July/August 2015
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
July/August 2015 Day Dream, Howard Hodgekin Good government is government that teaches us to rule ourselves. Goethe Reading the Signs Above Birthday List July – August 2015 Camphill Road, Copake, New York Becoming 94 Lenie Seyfert Landgraff, Clanabogan ..............8 July the Catskills are just high enough to collect clouds and arrange them Becoming 85 Muriel Engel, Tornadee, Aberdeen .................2 July into the colors of the apocalypse shortly before the day's ending Becoming 75 which leads me towards the thought Kumar Mal, Copake Village ...........................9 July Eric Hoyland, Oaklands Park .................. 28 August that illness, disease and disasters could easily reach us from the west Becoming 70 or else, maybe, in those moments Stephanie Rasher, Lehenhof ...........................2 July Penny Cotterill, Delrow .......................... 11 August of experiencing some form of elation Almuth Schurenberg, Lehenhof .............. 31 August when everything seems to be going well and when euphoria asks for an antidote while on dull days clouds redefine the horizon Any additions or changes, the bleak loneliness of lines awakening please let Sandra Stoddard know: in the soul something akin to a melody [email protected] +44(0)1224 733415 then there are times of leaden clouded skies Cresset magazines look for a new home when the gloom breaks only towards sundown as if a window of hope has just opened up Dear Editor, since 1985 I have been caring for the Föhrenbühl library. Soon I shall turn 81. In this over the mountains - one that runs counter library there is a nearly (not quite) complete set of to all that the day has produced until then The Cresset. The old English-reading Camphillers who used to live here are over the threshold and Andrew Hoy, Copake, United States nobody has asked for a copy of The Cresset. Now I fear that when I am no more looking after the books, these Cressets will most probably go to the bin which would be a pity, I think. Are there any Camphill friends who might like to have them? Christl Bender With kind regards crossed the threshold Saturday May 16 just before 8 am. Elisabeth Schaefer, Heiligenberg, Germany [email protected] Dear All! I know this to be controversial, but Christl knew so many people living so far apart…Not many of you could Contents make it to her funeral service, or to our evening of shar- ing memories. While handwritten stories and memories Developmental dilemmas Part two would enrich those of us who are physically present at Andrew Plant .............................................. 1 any of these events, you – her friends – might or will Lifetime Achievement Award for Joan Allen feel enriched by hearing/reading each other's stories. I David Andrew Schwartz ............................ 3 have set up an opportunity for those of you who wish The vision of Camphill Communities to make use of it, to share your stories, fond memories Ontario Diane Kyd ................................... 6 and gems in connection with celebrating Christl's life! Response to Camphill Communities Ontario You can upload photos, write stories, and enjoy reading (CCO) vision ............................................... 7 other people's experiences. This site will be available Breathing life into the beginnings of for one year only after which we will close it. We all Camphill Christine Polyblank ................... 8 know that what is put into cyber space will live on… Centenaries for builders of Camphill I think Christl would have had an opinion about all Johannes M Surkamp ................................ 10 of this, but I am not sure what it would be – her per- Friends who have died .................................. 11 News from the Movement: sonality could invite me to go either ‘for’ or ‘against’. Camphill in Palestine Please, take it in the spirit of being able to share across Faiza-Vida Alhusseini ............................ 12 long distances. Personally, I feel this to be important. Ahmed's story Ahmed Alazbat ............... 12 Christl was really a ‘stand-alone’ woman with a lot of Camphill in Palestine Eric Hoyland ........ 14 courage and many many friends! Personal impressions of Botton’s situation, April 2015 Vivian Griffiths ..................... 15 Thank you, Sabine Otto Book review .................................................. 