What is wrong with this picture? I looked out at a field of blooming clover and was struck by what I did not see…bees. No honeybees, no bumblebees, no wild bees of any species. No buzzing…silence but for the songbirds in the nearby trees.

What is wrong with this picture? This from an NBC article: Honeybees don’t just make honey; they pollinate more than 90 of the tastiest…

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Beatitudes

I read in the Atlantic Monthly this week that someone thought that this was the worst prediction of all time. My first thought was; unless it is the end of history, how would you know if it’s true?

Of course, if you look around today you would…

Let us wage a moral and political war against war itself, so that we can cut military spending and use that money for human needs.

Did you see all the fresh flowers and flags in the graveyards yesterday? Dust to dust, as they say. I was in the garden planting and thought how appropriate that here in Vermont, many people wait until Memorial Day to plant their gardens, past the danger of frost (usually). Life rising from…

I woke this morning thinking about the fable of the ant and the grasshopper. I have two or three cords of wood sitting in my backyard waiting to be split for firewood. This is next winters warmth. It is also a lot of work that can't be put off because it needs to season. This is where the fable comes in; am I an ant or grasshopper? The story is one of Aesop's Fables,…

“Podrán cortar todas las flores,

pero no podrándetener la primavera.”

 ― PABLO NERUDA

“You can cut all the flowers,…

I was speaking with college students recently about the culture of militarism in the United States. To quote Joseph Gainza of Marshfield, who led the American Friends Service Committee in Vermont for over 15 years and who founded Vermont Action for Peace, “(one way) of looking at other people, social problems, and even the planet itself, which has become a…

Have you ever wondered why we don't call our Friends Meeting a Church? George Fox, one of the founders of The Society of Friends (Quakers), used to call the Churches in England steeple houses. His idea, radical at the time, was that the Church is the people.

There is a Zen Buddhist proverb that says; The Zen that is at the top of a mountain, is…

I saw this message on a plaque recently; Grace isn’t a little prayer you say before a meal. It’s a way to live. Do you give thanks or say Grace before “breaking bread”? Where does this custom come from? This painting Saying Grace from Norman Rockwell speaks to the way that a lot of people feel about this practice.

Isn’t it fascinating…

I have a tradition of baking Polish Easter bread (babka) for Easter Sunday that I share with family and neighbors. This custom is carried on throughout Ukraine, Poland and Belorussia to celebrate the rising of Christ. My grandparents came from Lithuania and Poland so this…

33 Again, ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths: 34 But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God’s throne: 35 Nor by…

Yuletide Greetings,

Do you have a Christmas tree in your home? If so, then you are celebrating an ancient ritual called Yule or Jul, dating back to prehistoric Germanic and Celtic pagans. You are honoring  the Spirit in the trees. Isn't it fascinating how Christianity absorbs and incorporates earlier pagan rituals into its celebration of Jesus' birth?…

Fifth day, 13th, Eleventh month, 2014.

Do you understand this? Some folks call this Quaker-speak. This is normally written Thursday, November 13th, 2014.

I recently became administrator of my Meeting's (this is what Quakers call their congregation) website. In reviewing the format of the website I was faced with choices.…

Got a minute?

http://youtu.be/K49NlP5SsMQ

Do you feel that you do not have enough time for the important things in life? That time is not on your side?  Time is our construct. Perhaps I should say that our perception of time is our construction. Time is actually fluid. There is a principal called time dilation that is derived from Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. …

Communion, rarely do you hear this word around Quakers. These words from the New England Yearly Meeting of Friends, Faith & Practice put it succinctly; "The absence from Friends' worship of the outward observance of the sacraments is due to emphasis on the reality of inward experience...With full…

THE LEVELED GUN, THE BATTLE-BRAND,

WE MAY NOT TAKE;

BUT CALMLY LOYAL, WE CAN STAND

AND SUFFER WITH OUR SUFFERING KIND

FOR CONSCIENCE’ SAKE…

The problem we face today needs very little time for its statement. Our lives in a modern city grow too complex and overcrowded. Even the necessary obligations which we feel we must meet grow overnight, like Jack's beanstalk, and before we know it we are bowed down with burdens, crushed under committees, strained , breathless, and hurried, panting through…