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Contents
Representative Meeting at Oakwood Friends Begins with Friday Night Contra DanceYou are Invited to a Dance: The first official activity of the Spring Representative Meeting will start at 6:30 P.M. Friday night, April 12, on the Oakwood School campus. Students and adult Friends from around NYYM will gather in the Lane Auditorium for some contra dancing to the music of Barebones and Wildflowers. The caller, Eric Hollman, will guide new dancers through the patterns. Babysitting will be provided so that parents and grandparents will be able to join in the fun. Please come listen and watch even if you don't wish to dance.Friends who live in Poughkeepsie area are encouraged to join us, whether or not they are participating in the rest of the weekend. Lane Auditorium is in the first building on the left as one drives onto the campus from Spackenkill Road. There is a small parking lot on the left side of the building. Dan Seeger to be Saturday Night Speaker: At 7:00 P.M. on Saturday evening, Dan Seeger will speak on Friends' Testimonies in the New Century. Dan is a member of the Birmingham Monthly Meeting (Philadelphia Yearly Meeting). He has served as director of Pendle Hill Conference Center and also as Regional Executive Secretary of the New York office of the American Friends Service Committee. Friends and non-Friends also know him as a conscientious objector. In the case of U.S. v. Daniel A. Seeger, the U.S. Supreme Court greatly broadened the basis for religious conscientious objection to military service. Everyone is invited. Registration, Hospitality, Meals, Childcare: Because Oakwood will be in session, no housing will be available on campus. Please return the registration form as soon as possible so members of Nine Partners Quarter can find homes for hospitality. Mail the form to Lois Pan. Checks need to be made out to Nine Partners Quarterly Meeting. The deadline is March 22. Click here for driving directions and a list of area hotels. Childcare will be provided on campus. Indicate childcare, meals, and hospitality needs on the form. Registration will be in Collins Library. Committee Meetings and Display Space: Viola Hathaway is charge of assigning campus space for committee meetings and displays. Space request forms are available from Viola Hathaway, from the NYYM office, or on the Web. Completed forms need to be back to Viola on or before March 22.
Spiritual Journey Column for SparkThe Publications Committee is exploring the idea of adding a Spiritual Journey column to Spark. We are asking for your help in considering the value of this and in finding material for it. We hope people in your meeting will share some of their spiritual experiences and leadings.Please send us material or suggestions for people to contact. Perhaps you know of people who could talk to us about something they have experienced or have done, but would prefer to be interviewed rather than to write it up themselves. If you could let us know about them, that would also be very helpful. Some Friends are diffident about sharing their spiritual lives, but many have had experiences that would inspire the rest of us. If such experiences, leadings, and prayers were published in Spark, they could benefit us all. Please let us know how you can support this column with your suggestions and experiences or tell us why you do not consider it a good idea. Your comments are very important to us as we continue to make Spark more responsive to Yearly Meeting needs. Lee Ridgway, clerk, Publications Committee Calling All Worship Groups & Small MeetingsHow can Friends in small meetings and worship groups strengthen their spiritual community while at the same time reach out to others? This question will be the focus of Growth and Renewal, a retreat for small meetings and worship groups to be held at Powell House May 31-June 2, 2002.Facilitator Frank Massey will draw on his experiences as general secretary of Baltimore Yearly Meeting (BYM), where he provides support and counsel to meetings and worship groups. Frank is aware of the unique needs of small meetings and how to support them and help them grow. Responding to an increase in membership, BYM has successfully seeded several vital new worship groups in recent years. A lifelong Friend, Frank also has extensive experience working with Quaker youth. He is a graduate of the Earlham School of Religion. In addition to affording an opportunity to meet new people and explore paths to growth and renewal, the weekend also provides Friends from the same meeting with an opportunity to get to know each other better. As bonds deepen, a meeting community gains strength. To register or for further information, visit www.powellhouse.org or call 518-794-8811. This retreat is sponsored by the NYYM Advancement Committee. InfoShare is Online!Friends in NYYM want to know what's happening in our Yearly Meeting! To help meet this need, we will be publishing an online newsletter, InfoShare. Since Spark comes out only five times a year, and the need for information is ongoing, we will be publishing InfoShare in months in which Spark is not issued, except in the summer. Thus, InfoShare will come out in February, April, June, and October. InfoShare is posted on NYYM's Web site, but paper copies are available on request. We need your help. If your monthly, regional, or quarterly meeting is having an event, please let us know, so that we can spread the word. Send items to Paul Busby, c/o the NYYM office; e-mail paul@nyym.org. Paul Busby, editor Staff and StructureAt Yearly Meeting sessions at Silver Bay in 2001, minutes 63 and 64 established a new Ad Hoc Committee on Staffing and Structure and laid out the charges to the new committee. This ad hoc committee is following up on the previous Ad Hoc Committee on the Function of New York Yearly Meeting, whose report was sent to monthly meetings after YM sessions 2001. That report is on our Web site at www.nyym.org and also available from the NYYM office.The relevant minutes read:
The charge to the Ad Hoc Committee on Staffing and Structure is to test with monthly and regional/quarterly meetings the recommendations and suggestions put forward in the report of the Ad Hoc Committee on the Function of NYYM as presented at the annual gathering at Silver Bay, July 2001. Through this testing and their own discernment process the committee is further charged to revise the recommendations with a view to achieving greater unity about the steps to be taken to serve the renewal of the Yearly Meeting. 64. The Yearly Meeting will name an Ad Hoc Committee on Committees that is under the care of the Ad Hoc Committee on Staffing and Structure. The Ad Hoc Committee on Committees is charged with studying the NYYM committee structure and analyzing the different functions that are played by the committees. The committee is charged with bringing forward recommendations on ways to simplify and strengthen the YM committee structure. The new committee met on January 5, 2002, at Purchase. As directed by the YM minute, we have created the Committee on Committees, which will be evaluating the function of the YM committee structure. Margallen Fichter is clerk of that committee. We met a second time on February 2 in Albany. We are worshipfully considering concerns long expressed by monthly meetings and others in our YM community. We pray that with divine guidance, we can bring recommendations forward for consideration by monthly meetings and YM sessions that may effectively meet our needs for spiritual uplifting and all that emanates from this foundation. We will be meeting monthly. We welcome concerned Friends to participate in a committee session we'll hold at Fourth Month Representative Meeting and an interest group at Silver Bay. We will be placing minuted actions of the Committee on the Web site, www.nyym.org. Please consider joining us at Representative or Yearly Meeting, or e-mail me or call me with your comments and queries. Thanks! Joanna Komoska, clerk, Ad Hoc Committee on Staffing and Structure Volcanic Eruption in CongoWhen a volcano erupted near Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in January, the lava flow killed thousands, caused tens of thousands to flee, and destroyed uncountable homes and other buildings. According to Community of Evangelical Friends Churches in Congo, "The [land] where a simple wooden small Friends church is built belongs to a Friend who let Friends use it temporarily. This Friend will indeed take his [land] back so that he may use it to build houses for the members of his family whose houses have been burned down." The American Friends Service Committee is providing relief assistance. Dianne Forte, interim director for AFSC International Programs in Africa, says, "We must act quickly to prevent an escalating crisis. This tragic event dramatically affects refugees and displaced people who are already suffering because of an existing humanitarian crisis created by many years of war throughout the country and the region." Further information can be found on AFSC's Web site, http://www.afsc.org/emap/goma.htm. Friends who would like to assist can contact AFSC/Development, 1501 Cherry St., Philadelphia PA 19102. To contribute via Visa or MasterCard, call 1-888-588-2372, ext. 1. No More Victims CampaignAt the AFSC Web site, http://www.afsc.org, you will find our most recent report related to the international response to the war in Afghanistan. AFSC has not been in Afghanistan before, and we are building our presence there at a time when conditions are still unstable. The U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan has not ended, and the UN still considers the major roads in and out of Kabul to be dangerous.Our Central Asia team is sending two delegations to the region. Nancy Smith, AFSC's consultant for the team's mission to Iran, left for Iran and Herat (in Afghanistan) on January 16. She has considerable experience in the region as former head of Oxfam's office in Kabul. Nancy will visit refugee camps on the border with Afghanistan. She will also meet with representatives from UN agencies and the Iranian Red Crescent Society to get an update on the political and humanitarian situation. She will identify projects for the AFSC to support with $20,000 of emergency aid, and she will prepare a report with suggestions for further AFSC work in the region. Two additional people representing AFSC's interests left for Afghanistan (via Pakistan) the day after Nancy Smith: Leila Richards, AFSC's field coordinator for Central Asia, and Hadi Azimi, an Afghan-American who will be AFSC's field representative in Afghanistan. They will set up an office in Kabul and explore possibilities for supporting relief and reconstruction projects in the months ahead. They will also work on building contacts with humanitarian relief, development, UN, and government agencies. To follow the AFSC's No More Victims Campaign, check their Web site: http://www.afsc.org and click on No More Victims. Peggy Morscheck, director, Quaker Information Center FUM Triennial in KenyaJuly 10, 2002, Friends from all over the world will gather at the Kenya College of Communications Technology in Nairobi, Kenya, to celebrate two centennial anniversaries: the founding of Five Years Meeting (currently called Friends United Meeting) and the 100th year of Quaker missionary presence in Kenya.More information will be in the May Spark. Contact Pat Sickmann at Friends United Meeting for a registration form and information needed for overseas travel; 101 Quaker Hill Dr., Richmond IN 47374; daytime phone: 765-962-7573; pats@fum.org; www.fum.org. 2002 FGC Gathering of FriendsJune 29 to July 6, 2002
Nearly 350 years ago, George Fox had a vision of a great people to be gathered. This vision was the beginning of his ministry and the Society of Friends. Many people are still yearning for the peace and freedom found in God's love. We invite Friends near and far to come to the Gathering in 2002 and experience a people gathered in the Divine embrace.
