AS TIMELY NOW AS IT WAS THEN: "Such mischeefes as are imputed to witches, happen where no witches are; yea, and continue when witches are hanged and burnt; whie then should we attribute such effect to that cause, which being taken awaie, happeneth nevertheless?" --Reginald Scott, The Discoverie of Witches, 1584 A Friendly Letter

ISSUE NUMBER 121 ISSN #0739-5418 FIFTH MONTH, 1991

Dear Friend,

Last summer, before we were all so rudely them a long time to tackle sex, and in particular the interrupted, I asked (in AFL#111) for your counsel about dreaded H-word, which takes up most of this book, but what Quakers today have to say about sex. The the results were worth the wait. immediate occasion was a planned First Day School class on the subject for fourth to sixth graders at Langley Hill The book opens with Ben Richmond, of the Meeting, to be taught by my wife and another Friend. Friends United Meeting staff, cogently critiquing the arguments of some liberals that the biblical passages The class was held as scheduled, through the autumn condemning homosexuality don't really say what they and winter of 1990-91. Reports from participants, seem to say. I think he's right, too: those biblical writers including one particularly discriminating consumer, our who mentioned homosexuality clearly didn't like it. But daughter Gulie, indicate that it was a success. Marylou in response, Bob Fraser, a gay Christian Friend who takes was joined in the teaching by Walter Sullivan, another scripture just as seriously, asks, in essence, "So what?" member of our meeting. In the meantime, many of you Many biblical injunctions are ignored by orthodox responded to our request for input, some at length. The Christians. How do we decide which, if any, of its many letters came from older and younger Friends, single and commandments ought to be followed today? In sum, married, straight, gay and bisexual. All were read here where Ben Richmond excels in exegesis, i.e., figuring out eagerly, with much benefit and gratitude. what the biblical words actually mean, Fraser is ahead in hermeneutics, which has to do with interpreting and I have not forgotten the promise to share some of applying the texts, whatever they mean. these letters with you. To do this best, I have collected twenty-one of them into a document entitled Some As good as this exchange is, the Scottish Friend Quaker Letters About Sex, which is now available to Hugh Pyper's paper, "Without Apology: Reflections on interested Friends. Along with it is a tape of a Quaker Theology and Sexual Morality," is even better. conversation with Walter Sullivan, Marylou and Gulie, The sincerity, biblical learning and humility Pyper displays reflecting on teaching, and taking, such a class. in sharing his struggles as a gay Christian Friend are so affecting that they leave his respondent, the prominent The letters were thought-provoking and deeply felt; Quaker critic of homosexuality Herb Lape, all but struck some were quite eloquent. They show that the task of dumb with respect, showing much humility on his part. sorting out issues of gender and sexuality has not been ignored by Friends, even amid war and the other These two exchanges are so fine they make it distractions we have had to grapple with. Moreover, they possible to pass quietly by a discordant, gossipy tirade by give the lie to conservative claims that there are no Ruth Pitman on Sex, Society and Quaker Theology, which standards or serious thinking about sexuality among those mainly serves to highlight the unhappier features of the within other cultural circles. The tape and Some Quaker Wilburite tradition she hails from, and to underline Letters About Sex, which is about 40 full-sized pages, are unwittingly why it has declined so precipitously. available as a set for $9.95 postpaid, from my address. Sexual Ethics: Some Quaker Perspectives, is an And if you're interested in more reading in this area, excellent publication. It is available for $8.00 postpaid there's another publication you absolutely shouldn't miss, from QTDG, 128 Tate St., Greensboro, NC 27403. Copies called Sexual Ethics: Some Quaker Perspectives. This 100- can also be ordered from my address, at the same price. page paperback contains a series of papers delivered at the 1989 gathering of the Quaker Theological Discussion Group, held in Richmond, Indiana. QTDG, which throughout its thirty-year history has been something of ce;;;~ a stronghold of Orthodoxy, has also made good faith efforts to listen to opposing sides of many issues. It took Chuck Fager

