The community organizer's strategic plan

So there was this community organizer. He went to the town hall meeting, and they asked him to speak. He said it was time to start a new organization.

They asked him what was its mission statement. He said, "To preach good news to low-income people everywhere."

They asked him what his vision was. He said, "To liberate the oppressed. To release nonviolent offenders to community courts. To bring restorative justice for the felons, so they can seek forgiveness from the people they've hurt. To fill the food banks everywhere, so no one goes hungry. And to accompany the elderly, so no one has to die alone."

A group of them said, "We want in! Sign us up." So they formed the Board of Directors.

They went out holding community meetings and bringing their vision around to different neighborhoods. They were having great success, and crowds of people were coming. So they decided to have a board retreat.

"We need a strategic plan," they said.

"I've got one," he said, "and it goes like this:

1. Say good things to the poor and the poor in spirit,
   for theirs is the kin(g)dom of heaven.


2. Say good things to the sorrowful,
   for they shall find consolation.


3. Say good things to the gentle,
   for they shall possess the earth.


4. Say good things to those who hunger and thirst to see right prevail,
   for they shall be filled.


5. Say good things to the merciful,
   for they shall be shown mercy.


6. Say good things to the pure in heart whose inner light burns bright,
   for they shall see God.


7. Say good things to the peacemakers,
   for they shall be called children of God.


8. Say good things to the people who are persecuted by the system
   for doing the right thing,
   for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

And when he was finished, the retreat was over, and they put together a big meal and invited the neighborhood, because they knew the first principle of community organizing is to have good food. And everyone sat down together and broke bread. And it was good. The moment had arrived.
vocal ministry more or less as delivered at SF Meeting, 7/27/08

Trees of Righteousness

Today was the last day of College Park Quarterly Meeting's spring session at Ben Lomond Quaker Center, under the redwoods.

Robin M. has already blogged about the session from on site at Quaker Center. I'm back on the land line at home.

The official theme for the weekend was diversity and differences among Friends. I missed most of the special sessions on the topic, though. Instead, I spent a lot of time hanging out at the children's program, both to be present to my sons, especially Six Year Old, after a week of many evening or morning meetings for work; and to give moral support and a listening ear to the single member of the Children's Program Committee who actually attended the sessions.

There was a fair amount of discussion throughout the weekend. One exercise, which I missed, involved people placing adhesive dots on several ribbons that each illustrated a spectrum between poles of several axes of diversity: gender identity, sexual orientation, seasoned Friend or new, young/old, etc. Interestingly, class was one of the axes, but "white/person of color" was not.

For me, the spectrum from "Bible-centered/Christ-centered" to "nontheist," with the label "universalist" on the middle, was simply inadequate. There are nontheists who are strictly a-theistic, and there are some who acknowledge a mystery greater than ourselves which they cannot with integrity give a name to. There are Christian universalists. I clearly am a Quaker who reads the Bible, yet personally, being "in the middle" didn't seem to fit, because I identify somewhat with all these pieces. Perhaps fortunately, I missed doing the exercise in real time, so it was only intellectual for me at that point.

I had promised to participate in a Saturday interest group on "Scripture as a guide to Friends." For me, this was the real theme of the weekend. Fortunately, I didn't have to prepare anything, and the primary person who was asked to help with this interest group actually had done a great worksheet that I'll write about later.

I also attended half of Bible study both Saturday and Sunday, so that added to the scriptural focus for me.

Today, the plenary session ended with worship sharing on some queries about diversity. It was quite powerful. After a short break, we entered intergenerational meeting for worship with the children among us for about 35 minutes. Ministry rose up that had started working in me during the worship sharing. There was a piece I meant to include at the end, which I left out and which seems right to include at the end of this brief summary here:

According to the book of Luke, Jesus began his public ministry in Galilee with the scroll of Isaiah, at the start of what we label chapter 61: "The LORD has chosen and sent me to tell the oppressed the good news, to heal the brokenhearted, and to announce freedom for prisoners and captives. This is the year when the LORD God will show kindness to us."

The passage goes on to say, "The LORD has sent me to comfort those who mourn... He sent me to give them flowers in place of their sorrow, olive oil in place of tears, and joyous praise in place of broken hearts. They will be called "Trees of Justice," planted by the LORD to honor his name."

I believe Jesus was referring to this passage when, in Mark, he said, "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted... Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for what is right, for they will be filled."

We are called to different pieces of this work of justice, whether to end the death penalty, end the war in Iraq, teach young people, teach adults, or bring ethical principles into business.

What I didn't say, but which caused me to choke up when reading the phrase "Trees of Righteousness," is how much I have gained by getting to know the sturdy Quaker trees of my monthly, quarterly, and yearly meetings. Praise be to God that I have been given these blessings, these blessed Friends!

