So there I wasn't either

Vote Yes on I 594; Vote NO on I 591!
RantWoman deeply hopes that closing loopholes about ease of gun purchases will dramatically cut down the number of "idiots with guns" episodes around her!

The latest:
Neighbor: RantWoman did you hear about the shooting?

Which shooting? (Indeed several to choose from.)

Friday night in the parking lot. Two cars, people shooting at each other. About 8 cop cars. The place was lit up like a Christmas tree.

Was anyone h-h-hurt? (Actually if anyone had been hurt or worse yet killed, it would have been all over the building grapevine as soon as RantWoman walked in the door Sunday afterQuarterly Meeting.)

No, thanks you God and Jesus and a bunch of angels. Nobody with guns and no residents either. And apparently the cops got the shooters too.


Indeed, RantWoman was AWAY, away on one of her hours and hours doing something called minutes gigs.

This particular gig, for Friends Committee on WA Public Policy frequently comes with chatter about gun suicides and care of mental health issues. RantWoman is all for care of mental health issues. RantWoman is especially all over this topic because while trying to take minutes and listening to people go on about mental health issues, RantWoman gets to remember Marat the Mopey, a friend who bought the gun he finally succeeded in offing himself with after at least two other suicide attempts in a year. RantWoman's brain usually leaves the room at least temporarily; RantWoman manages to take minutes and say a prayer for some other stories that have emerged in the orbit of the policy chatter.

This time, while all that gunplay was happening in RantWoman's home parking lot, the meeting bounced fast over the message atthe top of the post and headed straight for Climate Change! Ura! Climate change gets its own post or posts. And RantWoman gets to be grateful, once again, to be nowhere near the drama of the moment and to say yet more prayers on repetitive themes!

Encouragement for Women Among Us

Various encouragement for women among us:

Don't Tell me to smile, with additional resources in the blog post
http://questforadequacy.blogspot.com/2014/09/dont-tell-me-to-smile.html


Learning to love criticism
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/28/opinion/sunday/learning-to-love-criticism.html?smid=fb-share&_r=2&referrer

And another point of view about criticism
http://bellejar.ca/2014/09/30/no-i-dont-want-to-learn-how-to-love-criticism-thanks/

The Woman's heart attack
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/28/opinion/sunday/womens-atypical-heart-attacks.html?WT.z_mob_rel=1

Bad Friend Interest Groups

RantWoman has a MOUNTAIN of gratitudes for Quarterly Meeting this time. They WILL make it through RantWoman’s keyboard, but first…

There was an abundance of interest group choices at this Quarterly Meeting. There were so many offers to lead interest groups that some group leaders reported no one attending. Everyone who reported no one attending was good-natured and grateful for opportunity to test something with themselves or to go to another interest group.

 On top of all that, hours after the end of the official Interest Group time someone from the Association of Bad Friends turned in offers to facilitate the following interest groups. Some of these interest groups actually occurred.

 
Rodent Wrangling with the Queer Quaker Cuddle Puddle. Featuring “Ratty” and sundry other representatives of earthcare unwanted dead or alive, even if skinned in less than 10 seconds.

 Versification in especially vehement Psalms with Walking Encyclopedia Friend. Featuring Psalm 68, RSV, Grade 2 Braille optional.

 Advanced Snarkasm: Sarcasm and Snarkiness for underappreciative noncontemplatives.

 Silent scribble font writing seminar for insomniacs in shared sleeping spaces

 To Heck with recovery in Rwanda Family Irreconciliation Hour with a random therapist and RantWoman’s Flogging Bureau

 Eat your peas; there are children starving in China / india/ S seattle, a gentler version of To Heck with  Rwanda, above.

 Solidarity in Somnolence: elocution for Sleep inducing speakers with fuzzy fleece throws for listeners who fall asleep in multiples.

 Beginning Procrastination with the Sometime in the Next Millennium Committee…

 RantWoman thinks there may have been more offers but has to lay over looking for the rest of the list.

 

 

 

Quotes for Reflection: Worship Sharing Groups

RantWoman is clear to post this for a couple reasons and with a couple caveats:

--RantWoman DEEPLY appreciates Friend Chris for pulling together these quotes, for one reason because RantWoman did not make it through anywhere near all of the Daniel Snyder Quaker Witness as Sacrament Pendle Hill Pamphlet. RantWoman sometimes lets herself be tempted to try to read regular print. RantWoman usually regrets this really fast. That is what happened with this pamphlet, and the quotes here are nuggets RantWoman clearly did not get to. This comment is partly reflection on the realities of RantWoman reading, partly continuing reflection on the question of whether other people besides RantWoman would also enjoy having Pendle Hill pamphlets in electronic format. Meanwhile, RantWoman got plenty of mileage out of nuggets.

--RantWoman is sometimes grateful to be able to share something from a past event. That will not happen reliably if the document sits in email or on some flash drive. So RantWoman posts here giving FULL credit for the work of compiling and developing to Friend Chris.


--These quotes elicited wonderful reflections in RantWoman's worship sharing group. First, we decided that we probably could not both walk and fully follow the directions. Then we took chairs outdoors and reflected in glorious fall sunshine.

