Damon Motz-Storey of the Sierra Club talks with Quakers Today about the role of radical joy, play, and community in climate work: "It is our superpower to be able to be joyful and to insist upon pleasure, even in a world that is so insistent upon pushing us back into the closet."
Quakers Today, hosted by Peterson Toscano, features writers, musicians, and thinkers who are seeking wisdom and understanding in a rapidly changing world.
My latest @friendsjournal.bsky.social newsletter is about Margaret Fell, the wind beneath George Fox’s wings—or, to put it another way, one of the biggest reasons Fox is remembered today as “the” “founder of the Quakers, and not just another religious visionary wandering around 17th-century England.
Quakers often speak with pride of how women have shaped the spiritual life of their community from the very start. But to fully honor an early Friend like Margaret Fell, we should look beyond the mere existence of her ministry and delve wholeheartedly into its substance. quaker.org/2024/09/16/w...
"There are times when I do not want to do what Spirit is guiding me to," Mary Linda McKinney acknowledges, "and other times when my ego gets puffed up in self-importance, forgetting Christ at my center. It is at these times that I need eldering." www.friendsjournal.org/growing-into...
Experiences of Quaker eldering.
"I've always written songs because I had a question." - Carrie Newcomer, in the latest from #QuakerSpeak@friendsjournal.bsky.social#Quaker#Quakers#singersongwriterquakerspeak.com/video/the-tr...
"We know when someone is being really true and authentic," says singer-songwriter Carrie Newcomer. "When someone puts their finger on the open palm of something true, it shakes the world just a little bit.… Why would I want to be any other way?"
When the Lord God, or whatever you wish to call it, opens your ear, follow the example of Isaiah (50:5) and George Fox: Do not rebel, and do not turn away. Listen as the disciples do, and—at the appropriate moment—share what you learn. quaker.org/2024/09/09/l...
"I fell in love first with the quiet. It was peaceful in the old-style meetinghouse with the centuries-old benches all facing inward.… It drew me to return the next Sunday. And the next. I’ve never left."—Nancy L. Bieber on life with her Quaker meeting.
A Friend reflects on how her worship community has shaped her.
It is, a Friend tells us, a necessary, loving act to shift Quakers' understanding of 'faithful' to 'true to your word' rather than 'monogamous.' To do so openly embraces a joyful diversity that can already be found within the Religious Society of Friends.
Faithful non-monogamy in Quaker vows.
James (1:22-25) warns that principles can only take us so far. We can’t just say we believe in simplicity and peace and all that, we have to actively commit ourselves to identifying what it means to live a simple, peaceful life, then live that way, every day. quaker.org/2024/09/02/b...
