As far as I know, the final settlement in that case was never made public. In a larger sense, the “final settlement” demanded by God’s grace and justice will never be measured in dollars, but there is something satisfying about knowing that money was involved: almost nothing slices through pious misdirection or sophistry like cold cash. But it’s also true that cash doesn’t cut deeply enough.

I’m still unconvinced we’re all doing enough to bring daylight to skeletons in our closets or healing to victims. Lawsuits make everyone clam up, yet they too often seem to be the only mechanism for shedding light on the situation in the first place.

https://blog.canyoubelieve.me/2019/02/trustworthy-part-one-cost-of-betrayal.html

On a day-to-day basis my biggest struggle – if I’m finding it hard to find the words – is over whether I need to wait for inspiration to come, or whether I’m just being lazy and underprepared. Whether I’m letting fear or procrastination stop me. The Quaker method has a lot to say to that. You know, you wait in silence and if it doesn’t come then it doesn’t come. But also you have to be disciplined, and prepared, for that to work

https://thefriend.org/article/my-ministry-is-the-jokes-and-kittens

I have put this talk together in ebook form complete with lots of pictures and illustrations and formatting that adds to the reading experience. I wanted to share this with all of you and make it as accessible as possible, so it is free to download. It should work with most modern-day eBook readers and apps. If that doesn’t work for you, I have also turned the talk into a downloadable .PDF.

http://gatheringinlight.com/2018/11/20/new-ebook-remixing-faith-now-available/

“We wanted our guests to have something to do as they arrived [while] we took pictures with our families, so we planned a kitten hour,” Colleen told POPSUGAR. “We did a cocktail hour with cocktails named after our cats for the reception, but the Quaker meeting house we used for the ceremony doesn’t allow alcohol on premises. I wanted a wedding falcon, but Iz vetoed that, and so we compromised on kittens.”

https://www.popsugar.com/moms/Couple-Has-Kitten-Hour-Wedding-45498151/amp

I don’t know much about Rorem or the extent or ongoingness of his Quaker identity (if anyone wants to share more in the comments that would be great). I keep a list I call “Surprising Unexpected Unlikely Quakers” for names people give me of famous’ish people with Quaker connections. Who’s your favorite unlikely Quaker?

At 95, Ned Rorem Is Done Composing. But He’s Not Done Living. (Published 2018)

As the composer, writer and gay icon lives quietly on the Upper West Side, his music and books…

www.nytimes.com

Most yearly meetings recommend that everyone who works with young people should have a background check. Most local meetings I have been a part of resist this, saying that “But we know that person – they have belonged here for years!” Requiring a background check feels to some Friends like an invasion of privacy, or that it goes against the openness and trust which they value in a Quaker meeting.

I have personally known of three respected Friends who turned out to be serial child rapists. Two were pillars of their meeting. None of the people in the monthly meeting knew learned about it because of outside legal action and investigations.

There were times when these individuals were around my children, though I was near-enough nearby that I’m not worried anything happened. Still, one of the cases involved rapes in a camper in the perpetrator’s backyard and I remember my eldest thinking it looked cool and trying the door handle. We also had a close call with a Boy Scout leader and respected local historian whose file was published when an Oregon judge ordered the national BSA to release decades of secret pedophile records.

One the affected meetings in particular is near and dear to me heart and have some warm and faithful Friends. I know it was a shock and ongoing trauma for them that this happened in their community. I understand that we were all a bit naive about these matters 10 and 20 and 30 years ago. But we’ve all been educated about just how common this is and just how charming pedophiles can be.

Even recently, I’ve had people assure me their Friends meetings are safe and that they don’t need to do background checks. I make a mental note to avoid those meetings. We are not immune. And we are not magically better about discerning this stuff than any other faith community.

Straight talk on preventing child abuse

Even worse, when we routinely marginalize certain gifts, we begin to see their exercise as dysfunctional and their absence as normative, rather than the reverse. When the prophet challenges us with uncomfortable truths, rather than using our discomfort as an opportunity for reflection and discernment, we tell her to tone it down, complain that she is “unwelcoming” and, if she doesn’t get the message, we run her off.

Welcoming the Gifts God Sends Us

In order to remain healthy and faithful, we must nurture all spiritual gifts, not just the ones that…

In the Shadow of Babylon

It seems that this perpetual cynicism may be the greatest threat of our era. Is the child of irony? The grandchild of government conspiracy theories? Maybe the cause doesn’t matter as much as the effect.

The mob thrives on chaos. It likes chaos. It likes to be the alternative authority that you go to because you can’t get anything done through the legitimate state. For that very reason, I think there’s no doubt that it promotes that chaos. It likes civic distrust. It likes cynicism. It can profit from that. I think the great tragedy of Italy is that, to a large extent, it’s kind of succeeded.

I think that if we wanted to construct a Quaker critique of the current American government–and the type of corporatized corruption we see in Russia and the petrostates, it would best start with the political culture that deny basic facts, gaslight citizens with ever-changing rationales, and creating chaos that can let financial hucksters reap billions. These are not governments based on integrity and fair playing fields.

The Mafia Is More Powerful Than It’s Ever Been

If you think of violent, influential organized crime in Italy as a thing of the past, think again.

Slate Magazine