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| Events | |
| Westbury Public Library | |
| 4/7 | Exhibit & Program, 2:00 P.M. with Fred Hicks |
| 5/3 | Abolition and the L. I. Quakers, 7:00 P.M. with Dr. Kathleen Velsor |
| 6/14 | The Peace Testimony, 7:00 P.M. with Dan Seeger |
| Westbury Friends Meeting | |
| 6/30 | Pageant at 12:00 |
| 10/20 | Commemoration Day, tree planting, luncheon, & speaker |
Gretchen Haines, Westbury
The Table of Contents from the packets includes:
To request one for your meeting, contact Anne Wright at AFSC/NYMRO, 15 Rutherford Pl., New York NY 10003; 212-598-0951; awright@afsc.org.
How do you travel to work? If you ride a bus or subway, you can use this time for spiritual reading or worship. Another practice could be to pay attention to your fellow passengers. Try to observe them calmly. Do they seem happy? Do they seem to be present to their spirit selves or caught up in the rush of life? Are you sometimes absent to your inner self? Feel compassion for those who seem unmindful. Wish them peace. Feel your connection to them. Ask God to comfort those who suffer. If you commute by car, consider keeping the radio off and use the time for some spiritual reflection.
During the day, bring your attention back into the present and remember the God within. Perhaps you can incorporate "reminders" into your work environment. Inspired by the writings of Thich Nhat Hahn, I have placed a small note on my computer monitor, with "W.A.Y.D?" printed on it. That stands for "What Are You Doing?" a way of reminding me to come out of my head and remember to be awake to my spirit. Some people set the alarm on their watch to ring as a bell of mindfulness to call them out of unconsciousness.
Transitions from one activity to another can be opportunities for a moment of reflection. Lunch break, times before and after meetings, even a run to the restroom can provide a moment to bring your awareness to the present moment.
When you return home, consider limiting time spent watching TV, on the computer, or reading the newspaper. Do you sometimes play the radio or TV just for background noise? It takes time to get used to sustained silence, but you can practice it a little at a time. If you participate in any exercise, use it as a spiritual activity. Your body is the temple of the Spirit, and taking care of your health is beneficial to Spirit. Try to keep your mind present to what you are experiencing, instead of letting your thoughts carry you away.
At the end of the day, as you lie in bed, turn your awareness once again to God. Were you faithful today? Did you make an effort to be present? If so, give thanks. If not, ask for the grace to do better tomorrow. Forgive yourself for any failings and set an intention for the next day. Ask God's blessings for all creation.
Do you take time to read any spiritual writings? Even ten minutes a day can be very helpful. When you read, let the words resonate in your heart more than in your head. Try to feel the meaning of the words and let them draw you into silence as you are moved. Even if you don't have time to read them, try keeping some spiritual books or pamphlets around the house. Just seeing them can be a source of inspiration, and you may feel moved to read a few words.
It's very important to be careful of the "shoulds" in spiritual life. They can be very destructive and can deter us more than they encourage us to practice. If you are able little by little to increase your daily attention to God's presence, it will grow in you over time. The Inward Teacher will guide you to any changes that you may need to make, and give you the grace to make them.
Mary Ellen Alexander, Brooklyn
If your answering machine allows callers to leave messages, please be sure to check the machine regularly. A seeker may phone your meeting only once and become discouraged when there is no response.
