When testimonies come drifting in

March 16, 2019
· Martin Kelley

Steven Davi­son asked what the tes­ti­mo­ny of com­mu­ni­ty even meant or whether it was spelt out any­where. No one could answer but no ine want­ed to omit it.

I sus­pect a process may be at work sim­i­lar to the one that has made “that of God in every­one” the puta­tive foun­da­tion of all our tes­ti­monies: an unself­con­scious thought-drift in a cul­ture increas­ing­ly impa­tient with intellectual/theological rig­or, or even atten­tion of any seri­ous kind, not to men­tion care for the tes­ti­mo­ny of integri­ty. These ideas arise some­how, some­where, and then get picked up and dis­sem­i­nat­ed because they sound nice, they meet some need, and they don’t demand much. They appar­ent­ly don’t require dis­cern­ment, anyway. 

The “Tes­ti­mo­ny of Community”

Disappointment, frustration, and betrayal

March 8, 2019
· Martin Kelley

From Johan Maurer:

What choic­es do we have? The most obvi­ous and most glib answer is: leave! Escape! In fact, after prayer and con­sul­ta­tion and weigh­ing options, that may end up being the best answer. 

This seems like a very ground­ed look at some of the oft-recurrent dys­func­tions in church­es. Check out the list of prob­lems. I sus­pect thet most seek­ers have run into at least a fee of these in congregations.

https://​blog​.canyoube​lieve​.me/​2​0​1​9​/​0​3​/​t​r​u​s​t​w​o​r​t​h​y​-​p​a​r​t​-​t​h​r​e​e​-​c​h​o​i​c​e​s​.​h​tml

The Lamb’s War and dietary non-violence

March 8, 2019
· Martin Kelley

On Friend­ly Fire:

I am think­ing of those pre­tend­ing com­pas­sion and love whilst con­sum­ing prod­ucts of cru­el­ty and bru­tal­i­ty. We say with St. Paul: ‘I will eat no flesh whilst the world stands, because I will not hurt my broth­er.’ All crea­tures are our sis­ters and broth­ers, as Saint Fran­cis of Assisi recog­nised cen­turies ago. 

The Lamb’s War and dietary non-violence

A more modern commission

March 7, 2019
· Martin Kelley

As an East Coast unpro­grammed Friend, Quak­er mis­sion work is still a bit exot­ic. We’re used to read­ing of well-meaning nine­teenth cen­tu­ry Friends whose atti­tudes shock us today. But here’s a sto­ry of some Mid­west mis­sion work with the Shawnee in the 1970s and 80s.

Their “mis­sion” work con­sists of farm­ing, teach­ing, music and wood­work­ing and lan­guage trans­lat­ing, lots of trans­port­ing chil­dren and teens. It also involves preach­ing each week, and par­tic­i­pa­tion in funer­als, wed­dings, and oth­er tra­di­tion­al pas­toral duties, all aimed at intro­duc­ing peo­ple to Jesus.

Their “mis­sion” work con­sists of farm­ing, teach­ing, music and wood­work­ing and lan­guage trans­lat­ing, lots of trans­port­ing chil­dren and teens. It also involves preach­ing each week, and par­tic­i­pa­tion in funer­als, wed­dings, and oth­er tra­di­tion­al pas­toral duties, all aimed at intro­duc­ing peo­ple to Jesus. 

http://​www​.lib​er​al​first​.com/​o​p​i​n​i​o​n​/​o​u​r​-​g​r​e​a​t​-​c​o​m​m​i​s​s​ion

What Does the Outside Say?

March 7, 2019
· Martin Kelley

Also in Friends Jour­nal’s issue, “Out­side the Meet­ing­house,” a piece from Brad Stock­er of Mia­mi Meet­ing in Florida:

Most Friends have an under­stand­ing of the archi­tec­tur­al mes­sage that our meet­ing­hous­es express. We under­stand the sim­plic­i­ty of the struc­ture. We under­stand the rea­son there are no steeples or cross­es on the out­side and why we have clear win­dows placed so as to invite the light to enter. We are equal­ly sen­si­tive to inte­ri­or design. While we come into fre­quent, inti­mate con­tact with the meet­ing­house exte­ri­or, and the land it sits on, we may be less aware of the mes­sage they convey. 

There may be a lit­tle whiplash to talk about but­ter­fly gar­dens after the recent arti­cle on Quak­er wor­ship from prison but I like the inten­tion­al­i­ty of Stock­er’s obser­va­tions: we are always mak­ing state­ments with the care (or non-care) of our phys­i­cal space. Miami’s the kind of coastal city where cli­mate change is very much not a the­o­ret­i­cal issue and Stock­er is very involved in his year­ly meet­ing’s earth­care edu­ca­tion ini­tia­tives. The meet­ing­house grounds are a place to mod­el good stew­ard­ship; tak­ing the care to have them be invit­ing and qui­et­ly demon­stra­tive of Quak­er val­ues is impor­tant outreach.

A bit of racism at Sidwell

March 7, 2019
· Martin Kelley

Not cool: some stu­dents at the ritzy DC Quak­er school made up racist user­names in a pro­ject­ed in-school discussion:

School offi­cials say sev­er­al of the student’s user­names were racist toward Asians and Native Amer­i­cans and two of the user­names includ­ed images of swastikas. As soon as the names and images were rec­og­nized the pro­jec­tor was turned off and the pre­sen­ta­tion was ended. 

Not many of the stu­dents at Sid­well are Friends so it’s high­ly unlike­ly that these were Quak­er kids. But it’s nev­er good to hear of behav­ior like this.

http://​www​.fox5dc​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​l​o​c​a​l​-​n​e​w​s​/​r​a​c​i​s​t​-​w​o​r​d​s​-​s​w​a​s​t​i​k​a​s​-​d​i​s​p​l​a​y​e​d​-​a​t​-​s​i​d​w​e​l​l​-​f​r​i​e​n​d​s​-​s​c​h​o​o​l​-​s​t​u​d​e​n​t​-​p​r​e​s​e​n​t​a​t​ion

Young Friends in UK write a Trans and Non-binary Statement

March 6, 2019
· Martin Kelley

This seems part­ly in response to con­tro­ver­sies around anti-trans fem­i­nists book­ing Quak­er meet­ing­hous­es for talks.

YFGM aims to be a wel­com­ing and acces­si­ble space for peo­ple of all gen­der iden­ti­ties where peo­ple feel includ­ed and oppres­sive behav­iour is not accept­ed. We recog­nise we have fur­ther work to do includ­ing some more imme­di­ate changes, and cre­at­ing space to nur­ture deep­er cul­tur­al changes with­in both YFGM and the wider Soci­ety of Friends. 

http://​yfgm​.quak​er​.org​.uk/​d​o​c​s​/​t​r​a​n​s​-​a​n​d​-​n​o​n​-​b​i​n​a​r​y​-​s​t​a​t​e​m​e​nt/