Friends Journal

Quaker faith in continuing revelation holds that God’s truth can be revealed anew to us every dayif we’re paying attention. Our May issue showcases our 8th annual Student Voices Project, which invited Quaker-affiliated youth to reflect on what they learned though a year shaped by a deadly pandemic, significant economic consequences, exacerbated social inequalities, worsening climate change, and ongoing racial injustice. Their stories offer insightful perspective on where we’ve been and where we’re headed, glimpses into a world in which adversity is frequently countered by gratitude for family, friends, and faith community.

A new children's book from Enchanted Lion Books presents a remarkable speech from a remarkable man, as Gaku Kusaba's illustrations accompany the words of José Pepe Mujica, President of Uruguay from 2010 to 2015, at the Rio+20 Summit, a conference on sustainable development convened by the United Nations in 2012. The global challenges we face, Mujica told his fellow world leaders, come from the way we live, from the global system of endless buying and selling, which drives away the very happiness we seek. Shared human happiness," he concluded, "is the greatest treasure of all.

"...hesitant to knock, I tried to find my keys while my boyfriend backed out from our driveway. Headlights shone on our side window... reflecting my face superimposed upon yours through the glass as you let me in." from "Upon Reflection" by Amy Raskin See more

Alan Durant and Dale Blankenaar's Quill Soup (Charlesbridge Publishing) re-imagines a classic folk tale, as a hungry porcupine arrives in a village where the inhabitants claim they have no food to share. So he requests a pot of water and declares his intention to make quill soup. Intrigued by this seeming impossibilityand by the porcupine’s assertion that the king loves his quill soupthe other animals offer the porcupine everything he claims would make his quill soup just a little bit better until his soup is thick and rich, with enough for everyone to share and enjoy.

"On a windy August afternoon, the four of usall women, all Quakerswent walking. Lonely from COVID, we kicked up dust with our shoes and sang songs. Then we settled under a gnarled old elm tree, telling stories." Johanna Jackson shares the insights she received that afternoon from her parents' generation of Friends. "This is what we do," she realizes. "We stand in a sea of noise and model quiet leadership. We call each other into better listening. We work to build the kin-dom of God, but we don’t do it alone. We rely on one anothertenderly, vulnerably, and with our hearts overflowing."

Friends Journal is seeking a volunteer Book Review Editor, to coordinate reviews of recently published books by and about Quakers and other books that may be of interest to our readers. This is an unpaid position, with an expectation of 10-18 hours/month, for nine issues each year. The candidate will work remotely, and the start date is flexible, ideally sometime in July or August. Applications will be accepted until May 21, 2021; to learn more, please visit our website.

From our archives: "...a monthly meeting is set up to be a faith community, not a social action group," Eileen Flanagan wrote in 2016. "The Finance Committee takes care of the meeting’s finances. The Grounds Committee the grounds. Even Care and Counselwhich may vary in name and scope from meeting to meetinghas a limited mandate, focusing on the care of meeting members and attenders." "In contrast," she writes, "the poor Peace and Social Concerns Committee has a mission that is both enormous and vague." How can a monthly committee identify and prioritize the injustices and crises Spirit calls them to address, in ways that amplify the spiritual lives of the meeting's members?