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THE ORKNEY CASE: QUAKERS CAUGHT IN A MODERN SATANIC WITCHHUNT

It began in a manner at once "[t's all we wanted and more," William Robert Hicks. Hicks, who had been a farcical and chilling--like a Kafka story McEwen affirms happily. cop in Tucson and also done graduate staged by Gilbert and Sullivan: Early work in anthropology at the University on the morning of 2/27 of this year, * * * * * of Arizona, now works as a criminal six policemen and four social workers justice policy analyst in Virginia. Soon burst into the bucolic home of William About the time that the McEwens he was attending cult crime seminars as and Sandra McEwen, Friends on South were finding their idyll on an island in a professional task, one after another, Ronaldsay, one of the Orkney Islands the North Sea, a police captain in Ohio becoming familiar with practically all off the northern coast of Scotland. named Dale Griffis was becoming the self-proclaimed experts working the known among police departments police training circuit, as well as their The police began searching the around America. He gave professional stories and claims. He took many notes house, confiscating such items as all seminars on what an admiring reporter and collected thick files of the materials their videocassettes (''Mostly programs called "satanic worship, mind-control handed out at the seminars. taped off the lV," William McEwen cults and destructive religious groups." said ruefully, "no sex or violence; Griffis was but one of a growing "At first alarmed by what [ some constable will have a very tedious number of circuit-riding "cult crime" heard at the seminars," he says, "I time watching them all"), a framed specialists, who during the 1980s became progressively more skeptical, picture of a stand of trees, an old spread warnings among law enforce- then even more alarmed by the cult photo album with snapshots of the ment, social work, and church groups experts' anti-intellectual and anti- family visiting a ruined abbey, and a about what they said was a rising wave rationalist stance." Trained as a gas lantern used for night farmwork. of hideous outrages committed by such working cop to find evidence that can underground criminal conspiracies. stand up in court, Hicks soon went At the same time, the social beyond taking notes at seminars; he workers were hustling the McEwens' THE FOEMAN BARES HIS STEEL began challenging the experts to back two younger children, aged 11 and 15, up their claims about a satanic cult out of their beds, into their clothes and This cult crime wave, Griffis and human sacrifice bloodbath with a police through the door. No stops for food, the others told their typically large and officer's bottom line: hard evidence. bathroom, or personal items were rapt audiences, was not simply a matter allowed; in seven minutes they were of church or synagogue vandalism, THEY UNCOMFORTABLE FEEL gone. Then the parents were interro- heavy metal music and drug use. Nor gated by the police for several hours. was it limited to bizarre and gruesome Here the experts began to hem murder cases involving the likes of and haw. On the one hand, they could POOR WAND'RING ONES? Charles Manson and Los Angeles' point to people like Manson, or a band "Night Stalker" killer Richard Ramirez, of drug murderers in Matamoros, The interrogation disclosed that who ranted about Satan at his trial. Mexico, some of whose killings were the McEwens have been teachers for indeed accompanied by torture and more than twenty years, first in Surrey, Even more ominous and strange rituals. But in the Matamoros where they ran a unique working farm unnerving, they alleged, these case, for instance, while there was a as part of a school program aimed at underground satanic cults engage in mishmash of Mro-Cuban and Aztec providing problem kids a therapeutic widespread human sacrifices, usually rituals, there was no identifiable hands-on experience. There they accompanied by horrible tortures and Satanism; and neither Matamoros, became Friends in the early 19708, hideous rituals. The production of Manson, nor the Night Stalker cases joining Petersfield Preparative Meeting. kiddie porn and snuff films are also involved anything resembling a And there they began to feel drawn said to be among their specialties. As hereditary ''family'' undertaking; the toward a life centered more on farming many as 50,000 such human sacrifices perpetrators were either loners or small and less on fulltime teaching. are committed per year in the U.S. by and shortlived groups of unrelated these groups, many of them children people. This quest led them to the borne on demand by captive women Orkney islands, where land was "breeders." Griffis, among others, So where, Hicks demanded, was affordable and the people reserved but insists that behind these bloody crimes the evidence of the traditional satanic open-minded. The islands also had a is an international underground family cults, with their breeders and wild kind of beauty, with their nearly network of hereditary satanist family their human sacrifices? Fifty thousand treeless fidds dotted with sheep and groups, made up of persons outwardly corpses a year, far more than the clad in heather. To some visitors the respectable or even distinguished, but official murder tally, makes for a lot of Orkneys seemed desolate, but the secretly dedicated to their grisly rituals disposal work. Surely some of the McEwens loved them. They bought and supremely skilled in concealment. remains must show up somewhere. As land and moved there in 1984. Now apocalyptic as the claims about them they farm and William McEwen teaches These lurid stories alarmed one were, there must be evidence. part-time, a couple days a week, flying of the early attenders at these cult in to schools on various of the islands. crime seminars, a researcher named Unfortunately, the experts didn't 3 have any. In 