4, Saturday ...Dr. Charles Jones, ML King Academy, noon. 5, Sunday .....Simple potluck meal at 11.30, followed by a meeting of committee clerks. 18, Saturday ..Rev. Nelson Johnson, ML King Academy, noon. 12, Sunday.....9 a.m., Quaker by Convincement,"Religion and the Social Order", Hubbard pp 135-173. Forum – Warren Wilson Reiner on Quaker business process. 16, Thursday .... Midweek Meeting at Marian Carter’s house, 7. pm. 18, Saturday .... Rev. S. B. Kyles, ML King Academy, noon. 19, Sunday....... Business meeting. 24, Friday ...... Bring and Share evening, meetinghouse, 7 pm. 25, Saturday .... Play, “Camp Logan”, ML King Academy, noon. 26, Sunday ...... Forum – “Pamphlet Adventures."
Each Thursday, at 4-5 pm, a silent peace vigil is held at the NE corner of Main Plaza (Commerce and Dwyer or Commerce and Soledad, which is the same thing) near the San Fernando cathedral.
Clerk: Bill Wilkinson, e-mail: bdwilkinson@earthlink.net
Newsletter Editor: Ken Southwood, e-mail: jksouthwood@grandecom.net
Website: http://www.sanantonioquakers.org
Donations may be made to Friends Meeting of San Antonio, P.O. Box 6127, San Antonio TX 78209. To leave a telephone message: (210) 945-8456.
Friends Meeting of San Antonio,
7052 N. Vandiver,
PO Box 6127 San Antonio TX78209
“THREE HOURS from the highway, on a very bad road up a mountain, sit the three small communities of San Luis, Santa Elena, and at the very top of the mountain, Monteverde. The world-famous Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve, founded by Quaker immigrants in the 1950s, attracts thousands of scientists and tourists yearly. But the locals, Costa Rican and North American immigrants alike, continue to farm much as they have for generations. Farms are small and tended by hand. And as they work on their farms, they literally walk in the clouds.
"About a two-hour walk from the tourists and scientists of Monteverde lies the San Luis Valley, a community of about 400 people, who are farmers, seamstresses, craftspeople, carpenters, hotel workers, and, potentially, guards and guides in the Cloud Forest Reserve. Ann Kriebel lived in the Quaker community of Monteverde in the early 1980s and worked in the San Luis Valley, delivering education in literacy, health care, nutrition, and the environment. While working there, Ann died suddenly, but her life continues as the inspiration behind Finca la Bella, the Beautiful Farm.
"In her honor, Quaker Earthcare Witness members and other individuals contributed funds to purchase this 120-acre farm and continue to support this project, which is a blending of nature preservation, sustainable agriculture, and human services. A partnership made up of representatives from Quaker Earthcare Witness, Monteverde Friends Meeting, the Monteverde Institute, and the farmers' association, establishes policy and oversees management of the farm. The Santa Elena Cooperative, started in 1971 as a joint effort by the Quakers and Costa Ricans to provide needed services for the community, originally held title to the land, but recently the title was transferred to the Monteverde Institute. . .”
FINCA LA BELLA has been busy over its short lifetime, providing land for landless families, practicing sustainable agriculture, opening a health clinic and a kindergarten for local pre-schoolers, starting a farmers' association, arranging agricultural exchanges with organic farms in the U.S. and Canada, providing ongoing agricultural education for farmers, founding a land trust to protect the farm, community building, and planting a tree nursery.
But Finca la Bella faces problems, raising funds for legal fees and capital for a credit union or for farmers, and nurturing leadership.
COFFEE produced by Finca la Bella is sold as "Café Monteverde" through Montana Coffee in five-pound bags at a discounted rate and can be resold in one-pound bags (bags provided on request), at full retail cost, sending the "profits" as a donation to the project. Ask for a couple of articles about the coffee to give background information as you sell it:
From Quaker Earthcare Witness website, http://www.fcun.org/
In 1951 the group of Conservative Friends from Alabama, objecting to the draft, emigrated from the United States to Costa Rica and settled in what was to be Monteverde. Four of their young men had been imprisoned for refusing the draft. The Meeting purchased land, founded the Cheese Factory, inviting local farmers to join the co-operative, started the Friends School and, in an attempt to protect the area’s watershed, devoted a third of the land to what now makes up the Monteverde Reserve. It received a letter of appreciation from the local bishop for its help to local farmers, free of proselytization. When Ann Kriebel first went there she found that the Quaker community needed no help so she went down to the Valley to work with the women there. At first their menfolk were suspicious – until they found that her help led to more income. Now the program has enlarged to include the men. A single Friends Meeting, faced with crisis, has brought more light into the world.
