Isaac Smith:
There are a lot of Quakers for whom the quality of their worship is measured by the quality of the silence therein, to the point that “disruptions” — whether they come from children, latecomers, folks who are not neurotypical, or folks who don’t comport themselves in the manner of the white middle class — are regarded as annoyances. This is not just a mistake.
A strenuously and lengthily argued dunciation of the fallenness of modern Friends, this piece is argued almost exclusively from books. It’s interesting (and much of it is undeniably true) though the author seem unable to imagine thst there might be some sparks of authenticity and propheticism still burning.
The following post was written by Blake Everitt, a Friend the UK and member of the newly-formed Revolutionary Quakers. This essay explores the prophetic and apocalyptic nature of early Quakerism, and sketches out how middle class revisionism took over the Religious Society of Friends.
The Religious Society of Friends: Children of Prophets or Children of Propheticide?
I usually find stories of Friends by tracking a list of a hundred-plus Quaker-related RSS feeds. I’ll also find them being shared on Facebook or in the Reddit Quakers group. For the first time ever I stumbled on one in Twitter Moments. Another likely first: I’m linking to the CIA website. Read the story of the Quaker pacifist who lived with the CIA.
Margaret [Scattergood] was far more skeptical of CIA and considered the organization’s mission to be in violation of her pacifist beliefs. She used her trust fund to financially contribute to antiwar causes. She lobbied Congress to cut the US Intelligence and military budgets. In the 1980s Margaret opened her home to Sandinistas from Nicaragua, while CIA supported the opposition.
Inviting Sandinistas to her home in the middle of the CIA headquarters compound is easily the most kickass Quaker stories I’ve heard in awhile. Chuck Fager also shared some of this story in a nice remembrance in a 1987 Friends Journal shortly after she died; apparently the land purchases in the 1940s weren’t quite so neighborly as the CIA public relations team seem to make out.
When we came here in fifteen or so years ago, Nancy Forrester’s Secret Garden was a magical oasis tucked in the middle of a block in Key West, a small forest said to be the last undeveloped acre in the city’s Old Town neighborhood. Full of winding paths and trees it was the rarest of spaces: loved, carefully tended, and shared with the public as a gift of beauty. But even then it felt besieged. In 2012 taxes and expenses became too much and Nancy sold off parcels to developers. From an article in Key News:
The tucked-away entrance to Nancy Forrester’s Secret Garden off Free School Lane in the 500 block of Simonton Street will be closed to the public after today, as finances and property taxes have forced Forrester to sell the land parcels that have housed an artist’s cottage and gallery, parrots, orchids, rare palms, meandering pathways and a meditative garden for more than four decades.
These days the garden has been reduced to a small backyard on Elizabeth Street which Nancy uses as a rescue parrot refuge. In the mornings she gives educational lectures on the birds, full of facts about their brilliant behavior, the destruction of their native habitats, and gentle lectures about how we can all protect native parrot habitats by living more lightly on the land (hint: no red palm oil or beef). From behind the fence came the sounds of a swimming pool being installed in the cutdown middle of the former garden. Nancy has life tenancy on the ill-repaired house where she lives with the parrots.
I don’t know the details of the real estate transactions or Forrester’s finances but I find it incredible that Key West couldn’t rally around one of its living treasures. I’m glad that Nancy remains along with her parrots and I’m grateful my kids got a chance to meet her.
YouTube
A good piece in the NYTimes on the stagnant jobs facing blue-collar America. I wonder if they would have written this if the votes had broken a different way and we were all talking of Hillary as president elect. A quote:
For workers like Mr. Roell, 36, who started at Carrier just weeks after receiving his high school diploma and never returned to school, the problem is not a shortage of jobs in the area. Instead, it is a drought of jobs that pay anywhere near the $23.83 an hour he makes at Carrier, let alone enough to give him a toehold in the middle class
Great stories and good reporting.