1985, for instance, Griffis largely on techniques which require an occurred, or of a good, safe preschool, persuaded an Ohio sheriff to excavate advance presumption of abuse, and (openness, solicitude for kids' welfare) 500 square feet of parkland in search which thus can make "evidence" out of and tum them into catch-22 evidence of 50 to 75 ritually murdered bodies. anything, even things one might expect of evildoing, whence they can be Nothing turned up. Hicks heard would be exculpatory. substituted for more specific proof of numerous other investigators admit, actual abuse. Hicks calls this "spectral when pressed, that despite all their Take day care centers, for evidence", and draws direct parallels scare-talk, they had never found such instance, in which occasional child between it and the kind of evidence or made an arrest of a abuse undoubtedly occurs, but which "testimony"of children (also traditional satanic cult figure. according to the cult cops are shot accompanied by intense, convincing through with sub rosa satanic nests. emotional displays) which produced the But paradoxically, this lack of One widely-distributed list of infamous Salem witchhunts and other evidence did not bother the cult crime characteristics of cult-infiltrated fatal outbreaks of mass hysteria. experts, or their supporters. A police preschools, by California therapist lieutenant from Richmond, Virginia, Catherine Gould, warns that: Hicks also noticed and after acknowledging he had no documented the close and reinforcing evidence of human sacrifice, told Hicks "...being able to walk directly into ties between many of the cult crime flatly: "No evidence can be evidence." the classroom does not guarantee safety. experts and fundamentalist Protestant Adds Griffis: "The most dangerous We believe that a 'watch' person alerts and Catholic groups, which are groups are the ones we know nothing perpetrators that a parent is arriving, traditionally big on Satan and demonic about....They are the real underground." and the child is quickly produced...the possession. The Cult Crime Impact ability to look into the classroom and see Network, based in Boise, Idaho, and its But if they lack the kind of what is going on provides no deterrent influential File 18 Newsletter is typical. evidence that police usually look for ....Personnelat offending schools do not "The only true and lasting solution to (and find) in "normal" crimes, the cult seem obviously 'strange' ....Some 'devil worship' or satanic involvement is cops believe they have plenty of living personnel at offending schools may even a personal encounter with true ''victims" of these shadowy traditional be exceptionally 'solicitous' of the child's Christianity," it declared in a 1989 satanist families, in the persons of academic progress." article, one of many such comments. numerous purported "survivors,"usually Dale Griffis agreed: "We are seeing in female psychiatric patients who have, A NEW METAMORPHOSIS the streets the sign of Annageddon." typically after lengthy therapy and often under hypnosis, begun describing Another widely-used diagnostic THE TRIAL, REVISITED what they believe are memories of approach, developed by psychiatrist ritual abuse as children and youths. Roland Summit, insists that abused Numerous fundamentalist groups children are likely to deny that have chimed in with this chorus, COMING WITH STEALTHY STRIDE anything happened to them, and then spreading the stories among their retract it after it has been admitted. highly Satan-sensitized constituencies. These "memories" include taking Such denials must not be accepted by (The effects of such stories in this same part in torture and sacrifices and/or therapist/investigators; the questions subculture about similarly demonic being used as breeders, sometimes must be repeated and repeated. witchcraft "conspiracies" were examined decades earlier. The survivors' stories in AFL#1l4-1l5.) are usually vivid, and the emotional Summit's critics have pointed out reactions they have in the telling are that his theory was based on work, not Hicks has assembled and intense. Many psychiatrists and with children, but with adults recalling analyzed his extensive fieldwork, counselors who work with them have what may have happened to them years interviews and research into a book, In become persuaded, on the basis of this before. Furthermore, while it may Pursuit of Satan, just published by internal evidence, that their stories have value as a therapeutic tool in Prometheus Books. The book is a must be true. breaking through denial when abuse is stunning, carefully documented, rational independently known to have occurred, but angry and very convincing expose But again, Robert Hicks points such contradictory "testimony", of, in his words, a: out that these stories, however especially when produced in the course powerful as psychological experiences, of repetitive, leading interrogation of "...law enforcement model of cult have yet to produce the hard evidence children, can hardly serve as convincing crime [which} appeared to me shoddy, needed to unmask and successfully evidence regarding the truth of abuse ill-considered, and rife with errors of prosecute an actual traditional satanic claims without external empirical logic(including faulty causal rela- cult. Nor is this surprising, since the confirmation. tionships, false analogies, lack of docu- "memories" usually concern events that mentation, and unsupported generaliza- happened long before, in a childhood Not the least of the tions) and ignorance of anthropological, when fact and tortured imagination are shortcomings of these approaches are psychological and historical contexts hard to separate. Hicks also points out that they take many of the ....Modern cult crime claims traverse a that the investigative "tools" developed characteristics of healthy people, such familiar historicallandscape replete with by cult cops and experts is