February 3, Sunday ......... Potluck lunch at 11.30. February 10, Sunday ........ Forum, Considering the State of the Meeting Report. February 17, Sunday ....... Meeting for Business, 11.30. February 24, Sunday ........ Forum, Pendle Hill Pamphlet, Quakers and Creeds.
Each Thursday at 4-5 p.m., a silent peace vigil is held at the NE corner of Main Plaza (Commerce and Soledad) near the San Fernando cathedral.
Clerk: Bill Wilkinson, e-mail: bdwilkinson@earthlink.net)
Website: http://www.sanantonioquakers.org.
Donations may be made to Friends Meeting of San Antonio, P.O. Box 6127, San Antonio, TX 78209.
Meeting telephone to ask for information: 210-945-8456.
Friends Meeting of San Antonio,
7052 N. Vandiver,
PO Box 6127 San Antonio TX 78209
Friends’ Peacemaking in KenyaDear All, While burning houses and deadly violence fills the news here in Kenya, AGLI has played a part in a great peacemaking activity! The Kipsigis are a Kalenjin group around Kericho in the Rift Valley. The Kisii are their neighbors across the border in Nyanza Province. As soon as the election results were announced, the Kipsigis began targeting the Kisii; they were incorrrectly perceived as having supported Kibaki in the election. Last Thursday [1/21] when a Kipsigis Member of Parliament [David Kimutai Too] was killed by a Kisii policeman, extensive violence broke out on the border between the two groups. Between ten and twenty people were killed; many, many wounded; and tens of houses burned. Jared is an AVP facilitator in Kisii and coordinator of the Uzima Foundation program there (Uzima works with youth empowerment). He is married to a Kipsigis woman who had to go into hiding in order keep from being attacked. Malesi Kinaro wrote a proposal to AGLI to support negotiation/reconciliation meetings between the Kipsigis and Kisii elders. Naturally I agreed. I just received the following text message from Malesi: "Jared is walking in the air. He just finished chairing a meeting that brought together District Commissioners, Members of Parliament, and elders from Kipsigis and Kisii. He says it went so well he doesn't think fighting will continue. We have been working to see this day when we make the first step. AGLI, through FPCD (Friends for Peace and Community Development), AGLI's partner in western Kenya, gave 108,000/($ 1550) for this and Uzima gave 40,000/- ($575). The journey is still long and much money needed. The Lord reigns!" [NOTE: /- is the symbol for Kenyan Shillings.] If this has saved the life of even one person, our efforts have been rewarded. Thanks to Jared for this great effort!
Peace, Dave
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Our Own Small ChaosWe apologize for the chaos prevailing over the newsletter for the past few months. Virus protection ceased to protect, computer-stored addresses were lost, reinstated, and lost again, the word processor was corrupted, backups not working, the hard drive was scrubbed clean of all harmful and harmless material, virtual documents losing their virtue.We hope we are now on the road to recovery and we thank Jim Spickard for his computer skills. This month a different font is used and the electronic version will be without columns. If this change excites strong emotions in you, please let me know.
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January Meeting for BusinessThe Clerk, Bill Wilkinson, opened the meeting with silence and the query selected by M&O.Carol Balliet, Treasurer gave her report. With December input income last year slightly exceeded expenses. The monthly report on income will now include a line for “facilities use.” Janet Southwood spoke for M&O, first saying that the committee finds no concerns that homeless people staying overnight in the meetinghouse grounds have caused any problems. The committee will hold a Forum on February 10th to form the basis for the State of the Meeting report considering SCYM’s query, “How has the Spirit prospered among us during the past year?” It encourages Friends to welcome newcomers and to answer any questions they may have. The committee recommends a lower rental rate for outside groups making bookings for a full year. Recommendations for modification to the fee schedule will be considered next month at a meeting of the Clerk and the clerks of Outreach, M&O, and the Finance Committee. Julie Bajusz will be preparing the Memorial Minute for Charles Goebel for reading at yearly Meeting. Gary Whiting and David Bristol are interested in planning a full-day silent Meeting retreat at the meetinghouse and the committee supports this. It encourages Friends to welcome newcomers and to answer any questions they may have. Ken Southwood gave the Outreach report, saying that the committee has subscribed to Quaker History and renewed the subscription to the Pendle Hill Pamphlet series. Celebration Circle has booked the meetingroom on each Wednesday evening for its meditation circle. A committee recommendation that a 7-pocket magazine rack be ordered for the lobby wall was approved. The committee is considering booking the Peach Pavilion at Brackenridge Park at the end of March for a picnic. The Clerk spoke of the need for Nominating Committee to fill vacancies in committees. He inquired about the sign at the property corner; Ken Southwood said that Jim Jacobs was dealing with it but had been sidetracked by his first exhibition of his art photographs. The Clerk reminded us that SCYM will be held on March 20th - 23 . Paul Lacey will give the keynoter address. Teachers are still needed for young Friends; Their expenses at SCYM will be funded and there will be a teachers’ workshop at Austin. [Meeting has a travel fund for those who would like help in paying for attending SCYM or other Friends gatherings. Those interested should speak to a member of M&O.]
