Interview with Britain YM recording clerk Paul Parker
Parker started attending meetings as a young teenager. He says he found Quakerism refreshing because Quakers asked him what he believed, while other Christian traditions told him what they believed.
https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.4688407
San Antonio Quakers’ minute on child separations
Friends Meeting of San Antonio finds the policy of the present administration of separating children from their families at the border to be shameful and contrary to American values. Further, using the Gospel to claim that “God has ordained” such actions is appalling to us as a people of faith.
A few years ago Friends Journal ran an article on the border humanitarian crisis, co-written by one of San Antonio’s clerks, so we’ve added this weekend’s statement to the article for context.
I like this interview on the Italian mafia by Isaac Chotiner in Slate, “The Mafia Is More Powerful Than It’s Ever Been.”
It seems that this perpetual cynicism may be the greatest threat of our era. Is the child of irony? The grandchild of government conspiracy theories? Maybe the cause doesn’t matter as much as the effect.
The mob thrives on chaos. It likes chaos. It likes to be the alternative authority that you go to because you can’t get anything done through the legitimate state. For that very reason, I think there’s no doubt that it promotes that chaos. It likes civic distrust. It likes cynicism. It can profit from that. I think the great tragedy of Italy is that, to a large extent, it’s kind of succeeded.
I think that if we wanted to construct a Quaker critique of the current American government – and the type of corporatized corruption we see in Russia and the petrostates, it would best start with the political culture that deny basic facts, gaslight citizens with ever-changing rationales, and creating chaos that can let financial hucksters reap billions. These are not governments based on integrity and fair playing fields.
Over on Reddit, historian Jason Aglietti hosts an Ask-Me-Anything about eighteenth century Quaker history in Maryland. There’s some good discussion about the ways the largely-neutral Quaker population was treated in various colonies, especially Maryland, which is Aglietti’s focus.
“The Friends They Loathed” was defended in April 2018 and examined a chapter of Maryland history that had never been explored in detail before — the religious persecution against Quakers during the American Revolution. Despite being a historian of American Christianity, I hold no religious beliefs.
Brian Drayton looks at the effects of syncretism, dilution, and cultural appropriation on the Quaker movement.
At first blush, such a process might be celebrated as a process of enrichment: Quakerism version 1 turns into Quakerism v2, now new and better because it has bells or outward sacraments or what-have-you. But note that this kind of change is not just a matter of simple addition, because elements drawn from various other traditions are themselves embedded deeply in some culture, and so they are clothed round with meanings and nuances that are implicitly adopted along with the idea or practice that has been explicitly imported.
Group decision making and moral disengagement in the context of yearly meeting schisms
This is an aspect of group discernment and consensus decision making rarely discussed among Quakers. Likely this is because the presumption is that in worshipful business meetings the presumption is that decision making is Spirit-led. It is a noble ideal and one that I have seen in action. And yet, it is also a dynamic that can be subject to abuse and as such ought to prompt some self-examination and possibly some intentional safeguards into meeting processes.
http://quakerlibertarians.weebly.com/blog/group-decision-making-and-moral-disengagement-in-the-context-of-yearly-meeting-schisms
One issue to which I am particularly sensitive is how our obsession with the past comes across to newcomers. Some people (especially those with Quaker ancestors) are excited by our history, while other people are turned off or simply puzzled by Quaker jargon and Quaker genealogies, which they experience as a serious barrier to being included.
Make Quakerism Militant Again
Quakerism is designed for disruption. Actively stirring up trouble, causing a scene, shedding Light on oppression. Following Christ calls us to be outlaws, to defy the powers of this world. To simultaneously break into and out of the state and extend the Kingdom. We are called to create and live into a new society.
Friends Journal 
Slate Magazine