A Hindu Prayer for PeaceO God, lead us from the unreal to the Real. O God, lead us from darkness to light. O God, lead us from death to immortality. Shanti, Shanti, Shanti unto all. |
Janet Southwood acted as clerk in Val Liveoak’s absence. Reporting for M&O, she said that the committee has considered the responsibilities taken on by new committees, to ensure that Meeting is a source of support and strength for everyone, and recommends that the Naming Committee for enlarging the Nominating Committee convene before May in order to fill existing vacancies and start early on 2007 nominations. There will be a meeting of committee clerks on Sunday, February 5 following potluck.
There will be a mid-week meeting for worship on the third Thursday of each month at 7.00 p.m. meeting at different homes during the year, for the next three months at Marian Carter’s home. Friends are asked to let M&O. members know if they would like to plan for meetings at their home. The book discussion group will meet as usual at the meetinghouse at 9.00 a.m. on the second Sunday each month with Gary Whiting facilitating. After seasoning it for a month M&O offered the following minute for approval:
“Friends Meeting of San Antonio will provide use of the meetinghouse facilities for any organization providing service or charity to the community in which a member of Meeting is actively involved and for worship and faith groups needing space in which to participate in their spiritual practices. The Ministry and Oversight Committee will bring to Business Meeting any requests for property use that do not meet these criteria or might generate concerns.”
The minute was approved.
Bill Wilkinson gave his first Treasurer’s report. Most importantly, he said that Marian Carter had received a bequest of $83,000, which she has donated to the Meeting. The bequest was from a relative of Rusty Carter, who would have wanted it to go to the Meeting. The Finance Committee will meet to consider how it should be used. It was suggested that the Committee should remember that Meeting has an oral promise of first refusal should the hair salon be sold.
General Fund contributions exceeded expenditures by $11,358 in 2005, and now stands at $50,559, but the Building Fund is much depleted with more bills expected. He suggested that at the end of 2006 the General Fund be set at $6,000, the Relief Fund at $995, and the General Fund Reserve at $10,000. A building sinking fund should be established funded at $200 per month and the building fund laid down. He is still struggling to reconcile his spreadsheet program with that of Craig Bejnar.
There was extensive discussion of Meeting’s response to the military flyover at the Martin Luther King march. It was agreed that the Meeting banner would be carried with quotations from King on nonviolence and war.
For the defunct Development Committee, Ken Southwood said that two items remain, replacing the thermostat with one more programable, which can be done by members, and installing better lights, better to light the center of the meetingroom. For Outreach, he reported that the committee has a roster of greeters from the committee, but that the list of responsibilities is heavy and help is always appreciated. (See list on inside of door of storeroom #1). The committee has designated the February 5th potluck as a simple meal with contributions to Right Sharing of World Resources. Friends are asked to bring dishes of rice and beans and are reminded that the intent is to share the diet of impoverished people. A Bring and Share evening will be held on February 24th at 7 pm. Bring something to show, tell, read, or perform, along with finger food, remembering that some Friends will come straight from work.
But the far end of the Meeting lot has been transformed by an anonymous gift of landscaping. The “dry creek” which takes drainoff from the parking lot and the drainage from the south of the meetingroom are marked by “bullrocks.” (Don’t bother with Webster’s, it’s not there. Though a nearby less polite term is.) They’re river rocks of about 3-4" across. Trees, bushes, and plants have been planted along with sod. The gap in the hedge at the NE corner, next Vandiver, has been planted, providing an enclosed space in that corner.
Large rocks and bullrocks surround the meetingroom, the courtyard and arbor have a deeper layer of crushed granite and the arbor is clearly marked. It will all be a space to walk in. Neighbors wishing to walk through the lot will still be able to.
But the plants will need frequent watering and Marian Carter and Laura Claghorn will gladly accept volunteers.
Austin Meeting has closed on purchase of an Episcopalian church after finding that the land they had previously purchased did not meet their expectations.
