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Caring for Young Adult Friends

Authored by: Cara Arcuni
Monthly meetings all over the United States struggle with attracting new attenders, particularly Young Adult Friends (YAFs) who fall between the ages of 18 and 35.  It’s a rather large and indiscriminate cohort, but the people in that cohort (including me) have something in common: whether convinced, birthright, or exploring, we just don’t seem to be sticking around.
On Love (September 2013)

Draft Counseling Across the Divide

Authored by: Bill Lovett
During the buildup of the Vietnam War in 1967, several Friends families found themselves in Visalia, California, due to the establishment of the American Friends Service Committee’s Farm Labor Program. The program was focused on helping low-income families, especially farm workers, to form cooperative groups. These groups of eight to twelve families were then guided through the process of building their own homes.
On Patriotism (January 2014)

Creating Real Security

Authored by: Al Thompson , Susan Strong , Leonard Joy , Shelley Tanenbaum , Sarah Hawthorne , James Hosley , Charlie Blanchard
American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) and Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) recently published a pamphlet titled, Shared Security: Reimagining U.S. Foreign Policy (April 2013). At Strawberry Creek Monthly Meeting in Berkeley, California, a small group considered this pamphlet and then organized a larger meeting to talk about this topic after Meeting for Worship on September 29, 2013.  Twenty-eight people attended. For the meeting, we prepared a one-page handout with some quotes from the AFSC/FCNL pamphlet. The text of that handout is included at the end of this article. [The pamphlet is also reviewed on page 32 of this magazine. – Editor]
On Patriotism (January 2014)

the tree thing, experiencing connectedness

Authored by: eric maya joy
during the 2013 gathering of friends general conference in greeley, colorado, a few of us met for three hours each day, all five days, to see what would emerge if we applied friends’ faith and practice towards seeking deeper unity with nature.  mark helpsmeet from “northern spirit radio” often attends this annual gathering; he interviews friends there and edits those interviews into segments for his radio show.   he arranged to interview three of us exploring unity with nature on thursday afternoon.
On Time (March 2014)

Do Quakers Mean Business?

Authored by: Rob Pierson
Recently a Methodist church invited me to a book study. They had been reading books on ethically based business, including Deborah Cadbury’s Chocolate Wars, and had grown wildly curious about these peculiar Quakers and their century and a half of confectionary success. The group leader tabulated a list of famous Quaker business leaders – not only in cocoa, but also in ironwork, railways, footwear, chinaware, household goods, pharmaceuticals, and banking. Why, she asked, was the list so long? Why were there so many Friendly industrial innovators? Why so many business names they now recognized as Quaker – from Cadbury chocolates to Barclays bank to Clarks shoes? What was it about this relatively small, seemingly austere, and ethically demanding faith that drove such a disproportionate share of business enterprise?
On Production (May 2014)

Love Always Protects

Authored by: Alvaro Alvarado , Donna Higgins Smith , Lynnette Arnold
Friends who gathered at Pacific Yearly Meeting (PYM) in July 2014 were moved by a refugee crisis unfolding on the US-Mexico border. Thousands of children continue to escape violence in Central America and seek reunification with family members working in the US. The crisis has many causes that require thoughtful analysis to discern long-term solutions, but for us the causes do not matter. As members of PYM’s Latin American Concerns Committee, we seek not to ascribe blame, but rather to follow God’s will. We are led to show love to these children.
On Family (September 2014)

A New Intimacy

Authored by: Robert Griswold
I have always longed to be part of a community. But it has become clear to me lately that “belonging” depends on being accountable. I do not mean this in a quid pro quo sense, like an accountant balancing the books. I mean this in the sense of family members being accountable to each other, where they care for each other, and they all contribute as much as they are able. In the intimacy of a family, each member accepts a sense of vulnerability to the others. They put their trust in each other. They know that each person’s conduct reflects on the family as a whole. They know that they owe the family the consideration of behaving in ways that reflect well on it. The family has a right to expect the members to account for their behavior. By being accountable in an intimate setting, people strengthen the bonds of love among them.
On Beginning (March 2016)

Surmounting Limits in Quakerism

Authored by: Anthony Manousos
When I asked Mary Klein if she would publish an article about the 2016 meeting of Friends World Committee on Consultation, she suggested that I write one for the issue on “Limits.” My initial response was: “Is she kidding?” I was grateful for her offer, but something in me bristles at the word “limits.”
On Limits (May 2016)

Quaker Radio

Authored by: Mark Judkins Helpsmeet
Perhaps you know the joke, “What do you get when you cross a Jehovah’s Witness with a Quaker? Someone who knocks on your door and then refuses to speak to you.” At the same time that we want to create the Peaceable Kingdom, we’re a bit hesitant about making too big a deal about the event, figuring others need to find their own way to it, without us being too pushy.
On Media (September 2016)