Letters to the Editor

Gratitude from Pasadena:

Greetings, Friends,

The fires that broke out in Los Angeles County in January were devastating. We are thankful that no lives were lost among our worshippers. We mourn the loss of others. We are thankful that our Meetinghouse campus was spared beyond windfall and smoke damage. We mourn the loss of members’ and attenders’ homes, and those of tens of thousands of others.

We are thankful that, among the chaos, confusion, and communication outages, we were eventually able to find all our evacuated people wherever they had found sanctuary and ascertain their conditions and needs. We are thankful that Friends have reached out in generous support of our efforts to ameliorate some of our financial loss. Other losses can never be remedied ― scenes of family memories forever erased, along with documents, photographs, and heirlooms destroyed.

Fire, as well as rain, falls upon the just and the unjust alike, and we let love rather than circumstantial judgment of any kind be our guide towards disbursement of Friends’ generous donations. The concerns of distant Friends that their succor not simply be passed on through us to impersonal organizations of relief kept us mindful that our responsibilities lay closest to home. Through deep and thoughtful discernment, we sorted our options, discarding airy notions of being able to accomplish more on a wider scale than our time and talents allowed. We focused on immediate relief to those most severely affected among our community, whether member, attender, or employee.

The school on our campus, founded by one of our members, acted quickly to perform smoke and toxic ash remediation before reopening a week later. We made a prompt contribution to help with their expenses and our standing committees are looking at ways to provide further assistance. A food bank, founded by Friends which we’ve supported modestly in normal times, was adjacent to the fire perimeter and spared by the flames. We made a donation to help their vital work continue unabated through these times. Much of the remaining funds will be spent repairing damage to our cemetery, and we will then meet again to discern the best use of the remainder to mitigate other damage.

The usual work of our meeting needed to continue throughout all this, of course, and there were times when we were overwhelmed and unable to respond to your questions in a timely fashion. We apologize for our tardiness in expressing our gratitude for your concern and support, but please know that it is heartfelt and that your love, light, and largesse were cherished and continue to help us through this time of unexpected change.

Sharing Fund Fire Committee

Orange Grove Monthly Meeting

Pasadena, CA

Nisenan Tribe’s Video about the Return of Their Land

I was so moved that I cried while watching this video. I could hear others from my Meeting cry in the dark theater as well. As a member of Grass Valley Friends Meeting, we recently visited Uba Seo—the art and culture gallery run by the local indigenous tribe, the Nisenan. Inside the gallery is a small theater; that’s where we watched the video, which is called “Homeland Return.” It’s about the connection the Nisenan have to the land and the transfer of the land occupied by the Sierra Friends Center (also called Woolman) back to the Nisenan. The Nisenan have renamed the land Yulica (Yoo-LEE-chah), which was the name of the thriving tribal village that existed there before the Gold Rush.

Grass Valley Friends Meeting met on this land for sixty years, and the Nisenan have graciously allowed us to continue meeting there. In the video, members of the tribe talk about what the land means to them and how they felt it called to them. It shows beautiful shots of the buildings and the land that we in the Meeting have grown to love: the clear running water in the creek that runs through it, the classroom where we continue to teach First Day School, the forest that surrounds the buildings, the boulder with the tennis ball-shaped holes in it where the Nisenan used to grind medicines, and the converted barn where we hold meeting for worship and where the Quaker library is located. The video was used last year as part of a fundraising campaign to help the Nisenan to pay county fees and the remaining debt attached to the property, so that ownership could be transferred. The campaign was successful; now the 232-acre site is owned by the Nisenan. Anyone who attended the Woolman School, Woolman Semester, or any other programs or meetings on the Sierra Friends Center campus may find it as moving as we did. The video can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klgu5mmAdX0

Donald W. McCormick

Grass Valley Friends Meeting

Thoughts concerning Victory in Europe Day

On May 8 this nation and others will commemorate the victory, 80 years ago, of human decency over the most pernicious and diabolical regime since the medieval Inquisition: one so consumed by evil as to perpetrate ― in the second quarter of the 20th century, before the term had even been invented ― one of the most lethal episodes of ethnic cleansing in recorded European history.

The triumph over humanity's baser instincts would, however, be short-lived. The ink was scarcely dry on the instrument of the Nazi regime's surrender before one of the victors unleashed ― on a different enemy in the same war ― the deadliest weapon ever used by one tribe against another, committing the two largest single-event mass murders of civilians in the known history of the human species.

So much for decency.

Perry Hutchison
Multnomah Meeting

Dear Editor,

We really enjoyed the article “Beans and ‘Beanites’” in the January/February issue of Western Friend. As the article mentions, Joel and Hannah Bean moved to San José, CA, in 1882, and worshiped with a Meeting that had formed in 1861. In 1885, four families financed the building of a meetinghouse and held the inaugural gathering 140 years ago on April 26. Friends still worship here, and it is the oldest Quaker meetinghouse west of Iowa!

As such, it is the “Mother Meetinghouse” for all Quakers served by Western Friend. About 10 years ago, the San José Meeting began raising funds to make the facilities wheelchair-accessible, including the 1885 building, its “Harmony Hall” (added by 1906), and the bathrooms (1958).

Permits are expected soon for these major accessibility renovations. We attended a fundraising event at the meetinghouse last July and were amazed to learn of the ongoing efforts over the years to raise funds. The Meeting is now within $72,000 of its goal of $391,000. We urge all Quaker Meetings and individuals to contribute to “our” meetinghouse. Donations can be sent to the San Jose Friends Meeting.

Mimi and Alan Edgar

Santa Cruz Friends Meeting