water's edge," a spirit that accepts the naturalist world view. They are religious contradictions and unfulfillable longings of without being theists, like Buddhists. And the human condition but rejoices that, in they are Quakers. While I do not share their spite ofeverything, we live in a world "alive testimony, I welcome it. So long as we see with meaning." through the glass darkly, we are edified by Curiously, Marty Grundy asserts that the testimonies of our fellow Friends, even experience is nor "an indispensable factor of when they don't speak to our condition. Quakerism," yet she rightly invokes experience throughout, and makes the Chris Kight Quaker experience of Christ the centerpiece Syracuse, N .Y. Finding God's of her argument. What some of us Way Forward nontheistic Friends are saying is this: We, Kickapoo Valley Meeting in Decision Malti~ roo, know Christ, nor as a supernatural deity, and not only as the historical Jesus (a man speaks out by Lon Fendall, who, incidenrally, knew well the power of Kickapoo Valley Monthly Meeting of Jan Wood, & Bruce Bishop connotative religious language). We know Christ (by definition) as the anointed, and Northern Yearly Meeting has published the $16.00 by this sign, we are called to anoint, to following epistle as a lerter to the editor. confirm, ro love one another. Wisconsin faced a vote on a proposed constitutional ban on same-gender marriage Loomis Mayer in this past November's election. We felt that Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y. this was a strong moral issue, and spoke out against what we saw as the persecution ofa Postmodern Quakerism segment of our society: I read Godless for God's Sake: Nontheism in Qtulkers on Constitutional Marriage Contemporary ~kerism to understand what Amendment compels nontheists to join or remain with On November's ballot, Wisconsin will the Religious Society of Friends. I found that vote on a constitutional ban on same-gender the contributors of this book were drawn by marriages. We of the Religious Society of (609) 714-0100 love and affection for their theistic Friends, Friends believe the movement to isolate and [email protected] the Quaker testimonies, and the shared scapegoat homosexuals, to promote hatred experience of the "Presence of God" in • MARRIAGE CERTIFICATES • against them, and to impose in law one corporate worship. Most would describe that group's religious beliefs on us all, is blatantly •INSCRIPTIONS • SCROLLS • experience of God as real. However, each immoral and contrary to Jesus' teachings. 22 New Freedom Rd., Medford, NJ 08055 fmds supernatural explanations of this With half of marriages ending in divorce, experience to be speculative, and prefers to unquestionably the right thing to do is to pass them over in silence and be content strengthen marriages. But diverting the with the natural world to which all of question to whether two people of the same creation is confined. The Bible describes this sex can have legal rights together, completely "natural" limitation with the notion that we loses track of the problem of frail marriages. N.E. Thompson & Co. ~ can never see God directly; we can only see It is marriages between "one man and one -110---l'-'''O l'>IO Sflll-'l S().,'\'\11 ~ 1 where God has been. These are not woman" that are having trouble; it is humanistic interlopers who carne late to violence within the home, a lack of deep We manage Investment Portfolios Q uakerism intent on "grafting their commitment, and promiscuity with other from a socially responsible perspective [a] theology" onto the Quaker tradition, as heterosexuals that threaten traditional Financial Advisory Marry Grundy's review (F]Nov.) stated. marriage. Heterosexual marriages are not T hey are Quakers (by convincement and Socially Responsible Investment threatened by homosexuals, especially by birthright) who reflect a postmodern those gays and lesbians in committed, stable, Portfolios that perform understanding of the world. They are not monogamous relationships-those who Custodians: Charles Schwab alone. Evangelical, mainstream, liberal, and would be most targeted by this law. Bear Stearns Sec. Inc. radical theologians like Pinnock, Borg, The proposed constitutional amendment Wieman, and Spong reflect many Christians' (410) 745-3550 really has nothing to do with marriage; it is a postmodern conceptions of God and the thinly veiled arrack on gays and lesbians, part www.nethompson.com religious life. All ideas of God (evangelical, of a pattern of discrimination and [email protected] liberal, radical, or atheistic) misrepresent institutionalized hatred. They are currently God. Bur the same Spirit works through the the favorite target ro be slandered by our 52 january 2007 FRIENDS jOURNAL • CLASSIFIED Ashland, Oreg.