April 2005 Archives

There's $7 in the Nonviolence.org Palpal account, not even enough to cover the current monthly charge to the web host. The world's top-ranked Nonviolence website with over 5000 visitors a day is about to wink out of existence because of lack of funds. Maybe that's appropriate. Lots of people talk about peace but the near-complete failure in fundraising for this project points to a reality that we don't really care enough to give serious support for these sorts of projects. My posts have been dropping off lately simply because I have to work my paying job to make ends meet (even so they barely meet but that's a different story).

If you think it's worth supporting major publications for peace, you can make a donation here. Twelve dollars will keep it going another month. Even better, U.S. citizens can look at their recent income tax charges, half of which went to support military spending. Why don't you give ten percent of that half to Nonviolence.org and other worthy peace projects?

Hi all: I don't want the imminent changes to be a surprise. There will be a lot happening in the next six months and it's almost certain the "Quaker Ranter" will suffer. I try not to get too personal on this site but money is crazy tight and much of this work will probably be coming to an end soon.

I was given permission to pass along this data from the FGC-sponsored Youth Ministry Consultation that took place Third Month. A number of goals and projects had been brainstormed beforehand. The thirty-or-so participants at the Consultation were each given ten stars, which they were asked to put next to the projects they thought should be pursued. Every star acted as a vote that there was one person interested in that topic. The stars were coded to indicate the age range of the voter: High-Schooler, Adult Young Friend (18-37 years old) and older Friends.

In the bookstore today a customer called in and asked about "Let your lives speak," a phrase frequently attributed to George Fox (it's the source of a book title, "Lives that Speak"). While a quick Google search finds lots of pages where people say things like "as George Fox said, you should 'let your lives speak,'" no one actually gives details of when and where he said it. The phrase seems to sit only by itself, with no passages before or after it. A few sites claim it was part of his message on Firbank Fell but no one cites a source. Sitting on the same Palm Pilot as the Yardbirds MP3s is Fox's Journal (Jones edition) and a keyword search doesn't pick up "lives that speak" or "let your lives speak" anywhere. Smells fishy, like another one of those too-good-to-be-true Fox quotes. Can anyone document that it's real?

PS: I fly bright and early tomorrow morning for this year's Quakers Uniting in Publications meeting, in Oregon. I don't know what internet access I'll have so my apologies if new comments have to sit for a few days.

I've always promised that I wouldn't let this blog get so serious that I couldn't share the ephemera of life. In that vein, here's a caution for any would-be urban plain-dress hipster: it's really hard to keep to the proper sidewalk demeanor when your MP3 player queues up the Yardbird's "For Your Love."

Especially when the bongos kick in.

This I know experientially.

For those who can't name God in their lives, it must be just a bit bizarre to come week after week to participate with a group of people praying for God's guidance. But that's okay. I think all that is good in our religious society come from the Great Master. We are known by our fruits and the outward forms of our witnesses constantly point back to God's love. This is the only real outreach we do. I'm happy spending a lifetime laboring with someone in my community pointing out to the Spirit's presence in our midst.

A humble giant among modern Friends passed away this weekend: Bill Taber. All of us doing the work of mapping out a "conservative liberal Quakerism" owe a huge debt to Bill. Although others are more qualified to share his biography, I know he taught for many years at Ohio Yearly Meeting (Conservative)'s Olney Friends School and then for many more years at the Pendle Hill Center outside Philadelphia. He and his wife Fran were instumental in the 1998 founding of the Friends Center retreat and conference center on the campus of Olney.

I had the honor of meeting Bill and Fran once, when they came to lead a meeting retreat. But like so many Friends, Bill's strongest influence has been his writings. Four Doors to Meeting for Worship was his introduction to worship. I'll quote from the "About the Author," since it explains the root of much of his work:

This pamphlet's metaphor of the four doors grew out of his awarness of a need for a more contemporary explanation of "what happens" in a Quaker meeting. He feels this lack of insturction in method has become an increasing problem as modern Friends move farther and farther away from the more pervasive Quaker culture which in earlier generations played such a powerful teaching role, allowing both birthright and convinced Friends to learn the nuances and spiritual methodology of Quakerism largely through osmosis. In sharing this essay Bill hopes to help nurture a traveling, teaching, and prophetic ministry which could reach out and touch people into spiritual growth just when they are ready to receive the teaching.