How is your meeting listed in the telephone book? Newcomers often report that they had a hard time finding us. The Advancement Committee suggests listing a meeting under "Churches Quaker" in the yellow pages. Many people who are not Friends think first of the word Quaker. Friends is not as well recognized.
In the white pages, we suggest that you list under "Quaker Meeting," followed by the proper name since most people will not know your meeting's name and would be unable to find you otherwise. If the phone company has a problem making changes in your telephone listing, or fails to make the change as promised, be persistent. It is well worth the effort.
Recognizing the importance of a telephone to meeting outreach, the Advancement Committee provides grants to help small meetings or worship groups cover phone service. The committee will also help cover the cost of changing a telephone listing to "Quaker." For further information contact Jane Berger.
Jane Berger, clerk, Advancement Committee
Everyone's favorite AVP exercise involved analyzing what interpersonal style we use when we approach conflict. We found it enlightening to think of ourselves as Turtles, Sharks, Teddy Bears, and Owls. We were able to use an AVP technique, the fishbowl, to discuss and resolve a conflict we were experiencing ourselves that weekend.
Rosa Packard brought the video The Good War and Those who Refused to Fight It. Friends who had missed it on TV were moved by its power. Fred Dettmer led singing from the piano. The food, as usual, was delicious. The weather was crisp and dry no blizzards to drive through this year!
Nancy Kraus, Purchase
Child Development Director
Asst. Dir. of Conference Services
Emp Positions
Conference Services: front desk, reservations assistant, conference set-up, concierge, driver, night utility
Program Services: lifeguard, boathouse instructor/attendant, children's leader, environmental education, tennis instructor, fitness instructor, craft shop, chaplain assistant, string quartet, accompanist, music director
Support Services: housekeeper, maintenance/grounds, gardener, dining room, kitchen, ice cream/pizza store, nurse/EMT, accounting assistant, emp activities coordinator, resident assistant
For more information contact the Personnel Office, Silver Bay Association, 87 Silver Bay Rd., Silver Bay NY 12874; cclose@silverbay.org; 518-543-8833 ext 211; www.silverbay.org.
Carolyn Close, director of personnel
Articles in this issue of Spark are devoted to the "general care of the spiritual life of NYYM," sharing what Ministry and Counsel is doing as a coordinating committee. Last year we featured younger Friends, their activities, and their dreams. This year we focus on the pastors of NYYM: their call, function, and responsibilities. What leads a person to answer God's call to the pastoral ministry? How is it different from the expectant waiting of unprogrammed Friends?
Last summer at Silver Bay we heard the report of the Ad Hoc Committee on the Function of NYYM. One of the items that came into the awareness of that committee was the need for the care and support of our pastors. What do they need? How do we answer their needs? Is it only CCMC's responsibility?
We are also including articles on two of CCMC's active task groups: Spiritual Nurturance and Conflict Transformation. These are in answer to two of the responsibilities listed in our Handbook.
Finally, how do we care for one another in the Yearly Meeting? Attending our own meeting for worship on a regular basis, visiting with Friends in their homes, and visiting with Friends at another monthly meeting. We need to take the time to worship together and get to know one another.
May the peace found in the presence of God bless your life and the lives of your family. May that peace then spread out into the world.
Ann Davidson, clerk, CCMC
Is a Friends pastor an anomaly?
I was recorded as a Minister of the Gospel by Indiana Yearly Meeting in 1983. I have served as an associate minister at First Friends, Whittier, Cal., and pastored a small meeting in North Carolina Yearly Meeting. I am now pastor at Farmington Friends Meeting.
There are many aspects to the role of pastor. One of the most important is leading the worship on Sunday morning. To prepare a message requires study, prayer, and listening. God can move me in the study as well as on Sunday morning. I plan scripture readings and select hymns so the worship will hang together on a theme. Often the hardest part is deciding what that theme will be. I may have several false starts before I become clear where God is leading me. A few times I have changed things on Sunday during the worship hour, but only when I feel led.
In addition to leading worship, I meet with several committees. I spend the first part of the Sunday school hour with the children. I spend time in prayer and meditation. I conduct weddings and do premarital counseling with the couple. When a member of the meeting dies, I meet with the family and plan the memorial service. I visit members of the meeting, especially shut-ins, and make hospital visits when someone is hospitalized. The meeting expects me to be involved in the community and the yearly meeting. I have led Bible study at Farmington/Scipio Region Spring Gathering, at New York Yearly Meeting, and at FGC Annual Gathering. I'm involved with our area Clergy Council and help with ecumenical ministries and outreach.
