Second Month, 2006

Queries for the Second Month: MINISTRY

• Is the vocal ministry in our Meetings exercised under the leading of the Spirit?
• Are you sensitive to one another's needs and to God's promptings, whether your response be in silence or through the spoken word?
• Do you foster the use and growth of the spiritual gifts of your members?

ADVICES

• Be ready to speak under the leading of the light.
• Pray that your ministry may rise from deep experience.
• Let it be audible and distinct, and free from unnecessary or superficial words.
• Consider that overly long or too-frequent messages may hinder the worship of others present.
• Do not assume that vocal ministry is never to be your part.
• Receive the ministry of others in a tender spirit.

CALENDAR NOTES

• Friendly Lunch at Books, Inc., at 11:30 am on the first Tuesday of the month. All are welcome. For further information, contact Betty Odum, Gene Beardsley, or Laura Winefordner.
• In response to a minute from the January business meeting, the Earthcare Witness Committee will begin a study of materials to use that will promote sustainability. All are welcome at the meeting. For more information, contact Arlene at ame49@alltel.net or genendick@gru.net.
• Quaker Study: cdEnjoy an evening of Quaker hospitality and fellowship, good food, and spiritual sustenance at Jeannie and Phil Buskirk's home. Walter Morris will lead the program and discussion with a presentation of the book, The Seekers, which includes references to Quakers. All are welcome. Call the Buskirk's for directions to their McIntosh home.
• Come to a Sushi Market Dinner at 6 pm on March 11. This dinner will feature sushi prepared by Chief Chef Dick Beardsley. It is expected that the dinner will be at the Meetinghouse; however if it is not ready it will be at Betty Odum's house.

  Quaker Market dinners are a fundraising effort for the new meetinghouse. Suggested donations are $10.00 per adult, $5.00 for children over 5 years old, and free for those under 5.

MEETING NEWS

The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don't flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing,
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on the brow
of the flower,
and retell it in words and in touch,
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing.

Galway Kinnell, from St. Francis And The Sow

• On Feb. 28 at 8 p.m. at the Phillips Center, UF, historian-activist Howard Zinn (author of A People's History of the United States) will be talking. (Ask Gene Beardsley for more details)
• Sarajane Muller, Marylynn Hall's sister, requested that this announcement be in the newsletter on behalf of Marylynn and Phil Hall: "We are all excited and happy as can be . . . Marylynn and Philip Hall will soon be three!" Announcing a baby shower (men invited too) on Sunday, February 19, 2006, 3 to 6 p.m. Hosted by Sarajane Muller. Light refreshments will be served. Please RSVP to 352-870-7647.
• Home Sweet Meetinghouse. Our new meetinghouse is growing toward completion. To ensure that we are fiscally responsible stewards of the meetinghouse, we need funds. Please send pledge amounts and contributions to the treasurer. If you have not made a pledge and feel led to do so, please let Laura know. Thank you!

Friends Committee Notes

• The Gainesville Friends Meeting Library Committee met on Sunday January 29th. The committee decided that, upon approval by the furnishing committee, they will purchase two bookcases. A carpet for the library is being donated to the meeting. The Library Committee will invite Amy Von der Porten to the next meeting for advice since she has a lot of experience as a church librarian. The committee did not make any decisions yet about pamphlets, display at entry, children's books, magazines, or categories for sorting. We will ask Connie Ray to check the Meeting minutes for the library policy approved several years ago. The Library Committee is looking for a simple catalog software program to list the books so that they can be retrievable by searching author, subject, or title. The committee will research the best and cheapest way to get a connection to the Internet; Bill Mitchell will be asked to link the catalog to the Meeting website. Please note that on moving day, the Library Committee will need several strong young people capable of lifting boxes: 23 of them!
  Betty Odum
• Gainesville Friends Meeting approved the following Minute at the January 8, 2006, Meeting for Business: "The Gainesville Monthly Meeting gives approval and support to global warning reduction and its related concepts in incorporating sustainable practices in the planning for the care of the meetinghouse: inside, outside, and the grounds."
  Gene Beadsley

Influences on Congressional Decision-Making

Many months ago, in the old meetinghouse, we had a discussion about what's the best way to influence members of Congress: via email or through letters sent in the U.S. mail. In its most recent newsletter the Friends Committee on National Legislation provides a numerical answer to this question. As it turns out, email and the U.S. mail run about neck and neck. According to a study done by the Congressional Management Foundation, 44% of the 350 congressional staff surveyed said individualized postal letters have a lot of influence while 34% said individualized email messages do the same. However, 60% said individualized email messages have some influence while only 52% said the same of letters. The biggest influence on congressional decision-making comes not surprisingly, I suppose from in-person visits from constituents, and next from contacts from people representing many constituents. (I wonder if the latter equates with money.) To complete the picture, 20% of the respondents said phone calls have a lot of influence while 68% said phone calls have some influence. So whether you use email or the U.S. postal service, (1) choose one issue you care about, (2) write a personalized short message (staff say they pay more attention to messages that don't look like they're copied verbatim from a form letter), and (3) make a request for specific congressional action.