based as truthfully denying that abuse public venom against nonconformists, 4 creation of scapegoats for real or influenced body would do: They ritual abuse, led by a crusading imagined social ills, the political formed a committee, and called the fundamentalist cult "expert." One exploitation of rumor and innuendo as press. staffer was part of a local evangelical a basis for public policy, and a will- fellowship whose members had becoml ingness to sacrifice civil liberties because The British media responded very concerned with demonic of the argued necessity to protect our with a vengeance. England's press laws possession and satanic activity. children from an imminent threat. " are very restrictive about coverage of such cases: for instance, it is illegal to + The nine children were In my judgment he makes a name the children, which may be separated from each other, taken to the compelling case, one corroborated by reasonable; but beyond that, it is also mainland, and questioned repeatedly my inquiries into similar responses to illegal to publish any information which according to a protocol closely modem witchcraft. He also points out would make possible the identttication following Roland Summit's model in that this gospel of satanism has been of the children. (11lis means, for which denial is denied, and "No,"really exported to other countries, such as instance, the publication here of means "yes." (perhaps a new term is in Canada and, increasingly in recent William and Sandra McEwens' names order for this process: Shrink rape.) years, England. would itself be actionable; let's hear it for the First Amendment!) + The parents were denied all * * * * * access to the children or communication But strictly interpreted, these with them. Visits and messages from Which brings us back to the laws would all but forbid even printing relatives or friends were also turned Orkney Islands and the McEwens last the location of the case, since in a away. So too were the efforts of Second Month, watching their children community as small as South British Friends, many of whom not only being bundled off and their home Ronaldsay, with perhaps a thousand. wrote letters of protest, but also sent searched, and wondering what the inhabitants, identttication of those postcards with messages of devil, so to speak, was going on. involved would be only too obvious. encouragement to the children. Over And indeed, in London, the staff of The 2000 such cards were sent, but none THEY'VE GOT A UTILE UST Friend was advised by counsel that were delivered to the children while even to publish the words Quaker and they were in custody. 11lis is, however, 11le specrric allegations (not Orkney in the same item would put the standard anti-satanist procedure: the formal charges) finally came out: The weekly on very thin legal ice; hence the cultists are believed to use coded social workers had taken the children Friend has printed only one very brief "satanic indicators"--cards, images, because they had "evidence" of their and very elliptical reference to the case, words--to exercise control over their being subjected to "ritual abuse." The in 11lird Month. victims from a distance, a la the movie term "satanism" was avoided; but the The Manchurian Candidate (a frequently "ritual abuse" was said to have WHAT, NEVER? HARDLY EVER mentioned "reference" in cult crime happened under the cover of darkness seminars). (that explained the seizure of the gas The rest of England's media, lantern), in ceremonies involving loud however, went after the case with a ENOUGH OF THIS RUDDY GORE music, outlandish costumes, wild vengeance, pushing to the limit of the dancing and forced sex between legal restrictions. For instance, they + And what would be news to children and adults, including parents. printed many details about the families, foreign readers, Orkney was but the who maintained what the Glasgow latest in a series of sensational cases 11lree other families were said to Heralds reporter lain Wilson called "an brought by British social workers be involved; their homes were also extraordinary 'open doors' policy with alleging satanic or ritual abuse. Two raided, many personal items the media", inviting them in and previous cases, in Rochdale and confiscated, and seven more children, answering any and all questions. Cleveland, had been thrown out for one only eight years old, similarly Reporters also dug into the background lack of evidence of any "ritual abuse", whisked away. One of the families the and experience of the social workers with social workers being chastised for McEwens knew well: they were who had taken the kids. They jumped their breach of good practice. attenders at the small meetings for on the disclosure, at a preliminary worship held in the homes of Friends hearing, that each child had been + The McEwens in particular had on the island; a third family they were examined for medical signs of abuse previously tangled with island social acquainted with; but the fourth were, and none had been found. workers, protesting the removal of they say, virtual strangers. several children from a family in which Here their investigations soon they had been abused by a father who Nonetheless, they all were turned up a series of facts which, in is now in jail. The social workers accused of being conspirators, and of a light of Robert Hicks's work, sound all wanted the children out of the home; most fiendish kind, in the abuse of too familiar: the McEwens argued that the children children. After reflecting on the shock would be better off staying with their of the seizures and the questioning, the + The Orkney social workers had, mother and receiving services; and they McEwens and the other parents did only a few months before, attended a took their case to public officials. what just about any such Quaker- conference in Aberdeen on satanic- Many reporters suspected that the TIME TO RENEW! DON"T MISS AN ISSUE!