I feel deeply honored that Friends let me into their lives at their most vulnerable times, such as illness and death, and also at their most joyful times, such as weddings and baby dedications.
A minister is on call all the time. I have a day off and set boundaries to honor my own time. But in an emergency, I am available to my meeting at any time.
My greatest desire is to be faithful to God. I feel called to ministry by God. In fact, God led me to it gently, but firmly, while I had been known to say, "I could never be a minister."
Being a minister means walking with Friends in their faith journeys, sharing my own journey, offering guidance, yet giving space. Being a minister means sharing joys and sorrows, good times and bad. It is also hard work. It is fulfilling. I am most successful when I let God lead me, and I am least successful when I try to do the work without God.
Ruth Kinsey, pastor, Farmington Friends Meeting
QIVP seeks to provide a way for us to live a more God-centered life. We believe that community is the best means to achieve our objectives:
We hope that the Quaker intentional village we are establishing in Columbia County, N.Y., can serve as a catalyst to help others who share our goals.
Beginning in 1993, a group within Wilton Monthly Meeting (CT) met regularly to discuss community building. Many Friends were interested in living in an intentional community, and Jens and Spee Braun broadened the discussions to Friends at the New York Yearly Meeting (NYYM) level and were encouraged to move forward.
They and a small group of other friends established a newsletter in 1999 and began regular meetings of QIVP in 2000. In August 2000 they moved ahead on establishing the first QIVP village, purchasing 135 acres in East Chatham, N.Y. This location was chosen for its proximity to NYYM's conference and retreat center, Powell House, so that we might support each other's missions. However, there is no formal connection between QIVP and either Powell House or NYYM.
Over the last year and a half, over 100 people have participated in aspects of establishing the Village, some committed to membership, others interested but not yet committed, and others general supporters. We have an active Advisory Council providing guidance, support, and leadership. With so many hands we have made good progress: We have renovated one of the old houses, removed tons of junk, and researched the history of the old farm (established in 1795 by a family possibly Quaker from Connecticut). We are currently working with the town on zoning issues, preparing our site plan, designing the first cluster of six houses, and planning the common house. At the same time, we are carefully defining and implementing the membership process, the financial structure, and the legal organization for the community.
We envision other Friends following their leadings to establish villages in other rural, suburban, and urban locales, under the auspices of QIVP, creating a network of villages that will support each other in living our lives in accordance with the QIVP objectives.
We encourage you to visit our Web site at www.qivp.org or e-mail info@qivp.org or call 518-392-0891. All are welcome to attend our Open Houses from 2-4 P.M. on Saturdays, May 4th and August 3rd.
Christine (Spee) Braun, founding member, QIVP
It is not possible to know the specifics about how to resolve each particular conflict, but we have observed common elements for guidelines and procedures. For example, we have come to realize that there is a need for training in the dynamics and process of reconciliation.
As we look at what should go in a handbook, we see the need for both a "faith" and a "practice" section. For example, we must have concern for how to balance the elements of transformation: forgiveness is a private (personal, interior) process; reconciliation is a public (social) process. Four elements must be brought into balance. They are, briefly, the requirement for truth, the demand for justice, the call for mercy, and the need for peace.
Finally, the task group is not a mediation service; please do not contact us for actual intervention services. We are providing conflict-resolution training to meetings, both a one-day, 6-hour workshop and a weekend Powell-House-on-the-Road workshop. Let us come to your place!
Cheshire Frager, representative to Task Group
I cofacilitate worship with Alyce Branum. We encourage persons to recognize God at work in their lives and to recruit persons for participation in service. Both Alyce and I act as visitation pastors, reaching out to those who are in need of comfort and care. We also share administrative and hospitality functions.
My background includes a master of divinity from Western Evangelical Seminary (George Fox University), four units of clinical pastoral education, recording by Northwest YM, board certification in the Association of Professional Chaplains, and work as a chaplain and as a director of pastoral services. My volunteer services include grief counseling with families and volunteer coordination with Habitat for Humanity.
Tryon Friends meet at 9:00 A.M. Sunday at the YMCA, 33 Bleecker St., Gloversville. Please come visit us. For information call 518-773-2203.