You can make a difference.
Don Smith, FCNL Rep

The Laws of the Universe

Many of us in the meeting were moved by Connie Ray's worship on the laws of the universe. Michael Daube found the article that Connie referred to during her worship, and sent it to the newsletter for us all to ponder.

From the comic strip You Can U in Sunday Newspapers: 9/29/96

Dear Jax:
What are the laws of the universe? --- from Lee Kear --- Woodbury, TN

Dear Lee,

That's kind of a mind-expanding question. The best questions are the ones that make you think a bit. And Beakman and I thought a lot about this one. Genius Nobel-prize-winning physicists like Leon Lederman are out looking for the one law of the universe. But when we answer questions we keep seeing the same powerful laws pop up over and over. Today's comic might seem all cosmic, but the Universe is a pretty cosmic (and comic) place to be. --- Jax Place.

#1 The universe likes balance

The universe working toward balance is why airplanes fly, why balloons lose their air, how fish can get oxygen from water, how batteries work, why the wind blows and lots more. If an atom wasn't balanced it couldn't exist.  The forces of nature will push tirelessly and forever to make things balance. Yow!

#2 Nothing ever disappears

There is only so much stuff in the universe.  None of it disappears even when things seem to disappear, they've really only changed their form. Like fire.  Where did the wood go?  It mixed with oxygen and transformed into other gases particles in the smoke, and even into light and heat.  An important part of the law is that energy is just another way for matter to be, and vice versa.  Radical!

#3 There is no darkness only light

You cannot make something that is not a thing. Negative things like darkness or cold are not really things at all. They're the absence of things. There is only more or less light. There is only more or less heat. To make dark you must block the light. To make cold you must remove the heat. Energy will move into cold or dark spaces, until all of the spaces shares equal light, equal heat. See the Law #1.

#4 There are different truths.

Energy can be a wave, like a radio wave or a light wave. A whole set of laws of Nature flow from energy being a wave. But energy can also seem to be a quantum - a little chunk or particle of energy. Photons are particles, chunks of light. And whole new laws flow from the view that energy is in chunks. We call this view quantum mechanics. Both views are way different. Both are completely true. They are different truths.

Precious Cargo

During a recent Meeting for Worship a prophetic and distressing analogy was shared. The speaker likened our current state of the earth to the sinking of the Titanic where all of humanity is on board and the ship is taking on water before our very eyes. This dire message concluded with the question: "What would Quaker passengers do in this circumstance?"

Later in the sharing period following worship, another speaker rose to exclaim, "Our Meeting carries precious cargo and our first priority is do everything in our power to save it." At this point, as if on cue, First Day students, from tiny tots to teens, trooped exuberantly into the worship room as if to dramatize the speaker's words.

There is no doubt in my mind that the growing environmental crisis is the greatest challenge that most of us are likely to face in our lifetime and certainly the greatest threat to future generations.

It was all brought home to me poignantly the other day as I sat rocking on the front porch, holding my seven-month-old grandson. We looked out at a sunny wood alive with busy Carolina wrens calling to one another and the rustle of leaves as gray squirrels scampered from tree to tree. It was a special time of contentment and bonding for us, but it was also clouded by my thoughts of what the future might bring to this new life in my arms.

The words "what would Quakers do...." and "our Meeting carries precious cargo...." still ring in my ears and have rekindled my commitment to be fully engaged in understanding and facing up to the crisis before us, as well as taking concrete steps towards eliminating the root causes. The Earthcare Witness Committee was originated for this purpose and invites all members and attenders to join us in this important endeavor.

Richard T. Beardsley 1/21/06

Sitting Surveillance Targets

Are you brave enough to stomach one more "Quaker/surveillance" quip? This one is from "Anonymous," the author of Imperial Hubris, and Through Our Enemies' Eyes. "Quakers make excellent surveillance targets, because they sit still longer than anyone else." Becky Ray called me last night with that one. She attended a forum featuring several experts on espionage who discussed the latest flap about presidential power, etc. She was the first one to ask a question, which was, essentially, if the president has all this power, what is to stop government agents from conducting surveillance on groups such as Quakers? Nobody gave her a straight answer, but they all made comments. She liked the sitting still longer comment best. She was subsequently interviewed by three journalism students and a Russian television crew!
Connie Ray