The prayer bells of heaven lay hidden in the silence

Today I helped facilitate a session on Quaker silence as one part of a board retreat for a local organization. It took a lot of planning with my fellow presenters, and a lot of logistical support (thank you, George and Katherine and Daniel, Peter, Greg, and Rosemary, Marisa and Kevin and Levi, and of course Robin, Nine Year Old and Six Year Old!).

It was really pretty extraordinary. One helpful tool in preparing my part was Brent Bill's book Holy Silence. Chapter three starts with this quote from William Penn, which I read to the group: "True silence is the rest of the mind; and is to the spirit, what sleep is to the body, nourishment and refreshment."

Another aspect was an experiment in group centering that you might like to try with a group unused to silence. I suggested we create a lot of noise and hub-bub in the room, then decrescendo into silence. It worked! It helped to have the external experience of going from the noise to the quiet.

We only had 15 minutes scheduled for the actual silence, and most of the group were not Quakers, so we called it "silent reflection/worship time."

Worship actually went almost 30 minutes. Not long into it, one person spoke, and that opened up the opportunity for several more people. Each one felt deeper than the previous one. Several of us had tears in our eyes, as the expressions of gratitude came. It ended just after a friend talked about how the board always had the next hurdle in front of it, yet he noticed that he was happier the more time he spent around this institution; he asked us to take time to notice what we had already built as a community, even as we were looking ahead at the next step.

What was in my mind as we closed worship was Brent Bill again, this time quoting Carrie Newcomer's "Holy as a Day is Spent" (link is to a PDF of the lyrics):

"Holy is the familiar room
And the quiet moments in the afternoon
And folding sheets like folding hands
To pray as only laundry can"

I wouldn't have been able to read it without sobbing at that point, though, so it's just as well worship ended. (Like AJ and Allison, I have recognized tears as a sign of the Spirit's presence.

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It's seeming like I have an ever-growing prayer list for both my own life and personal connections and the world at large. So I'll just offer up these lyrics as a parting prayer, instead. (I found two versions of this on YouTube and chose not to link to them. There's just not as much bluegrass gospel video as there is the blues videos like those that Johan Maurer links to!)

Prayer Bells of Heaven

While we are living in this world of care
Many the burdens that we have to bear
But there's a prayer bell at the Lord's right hand
Give it a ring and He will understand.

Chorus:
Prayer bells of Heaven, oh how sweetly they ring (they keep ringing)
Bearing the message unto Jesus the King (of glory)
When you are burdened with troubles and care (my brother)
Ring on and on for God will answer your prayer.

Three Hebrew children to the flames were thrown
Because the mortal king they would not own Jesus delivered and the king then saw
Prayer bells of Heaven beats a man made law.

Chorus

When Paul and Silas were both thrown in jail
They did not worry about who would go their bail
But on the prayer bell they began to ring
Off fell the stocks and they began to sing.

Ministry of the drill, followed by Firstday School ambitions

I taught Firstday School on Sunday. It was an ambitious lesson covering two parables from Luke, Jesus' entry into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, Quaker business process, and an activity to draw menu choices for the kingdom feast. It somehow worked, except I should have skipped the presentation to the full meeting. The lesson scheme is posted below.

And this was after giving vocal ministry while holding a cordless drill in its case... cubbie had asked to borrow it, and so I had it in my backpack. It felt right to use it as part of the metaphor about building community, sometimes literally by building houses, sometimes by taking meals to parents who are staying in the hospital with their 18-month-old son while he gets a long list of tests for an unknown ailment...

No wonder I'm tired even two days later.
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A Firstday School Lesson Given During Lent 2007

Introductions: say your name and your favorite season

Objectives:

· To learn about the holiday of Easter and the life of Jesus

· To practice how Quakers make decisions

· To do an activity that we decide on as a group

Strategies:

· Read two parables: the lost sheep (Lk 15:1-7) and the lost coin (Lk 15:8-10).

o Lesson: God loves all of us and wants us to find God

· Read about Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem (Lk 19:35-40) and cleansing of the temple (Lk 19:45)

o God’s kingdom is here and now if we can see it. Even the stones will shout aloud! (Some people say they find God in nature; could that be a part of what that means?)

o Jesus was also making the point that the people of Israel would not get their freedom back from the Romans by attacking the Romans with armies. They had to do it by inviting God into their lives, by acting out of love toward their enemies.

o That provoked the political and religious leaders, and they decided to have him punished, even killed.

· Jesus had a last meal with his friends, called the “Last Supper.” His friends were called his disciples. But Jesus was always eating with the people he met, even if the rules of the time said he shouldn’t. He met strangers and got to know them as friends.

· Often we talk about God’s kingdom as being like a feast, where everyone has a place at the table.

Now we’re going to learn a little about how Quakers make decisions and then make our own decision as a group.

· Quakers meet together in a “meeting for worship with a concern for business.” The idea is that we go into a meeting for worship, but we have specific things we need to do on an agenda, or list of things to do.