Sunday Blackmon, Tryon Worship Group
| Do we make opportunity in our daily lives for communion with God and the opening of our hearts to an awareness of the Christ Within? (NYYM Query) |
I had been looking forward for weeks to the silent retreat at Powell House. On Friday morning there was much to do at home and at work. A busy time hardly good preparation for a silent retreat but by the time I was driving on the Taconic Parkway and had left heavy traffic behind, the tension began to drop away. The Welcome Home sign on the door at Pitt Hall greeted me warmly, and I did indeed feel welcomed for this fourth Dwelling Deep weekend.
After dinner Linda Chidsey gathered us in the library with an introduction to the weekend, and we shared why we had come. One woman explained she had come to "be," not to "do." Yes, I thought, relaxing, that's it a weekend to just be. We would be letting the world fade away as we settled into our true self, our center, where God within dwells. The silence then began and we retired to our rooms, exchanging silent friendly glances with a roommate. I felt not alone but supported by a shared silence.
As in a monastery, a tinkling bell awoke us at 7:15 and we gathered in the library for worship and then for our first silent meal. This was a satisfying chance to pay attention to our senses the colors, taste, and texture of the food, others' faces, discerning what needed to be passed, sunlight coming in, birds at the feeders outside.
Then we met again for worship in the library and began to move from silence into stillness. The remainder of the morning we worked in small groups doing work for Powell House. Linda shared the discovery she had found in early NYYM minutes of a letter written to President Wilson from the Yearly Meeting urging him not to enter the war in Europe.
We each pursued our own activities after lunch. I took a short nap and delighted to wake and find it snowing. I took a walk around the grounds, just "being" in the beauty of Powell House enhanced by snow. Later in the afternoon we met in two groups to share our experience thus far in the weekend. Many of us shared the anxiety and sadness we had felt since September 11. One person in my group had been counseling survivors and victims' families day and night for weeks afterward. She described the heartbreak of telling family members to bring in a toothbrush or comb used by a missing person so it could be used to obtain a DNA sample. I shared the unbelievable good fortune to have a son who had not been at work at his office in the World Trade Center that day, but I was shaken by the close call and by the many memorial and funeral services in our town. Ann Davidson said that although they were somewhat insulated from the tragedy at Powell House, groups coming for weekends were obviously affected. We again entered the silence.
Saturday and Sunday evenings after dinner was for "active silence" when we gathered to each work on some project we had brought with us. Some read, others wrote or did needlework. What peace! Silence continued through worship and a snack.
Sunday's schedule was much the same. Monday morning we met after worship to prepare ourselves for a return to busy lives: What had the weekend meant for each of us? Would it have an effect on our lives as we returned to the bustling, noisy "real" world? I realized that a good part of the peace, in addition to dwelling in beauty, silence, and stillness for three days, was the absence of the telephone and the media that had filled my days since September 11. Would I be able to reduce that? Returning very rested and refreshed, I found I was able to recall the peace and centering silence of the weekend, helping me so far to respond to my busy life at a deeper level. I encourage others to discover a deepening silent retreat.
Martha Murdock, Rockland Friends Meeting
I took such a pilgrimage in mid-October, accompanied by a Friend from 15th Street Meeting. We stood, along with several others, gazing down Washington Street toward "ground zero," weeping and praying. The image of that tangled mass of destruction remained with me throughout the week, haunting and troubling, beyond all words.
That weekend I attended a conference at Powell House on the Incarnation, with Alan Kolp. I took along Sandra Cronk's pamphlet "Peace Be with You," an essay to which I've returned from time to time over the years. During the night I awoke with the words "redeemed and redeeming," hearing them in the way that I understand early Friends spoke of Christ as "come and coming," the church as "appeared and appearing," the Kingdom both here and yet to come. I held these words, along with a sense of their promise, throughout the day as I traveled to Schenectady for a Witness Coordinating Committee meeting. Returning to Powell House in the late afternoon, I rejoined the conference.
Upon awakening First Day morning, I picked up the pamphlet I had brought along, and the following words leaped off the page: "Christ is the window through whom we may see God's redemptive love for the world most clearly." Later that morning I shared my experience upon reading these words; it was as though a new lens had been inserted between my inward eye and the scene at "ground zero." And over the next several days it came to me that I could let go of all my anxious and troubling thoughts: "What can I do in response to this horrendous event?" "What can I do to ensure such a thing will never happen again?"