16 Camphill Soltane http://www.forevermissed.com/christl-bender/#about Developmental dilemmas Part two of three Intentional communities and the differing responses to change Andrew Plant, Milltown Community, Scotland Andrew began to write this paper some years ago – ‘married’ to everybody else. This was to be a preparation before the present situation in the CVT communities for the Second Coming at which time the spiritual union came to a head. He wishes it to be understood that between the sexes that had been broken by Adam and this paper was meant to be read in the context of Eve at The Fall would be restored. However, the sexual general developments in Camphill communities practices advocated by Noyes led to accusations of over the last 20 years or so and in no way is meant adultery and fornication. As a result the community had to be taken to refer to the specific predicaments to leave their original settlement at Putney, and Noyes faced by the CVT communities in dealing with and his followers amalgamated with the Perfectionist change. community of Oneida in New York. The Perfectionists The full article can be read on the Camphill believed that Christ had already returned to earth and Research Network website. Part One was published that their task was to bring about the millennium king- in Camphill Correspondence May/June 2015, and dom of Jesus on earth. The Perfectionists asserted that the third part will be in the September/October they had attained a state of Perfection – of being without 2015 issue. sin – and thus were assured of salvation. Under Noyes’ leadership communal life at Oneida was based on a shared religious life, Bible Communism, The wider experience mutual criticism, male continence and complex mar- n order to explore the implications of decisions that riage. Mutual criticism was the public occasion for the Icommunities make in regard to the changes they are members to acknowledge their faults and to point out faced with we can look at some examples of communi- the faults of others. This ensured that no behaviour or ties that adapted and those that refused to compromise. thoughts were to be private or personal – every concern We will be considering in brief the developmental story of the individual was a concern for the whole commu- of six intentional communities – three of which went nity. Through male continence – the practice in which the along with change and three that resisted change. man was not to ejaculate during sexual intercourse – the The three that saw adaptation as a necessary means women were to be freed from continual child-bearing. of survival are Oneida, the kibbutzim and The Farm. Noyes went further in exerting complete control over The three that saw resistance as the necessary means his followers in introducing the practice of stirpiculture of survival are the Old Order Anabaptists communi- and ‘Ascending Fellowship’. Stirpiculture was a form of ties, the Shakers and George Rapp’s Harmony [to be eugenics or controlled breeding. described in the September/October issue of Camphill In the quest to breed perfect children only those par- Correspondence]. ents who had been selected for their spiritual and moral Of these six communities four are religious – Oneida, qualities were allowed to have consummated sexual The Anabaptists, the Shakers and Harmony – and one, intercourse as these offspring, who were reared commu- the Farm, set out as a spiritual community but has not nally, were destined to regenerate the world. ‘Ascending remained so. Three of them – Oneida, The Shakers and Fellowship’ was the practice whereby young community Harmony – no longer exist. Of the three that are still members, who had no choice as to their partners, were here the Anabaptist communities have not been unduly sexually initiated by older members. disturbed by change whereas the other two have been Despite, or because of these radical ideas, Oneida was radically altered by the process of compromise and a flourishing community for thirty years with so many adaptation, as we shall see. people wanting to be part of the religious and social experiment that several offshoot communities were started up. The members were extraordinarily loyal to Responding to change – communities that adapted their leader; they enjoyed a wide range of social and Oneida cultural activities and worked productively in the many John Humphrey Noyes experienced a religious con- successful business enterprises. However, tensions had version in 1831 as part as what has become known in begun to appear. The fact that Noyes had fathered nine American history as ‘The Great Awakening’ – a populist of the fifty eight children born through stirpiculture movement of religious fervour that swept across parts of undermined his leadership. The sexual practices at the country at that time. At his home in Vermont he set Oneida came to the attention of the authorities and led up the Putney Community to try out his radical religious to accusations yet again of fornication and adultery, as ideas and in time other millennial communities were a result of which the community faced prosecution. As established that were inspired by Noyes’ ideas. Noyes before, Noyes had to flee in order to escape this danger saw himself as a vessel that the Holy Spirit was going to and in 1879 he left Oneida and crossed the border into inspire and he demanded that his followers completely Canada. Perhaps finally realising that his ideas were accept his spiritual leadership. He abolished marriage too controversial for society to accept and therefore in his communities as he held that it was an institution jeopardised the continuation of his communities, Noyes in which the man ‘owned’ the woman.