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PersonalRuth Lofgren was appointed the first San Antonio Peace Laureate at the annual Blessing of the Peacemakers interfaith ceremony at the San Antonio peaceCENTER on Sunday, January 27, 2008. The peaceCENTER award stated:“Dr. Lofgren, a 91-year-old microbiologist, has always prioritized her life around issues of the environment but is now focusing on issues of consciousness and inner life, raising questions of how we as humans can be our best selves amidst "the social disease of exploitation" that seems to be threatening this planet and all living beings. As the 2008 Peace Laureate Dr. Lofgren will be honored for her wisdom and experience and will be available to speak to schools, faith communities, civic groups and the media about her vision for peace and justice.” Jim Jacobs had an art opening of an exhibit of his photographs and prints at Gallery Nord at 2009 Northwest Military Highway on February 2, and the exhibit will be up for two months until April 4. Jim says that, at his age, his career as an artist is just starting. His art is lovely and must be seen. His photographs are digital, many with silkscreened abstractions overprinted, and in one case “digitally collaged.” There is a variety of textures. We are led to look at ordinary scenes with new eyes. Tom Rein, who brought his young Somali Bantu friends to Forum, was nominated for this year's Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Distinguished Achievement Award. On a Saturday in January at the City Council Chambers he was considered, with many others, for that award, and was given the annual Bahai Race Unity award. When some of the Bantu girls were attacked by other children and fought back, Tom taught them nonviolence. He says of them, “ They are always cheerful, cooperative, and respectful. They seem to be surrounded by the light of grace. They are special heroes in a very difficult situation.” Clara Whiting has left her family for Perry Point, Maryland, to train for Americorps. So far she has taken courses in First Aid, CPR, and fire-fighting! She does not know where she will be sent nor what she will be doing, but she is en joying it. This is the first time she and her twin Molly have been apart.
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Bric A BracPastor Christian Fuhrer of Leipzig, “Clergyman of the Streets,” has reached required retirement age. He was a leader of the nonviolent revolution which led to the downfall of the Communist East German government. 120,000 people marched, a month before the wall fell. He said, “It is not the throne and the altar but the street and the altar that belong together.” After the collapse of East Germany he “has taken a stand against everything from the Iraq war to the closing of a brewery, from right-wing extremists to the curtailing of unemployment benefits.” He is not expected to become quiet.“Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder.” (Albert Einstein) A word to the wise (consumer): "A startling change is unfolding in the world's food markets. Soaring fuel prices have altered the equation for growing food and transporting it across the globe. Huge demand for biofuels has created tension between using land to produce fuel and using it for food." "The food price index of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, based on export prices for 60 internationally traded foodstuffs, climbed 37 percent last year." (New York Times, Jan 19) Another report from the Times (Feb 8) cites studies indicating that the conversion of forests, scrub, or grasslands to production of biofuels results in the release of more greenhouse gases than would be saved by the use of the fuels. They suggest that use of existing cropland would just result in the clearing of other land for food crops. "China recently banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission. The religious affairs agency explained that this was 'an important move to institutionalize management of reincarnation.' (The Economist November 3-9) The Economist adds that the real purpose is to prevent the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, from being succeeded by someone from outside China.