It came to me that I could pray. I could pray from a place of assurance that all has been redeemed and is being redeemed. To this, I could add my prayer for redemption. I could attune my eyes. I could look for, point to, affirm, and lift up evidence of redemption all around me. I could participate in God's redemptive love for the world in my every breath, with every thought, word, and deed.
There's no way I could have written these words several months ago. Indeed, if I had read them from the pen of another, I don't believe I would have understood. And yet here they are, now. To be clear, I do not claim any grandiose or overnight "success" in the moment-to-moment practice of redemptive love. That, I imagine, would take at least a lifetime.
However I can claim, with heartfelt certainty, that I've been given a new piece of wisdom or insight, that is, wisdom and insight that are new to me. I pray that I may be faithful to what has been given. I humbly request Friends to uphold me in my intent and my efforts, and should there be others so led, may we join together in a collective, corporate prayer for redemption.
In Peace,
Linda Chidsey, Clerk, NYYM
Postscript: A Friend with whom I shared this piece suggested it would be helpful to explain, in all its newness, my understanding of redemption. Sensitive and tender toward the range and diversity of theology within our Yearly Meeting, I ask that Friends "listen in tongues" as they read these words.
Profound in its reality, the words that come to explain or define redemption are simple. At God's initiation all things have been and are being reconciled, brought back into God's good order. Redemption has to do with hope, belief in the promise, trust in God's faithfulness and love. It means we don't have to do it all ourselves, though each one of us has a significant, perhaps extremely difficult part to play. Redemption having been redeemed has to do with the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It's about the Cross. Redemption proclaims that out of suffering and tragedy may come the miraculous.
Visitation activity grew out of the commitment of CCMC at its fall 2000 retreat concerning visits. A total of 26 MMs were visited to share worship, and more extensive workshops or consultations were held for three meetings.
Janet Carter, Task Group on Pastoral Care/Visitations
Mustafa Barghouthi, president of the Palestinian Medical Relief Committees and director of the Health, Development, Information and Policy Institute (HDIP) in Ramallah, says:
Palestinians have been asking for an international protection force to monitor events in the region for months. The US has twice vetoed a United Nations resolution asking for this. Ten months ago, Palestinians began their own grassroots movement of international protection. Since then, delegations from a number of European countries, as well as Canada and the United States, have witnessed to and monitored the situation on the ground reporting the reality to their home countries.
Be a part of this urgent work on behalf of Middle East peace! Please respond by June 1, 2002. Contact Bill and Genie Durland or Christian Peacemaker Teams, cpt@igc.org; 312-455-1199.
We would like to thank all Friends and alumni who have given money to the school for the damage and thank you for your concern. We will be pleased to use the money for development of the school or toward a donation to the Ministry of Public Works for the cost of the repair, which was approximately US$18,000.
We are hoping to obtain an acknowledgment from the Israeli government of the damage done to the school and to hear from them whether such damage is of any consequence to them or whether they see this accident as "collateral damage" for which they have no responsibility. We have received no acknowledgment by the Israeli government of the damage, and certainly no expression of regret or apology. The U.S. State Department seems unwilling to pursue this matter. The Israeli government has, it seems therefore, no intention of reimbursing the Ministry of Public Works for the cost of repairs.
This is a great sadness. Are we wrong to expect that Israel would have some concern about damage to a school, particularly to a school that has been concerned over the years with a movement toward peace and reconciliation? What conclusions can we draw from any lack of interest in acknowledging to the school its responsibility for the damage? What conclusions can we draw from the fact that the U.S. government seems unable or unwilling to comment on the attack on a school that has a large proportion of American students and teachers and has benefited over the last hundred years from American Quakers and from the state?
We pray for justice, reconciliation, and peace. We pray for integrity and honesty. We pray for our common humanity and our concern for others. We pray for the families on both sides of this low-level war whose lives are broken by death and destruction.
Colin South, director, Friends Schools, Ramallah, El-Bireh
Deadline for applications is April 5, 2002. For more information, contact Friends Peace Teams, Box 10372, San Antonio TX 78210; 877-814-6972; fpt@quaker.org; www.quaker.org/fpt.
What can we do in the U.S. to build better relations with Muslims?
Tariq Remtulla, Quaker U.N. Office
The force of John Bowne's personality changed the course of history. When he arrived in Flushing, the Quakers and other sects were being persecuted. Quaker meetings in Flushing were banned by Gov. Peter Stuyvesant's decree. Bowne and his wife offered their home for weekly meetings for worship. Arrested, ignoring escape setups, jailed, yet still refusing to plead guilty or pay the exorbitant fine for his release, Bowne was soon forced to travel to the Netherlands, where he was acquitted. He returned to Flushing in 1663 with a letter instructing Stuyvesant to halt religious persecution.