ForumWarren Wilson-Reiner, Clerk of South Central Yearly Meeting, will come to Meeting on Sunday February 12th, to speak on the Quaker way of conducting business. As he is making this trip specially, we hope that a goodly number will be present.And for the forum on the 26th our librarian invites each of you to pick a Pendle Hill pamphlet from the library and tell the forum of your experience with it.
|
It defines these broadly as “not only urban legends but also common fallacies, misinformation, old wives' tales, strange news stories, rumors, celebrity gossip, and similar items.” It classifies them in terms of how trustworthy they, and their origins, are. It appears to be very diligent and unbiased. Denise agrees. Worth looking up.
And it dismisses the “Bad Boys” story as a cheap shot, impossible to verify, and repeated in items about Canada and India.
Wayward ChristiansThis is the title of an article by Charles Marsh, an evangelical Christian, in the New York Times on January 20. In it he takes evangelical leaders to task for corrupting the integrity of the Christian message. Some quotations:“We should offer to serve the war effort in any way possible.” Charles Stanley, televangelist. “American foreign policy and military might have opened up an opportunity for the gospel in the land of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” Article in the Baptist Press news service. Iraq is “a focal point of end-time events.” Tim LaHaye, author of the “Left Behind” series of novels. “God is pro-war.” Jerry Falwell. Marsh quotes Franklin Graham and Marvin Olansky as saying that the American invasion of Iraq would create exciting new prospects for proselytizing Muslims. He says that the common theme appears to be that “our President is a real brother in Christ, and because he has discerned that God’s will is for our nation to be at war with Iraq, we shall gloriously comply.” And that “our Faustian bargain for access and power has undermined the credibility of our moral and evangelistic witness in the world.” But, “repentance is a tough demand for a people utterly convinced of their righteousness.” Then, we have our own leader right here. According to "TheGodly Must Be Crazy", http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2004/10/27/scherer-christian/, Glenn Scherer, Grist, October 27, 2004, “Hagee preached a fiery message as simple as it was horrifying: "The war between America and Iraq is the gateway to the Apocalypse!" he said, urging his followers to support the war, perhaps in order to bring about the Second Coming. After Hagee finished, DeLay rose to second the motion. "Ladies and gentlemen," he said, ‘what has been spoken here tonight is the truth from God.’"
|
Boyce Rummel says, “after several months of struggling several things came together last week that feel good. My bond was approved and I've sent my application for my RBI license. This allows me to retail/broker/install manufactured homes. Combined with my brothers real estate brokers license we can do what we need to for our business. Also, we delivered our first sale to Louisiana Friday and have several more headed that way. More projects lined up, but not too stressful.”
We received a lovely photo of Rese (Jr.), Cayla, and Jessica Farrish from Japan. They have grown and we miss them. And Rese (Sr.) and Susan too! Jennifer Richmond has taken a position in Austin so she will soon be moving. We shall miss her and little son. And the children will particularly miss him. Carol Balliet has finished moving. She says “I'm enjoying the skylights in my ‘new’ house.” We think that’s from the inside. But in a new house, who knows?
Charles Goebel and Marian Carter paid a visit to Calvert to meet with two people, who had come specially from New York, and a couple living in Calvert. They wanted to discuss an artist whom Charles knew many decades ago. The couple in Calvert also knew the deceased artist at a different time from Charles. The N. Y. folks are putting together information with the thought of either a book or a play. It gave Charles pleasure to reminisce and to add his knowledge about the painter.
Marian says, “We met at an elegant Victorian bed and breakfast in that small town of 1,400 people 30 miles from College Station. Charles exclaimed about the furnishings and the old victrola. The luncheon, in a lovely old fashioned dining room decorated for Christmas added to the charm of the whole experience.”
Val Liveoak went to Bolivia in January to conduct sessions in AVP. She was there at the point when Bolivians elected their first indigenous president, Evo Morales. Val intended to visit Lake Titicaca. So did the president, who, with thousands of supporters, visited the site of pre-Incan civilization to pray. We shall hear if Val’s visit coincided.
Julia Eyer and Michael Parchman are on sabbaticals and will be spending time in February in the Rockies writing and skiing, perhaps in that order. They plan to go to England later when Michael will be speaking with an English researcher about their work.
The Salt Lake Tribune, 3-Jan-2006, cites Gary Morales, in prison for murder, who “works in gang-prevention programs, coordinating workshops for the Alternatives to Violence Project, which teaches nonviolence and conflict resolution to inmates.” A photo of his victim hangs in his cell, a call to work for nonviolence.