One of the spiritual methodolgy's Bill shared with his students at Pendle Hill was a collection by a old Quaker minister named Samuel Bownas--regular readers of this site know how important Bownas's Descriptions of the Qualifications has been to me. But other books of his have been invalable too: his history of Ohio Yearly Meeting shared the old culture of the yearly meeting with great stories and gentle insight.

Bill Taber might have passed from his earthly body Friday morning but the work he did in the world will continue. May we all have the grace to be as faithful to the Teacher as he was.

By James Riemermann

Here's a thought-provoking comment that James left a few days ago on the We're All Ranters Now piece. It's an important testimony and a good challenge. I'm stumped trying to answer it upon first reading, which means it's definitely worth featuring!

So why didn't I get the memo that April is "Don't Blog About Quakerism Month"? On Monday Beppe said he was taking a hiatus from Quakerism. On Tuesday, Amanda confided to us that she's having a midblog crisis. Wednesday has Kwakersauer's announcement that his blog is under deconstruction.

I'm looking around here and I'm getting a little nervous. The Contrarian Quaker started things on Third Month 31, posting a thoughtful piece on those of us who have been expressing doubts lately. Since then a number of Quaker bloggers have gone quiet: The Brooklyn Quaker, Quaker Dharma and Can You Believe Johan have gone almost a week into April without a post. Gulp!

Public Quaker Alice is still with us, she posted three days ago. Just Curious James checked in on April Fool's Day (but he's talking about British Evangelicals--uh-oh!). LizOpp checked in on the third and Kenneth Sutton has had two posts in April (go Kenneth!).

Still I have to wonder if someone else is planning to take the fall on Thursday? I feel like I'm in one of those bad haunted mansion mystery movies: the lights go out, a scream shatters the night and there's one less guest at the hotel. I'm still here. Has anyone seen the butler lately?

Update: Beppe has talked more about the practices and motivations of Quaker blogging.

From the excellent religious journalism site The Revealer is Scott Korb's review of the new book by the National Survey of Youth and Religion (I talked about the survey a month ago). It's an great review, made better by the friendly disagreement in the commentary. But what struck me was his use of the terms "therapeutic individualism" and "moralistic therapeutic deism."

The authors first identify the social contexts in which adolescents live and believe, starting with a discussion of therapeutic individualism, a set of assumptions and commitments that "powerfully defines everyday moral and relational codes and boundaries in the United States." Personal experience is what shapes our notions of truth, and truth is found nowhere else but in happiness and positive self-esteem. In religious terms, according to teenagers, God cares that each teenager is happy and that each teenager has high self-esteem. Morality has nothing to do with authority, mutual obligations, or sacrifice.

But we're not talking about the teenagers here, are we? The review hints that this is the condition of the adults too, only we're better at couching it in more convincingly religious-sounding language. Did I say I attended two days of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting sessions this weekend? More to come.

I would love to expand the Quaker Ranter into a new online magazine that would encourage and mentor in a new generation of writers, activists and ministers in the Society of Friends. I’m already moving in that direction, with more and more “Guest Pieces,” but it can not be done with just a nip and tuck there: even with my fifteen years of publishing experience and the lovely instant publishing possibilities of the internet, some work and expense is needed to properly launch a new online journal.

It seems beyond yesterday's news but the findings of the presidential commission on intelligence gives more evidence about the deeply-flawed U.S. prewar intellegence on iraq.

Here's the New York Times' analysis on the report

"It is hard to deny the conclusion that intelligence analysts worked in an environment that did not encourage skepticism about the conventional wisdom," the commission said. But that understated indictment is about the extent of the commission's effort to explain the responsibilities of the nation's highest officials for one of the worst intelligence failures of modern times.

So the latest and presumably the last official review of such questions leaves unresolved what may be the biggest question of all: Who was accountable, and will they ever be held to account for letting what amounted to mere assumptions "harden into presumptions," as Judge Laurence H. Silberman, chairman of the commission, put it.

Here at Nonviolence.org, we just wish we had a dollar for every yahoo who sent nasty emails insisting weapons of mass destruction were about to be found. Even more disturbing is that all this may not be yesterday's news. As the Times also reported, the report says that the U.S. "knows disturbingly little about the nuclear programs of many of the world's most dangerous actors.