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Remembrance and ResistanceSusan Neiman, in the New York Times of Feb 2, points out that: “Germany has spent millions of dollars commemorating the Holocaust with monuments, museums, and educational initiatives that show no signs of letting up. The effort and expense is impressive and is a model for other countries dealing with their darkest pasts.”She suggests that remembrance may better focus on those who resisted rather than on the victims, to give hope: ”In 1943, when the Nazis were undecided about whether to deport or murder Jewish spouses of non-Jews, they tested the waters by rounding up nearly 2,000 Jewish men whose non-Jewish wives had already withstood considerable government pressure to divorce them. These wives spontaneously gathered in front of the building in the Rosenstrasse where their husbands were being held. For one long week they refused to leave the little square in central Berlin, despite the Gestapo machine guns trained upon them. It’s often said that nonviolent resistance worked for Gandhi and Martin Luther King because their oppressors were civilized; the governments of Britain and the United States could be bested by the moral courage of their opponents, while totalitarian regimes simply shoot them. This not only underestimates racism but also our possibilities of combating them. For in Berlin’s Rosenstrasse, the police backed down. The men were released. They and their families survived. And in a country that devotes so much time and energy to commemorating the victims, these brave women remain anonymous; all that really marks their story is a small clay-colored memorial in a park that few Berliners know.” The women were using a resource their husbands did not have – they were gentiles. And they had not been rounded up and confined. They were free to resist in the public square.
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PovertyDavid Zarembka, from Kenya, speaks of some Friends meeting with bicycle taxi drivers suspected of having been involved in the violence in Kakamega. They were sorrowful about their part but slowly moved to deeper things. One said “We are nothing in this nation. We are the ones to suffer.” Another said “The problem is the attitude of ‘these’ people. They come to our town, to our homes and then they decide we are fools. I work in their vehicles and the way they treat you. . .” Another said, “ Martha Karua [Kikuyu minister] speaks as though we are nothing.”Many years ago we formed the opinion that poverty, a fact of life, was bearable for those who saw this as their fate and that of so many others. Pride was possible in how they bore it and dealt with it, with self-respect. But when it is accompanied by contempt and blame from others for their condition, destroying any pride they may have, poverty may become unbearable. Poverty is a station of life in Third-world countries. In America, and now perhaps in Kenya, it is often regarded as the fault of the poor for not improving themselves. Even seeking that of God in others may not be enough if they do not experience respect for themselves as people.
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PTSDIn an article on murders by veterans currently returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, the New York Times says,“Decades of studies on the problems of Vietnam veterans have established links between combat trauma and higher rates of unemployment, homelessness, gun ownership, child abuse, domestic violence, substance abuse – and criminality. Ending up in trouble with the law has always been a final common pathway for some portion of psychologically injured veterans.” “‘You are unleashing certain things in a human being we don’t allow in civic society, and getting it all back in the box can be difficult for some people,’ said William C. Gentry, an army reservist and Iraq veteran who works as a prosecutor in San Diego County,’” But this has produced reactions, that the murder rate among veterans is not particularly high, and that the article could cause prejudice against veterans. “In war there are no unwounded soldiers” – Jose Narosky.
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War Outdated?More evidence that economic development has outdated war as the avenue to wealth, prestige, and power? The Prime Minister of India has visited China, with which India once had a border war. “The most important thing for the two countries is to create a favorable environment, a peaceful environment for development in the long term,” said Sun Shihai, a South Asia specialist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.” (NYT January 13).
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American Hegemony?In 1997 an article in The Economist described revolutionary new American weapons. It added, “By increasing American might, it may encourage the country’s unilateralist element to think it can win wars without having to work with troublesome partners.”This year, Parag Khanna, in “Waving Goodbye to Hegemony,” in the New York Times ,January 27,said, “Many saw the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq as the symbols of a global American imperialism; in fact, they were signs of imperial overstretch. Every expenditure has weakened America’s armed forces, and each assertion of power has awakened resistance in the form of terrorist networks, insurgent groups and “asymmetric” weapons like suicide bombers. America’s unipolar moment has inspired diplomatic and financial countermovements to block American bullying and construct an alternate world order. That new global order has arrived, and there is precious little Clinton or McCain or Obama could do to resist its growth.”
