April Announcements

Gretchen Schafft is a Friend from the Bethesda Friends Meeting in Washington, DC., an anthropologist at American University, and a graduate of Ottawa Hills High School. On May 3, she will be speaking at Schuler's Books and Music on 28th Street about her new book, "Commemorating Hell, published by Illinois University Press. This book, written with Gerhard Zeidler, is about the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp in Germany and the way it was later remembered under a communist and then a unified German government. From this camp of 60,000 inmates, of whom 20,000 perished in a year and a half, the US received Wernher von Braun and Arthur Rudolph, two of our pioneering space engineers. Little has been said of this camp, and new information based on 20 years of interviews, observations, and archival research brings to light many aspects of war and peace that are as relavent today as they were then. She hopes some of her Quaker Friends will come to hear the talk at 7 PM on May 3 in the 28th street store and bring interested friends.

By the way, her family went to Camp Innisfree for seven years with Grand Rapids Quakers!
Email Address: * gschafft@verizon.net
Name: * Gretchen Schafft

April Query

Query:

• Do we center our lives in the awareness of the presence of God so that all things take their rightful place?
• Do we keep our lives uncluttered with things and activities and avoid comments beyond our strength and light?
• Is the life of the Meeting so ordered that it helps us simplify our personal lives?
• Do we order our individual lives so as to nourish our spiritual growth?

March Query

• Do we live the virtue of that life and power which takes away the occasion of all war?
• Do we refrain from taking part in war as inconsistent with the spirit of Christ?
• What are we doing to remove the causes of war and to bring about the conditions of peace?
• Where there are hatred, division and strife, how are we instruments of reconciliation and love?
• As we work for peace in the world, are we nourished by peace within ourselves?

March Announcements

• March 11: Book reading group will meet at 7:00 p.m. at Betty Ford's, to finish the pamphlet "Living from the Center."
• March 20: Program after worship. Deb Wicering will present about the Sinai Peninsula.
• The Social dinners will occur on the 1st two weekends of May: Friday/Saturday evenings, May 6-7 and 13-14. Please contact Mike Holaday if you are willing to be a host.
• We encourage those who are led to ministry to stand if they are able and to speak loudly enough for those present to hear.
  

MI Forum on Jobs & Human Needs

The Michigan Peace Budget Coalition and the Friends Committee on National Legislation invite you to attend the Michigan Forum on Jobs and Human Needs

SPEAK OUT FOR A JUST AND HUMANE U.S. BUDGET

How does the federal budget affect Michigan? How can people in Michigan speak up about shifting federal spending from the Pentagon to jobs, human needs, and diplomacy?

Saturday March 5, 2011, from 10am to 3pm

Central United Methodist Church
215 N. Capitol Ave. in Lansing. At the corner of Capitol and Ottawa.

Speakers include:

• Lynn Jondahl, Michigan League for Human Services
• Bob Sheehan, Clinton-Eaton-Ingham Community Mental Health
• Ruth Flower, Friends Committee on National Legislation
• Jo Comerford, National Priorities Project

And YOU!

We will videotape your messages to send to our congresspersons

To register, e-mail names to MichiganForum@yahoo.com
Event is free. Lunch will be provided.

Sponsors include: Shalom Center for Justice & Peace, Michigan League for Human Services, National Priorities Project, WAND - Women’s Action for New Directions, Edgewood United Church of Christ Justice & Peace Task Force, Red Cedar Friends Meeting, Call to Action of Michigan, MSU Students for Peace & Justice, Peace Education Center of Greater Lansing, Keep Making Peace, Greater Lansing Network Against War & Injustice, Michigan PeaceWorks, Interfaith Council for Peace & Justice, Michigan Peace Action, 4th Ward Progressives, 11th Hour for Peace, Michigan Universal Health Care Access Network, Michigan Peace Team, Intercultural Communications, Pax Christi Michigan, MSU Peace & Justice Studies, UP North Ministries, MSU Peace & Justice Studies, Straits Area Concerned Citizens for Peace & Justice, Lansing Latino Health Alliance, Unitarian Universalist Church of Greater Lansing Social Action Committee, Detroit Friends Meeting, Teamsters Union, First Congregational United Church of Christ, Grand Ledge, and others.

Find the Michigan Forum on Jobs and Human Needs on Facebook.

Event will be live-streamed at Lansing Online News.

FCNL has been working diligently to get Senator Stabenow to join with her colleagues on the Senate Budget Committee to hold hearings on the Pentagon budget (the last audit of that budget around 2002 found a trillion dollars unaccounted for. The Pentagon has failed to meet the legally required audits for years.) It would seem a no brainer to at least hold hearings! Unfortunately, Senator Stabenow isn't interested in attending our forum, but we are going to bring publicity to the issue and hold her (and others) accountable.

Ruth Flower, a senior lobbyist at FCNL will speak to the inequity of the Pentagon spending vs. human needs spending, Jo Comerford from the National Priorities Project will provide information on how the flow of money to the military saps Michigan, and we have speakers and panels from Michigan human service agencies and government to speak about their pressing needs.

Our event will be live-streamed, and we will have video-tapers to tape our personal comments to send to Senator Stabenow on how the economy is affecting us or the communities we work with.

We'd love to have Friends from Grand Rapids attend and give witness to their concerns. And if any of you would be able to stay over until Sunday, we'd find homes for you to stay in and attend our brand new Quaker meetinghouse on Sunday.

Either email me back or email the address on the flyer (MichiganForum@yahoo.com) to let us know if you are coming, if you know in advance. Margaret Nielsen, (another Quaker) is the one who will get the emailed registrations. Bring hand-outs for our information tables if you have networking info to pass along.

Thanks,
Becky Payne, rapayne7@comcast.net

February Query

Query:

How do we prepare our hearts and minds for Worship?

Do we meet in expectant waiting for the prompting of the Divine spirit?

Is there a living silence in which we are drawn together by the power of God in our minds?

Is this inspiration carried over into our daily living?

February Announcements

• February 11: Friends Book Group, 7:00 p.m. at Judi Buchman's.
• February 20: Program following Worship--Cathi Deyo will talk about her trip to Palestine.

• February 25: GR Friend Paul Emery will be performing at Essential Bean Coffee House in Caledonia this Friday evening from 7 to 9 pm. Here is a link to address and map: http://local.yahoo.com/info-16436153-essential-bean-llc-caledonia

• On Potluck Sundays, beginning in March, we will be having a monthly discussion group intending to center on issues of Quaker faith and practice, Quaker and Church history, theology, and contemporary social and cultural issues as they related to faith. This will be after Meeting for Worship, sometime during potluck. Scot Miller is coordinating.
• March 5: Gathering of GR Friends: You are invited to Scot and Jenn's house for potluck dinner and discussion. The gathering is intended to focus upon corporate reflection with attention to the spiritual condition of our meeting, our testimonies, and our hopes for the future of GR Friends Meeting. This invitation is extended by Scot and Jenn, and Mike and Bev.