RIP St Leonard
If you are the dealer, I’m out of the game
If you are the healer, it means I’m broken and lame
If thine is the glory then mine must be the shame
You want it darker
We kill the flameMagnified, sanctified, be thy holy name
Vilified, crucified, in the human frame
A million candles burning for the help that never came
You want it darkerHineni, hineni
I’m ready, my lordThere’s a lover in the story
But the story’s still the same
There’s a lullaby for suffering
And a paradox to blame
But it’s written in the scriptures
And it’s not some idle claim
You want it darker
We kill the flameThey’re lining up the prisoners
And the guards are taking aim
I struggled with some demons
They were middle class and tame
I didn’t know I had permission to murder and to maim
You want it darkerHineni, hineni
I’m ready, my lord
Magnified, sanctified, be thy holy name
Vilified, crucified, in the human frame
A million candles burning for the love that never came
You want it darker
We kill the flameIf you are the dealer, let me out of the game
If you are the healer, I’m broken and lame
If thine is the glory, mine must be the shame
You want it darkerHineni, hineni
Hineni, hineni
I’m ready, my lordHineni
Hineni, hineni
Hineni
I was in early high school when I got my first alarm clock radio. My parents were a bit older when I was born, so the LPs in the back of our hall closet were a generation-and-a-half out-of date: I remember mostly musical soundtracks like South Pacific and West Side Story. My older brother had brought the Beatles into our house but he had moved away for college and adulthood years before and the only trace of his musical influence was a Simon & Garfunkel greatest hits 8‑track tape my mom had bought for a penny from the Time-Life record club.
In my bedroom late at night in the early 80s, I explored the sounds inside my new radio. I would bury myself underneath my Star Trek sheets, pull the radio inside, and listen with volume barely perceptible. Three was no real reason for the secrecy. I’m sure my parents wouldn’t have particularly cared. But I was a private kid. I didn’t want to let on that I was curious about the adult world. Pop radio and MASH reruns were my secret.
I had had a shortwave radio in middle school and brought the thrill of long-distance discovery to my radio explorations. Geography and sound had more mystery in those days before the internet. On a cold, clear night, I could tune in AM powerhouses half a continent away.
One particularly cold night, one of these distant signals played a song I had never heard or even imagined. It was half-drowned out by static. The signal drifted in and out in waves but I listened mesmerized. To a introverted kid in a sleep Philly suburb, this song was a key to a yearned-for future. I was instantly certain that that no one around me had ever heard this song. If only I could make out some words, maybe I could spend the next year scanning the distant radio bands to hear it again. As I got older, I could go into the city to scour bins in the seediest of indie record stores. This song no one knew would be a touchstones to a new adulthood I was constructing in the secret of my bedroom.
As the fade came, I barely caught the DJ’s words through the static. “Hotel California.” I vowed to myself that someday, somehow, I would find this song and hear it again.
RIP Glenn Frey.
A Friends School talks openly about past school abuse via Raleigh News & Observer)
The alumnus said he’s upset the principal [Harold Jernigan] has not acknowledged the accusations. But he said he doesn’t regret sending his original message. ‘If you read Quaker literature, they spell ‘Truth’ in the uppercase – the implication of divinity,’ he said, ‘that it is a holy thing to continue that search for truth.’
I’m glad this is getting out now, but I did a double-take as the accused principle is still alive and living a few dozen miles from me. He was a lightning-rod figure as principal of at least two other schools after Carolina. I imagine the behavior continued. Updates below:
Update December 2014. I have received emails from a former student who wished to remain anonymous at this time. I have no way to fact check this but it is consistent with the history and I have no reason to think it’s inaccurate. With that caveat, here are some excerpts:
As an Alumni of Atlantic City Friends School I am not surprised at all to hear about Harold Jernigan sexual abuse in the least . Please note this abuse along with more forms of abuse went on at ACFS into the early 80’s
Sexual abuse was not the only abuse. Abuse of the school system in general including drugs , abuse of power , money , teaching so badly that curves were used to grade so curved that the highest grade in a math class Harold Jernigan taught was a 42 yet all were passed . Harold Jernigan also would listen to classrooms and locker rooms with a speaker system in his office even after he promised Teachers he would not . Please note if Harold Jernigan did not want a student to pass he would call a meeting with all Teachers to make sure certain students would not pass no matter what .
I was a victim of his non sexual abuse but still abuse all the same .
I am only telling you this so someone puts a stop to this abuse. Back in the late 70’s early 80’s who would believe a teenager . To see this Finally come out makes me know there is Karma .
As teenagers in school we would talk amongst ourselves . No one would come forward because we knew Harold would hold back our Diplomas or not forward a letter to a college .
You must remember ACFS was attended by either high IQ students , rich kids that were kick out of their other schools or students that wanted to attend a private school . This made the student body Easy Prey .
During my time at ACFS I made friends with some of the Teachers . These Teachers are some of my sources ! They knew but needed their job