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McEwens were raided partly in children be returned at once. When real crimes against children and retaliation for these protests. the workers hemmed and hawed and parents, instead of wasting them in talked about administrative details, wild ghost chases. It ought also to The social workers' persistence some parents lost their cool; voices cause some second thoughts and soul- in the face of negative court findings were reportedly raised, and one worker searching among therapists who have shows how deeply ingrained the satanic was even called a name which will go bought into the macabre tales of cult cult abuse myth has sunk into the pro- unmentioned here, except that it is "survivors." fessional cultures involved. These are commonly applied to female dogs and people who feel they have a 'pb to do, rhymes with rich. The unnerved social For that matter, though this may in the face of fiendish, unseen forces workers soon relented, and the children be too much to hope for, Hicks's book, working ceaselesly to thwart them. were flown back to the island that and a consideration of the Orkney case night on a chartered plane. ought to move even some of the more In the Orkney case, not only was fervid Satan-obsessed fundamentalists the media against the social workers, End of story? No. The social and evangelicals to reexamine whether but they also had to contend with the work department has appealed the their estimates of the devil's priorities opposition of their own fellow sheriff's decision, insisting that there is correspond to the actual course of evil Orcadians as well: most of the evidence of abuse that has not yet been in today's world. population of South Ronaldsay signed fairly considered. Furthermore, a police a petition ridiculing the charges and investigation, which could result in After all, the toll of authenticated demanding the nine children's return. criminal charges, is still open. Social satanic cult sacrifice victims, after years work sources indicate they are clearly of witchhunts, still stands at zero. By When the charges were finally not persuaded that they were in error. contrast, in barely four months, the brought before a judgeCcalled a sheriff One such source, hinted darkly to me number of victims claimed by Molech in Scotland), the social workers that the sheriff's decision was just the in the Persian Gulf is approaching two received an even bigger 'pIt: On 4/4, kind of public relations victory that a hundred thousand and is still mounting the second day of a proceeding ritual abuse cult would have wanted. up. Do we have another case here of expected to last for weeks, Sheriff Furthermore, this source added that Matthew 23:24--straining at gnats while David Kelbie, who had spent most of they suspected there might be different swallowing camels?? the previous night reading transcripts levels of involvement in the ritual and listening to tapes of interviews abuse among the four families: "This THE YEOFRIENDS OF THE GUARD with the nine children, abruptly threw could be a matter of the periphery the case out of court, saying it was versus the core," this source reflected. If the planned judicial inquiry fatally flawed procedurally. He went does result in damping down the on to heap scorn and ridicule on the COMING: TRIAL BY JURISTS satanic cult hysteria, this will in no interview "evidence," and the methods small measure be due to the of questioning: So the social workers will have steadfastness of the Friends caught up a second chance--two of them in fact. in the Orkney case. They have CHILDREN IN A PENAL COLONY The British minister for Scotland has maintained, according to reports and announced that following the appeal my own inquiries, a remarkable degree "Far from being left in places there will be a full judicial inquiry into of calm throughout their ordeal. As of safety, they have been repeatedly the Orkney Case. Such an inquiry, by reporter lain Wilson noted in the taken to other places and subjected to an independent panel of judges, carries Glasgow Herald, "Asked why they cross-examination designedto break them great weight in British lawmaking, and refused to go to 'any limits' for the down and admit being abused. There is guarantees a full public investigation, return of their children, the parents' no lawful authority for that whatsoever. with massive press coverage sure to response was: 'Violence breeds violence. This was, in my view, another example follow. It could also yield Good will overcome evil. We will win, of a failure to regard the children as recommendations for legal changes that our way.'" And they have won, the persons possessed of rights." are likely to be enacted. latest round at least.

