Expanding our concepts of pacifism
My blogging pal Wess Daniels wrote a provocative piece this week called When Peace Preserves Violence. It’s a great read and blows some much-needed holes in the self-satisfaction so many of us carry...
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What does it mean to be a Quaker?
Craig Barnett tries to define Friends: “I want to suggest that there is a living tradition of spiritual teaching and practice that makes up the Quaker Way, which is not defined by a particular social...
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Taxes then and now
Every year as April’s tax deadlines comes near, the War Resisters League produces a pie chart showing military spending as a percentage of the federal budget. This year Ed Hedemann went back in time...
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A reply to The Theology of Consensus
L.A. Kauffman’s critique of consensus decision making in The Theology of Consensus is a rather perennial argument in lefty circles and this article makes a number of logical leaps. Still, it does map...
View ArticleQuakers and the ethics of fixed pricing
From a 1956 issue of the then-newly rebranded Friends Journal, an explanation of the ethics behind providing a fixed price for goods: Whether the early Quakers were consciously trying to start a social...
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Edward Tufte and classical intellectual inquiry
Near the beginning of Edward Tufte’s Beautiful Evidence, he writes “My books are self-exemplifying: the objects themselves embody the ideas written about.” The same could be true of his presentations....
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Wheat planting at Howell’s Living History Farm
We’ve gotten into the habit of visiting Howell’s Living History Farm up in Mercer County, N.J., a few times a year as part of homeschooler group trips. In the past, we’ve cut ice, tapped trees for...
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The Quaker Wars?
Over on Quora, a question that is more fascinating than it might at first appear: What wars in history were fought in the name of Quakerism (Society of Friends)?: This question is neither sarcastic nor...
View ArticleNew from Neil Young
And in all this craziness I missed that Neil Young had just dropped a new tune on us. And apparently, this is just one of four new songs: Famed rocker Neil Young has played hundreds of towns and cities...
View ArticleMixing it up
Back in November I started a blog post that ran out of umph and stayed in my drafts. At time time I was reacting to the progressive debates about safety pins as a symbol but it seems we’re are in...
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The demise of online subcultures?
An interesting profile of a niche community affected by the shift of attention from community-led sites to Facebook, “How Facebook – the Wal-Mart of the internet – dismantled online subcultures.” Over...
View ArticleRemembering Christine Greenland
Over email, the news that Christine Manville Greenland has passed. In recent times I worked with Christine mostly through the Tract Association of Friends but I’ve known her for so long I don’t know...
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In praise of an editor past
Frances William Browin from the September 15, 1968 Friends Journal.When I became an editor at Friends Journal in 2011, I inherited an institution with some very strong opinions. Some of them are...
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Hammonton 2017 Fourth of July
We didn’t see much of the Hammonton Fourth of July parade this year because once again the kids were in the bike parade portion (all except Francis, who had a bad meltdown in the morning and stayed...
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The lost A List
Rose Marie-Official on Twitter “In #waitforyourlaugh (upcoming film on me) it covers my music being cut from Top Banana film because I… Twitter As A List Hollywood stars come out to tell their Harvey...
View ArticleCan Quakerism Survive?
Sometimes I’m remiss at actually sharing articles I’ve worked on as part of my duties as Friends Journal’s editor. It’s especially ironic this week given that one of the most talked-about recent Quaker...
View ArticleGathered vs focused Meeting part 2
Isaac Smith is back adding some nuance to his parsing of the differences between Quaker worship experiences: If you’re swept up in a net, you’re off balance; you don’t have the same certainty about...
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Decline and persistence, part two
So much to chew on in Johan Maurer’s Decline and persistence, part two. Find a good chair and take the time to read. Friends theology strips away all irrelevant social distinctions, giving us the...
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Early Quaker “Yearly meetings”
Brian Drayton is looking at an early form of public Quaker worship, who’s various names (including “yearly meetings”) have perhaps hidden them from modern Quaker consciousness: From the Quaker toolbox:...
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Quakers and Mental Health
Well this one hits home for me. The new QuakerSpeak talks to Oregon social worker Melody George in the topic of Quakers and Mental Health: I really see mental diversity as a gift to a community, and...
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