Twice a week over the next thirty years, Quaker meetings were held at Bowne House, which was expanded in 1680 to accommodate the growing number of Friends. In 1689, religious freedom and tolerance were formally enacted and protected in British New York and later officially recognized in the state's constitution.
John Bowne's home has survived over three centuries and is now an official New York City Landmark and a registered site on the National Register of Historic Places. Dating back to 1661, it is the oldest building in Queens County and the second oldest in New York City.
Saved by private purchase in 1945, the unique structure reflects Dutch, English, and New England design. The museum opened to the public on July 4, 1947.
The first phase of a restoration project began in September 2000. While the floorboards are up an archeological excavation is in progress. Excavation is also taking place near the house foundations and on the grounds.
For more information about the history of Bowne House or details about the renovation, contact Bowne House Historical Society at 37-01 Bowne Street, Flushing NY 11354; 718-359-0528.
Newton Garver writes, further, ". . . it strikes me that three things I enjoy both distract from simplicity and lie at the roots of violence: pride, power, and privilege. I enjoy them, in the sense that I possess them to some degree and in the sense that I like having them and am disinclined to renounce them. . . . When we speak of power we often have political power in mind, and that means the ability to dominate, to control other people. Such power is inherently divisive, as are perhaps all groupings, and hence contrary to simplicity. . . .
"Privileges are an obvious affront to simplicity, especially if one thinks of systematic privileges such as the Soviet nomenklatura or the Indian caste system. There are many different kinds of privileges, and there is a great temptation to disguise privileges (such as living in a rich country, or having a large inheritance, or not needing to work because of a generous pension) as rights rather than privileges. That strikes me as a middle-class illusion, and in any case rights are often even more complicating and more divisive than privileges.
"Having gone through this analytical exercise, I find that I am not ready to give up any of these obstacles to simplicity. I have a positive self-image, and through AVP I try to teach others to have one too. I like to be able to do things (have power), and I like showing other people how they can also have power. My life is full of privileges I am willing to share but unwilling to renounce. I like to think that by sharing pride, power, and privileges I am helping to break down barriers, but I am not sure that such sharing is what true simplicity really is."
And yet, as Bob Bogen writes, "Actually my concern related to RSWR, heightened by the recent terrorist atrocities, has always been the need for a vision and a program to eliminate, or at least reverse, the growing, worldwide grinding poverty. Even most Friends, living in a comfortable if complex society, appreciate that the more simple life of most others in the world may not be The Problem, in fact may be part of the solution." However, "The simplicity of Neo-Luddism to the contrary, there is little hope in closing the barn door on our complex technologies. Misled and unbalanced individuals as well as modestly funded small terrorist groups can also now use these technologies to destroy some or all of life on our little planet."
Thus it would appear that sharing may or may not be the same as simplicity, but both are needed. Bob Bogen reminds us that not sharing may have a terrible cost. Most of us can attest to the satisfaction of being able to share a kind of power, indeed, that few of us would readily renounce. And there is great pleasure to be had from a degree of living off the land, if we have land, and in spending time with our children instead of rushing to drive them from one activity to the next. There is even greater pleasure in freeing ourselves from material concerns sufficiently to experience the Divine, or at least to savor the beauty of Creation. In fact, both sharing our wealth and simplifying our lives can be immensely rewarding.
Mary Eagleson, clerk, Right Sharing of World Resources Committee
DEATHS
Martha N. Esmond, member of Saratoga, on January 5, 2002.
Edith Klein, member of Scarsdale, on December 20, 2001.
Edward Rogers, member of Shrewsbury, on February 25, 2002
Sarah L. Townsend, member of Hamilton, on December 1, 2001
TRANSFERS
Gardiner & Helen Angell to Kendal (PYM) from Scarsdale
Emily Smith Asche to Fallsington, PA, from Poughkeepsie
Susan Laughter to Brooklyn from 15th Street
Donald Prutzman to Brooklyn from 15th Street
MARRIAGES
Henry Baya, member of Scarsdale, and Elaine Appleby, on December 1, 2001.
Alexander Clague, member of Scarsdale, and Beth Ann Gannon, on November 9, 2001, under the care of Scarsdale.