Testimonies of Separation
I have litigated divorce, paternity, custody, child support, and Order of Protection cases in Arizona for over three years. My work has largely been funded by a grant for crime victims’ rights.
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I have litigated divorce, paternity, custody, child support, and Order of Protection cases in Arizona for over three years. My work has largely been funded by a grant for crime victims’ rights.
“Tell me a story.” How often we said that as children! “Tell me a story.” Narrative has the power to shape our world; indeed it is how we understand the world and our place in it. “Tell me a story.”
For a single moment, time collapsed in the Tucson International Airport. Heads turned abruptly. Passersby stopped dead in their hurried tracks. A soul-deep wail erupted from the throat of a sturdy woman with a mighty set of lungs. Haregewoin’s cry shattered the hubbub and echoed off the sterile walls, like thunder.
“To put it in the language of Friends, community happens as that of God in you responds to that of God in me.”
– Parker Palmer
The following text is an abridged version of a recently discovered, previously unpublished article. The full version is published online at: westernfriend.org/media/expanding-nonviolence
On Monday night, I went to bed fretting about how very little we old people in retirement communities are able to do about all the problems of this world.
On Tuesday morning, before I fully woke (was I still dreaming?), I began to imagine a man called Tom Friendly, and I was comforted.
OUR principle is, and our practices have always been, to seek peace and ensue it; to follow after righteousness and the knowledge of God; seeking the good and welfare, and doing that which tends to the peace of all. . .
I am an African American whose encounter with God is more an attitude than belief system, a certain swagger and daring in the face of what black liberation theologian James Cone would refer to as “obvious failure.” By all quantitative standards, the post-Reconstruction experience of African Americans would meet the definition of failure.
I became a convinced Friend the first time I walked into a Quaker meeting for worship. I was twenty-one, and I experienced the best of what Quaker worship can be. Compared with my previous experience of religion – a “stand up, sit down” experience of being “preached at” – I said to myself, “this is the real thing.” That was fifty years ago.
Be a CASA – Court Appointed Special Advocate
Our world presents us with many problems that are so large we may feel we can do little to make a difference. CASA is a program where one individual’s efforts can change a life, often lives, for the better.
