Putney Friends Meeting

Putney Friends Focus on the 2012 World Conference of Friends — June 10

On Sunday, June 10, two members of Putney Friends Meeting will report on their experience this April attending the 2012 World Conference of Friends in Kenya. Noah Baker-Merrill and Rosemary Zimmerman will share photos and stories from the conference, which was the largest worldwide conference of Friends since 1967. The Conference included Quakers from many parts of Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Latin America and North America engaging the theme of “Being Salt and Light: Friends Living the Kingdom of God in a Broken World.”

Noah and Rosemary will start their presentation around noon, after a light potluck at the close of the late morning Meeting for Worship. They will also focus on the concluding statement of the conference, the Kabarak Call For Peace and Eco-Justice.

In addition, at 9:30 am on Sunday the Adult Religious Education committee will host an open discussion in the Fellowship room of the Salt and Light booklet created as a preparation document for the World Conference. This booklet can be downloaded or viewed online at the World Conference of Friends website.

For those who cannot make either of these events on Sunday, you can watch an earlier report by Noah Baker Merrill to Putney Friends Meeting about the conference.

Noah Baker Merrill also led worship on one of the days of the Conference. Click here for the full text of his ministry and click below on the short video clip of the conclusion of Noah’s talk at the conference. To access the texts of other talks and sermons at the Conference, check out this webpage.

Please join us at Putney Friends Meeting this Sunday, June 10, to hear about this inspiring World Conference of Friends!

06/07/2012

Member Activities, Noah Baker Merrill, PFM Events
Young Adult Friends Conference on Ministry, Earthcare, and Social Action at Pendle Hill

A Great Young Adult Friends Conference on Ministry, Earthcare, and Social Action Has Been Scheduled for June 15 – 20, 2012 at Pendle Hill.

All Young Adult Friends (ages 18 to 35) in the US and Canada are invited to be part of an intensive six-day conference centered on ministry, earthcare, and nonviolent social action as part of Pendle Hill’s reconceived Young Adult Leadership Development Program (YALD).

For this conference, Pendle Hill is partnering with the Quaker Earthcare Witness and the Clarence and Lilly Pickett Endowment for Quaker Leadership. The result: a powerful spiritual and educational program that will provide guided discernment for Spirit-led witness in the world, joyful fellowship, transformative leadership, and nonviolent social action skill-building. At its core, this conference is about providing the foundational skills and training to inspire revelation – and nonviolent revolution – as we strive to live in Spirit-led relationship with ourselves, our communities, and the earth.

Program Description

The program will include inspirational speakers, workshops and trainings, worship and worship-sharing, fellowship, discernment of gifts and ministry, service, and opportunities to explore the use of nonviolent direct action. The conference will culminate in a series of workshops on discernment of ministry and leadings, and will include a special gathering of Pickett Endowment alumni. All Pickett Endowment alums are welcome to attend the entire conference, but will be especially encouraged to attend the Pickett workshops on Tuesday, June 19 and Wednesday, June 20 to share their own journeys with discerning the call to Spirit-led witness.

Who Can Apply?

Any young adult Friends in the United States and Canada who feel a movement in our generation to create the world we believe is possible, and to live into Right Relationship with the Divine, one another, and the earth. This conference is open and welcoming to young adult Quakers of all backgrounds, experiences, and Friends’ theologies. While we recognize that this gathering is firmly rooted in the unprogrammed Friends’ tradition, we also believe the thematic content to be urgently relevant to all branches of Quakerism and hope all interested young adults will feel that their voices belong at this table.

Why an Application Process?

We are asking interested individuals to apply because we have a limited number of spots available and want to ensure that a wide range of participants from a variety of locations are able to come together to engage this work. We hope to accommodate as many young adults as possible, and appreciate your understanding of our application-based process that may mean that some Friends will not be able to attend.

Please use the form on the YALD webpage page to apply. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and applicants will be notified within 2-3 weeks of submitting their application. Apply early, as we expect the conference to fill up quickly.

Program Cost

Program fees, which include room and board, is $300. Scholarships will also be available for participants who need support, and interested individuals are asked to consider requesting financial assistance from their monthly/yearly meetings or communities.

Apply now!

Contact Emily Higgs at ehiggs@pendlehill.org for more information.

Also, are you an ally to young adults? Would you like to support this important gathering? Please consider a financial gift to allow more young adults to participate. Send donations to Pendle Hill (338 Plush Mill Road, Wallingford PA 19086) with “YALD Financial Assistance” in the memo line. Thank you!

05/28/2012

Wider Quaker World, Young Adult Friends
Northwest Quarterly Meeting at PFM June 2 and 3

Putney Friends Meeting and Keene Friends Meeting are co-hosting the Northwest Quarterly Meeting of Friends at Putney Friends Meeting on the weekend of June 2nd and 3rd. We hope you will be able to join us. Below is the schedule of Quarterly Meeting activities scheduled for the weekend.