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In Other Meetings, then, . . .Susan B. Wharton was a woman of abounding energy and enthusiasm. “Not long after she graduated from Vassar, she came to her aunt, Susan Parrish, and asked what she could do for the Meeting. Susan Parrish considered for a moment and then said, ‘If a Friend in meeting expresses a view of which thee approves, it might be all right for thee to say, ‘So do I.’”An English Quaker in York Meeting prayed with the air of addressing a fellow reader, “O Lord, as thou hast doubtless seen in this morning’s Manchester Guardian . . .” Agnes Tierney, when told what a wonderful sermon she had preached, quoted an earlier minister, who knew the danger of prideful satisfaction in public utterance, “That’s what the devil said to me when I sat down.” (From the Poleys’ Friendly Anecdotes). |
From AFSC:New Cost of War video now onlineTwo minute video to help understand the outrageous amount of money being spent on the Iraq war. http://www.afsc.org/cost/.
Support victims of violence in Kenya
It's My Life! A Guide to Alternatives After High School
End the siege of Gaza:
Purchase fair-trade olive oil:
Immigrants ensnared by bureaucracy:
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The Best People“We happen to be the best people in the world, with the highest ideals of decency and justice and liberty and peace, and the more of the world we inhabit, the better it is for humanity.”That was Cecil Rhodes, on Britain, around the time of Victoria’s Silver Jubilee. Joseph Chamberlain believed “that the British were the greatest governing race the world had ever seen. . . They knew best, and if other peoples resented the imposition of British standards, they would learn later in life that it had all been for their own good. . . The Pax Britannica . . . had cured many of the evils of India, where peace really had been universal since the end of the Mutiny forty years before, and where the ferocious old antagonisms between race and race, creed and creed, rajah and mogul, were now only colourful sagas in the folk-memory. It had apparently healed the breaches between the British and French in Canada, where the new Confederation was a delicate equilibrium between the two. It had brought order to the quarrelsome sultans of the Malay peninsula, ended the piracy of the Persian Gulf, reduced the cannibals of Australia to shirts and wage-rates, and for eight hundred years had kept the unruly Irish under control.” (Jan Morris, Pax Britannica: the Climax of an Empire. Wonderful. How fortunate for us that things turned out this way. But what’s this that we hear about Irish independence and the Scottish Nationalist Party advocating secession from the United Kingdom?
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A Very Incomplete ListThe peaceCENTER circulates, monthly, an impressive list of events in San Antonio, too long and detailed to repeat here. The following are events just for February. To see details for yourself, go to website http://1.salsa.net/peace/Feb 2-23. Creating Peace: Tibetan Buddhist Wisdom Methods, a series of four Saturday talks about the importance of cultivating peace. Every Thursday, 4-5 pm, the weekly Vigil for Peace, Every Wednesday Night, Celebration Circle Meditation Circle, 7:00 pm at the Quaker Meeting House, “this beautiful and consciously created sacred space.” February 1: Black and Blue: 400 Years of Struggle and Transcendence, a Dramatic Readers Theater performance at the Carver Community Cultural Center. February 2: Howdy, Y'all - It's Quihi Time! Medina Mud Band at its almost-annual fundraiser and dance for Inner City Development, February 4: St. Mary's University, "Interfaith Dialogue: A Pathway to Peace" Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, Ph.D., D.D.
February 5: Alan Pogue, The Twig Bookstore, to talk about his new book, Witness
for Justice: The Documentary Photographs of Alan Pogue.
