I hope it's appropriate to post this here although it's not a uniquely Quaker issue...

With just over a month left in the final comment period on the Keystone XL pipeline decision, I was surprised to find that there were no petitions about it on the White House site, so I started one.  I've tried to acknowledge in it both the public policy concerns I have and the fact that the way I live my life, the way most of our lives, still depend on the kind of dirty energy which I'm…

Exodus 8 – The plague of frogs is brought about by Aaron stretching out the staff over the streams, canals and pools of Egypt.  The Egyptian magicians match him in this one too.  Pharaoh at first tells them he will let the people go, but he reneges (8:11).

Then Aaron stretches out his staff and turns dust into gnats – the third plague.  This the magicians cannot match, but Pharaoh is not moved.

Then the Lord tells Moses to threaten swarms…

March 19, 2013

Second of a series of posts on John Punshon’s Reasons for Hope: The Future of the Friends Church. Part 1 is here. 

In no way does John Punshon attempt to give a proper history of Quakers in the U.S. over the past two centuries, but he does see Quakerism – indeed any denomination – as being a dynamic movement that constantly has to adjust in response to new…

The following is an excerpt from a message delivered by ESR student Anna Woofenden in Earlham School of Religion Worship on Thursday, March 14 2013. 

Exodus 6 – God assures Moses that He will punish Pharaoh. He repeats to Moses the essence of his promises: that through his appearances to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, He established a covenant which He is now acting upon – He will rescue His people from their slavery; He will take them as His own.  And the people “will know that I, the Lord am [their] God when I free [them] from the labor of the Egyptians and bring [them] into the land which I swore [to give their ancestors]”…

I love the Man of La Mancha score.  I drove my family crazy playing the album over and over.  It's probably ahead of Jesus Christ Superstar and my BJ Thomas christian albums.  My spirit soars as I hear "to fight the unbeatable foe, to strive with your last ounce of courage, to dream the impossible dream!"  I guess you have to be mad to live that kind of life but isn't that what disciples of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, should be doing?  Shouldn't we live and die as lovers, forgiving those…

The past few days, my Meeting has been struggling with whether or not we should revise our Mission Statement. We saw no need to worry about it until a Facebook page was constructed on behalf of the entire gathering. Much of the commentary and debate thus far, to me, has been little more than hair-splitting and semantic. Some Friends think that this entire…

Exodus 5 - Then they go together – Moses and Aaron - to ask Pharaoh to let them go “hold a festival [“hag”] for me in the desert” [“hag” in Hebrew is related to hajj in Arabic].

Pharaoh wants to know “Who is YHWH, that I should hearken to his voice” (5:2). Pharaoh accuses them of just being lazy and looking for an excuse to get out of doing the work he wants them to do. Instead of letting them go, he increases their…

Exodus 3 – “One day Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro . . . He led the flock far into the wilderness and came to Sinai, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the middle of a bush . . . Though the bush was engulfed in flames, it didn’t burn up” (3:1-2).

Moses goes over to the bush and tries to find out what is happening, and God speaks to him “out of the midst of the bush” (3:4), calling…

"Welcome, Paco!"

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Exodus

Introduction: We turn here from the origins of the earth’s peoples—nations, races and clans—to the origins of the Jewish people religiously and politically.  While we have no “outside”—extra-biblical—sources to weigh historical information against, the [historically/culturally] experiential impact of the exodus memory/story is impossible to set aside. 

The memory/story, which is recounted here, is not only reality-orienting for the Jewish people,…

March 15, 2013

I’ve been re-reading John Punshon’s Reasons for Hope: The Faith and Future of the Friends Church (Friends United Press, 2001).  I read it quickly in 2001 when it came out, but now see I didn’t give it the care and attention it deserved. What’s more, I can’t find any indication there was much substantial discussion of it among Friends. I think it was and is worth our careful…

Job 40 – Now God asks Job for some reply. And Job is brought low. “See, I am of small worth; what can I answer You? I clap my hand to my mouth” (40:4).

And God responds to him: “Gird your loins like a man; I will ask, and you will inform Me. Will you prove me in the wrong? Will you condemn me that you may be justified? Have you an arm like God, and can you thunder with a voice like his?” (40:7-9).

The powers of man are second only to those of…

Job 38 – Finally God speaks out of the tempest, the whirlwind:

“Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorant words? Brace yourself like a man, because I have some questions for you, and you must answer them” (38:2-3).

He is speaking to Job but really through Job to all of us: “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundations?” (38:4) In a way, God speaks the very same arguments Elihu spoke, but the difference is He is speaking directly and…

March 13, 2013     Important Update Below

I was struck recently – quite favorably – by something written by Colin Saxton, General Secretary of Friends United Meeting (FUM).  Unity was his topic:

“For all of our principled moral and doctrinal stands, however, I keep wondering, “Why is there almost never a principled stand for unity, at least among those who are followers of Christ?” In fact, in the…

Job 36 – Elihu speaks again. He speaks to “justify my Maker” (36:3) as a “man of sound opinions” (36:4).  He, like the other “friends” refuses to let Job imply that God is not a God of justice or a God who cares for the poor. These are opinions all who love God will defend. The “fates” that men endure are fates that flow from God’s justice, he says. “If they will serve obediently, they shall spend their days in happiness. . . but if they are not obedient, they shall perish by…

Job 34 – Elihu continues: The reason God gives us is meant to weigh arguments so that we can decide what is just and unjust. Job has declared that he is right and that God has deprived him of justice (34:5). But while he differs somewhat in how he thinks he’s come to truth, he essentially agrees that God does “repay people according to their deeds. He treats people as they deserve” (34:11).

“If God were to take back his spirit and withdraw his breath, all life…

Job 32 – The three “friends” of Job now give up on him “because he kept insisting on his innocence” (32:1).

Elihu, son of Barachel the Buzite, now speaks to Job in anger. He is younger that all the others, so he has tried to hold his tongue, but now he is annoyed that the three “friends” have been so unsuccessful in convincing Job that he must have sinned. He thinks it is “the spirit in men, the breath of Shaddai, that gives them…

Job 31 – Job’s lament continues. He wonders what it is that makes God choose what we shall receive from Him. “[W]hat has God above chosen for us? What is our inheritance from the Almighty on high? Isn’t it calamity for the wicked and misfortune for those who do evil?” (31:2-3) – just as his “friends” have said over and over. This idea is a great temptation. It makes sense when we weigh our ideas of God against the notion of what justice is. I think…