Quarterly Meeting Schedule:

Saturday, June 2nd

6:00 p.m. —Gather with potluck supper
7:30 p.m. —Program: Music

Sunday, June 3rd

8:30 a.m. —Early Meeting for Worship.
9:30–10:30 a.m —Quarterly Meeting Committee time.
10:30—11:30 a.m. —Late Morning Meeting for Worship.
Noon (or so) –Potluck cookout shared with the Putney Friends First Day School summer break celebration.
1:00 p.m. (or so) –Quarterly Meeting for Business.
Mid-afternoon (or so) –Close.

Keene and Putney Friends are especially encouraged to bring dishes for the Saturday evening and Sunday lunch potluck meals. Also, if you can offer overnight hospitality to Friends from other Meetings in our Quarter, please contact Carol Forstythe.

05/26/2012

PFM Events, Wider Quaker World
Gathering With A Concern For Gospel Ministry

If you have a concern for Gospel Ministry, if you sense a calling to being a Spiritual Nurturer, if you find yourself called to vocal ministry in worship, or if you hunger for deep Spirit-led fellowship, join us on June 2nd, from 2 to 5pm at Putney Meetinghouse.

Friends from Northwest Quarter and elsewhere gathered to worship and share a sense of call to ministry in October and again in December. Some were feeling a first tug toward a ministry as yet undefined, others were looking to support Friends in their calls. After a period of worship Friends shared their journeys and discussed the joys and trials of living a life close to the Spirit. At the end of our time together we decided to gather several times a year in the Quarter.

We’re a small theologically diverse group of Friends called to meet and support each other in both traditional forms of ministry and the various modern interpretations of ministry that are alive among Friends today. Springing from the Brian Drayton’s nurturing ministry to ministers, who led October’s gathering, we look to worship together, to share with each other and to listen.

Join us on June 2nd when we gather a third time for mutual support and encouragement. We’ll gather at 2 o’clock for some chat and settle into worship at about 2:30. For questions or more information, please contact Carl Williams.

05/26/2012

Wider Quaker World
Welsh Quakers Talk About Quaker Faith In This Short Documentary

05/23/2012

Uncategorized
Vermont Politicians Win Support For Putney Friends Meeting Couple

Leahy, Sanders And Welch Announce Lifting Of The Threat Of Deportation That Hovered Over Frances and Takako!

Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) recently announced a breakthrough that will bring certainty and stability for now to the legal status of a Japanese-born woman, Takako Ueda, who is married under Vermont law to an American citizen, Frances Herbert. The couple live in Dummerston, Vt and attend Putney Friends Meeting.

The bi-national same-sex couple has been together for more than a decade and were legally married in Vermont last year, but U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services had denied the Japanese-born Ms. Ueda a spousal permanent resident card, also known as a green card. Under the federal Defense of Marriage Act, their marriage is not recognized at the federal level.

Leahy, Sanders and Welch announced that the citizenship agency used its discretion to grant “deferred action” to Ms. Ueda, in effect suspending any potential deportation for now.

The lawmakers previously had urged Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano for her agency to reconsider its December 2011 decision to deny a spousal green card for Ms. Ueda. They asked that the agency re-evaluate its policy on marriage-based immigration petitions for same-sex spouses, and particularly for the Dummerston couple.

“We welcome this remedy that for now will offer a measure of common sense and compassion for this Vermont couple. Ms. Ueda now will be able to apply to USCIS for authorization to work, and to the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles for a driver’s license. All three of our offices have worked hard to support this loving and committed couple who have been unfairly prevented by DOMA from enjoying the rights and benefits that all lawfully married couples deserve,” the delegation said in a joint statement on Tuesday’s breakthrough.

05/23/2012

Uncategorized
Video of PFM Member Speaking To Massachusetts Bible Society

Crisis, Faith, and Action: Transitioning to a Beloved Community in the Era of Peak Oil, Climate Change, and a Dysfunctional Global Economy

At this February luncheon of the Massachusetts Bible Society, Quaker Transition activist Steve Chase addressed some key questions: What is faithful, abundant living in the midst of the triple threat of peak oil, climate change, and an increasingly dysfunctional global economy? How can we draw on our faith as friends and followers of Jesus to resist the pulls of empire and consumerism, and unleash our creativity and love of our neighbors and God’s good earth? How can we respond to the challenges of our time with an inspiring vision of Beloved Community in the 21st Century that moves us beyond either denial or despair and helps us cultivate an inward state of blessed unrest and an outward engagement in creative faith-based activism? What can we start doing now to foster a transition to a more livable, just, relocalized, and neighborly post-oil world?

Bio: Steve Chase is a professor of Advocacy for Social Justice and Sustainability at Antioch University New England, a co-founder of the Transition Keene Task Force, a member of Putney Friends Meeting (Quakers) and a co-founder of the Quakers in Transitionproject of the New England Yearly Meeting of Friends’ Earthcare Ministries Committee.

