Spark, September 2015

Fall Sessions

Click the following link to go to the Fall Sessions 2015 section of the website for registration and information about Sessions.

Download a pdf file of Spark

Contents

Articles

• Seeking, by Susanrachel Condon
• Friends and Zen Meditation, by Gallia Taranto
• Quakers and Other Religions, by Marilyn Henry
• Quakerism in a Multifaith Environment, by Turtle MacDermott
• AVP Summer Camp at Chatham-Summit Meeting, by Jeff Bird
• NYYM Forum: you can comment on these articles in the Comment box at the end of each article. Start a conversation!

Around Our Yearly Meeting—Yearly Meeting news

Notices

Around Our Yearly Meeting

Meeting News

Chatham-Summit Meeting holds AVP camp for youth

Approximately twenty high school youth attended a two-week Alternatives to Violence Project Camp held at Chatham-Summit’s meetinghouse. Most of the youth were in the 9th and 10th grades from local schools and most were of Latin American heritage. The youth received Basic and Advanced AVP training coupled with fun activities. (See an article on the camp here.)
    The camp was conducted in co-operation with Wind of the Spirit, a local immigrant rights group whose leadership (Diana Mejia & Stuart Sydenstricker) also attend CSM, and with the support of AVP-New Jersey. Many of the volunteers who helped with the camp were from Chatham-Summit Meeting and the camp received some of its funding from NYYM.

Flushing meetinghouse a featured sacred space

This year, the Meeting has been worshipping together for 350 years and in their current meetinghouse for 200 years.  

Flushing Meetinghouse the pick-up site for the Flushing CSA

The Flushing meetinghouse was a featured site for the 2015 open house celebration of sacred spaces organized by the New York Landmarks Conservancy. The meeting offered free tours and refreshment. For more information, visit Flushing Meeting’s website: flushingfriends.org/2015/05/15/sacredsites/.

Housatonic Meeting writes Mother Emmanuel AME Church

After the shooting of members of Mother Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, Housatonic Meeting wrote the following letter:

Dear Sisters and Brothers,
    We write to extend our heartfelt sorrow for the recent loss of your good and faithful pastor and eight beloved members of your congregation. We write also to thank you for the inspiration you have provided the entire Nation by the generosity of your response to an unspeakable act born of fear and hatred.
   Too often we have witnessed times when an act of violence has given rise to words of recrimination and the desire for retaliation. You, on the other hand, responded from your deep and abiding faith in God and demonstrated the power of forgiveness to change a Nation’s conversation and take down a long-standing symbol of dominance and hatred.
   In your response, you have challenged us to examine more deeply both our individual and collective hearts and minds and to take whatever action is necessary to remove the residue of injustice and systemic violence that is part of our Nation’s history. We pray that we may we rise to the opportunity this tragic event has offered.
   We join our hearts in prayer with you and others throughout our beloved country that we might come to know the power of God’s grace, the transformative power of love.
   May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father … comfort your hearts and strengthen them in every good work and word. (2 Thessalonians 2:16-17).
   With love and blessings, Housatonic Monthly Meeting Friends (Quakers)

Rochester Meeting honored by the NY State Judicial Process Commission

The New York State Judicial Process Commission awarded Rochester Meeting its Outstanding Funding Award for outstanding contribution to the Commission over the years and gave the meeting a Tea Light Holder as a token of appreciation.

NYYM writes letter to Pope Francis

At Summer Sessions, the gathered body approved a minute brought forward by Indian Affairs Committee that directs the clerk of the Yearly Meeting to send a letter to Pope Francis upon his visit to the United States asking the Pope to repudiate the so-called Doctrine of Christian Discovery, and to rescind the papal bulls written in the 1490s and early 1500s upon which the Doctrine rests. These papal bulls and the Doctrine of Discovery conferred upon “Christian princes” who “discovered” new lands occupied by “pagans” the right to claim and govern those lands and subjugate their inhabitants. You can learn more about the Doctrine of Discovery by visiting our website:

• Read our letter to Pope Francis
• Read our minute on the Doctrine of Discovery (2012)
• Read our fact sheet on the Doctrine of Discovery
• Visit a website on the Doctrine of Discovery

Upcoming Events

Quaker Outreach Roundtable

October 10 – Shrewsbury Meetinghouse

Shrewsbury hosts an Outreach Roundtable on Saturday, October 10, from 9 to 3:30. The morning session features speakers on several topics related to meeting outreach: “Lessons, Inspirations, and Surprises from NEYM’s Quaker Outreach Pilot Project,” “Inreach+Outreach=Upreach,” and “Marketing 101 for Quakers.” The afternoon session features open sharing of your ideas and experiences in outreach and exploration of possible next steps. Please RSVP to Robin Whitely at rhwhitely@comcast.net or 973-634-5742. You can download the flyer on our website at nyym.org.

17^th Annual White Privilege Conference

Date: Thursday, April14–17, 2016
Place: Philadelphia Marriott, Downtown Philadelphia

New York Yearly Meeting is one of the host organizations for 2016’s White Privilege Conference, and a NYYM working group is helping to plan the conference and urges NYYM Friends to attend. The theme is Let Freedom Ring: Re-imagining Equity and Justice in the United States. A participant in a previous conference observed that it “laid excellent groundwork for establishing a culture of open mind, open heart, and open arms.” For more information, visit whiteprivilegeconference.com.

NYYM News

Faith & Practice 2015 Edition now available

The 2015 Edition of Faith & Practice is now available. This edition includes earthcare advices and queries, as well as a section on worship groups. The price is $7.00 a copy, $10.00 if we ship it to you. Order your copy by contacting the office at 212-673-5750 or office@nyym.org. You can pay by check or online at our online donation and payment page (write “Faith & Practice” in the field labeled “This payment is for:”).

Notices

New Members

Lisa Dukielski – Rahway-Plainfield
Robert Fatherley – Wilton
Elizabeth Marie Gill – Chatham-Summit
Mark Joseph Harper – Chatham-Summit
Andrea Jaquette – Chatham-Summit
Kevin Johnson – Poplar Ridge
Patricia Runkle – Chatham-Summit
Cora Waldman – Brooklyn

Transfers

Margot Kimball, to Brooklyn from Radnor (PhYM)

Deaths

Joseph Anzalone, member of Buffalo, on June 26, 2015
Marilyn Zoty Atkin, member of Wilton, on May 5, 2015
Richard Goodman, member of Manhasset, on September 10, 2015
Dorothy Johnson, member of Farmington, on May 15, 2015
Richard McClurg, member of Farmington, on April 16, 2015
James Oltman, member of Purchase, on July 21, 2015
Richard Padgham, member of Farmington, on April 3, 2015
Virginia Perry, member of Wilton, on June 21, 2015
Doris Belle Randall, member of Wilton, on April 23, 2015
Cora Lee Snyder, member of Purchase, on June 17, 2015
William Sims, member of Poplar Ridge, on June 26, 2015
Marion Swinden, member of Cornwall, on June 27, 2015
Jane Taylor, member of Rahway-Plainfield, on February 8, 2015
Lynn Estella Vail, member of Rahway-Plainfield, on April 27, 2015
Mark Wiegand, member of Chatham-Summit, on June 12, 2015