He added that the transcripts It could even serve, at least in But they are not out of the included emphatic denials by seven of England, as the definitive needle to woods yet. The task of preparing for the children that any abuse had ever prick the balloon of official the judicial inquiry will be demanding taken place. The only "ritualistic witchhunting for traditional satanic and expensive; the chair of the local music" referred to in the questioning family cults that thus far have not been parents support committee estimated it was by performers such as Michael shown to exist in any case that had to could be as much as $30,000 per Jackson and British rockers. He said bear the cold light of formal judicial family. And that's not to mention the the children should be returned horne proceedings. wear and tear of another bout of as soon as possible. national and international publicity. With any luck, Hicks's book can One wonders, when all this is over, Trailed by reporters, the jubilant help do the same in the U.S. If so, it whether the McEwens will look at their parents then stormed into the social would free up substantial amounts of adopted Orkney island horne with the workers' office and demanded that their police time and resources for work on same affection. Let's hope so. ~NllHH::>.LIM NlI:>lOOWV NI ~H~llV::> 'SONYISI A:>lN)lllO :>lH~NI SlIIDIVlll) ::>lOISNI

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THIS MONTH IN QUAKER HISTORY

Of all the unlovely fallout from the 1827 Separation bury her there, one of the Hicksite trustees scaled the in Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, the case of Western Burial wall, broke open the lock with an ax, and let them in. Ground was among the worst. The cemetery, near After a second such incident, the rump trustees met and Seventh and Arch in downtown Philadelphia, had once authorized the building of another, Hicksite gate in the been managed cooperatively by a committee of trustees cemetery wall. drawn from all five meetings in the city, and Friends from all these meetings were buried there. And so it came to pass, on Fifth Month 31, 1828, that a crew of workmen, among them the Hicksite When the yearly meeting separated, the five city Trustees, showed up at the Western Burial Ground and meetings divided also, and there were sharp conflicts over proceeded to knock a large hole in the wall. When the control of the various properties. The Orthodox elders outraged Orthodox saw what was going on, they managed to keep many of the properties in their hands, complained to City Hall, and the mayor himself swore out because they held most official positions and many of a warrant against the intruders, charging them with them were experienced in business and law. forcible entry and rioting.

The Western Burial Ground, though, was not as Five of the Hicksites were accordingly arrested. easily controlled as, say, a meeting house. The Orthodox They refused bail, and stayed behind bars for five days, majority among the trustees expelled the two Hicksites until a judge tossed out the charge and freed them. among them; but keeping their supporters out of the Nonetheless, the Orthodox trustees bricked up the new cemetery was not so simple, even though there was a gate and still refused the Hicksites entry. wall around it with a locked gate. Both sides had many relatives buried there, and numerous Hicksite families (In the end, history's joke was on the Orthodox. looked to it automatically in their time of loss. Western Burial Ground eventually passed into the care of Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting, the Hicksites' major On one occasion, when the Trustees refused to let stronghold; and today its turf is open to the remains not the family of Ann Shotwell, a young girl of seventeen, only of them, but of non-Quakers also.)

QUAKER CHUCKLES

Upper Creek Monthly Meeting was once visited by "Friends," he asserted, "the truly wise are always in a new young elder from Philadelphia. The visitor doubt. Only the foolish are sure of their case." preached eloquently at First Day worship--so eloquently that Lucretia, Upper Creek's senior minister, suspected him Lucretia spoke up quietly. "Is thee sure of that?" of being infatuated with city notions and affectations, and in need of seasoning. The young elder did not hesitate. "Yes," he answered. "Absolutely." Her suspicions deepened when she heard the young elder declaiming after meeting to some of the male elders. "That's what I was afraid of," Lucretia murmured.