The AfricaFocus Bulletin, 21-Dec-2005, has excerpts from a report from the Alternatives to Violence Project, which is working with judges in Rwanda involved in the local Gacaca process of genocide cases.….” It also refers elsewhere to the Rwanda Friends Peace House AVP, in which Val Liveoak has taken part. This Bulletin contains excerpts from an evaluation report, published on the web site of the African Great Lakes Initiative, (http://www.aglionline.org).
Dr. Drew Westen, a psychologist at Emory, tested committed Republicans and Democrats, giving each quotations (reported as true) from George W. Bush and John Kerry which showed each as reversing himself, giving discrepant views on an important topic. The neural circuits of the brains of the subjects were imaged to examine which parts lit up when they received unwelcome information, information which challenged their opinions of Kerry and Bush.
The result indicated that “for partisans, political thinking is often predominantly emotional.” The “‘cold reasoning’ regions of the cortex were relatively quiet.” So, is our commitment to Friends’ principles unthinking, merely emotional? And how bad is this? Is there a “spiritual” region in the brain? Whatever the situation, if emotional reactions interfere with our listening to and considering unwelcome information, which may be correct, and to reaching out to others who differ from us, then our commitment interferes with our principles.
Carol Balliet and Leila Powell led a forum on “Communicating Beyond Disagreement” at the end of January, too late for this newsletter to summarize. We assume that the subjects of the experiment were, properly, told afterwards which of the quotations were true and which fictitious.
“At the center of our Quaker faith and practice is the Friends’ Peace Testimony, which grew out of our religious experience that all life is sacred, having been given the Light Within by God, and that each of us is called to answer to that of God in everyone. One outward expression of our inward experience is exercising a personal concern to engage conflict with a respect for life and without threat or harm to our opponent. We seek to transform conflict through truth and love and without violence. Many Quakers feel so strongly about this that they will risk their lives to stand in loving witness to rebuke the violent actions of others and to rely only on the force of truth and the power of love.
We know the work of the Christian Peacemaker Teams in Iraq, particularly in helping the Iraqi detainees at U.S. run prisons and their families. Our FCNL staff who have worked in Iraq remind us that Christian Peacemaker Teams were among the first to expose the truth about and speak out against the abuses of the U.S. government against detainees at Abu Graib and other U.S. prisons.
Here at FCNL, we recognize that many have been kidnaped and abducted in Iraq. We pray for the release of all people illegally detained in Iraq. We also urge the release of the unknown number of people detained without due process by the U.S. military or other agencies and held without providing access even to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
War is Not the Answer. There are no military or violent solutions to the conflict in Iraq. More troops, more guns, and more killing will not bring peace or justice to this region. We will continue to work in the United States for an end to the U.S. occupation and withdrawal of U.S. forces and bases.”
San Antonio is celebrating the history of the civil rights movement by producing “Know Why You’re Marching.” This is a series of talks, a play, and films to be held at Martin Luther King Academy, 3501 Martin Luther King Drive at noon Saturdays January 7 through February 25. The brochure for this is on the meetingroom notice board. Each lecture will be followed by a film. The lectures in February are:
Feb. 4 Dr Charles Jones, professor of Black Studies, specializing in Black politics, currently writing a history of the Black Panthers.Feb. 11, Rev. Nelson Johnson, labor and civil rights champion, Greensboro NC, involved in the Greensboro Truth Community Reconciliation project.
Feb. 18, Rev. Samuel Billy Kyles, civil and human rights legend, Memphis, eyewitness to Martin Luther King’s assassination..
February 25, a play, “Camp Logan,” about the 1917 riot, court martial, and hanging of Black soldiers at Fort Sam Houston.
A small group of Friends carried the Meeting banner in the Martin Luther King March. The banner contained a V formed by black and yellow ribbons marking protest at the military flyover. It also had two quotations from King’s statements, “Non-violence is the Answer,” and “We Must Find an Alternative to War.” Other Friends walked in other parts of the march. The objection to the flyover here formed the headline in both the New York Times (“Protesters at King March Oppose Air Force Flyover”) and the Express-News (Marching with a Message: Despite flyover and its protesters, MLK Day is all about peace.”)
At the end of January there will be the opening meeting for the 2006 Season of Nonviolence, “The Blessing of the Peacemakers.” Young people will be reading, or singing, something representative of their church. Sebastian Whitworth will represent Meeting, reading a piece relating to Friends’ peace testimony.
Are your meetings for church affairs held in a spirit of worship and in dependence on the guidance of God? Remember that we do not seek a majority decision nor even consensus. As we wait patiently for divine guidance our experience is that the right way will open and we shall be led into unity.