-Friendly place in Southern Oregon tor outstanding theater, rafting, fishing, birding, quiet time. Anne Hathaway's B&B and Garden Suites. FRIENDS ]OURNALjanuary 2007 53 • Do you care about the future War Is Not the Answer! of the Religious Society of Friends? Interns Needed to Help Change Public Policies Support growing meetings and a spiritually vital Quaker ...... ~c~~.,..~ Interns and staffers with Friends Commit ·~· ism for all ages with a deferred gift to Friends ...fC tee on National Legislation (FCNL) work • General Conference (bequest, charitable gift annu • • with members of the U. S. Senate and EARL H AM ity, trust). a • NL House of Representatives to reshape the SCHOOL •f RELIGION For information, please contact Michael I.r~;;;;;;:""'== direction in which our nation is headed. Wajda at FGC, 1216 Arch Street, 2-B, N AnONAt. L!ctK.AnoN Join an organization seeking to shift bud- Vitality Among Friends: Discerning the Leading of the Philadelphia, PA 19107; (215) 56 t -t700; get priorities from military spending to human needs at Spirit. February 3 (Arch Street Meetinghouse) and March m 54 january 2007FRIENOS j OURNAL Beautiful Pleasant Hill, Tenn. Affordable and di Custom Marr iage Certif icates and other traditional o r verse activist community. Full-range, independent decorated documents. Various calligraphic styles and homes to nursing care. Local Quaker Meeting. (931) 277- watercolor designs available. Over ten years' experience. 3518 for brochure or visit FRIENDS ] OURNALjanuary 2007 55 ..------Opportunity for Friends ---~--. t( €/ lf«~"t«~"e..s> tk l'tfe Mla~itlfe..s>&> of tle-e Re~ioa&> cfoetet:f ofh-t el(k (t{_aafet.-&>) €; tle-!"oa;i, « re you a Quaker scholar, artist, activist or teacher? Do you have a concern to strengthen Quaker faith, practice, scholarship and witness? We 11 invite you to consider Pendle Hill for 2007-2008. Among the opportunities we offer are the following: The Henry J. Cadbury Scholarship supports a scholar with a serious interest in Quaker faith, practice or history to live and study at Pendle Hill on a project of significance to the Religious Society of Friends. The scholarship is for a full academic year. The scholar's project needs to be endorsed by a meeting or institution. Apply by March 15,2007. The Kenneth L. Carroll Scholarship allows Quakers to concentrate on Biblical Sharon MacDonald, a Canadian Friend who worked on and Quaker studies to benefit their local meetings. Apply by March 15, 2007. her doctoral dissertation at Pendle Hill in 2004-2005, presents her research. Pendle Hill is a Quaker religious educational community grounded /V!w Ctllfec & Pe/(1~ l!tff--Mrl tv~? in daily meeting for worship. The Pendle Hill community seeks to I knew my time be a living model of a different way of being in the world, through at Pendle Hill expression of the Quaker testimonies of integrity, equality, simplidty, would yield rich community and peace. Pendle Hill provides opportunities for results from study, spiritual deepening and service in a nurturing environment. research at nearby Resident faculty, staff and students live on Pendle Hill's beautiful Quaker libraries 23 -acre campus in Wallingford, Pennsylvania. Students come on the historical from many parts of the United States and from other countries. relationsh ip of Adults of all ages participate. People come to Pendle Hill for African Americans many reasons-to expand their knowledge, deepen their faith, and Quakers. It was an honor to be the Henry J. Cad bury engage in active social witness, or achieve clarity during a Scholar for that work. What I hadn't anticipated were the sabbatical or personal transition. great blessings of being with others committed to lives of purpose and passion and with gifted teachers who, as partners in listening and speaking, led me to a deeper and richer relationship with the loving presence of God. -Donna McDaniel (on right, with Vanessa Julye), 2007-2008 Term Dates Resident Program student and Autumn: September 28-December 15 Henry J. Cadbury Scholar. 2001-2002 Winter: January 4-March 15 Spring: March 28-June 7 Contact Darlene Walker to find out more: PENDLE HIIL 800.742.3150 (U.S. only) ext. 161 A QUAKER CENTER FOR STUDY AND CONTEMPLATION 610.566.4507 ext. 161 338 Plush Mill Road · Wallingford, PA 19086 [email protected] www.pendlehill.org