February 5-7: Trinity University, Films from Human Rights Watch Film Festival:
Cocalero (Argentina): The rise of controversial Bolivian President Evo Morales. February 6: Trinity University General John Abizaid at Laurie Auditorium. Wednesdays: Trinity University's Coates Library -- films, subtitled in English. Adam's Apples (Denmark). Arranged (United States). Her Name is Sabine (France). The Violin (Mexico). February 11: Trinity U, Problems of the Global Environment: The Flip Side of the Coin. February 11-12: SAC, Morgan Spurlock, with his newest film "What Would Jesus Buy?", the work of Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping. February 11-12: Magik Theater, benefit production of The Vagina Monologues to raise awareness and funds for local organizations working to end violence against women and girls. February 12: Trinity U, Laura Gomez: Manifest Destinies: The Making of the Mexican-American Race. February 19: Trinity U, Three Ways of Addressing Immigration: Liberalism, Nationalism, and Postmodernism, February 21: Viva! Bookstore, film Don't Call Me a Saint, the Dorothy Day story, February 20 or February 23: Oblate School of Theology: The Sermon on the Mount: Discipleship in an age of promise and peril. February 27: Andrei S. Markovits, University of Michigan on Uncouth Nation: Why Europe Hates America, February 29: submit poems for Let Words Be My Weapon: Poets and Writers Against War. Esperanza Peace and Justice Center, March 20. February 29, March 1 & 2 and March 7, 8 &9: An Altar for Emma, a multi-media life of Emma Tenayuca - Esperanza Peace and Justice Center and Our Lady of the Lake University.
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Personal GrowthStan Banker’s fantasy of a “General Friends Conference” workshop guide from his Quaker Lite 2 ½: The Lite Within:
1. Creative Suffering |
Family Eco-Tour in WashingtonPatricia Newkirk would love to see somebody from the Meeting at William Penn House in Washington for a Family Eco-Tour/Service Learning Trip, June 29 – July 7. The Smithsonian Folklife Festival is an exposition of living cultural heritage outdoors on the National Mall. This year they are making an effort to make a large percentage of the trash generated by the festival either recycled or composted.Your family can join the festival volunteer crew to help festival goers sort their trash appropriately – go to http://www.folklife.si.edu/center/festival_2008.html Activities include:
You meet other great people, too! The cost is $250 per person or $1,000 per family of 4 or more in Penn House accommodations (including bed linens and towels). Breakfast is included. Metro is the best way to get around. Parking is scarce. For more information, contact Patricia Newkirk at (202)543.5560, www.WilliamPennHouse.org
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Creeds and QuakersThis is the Pendle Hill Pamphlet by Robert Griswold. In it he reminds us that the central feature of Quaker spiritual authority lies not in our belief(s) but in our direct communion with the Divine – a difficult and challenging reminder, discouraging some from the attempt.He distinguishes belief, something arrived at by considering ideas, from faith, the spiritual apprehension of divine reality. Creeds are formalized beliefs. He feels that the divine reality was experienced by the Hindu Vanaprasthas, Gautama Buddha, and Jesus of Nazareth, and, later, by George Fox, who felt it to be reachable by everyone. From it come Quaker social testimonies of peace, equality, truth, simplicity, and community, convictions that the outward life must express truth divined inwardly. But if these are arrived at by thought and become ideals without spiritual grounding, they have become creeds. Creeds, he holds, act as filters in our experience of the world, excluding aspects of truth; as acts of arrogance by which we capture divine reality in a formula; as boundaries by which we exclude and reject others; and as tools by which worldly powers control and use us. They make for contented settlements, blocking fresh apprehensions of the divine reality. Yet, in the absence of a Quaker creed, we have no “product” to offer others, making it difficult for them to understand us. This is the reason we need our lives to be speaking for us. His words challenge. We recognize that there are those of other sects whose lives speak louder than ours – Desmond Tutu, Martin Luther King, Mohandas Gandhi, and numerous other Jews, Catholics, Muslims, and others. And we are left with the responsibility of distinguishing the Light when we experience it from other insights determined by our egos or our characters. And avoiding making the perhaps inevitable judgment that the answers to others’ prayers, the Pat Robertsons and Jerry Falwells of this world, are impure. We have been discussing Robert Griswold’s pamphlet and we shall discuss it again on the 24th of February.
The workshop, the materials, are what does not exist. Be a spot on the ground where nothing is growing, where something might be planted, a seed, possibly, from the Absolute.
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Query for FebruaryDo you try to set aside times of quiet for openness to the Holy Spirit? All of us need to find a way into silence which allows us to deepen our awareness of the divine and to find the inward source of our strength. |