--RantWoman is also sometimes a Very Bad Friend. The quotes contributed to some Bad Friend thoughts posted separately.

Quotations for Reflection

NW Quarter, North Pacific Yearly Meeting

September 26-28, 2014

Prepared by Christine Betz Hall

 

                                   

1.           There is an experience of the Eternal breaking into time, which transforms all life into a miracle of faith and action. Unspeakable, profound, and full of glory as an inward experience, it is the root of concern for all creation, the true ground of social endeavor. This inward Life and the outward Concern are truly one whole, and, were it possible, ought to be described simultaneously.    
                           —Thomas Kelly (d. 1982)[1]

2.           True Godliness does not turn Men [sic] out of the World, but enables them to live better in it, and excites their Endeavours to mend it.     —William Penn (d. 1718)[2]

3.           From an inward purifying, and steadfast abiding under it, springs a lively operative desire for the good of others...  And being clearly convinced in my judgment that to place my whole trust in God was best for me, I felt renewed engagements that in all things I might act on an inward principle of virtue and pursue worldly business no further than as Truth opened my way therein.                                                   —John Woolman (d. 1772)[3]

 

4.           For one thing, the legacy of John Woolman invites us to be open to recovering more fully the collective dimension of meeting for worship. We are summoned to “dwell deep.”
         For another, we are invited to see our activism as a species of worship. For activists, this is an invitation to root our activism more fully in the transforming power of meeting for worship and the love of God we encounter there. For those who are more of contemplative than an activist orientation, it challenges us to broaden our understanding of the boundaries of the meetinghouse, and the boundaries of worship itself.
                           —Michael Birkel (contemporary)[4]

5.           “The Society of Friends,” says Evelyn Underhill, “has produced no great contemplative.” This is true if, by a great contemplative, we mean a person primarily engaged in contemplation. The Quakers set aside regular times for contemplation, both individual retirement and public meetings, but contemplation has always been for them the inner side of a complete action, which to be whole must represent perfect balance of inner and outer. Real experience of the divine Presence has the result of sensitizing the conscience so that the worshiper could rise from quiet waiting with the feeling that a new and sometimes very difficult task had been laid upon him.            
                           —Howard Brinton (d. 1973)[5]

6.           There is a journey that some follow by starting in prayer and others follow by starting in action. It is the witness of our tradition that those who are naturally inclined to begin in prayer will eventually feel led into outward action, and those who are naturally inclined to begin with action will eventually feel called more deeply into prayer. However, it is sometimes the case that those who pray do not act, and those who act do not pray. There is an unfortunate tendency among some Quakers to separate prayer and action rather than to integrate them.
                           —Daniel Snyder (contemporary)[6]

7.           The activists in our groups <in classes at Pendle Hill> kept us grounded in the real and urgent needs of a broken world. The contemplatives in the class challenged us to resist the temptation to carry the world’s problems on our own shoulders. The activists were challenged to season their sense of urgency in prayer. The contemplatives were challenged to bring their faith to outward visibility. Together we began to discern the contours of hope, for although we yearn to see and to celebrate the visible results of our work, we dare not anchor hope in the visible, for we are working toward a future that we may not see in our lifetime… —Snyder[7]

8.           …being awake to the Presence of God does not take us away from the world but allows us to be even more deeply in it <paraphrasing William Penn> …We came to understand this inward/outward path as sacramental. Quaker witness is an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible Grace. This is the classic definition of a sacrament. It means to live, walk, speak, and act in the world, not as our anger, guilt, fear, or despair shapes it for us, but as it is re-shaped, again and again, in our ongoing encounters with God. To live sacramentally is to fall so completely into God’s infinite Love for us and for the world that we come to see, to know, and to act in the world in light of this Love. —Snyder[8]

9.           Every one of us is called to be a contemplative—not in the sense of a particular vocation we call “the contemplative life,” but in the sense of a holy habit of contemplative love that leads us forth in partnership with God into creative and redeeming work.  
                           —Richard Foster (contemporary)[9]

 

 

LAST WORD ACTIVITY: Worship group members review the quotes above separately. Each one chooses a sentence or passage that means something to her or him.

1.   One person reads aloud the passage she or he chose without commenting on it.

2.   One at a time around the circle, the other group members may talk about that passage/quotation for a brief minute—share thoughts, feelings or questions.

3.   When others have finished commenting on the quotation, the person who introduced it shares why they chose it and what it means to them. The person who brought the passage has "the last word."

4.   The next person reads aloud the quotations they have chosen, and all comment.

5.   Repeat until everyone has shared their quote.

 

---

[1] Kelly, Thomas R., and Douglas V. Steere. A testament of devotion (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1941). 65

[2] in Snyder, Daniel O. Quaker witness as sacrament Pendle Hill Pamphlet 397. Wallingford, Pa.: Pendle Hill Publications, 2008, 35.

[3] John Woolman, “Journal,” in The Journal and Major Essays of John Woolman, Ed. Phillips P. Moulton. (Richmond Ind.: Friends United Press, 1971), 38.

