Hi QuakerQuakers,

When the idea for QuakerQuaker started bubbling up back in the summer of 2005, it was seen as a place for Quakers from across the branches of Friends to come together with curious seekers and Quaker-adjacent spiritual folks to talk about what "primitive Christianity" might look like today. The phrase was lifted from William Penn—you might think of it as his elevator pitch, or summary of what the Quaker movement was trying to do. Blogging was in its golden age and a lot of the work was highlighting the great conversations of what we called "Convergent Friends."

Things have changed over time. A lot of the old crop of Quaker bloggers have rolled up their sleeves and are teaching Quakerism at schools, leading workshops, shepherding Quaker organizations... Much of that work has moved over the screen. But still, sixteen years later QuakerQuaker is still providing a forum for Friends to share stories and engage in discussions. I'm as surprised as anyone that this work continues!

Quick numbers:

Back in 2017, I ran the numbers on QuakerQuaker. I thought it'd be fun to update them now.

• 3,700: Members on QuakerQuaker.org.
• 3,474: Followers on Twitter
• 189: Months since the QuakerQuaker name was registered.

Please help out

Keeping QuakerQuaker running costs $400 a year. I've had some faithful donors over the years supporting this but interests and life conditions change and long-time supporters leave. It would be great to have some more support, either as a one-time gift or ongoing. You can start by going to http://bit.ly/quakergive. Other options are available on the donation page at http://www.quakerquaker.org/page/support.Thanks for whatever you can spare. I'm as surprised as anyone that this little DIY project continues to host some many interesting Quaker conversations almost sixteen years on!

Feel free to use the comments on the site to share other resources that other QuakerQuaker members might want to use to keep up with the conversation. For the last ten years I've been an editor of Friends Journal so I'll give that a shoutout, along with our fabulous QuakerSpeak video project (both are free to access and have weekly email lists you can sign up for). These days there's also a lot of good discussions and sharing of links over on the Quakers subreddit. 

In Friendship,
Martin Kelley