For more other online videotaped talks from the MA Bible Society, go to: http://www.massbible.org/program-videos.

02/25/2012

Member Activities
“Art, Social Action, and Spirituality” topic for West Brattleboro Quakers

The West Brattleboro Quaker Worship Group will host a discussion on Sunday, February 5 with documentary photographer Michael Forster Rothbart, whose exhibit “After Chernobyl” has just opened at Vermont Center for Photography, will share his spiritual path: finding and sharing hope and beauty in many of the world’s difficult places.

As he wrote in a recent Friends Journal article, “I am equally a Quaker and a photojournalist, and these two tracks of my life cross-pollinate constantly. Both live as witnesses, and there are many parallels between photography and Quaker worship.” Rothbart will illuminate these connections from his experience and lead a group discussion.

The Worship Group meets for spirit-led worship every Sunday at 10:00 am at the Brattleboro Area Jewish Community, 151 Greenleaf Street, West Brattleboro Singing precedes worship at 9:50. The discussion with Rothbart will follow at 11:15. Children are welcome though formal childcare is not provided.

The Worship Group has been meeting weekly for one year and all are welcome.

For additional information contact Doug Cox at 257-1024, dcox@sover.net.

02/03/2012

Uncategorized
Awakening Through Love Study Group at Putney Friends Meeting

Come practice and study meditation for compassionate living for the next six Tuesday nights from 7 to 8pm. Starting on February 7, participants will use John Makransky’s book Awakening Through Love and practice meditation to enliven our capacity for deep peace and powerful love and compassion. No prior mediation experience needed. ALL sincerely welcome.

Julie Forsythe, a longtime member of the Putney Friends Meeting, will facilitate the six sessions. Julie is a co-founder and guiding teacher of the Foundation for Active Compassion with her teaching mentor, Lama John Makransky, and Leah Weiss Ekstrom. Julie was introduced to Buddhism in 1969 when she was working at the Quaker Rehabilitation Center for Vietnamese civilians during the Vietnam War. Julie has been a student of Lama Surya Das’ and Lama John Makransky’s since 1995 and she has completed many meditation retreats in the natural ease tradition of Tibetan Buddhism (Dzogchen), including multiple One Hundred Day Retreats. She has also served as a practice leader in these retreat settings.

A Sample Talk By John Makransky (about nine minutes into the video)

For more information, contact: juliabforsythe@gmail.com or visit the Foundation For Active Compassion.

02/01/2012

Community Events
Around the Fire: Evenings of “Sacred Conversations” at Putney Friends Meeting

Friends’ practice has always been to allow space in our schedules for conversations that matter, that are about what is mostly deeply Real in our lives. One of the ways we can deepen our spiritual journeys is to share them with one another. Last fall, a group of Friends began gathering for monthly conversations we’ve come to call “Around the Fire”.

Under the care of Noah Baker Merrill – who has been released for ministry by Putney Meeting – and with support from members of his oversight committee, the conversations we’re sharing together are wide ranging, funny, tender, challenging, and nourishing.

We’re often a group of about six or so. Some come once, some every time. We meet at 6:00pm for a brief potluck meal, and then we settle around the meetinghouse fire into “sacred conversation” – an informal time with plenty of space for words to be spoken and received with care. We allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit to ask questions of one another, to share our experiences and understandings, and to encourage one another as we find Life and Love at work in our lives.

We’ve discovered how powerful and surprising it can be to hear how Spirit has been at work in each others’ lives. Some of us have been able to ask burning questions about what Quakers actually believe. We’ve shared about how we came to Friends, and why we’ve stayed. We’ve talked about what we’re doing all that time in meeting for worship, about the role of the ego in Friends’ tradition, about prayer, about our encounters with what we call God. We’ve been challenged to consider how what we say we believe translates – or sometimes doesn’t – into how we act in our daily lives. We’ve found echoes of today’s challenges in the lives of Quakers long dead. With many different words to describe our understanding of the Divine, we’ve begun to see glimpses of what Quaker minister Bill Taber called “a shared vocabulary for the inward landscape”. And sometimes, we’ve been able to speak out loud for the first time what we have only known silently as Grace at work within us.

Together, we’ve been quietly reminded that meeting for worship doesn’t have to happen only on Sunday mornings. Wherever two or three are gathered, we’ve felt, the Light can be present with us, opening us to new understandings and new richness together.

If this unfolding story speaks to you, you’re welcome, regardless of how long you’ve been attending worship with Friends. We hope you’ll consider joining us!

Around the Fire Dates and Times:
6:00pm-8:30pm at the Putney Friends Meetinghouse:

February 9 (Thursday)
March 6 (Tuesday)
April 3 (Tuesday)
May 10 (Thursday)

For more information, contact Noah at 802-451-6931, or email noah.merrill@gmail.com.

01/30/2012

Community Events