[4] Birkel, Michael. “Mysticism and Activism: On Learning from John Woolman” Wider Quaker Fellowship: Voice Of Friends, Friends World Committee for Consultation, Web. 30 July 2012. Southeastern Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, Annual Michener Lecture, 2002, 19.

[5] Brinton, Howard Haines. Friends for 300 years; the history and beliefs of the Society of Friends since George Fox started the Quaker movement.. [1st ed. New York: Harper, 1952], 27.

[6] Snyder, Daniel O.. Quaker witness as sacrament Pendle Hill Pamphlet 397. Wallingford, Pa.: Pendle Hill Publications, 2008, 22.

[7] Ibid, 29-30.

[8] Ibid, 31.

[9] Foster, Richard J.. Streams of living water: celebrating the great traditions of Christian faith. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998, 58.

Leaving the Quiverful Movment: blogs, etc.

Blog as Filing Cabinet Item about woman who left Quiverful movement of conservative Christians / abusive family dynamics. Mentions several other blogs. Possibly of interest to people who find themselves entangled in or recovering from such connections.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/09/656002/

Interest Group List, Fall 2014 Quarterly Meeting

Interest Group Title	Interest Group Presenter	Interest Group Description
US Immigration Policy Then and Now	Mary Ruth Petzing	Working together and speaking from our own histories and experiences, we will explore immigration to the US from colonial times to the present. Then we will discuss current issues including the unaccompanied children from Central America
Junior Friends in Guatemala	Hannah Billen and other Junior Friends	Come join a small group of Junior Friends to hear all about our service trip to Guatemala. We will tell stories, pass around photographs and share the valuable lessons this incredible country and its people have taught us. Suitable for all ages: YES
Ways of Working on Climate Change in Your Community	Lynn Fitzhugh	Things 350Seattle.org has been doing during its first 18 months of existence with an emphasis on what you can do in your community. We will talk in depth about the threat that oil trains traveling across ID and all of WA pose to community safety Suitable for all ages YES
“Forest Bathing,” in Japan also called “Shinrin-yoku”	Sol Riou	In Japan, “Forest Bathing” or"Shinrin-yoku" is prescribed by doctors. We will practice walking with full awareness, using our five senses, in the forest for relaxation and recreation. Suitable for all ages: YES
Let’s Change the Criminal Justice System in Washington	Tom Ewell	Support the Friends Committee on Washington Public Policy (FCWPP) work in prison reform." We will look at the current legislative agenda for FCWPP in the coming legislative session and suggest ways you can help. There is a real chance for change this time.
Way of the Spirit	Christine Hall	Way of the Spirit—a study-retreat program from the wisdom of the Quaker Tradition. Interest Group: Try a meditative exercise with Isaac Penington, meet people who’ve experienced the program, share and question together. Is 2015 the year to come home to who you are meant to be? In Way of the Spirit, you’ll deepen faithfulness, explore leadings in life-changing community. Challenge yourself to spiritual growth. Begins January 16-19, 2015 in Mt. Angel, OR.
Collect Print and Paint from Nature	Laurel and Polly Boyajian	We will make egg tempera paints with natural earth pigments. We will collect leaves, needles, sticks, cones to use as brushes, resists, and prints If younger than 8, please bring an adult too.
Nature Walk	Ellie Duffield	Seeing, learning about the geology, plants, animals, their names, history and how they interrelate to each other. Intended for Adults
Coming of Age Celebrations for Quaker Youth	Debbie Townsend	Interest Group Description: Many religious traditions have a way of marking a child's transition out of childhood: confirmation, bar or bat mitzvah, etc.  Now, quite a few Quaker Meetings around the country have created or are exploring ways to mark coming-of-age. Share your ideas, and learn what Eastside Friends Meeting has planned for their eight-graders this year. Adults, Jr. Friends
Business Meeting? Continuing Committee? What Quarterly Meeting Decisions Get Made Where?	Don Goldstein, sponsored by Continuing Committee	We will review the history of what kinds of decisions have been made by Meeting for Business and Continuing Committee for the operation of Quarterly Meeting events, including the Silent Retreat. We will consider whether those present would like to change the division of decision-making authority and if so how. For a background document, contact Don, dnx6309@gmail.com

 

Secular Jewish Circle Rosh Hoshanah September 24

RantWoman got asked weeks ago about wording for a bulletin announcement. RantWoman suspects she flubbed the proofreading. Here is what RantWoman wishes the announcement said:


On Wednesday September 24th UFM will welcome the secular Jewish  Circle who have rented the social hall and worship room from 6-10 pm to observe Rosh Hoshanah. 

Midweek Meeting for Worship will be held in the library.



RantWoman further inquires:
Would it maybe be possible to put up some signs, maybe a  computer-generated LARGE FONT sign or two? I know illegible and handwritten is "simple" and even often does the trick, but....

In the Light?
--Why the question mark?
--Does RantWoman mean put the sign up in the light where it can be read?
--Does RantWoman mean she is unsure where to put the signs?

Please hold the whole event in the Light, legible signs or no legible signs.

Please also hold RantWoman in the Light for being an insufferable editor who sometimes maybe just maybe takes for granted certain verbal gifts and does not want to seem as overbearing as she probably comes across. Sigh!