· Then together we all offer what we think if the best choice for a particular thing. Everyone has a chance to be heard. Then we decide as a group what we think would be best, what we think God wants us to do.

· Now we have a chance to decide something together as a group. Which would you rather do: make signs for a parade proclaiming God’s rule of love on earth, or draw food for a meal where we welcome everyone to the table?

Results: Make signs or drawings of food

Affirmation: Show results to adults

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The children chose to illustrate the kingdom-feast with drawings of food they wanted to bring to the feast. They understood the idea of a march or rally -- we live in San Francisco, after all -- but wanted to focus on the food.

We got into a great conversation about the readings. A real highlight was when one of the participants asked, "So Jesus was Jewish, right? How could he be Christian, if he was Jewish? Jewish people don't follow him, right?" She was genuinely puzzled; this was a recent insight for her. I didn't have a clear and succinct answer, let's just say, and it was also a gift to be present to her in her questioning.

By the end of the time, the children just weren't able to focus on how to present this to the full meeting downstairs. Thus the presentation fell completely flat; the children were completely silent. So I said, "Today we learned that the kingdom of God is like a feast that's available to everyone, right here on earth." And that was that.

Though realizing we weren't prepared, I didn't listen to that prompting and decide not to do it. Oh, well! Lord, have mercy on me; teach me the Way of mercy.

Yet the Spirit was apparently moving: After meeting, two Friends said the Bible Study group had been reading Luke 14 and 15 that very morning. They had spent much of the time talking about the kingdom of God; what is it, where is it, what is it like? And then the children had been covering the same territory. Lord, thank you for your many blessings; what an interesting life this is!

Notes from Quaker Heritage Day

Quaker Heritage Day was held at Berkeley Friends Church, 3/3/2007. Here are a few of the notes I wrote down that day.

Max Hansen, pastor:
Christianity today is seen as a shackle to the mind. Yet John Woolman, for example, one of the most liberated minds ever, had the power of the Lord over his mind. That was the source of the freedom. Brian Drayton is that way, too.

Brian Drayton: Introductory Remarks
The world needs what Friends long to do: Follow the spirit of Christ faithfully. We need to school each other into greater faithfulness in our witness.

The world doesn’t need our activism. It could use it, but others do that, too. The world needs our testimonies to our present teacher, Christ, dwelling among us, helping us to be transformed and show evidence of it.

It is not a matter of principle, it is a matter of specific daily practice. We need to readopt the term “Children of the Light” and renew our Society. Vocal ministry is a necessary gift to that end, not the only one.

Consider how a plant body is modular, parts can be broken off and pieces can self-replicate. However, an animal body is integrated and can’t just be broken apart that way. Similarly, we are parts of one body, the church.
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Here's a photo of 8 Year Old linked to Max Hansen's blog:

And here's one of Five Year Old with one of our hosts for dinner:

Red-Eyed Toe-Munching Monster

On delivering ministry while the drawstrings of one's sweatshirt are being pulled

During meeting for worship on Sunday, Five Year Old was having a hard time. He had been playing with my watch, and then he dropped it. Robin prevented him from picking it up, then handed it back to me. He was frustrated. He lightly hit Robin on the knee with his hand. "Stop!" she whispered. So he hit her on the knee with his head. "No!" she shook her head. Then he bumped her purse for a while, then he came over and hit me lightly on the knee. "Stop, you may not hit me!" I said. So he bumped his head on my knee.

I picked him up and sat him on my lap. He curled into me, wanting to be held closely, like a small baby or toddler. I comforted him for a bit.

And then I had a sense of how blessed we were, that maybe we were having a little bit of a hard time, and how much harder almost the entire world has it.

So I stood up, still holding him, and thanked God for the blessings in my family's life, and asked for strength and comfort for the children who suffer in the Kibera section of Nairobi (where our Friend Heidi is working with orphaned and abandoned young people), in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Middle East. (And all the other places in hindsight that I didn't name.) After all, Jesus said, "Suffer the little children to come unto me."

Finally, I asked for strength in our meeting community to carry on, to make a difference, and to be a role model for each other and the world.

Meanwhile, Five Year Old went from leaning his head against me as I started to speak, to looking into my eyes, and then he pulled my hood up on my head and started pulling the drawstrings tight!

All while I'm trying to speak clearly, despite my runny nose and teary eyes, the words that were flowing out of me.

Samuel Bownas never covered this situation!

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PS Blogger is making me switch to the new blogger. I can hold out no longer. In my experience, when others upgrade, my bloglines subscription seems to disappear. So if you don't see anything in your reader for a while, you might want to check back to the site to see if it's me or if it's Blogger, and resubscribe if needed.
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Update, 2/14: Corrected typo "hood on head" which I noticed because Martin picked it up on the QuakerQuaker feed.