Annual retreat
Worship and Ministry organizes an annual retreat for friends of
truth who wander into Arch Street Meeting House for our weekly unprogrammed Meeting for Worship.
In years gone the retreat has include an overnight stay at
Burlington Meeting House, near the Delaware River in New Jersey. In
2019 we met not long after I learned that a good man from the
Philadelphia African communities had died, at the same time as the
father of my younger two children. Both long, lingering deaths, after
perfect lives, which to me means that 51% good. We all make mistakes
and do stupid things, but if the good is greater than the bad, I call
that a perfect life, and leaving the world behind a better place than
when we took our first breaths, and became alive.
Video from in the burial ground at Burlington Friends Meeting
House and Retreat Center: https://youtu.be/M_qjQvzOORM
This year we convened at 8:30am on a May Saturday in Arch Street
Meeting House, and discussed what we believed, why we believed it,
and how we arrived at the understanding that we are Quakers, and what
that means to us.
---
What are you?
I remember Bertrand Russell speaking on the tiny black and white
television my mother rented for school holidays so our brains would
not turn to mush. I remember watching Lord Russell speak, and I remember the
great Japanese television series called The Samurai. Not much else. I
loved The Samurai, because the good always won against Ninjas.
A little dive into Bertrand Russell: his paternal grandfather was
prime minister of Britain twice. Wow. I saw he was born in 1872, had
an older brother Frank, and they both were students at Winchester
College, which was created in 1364 as a feeder school for New
College, Oxford.
Wait a minute, my Dodgson great grandfather and most
of his brothers were students at Winchester, could they have known
each other? Yes indeed, my great great uncle Campbell Dodgson was at
Winchester with Lionel Johnson, a poet who wrote poems to Campbell, and who also went on to New College with Campbell.
Frank and Lionel became even greater friends, and both died young.
Campbell spend a summer with Oscar Wilde and Bosie, whom Lionel is
reported to have introduced.
I adore Campbell. I am not sure how he managed to avoid falling
into any of the holes that consumed so many; three of his brothers
killed themselves and a fourth died in a lunatic asylum. However,
this is a tangent.
Listen to Lord Russell:
Bertrand Russell https://youtu.be/xL_sMXfzzyA
Bertrand Russell explains why he was not a Christian
https://youtu.be/NdDYvvevLZk
What am I? During the May retreat Paul told us that he had
taken an online quiz at belief.net that showed that he was an
orthodox Quaker, and suggested a recent attender of our Sunday
gathering for Meeting for Worship could take the test and see what
happened. He told us after Meeting for Worship on June 20th, or maybe
June 13th, that he had taken the test again and was still an orthodox
Quaker.
Here is is
https://www.beliefnet.com/entertainment/quizzes/beliefomatic.aspx
I took the test, and was classified as a liberal Quaker. I like
some of the questions: like how important are social programs like
feeding the poor? Hugely, as so it was for Paul.
---
Feeding the homeless and hungry
Paul died on June 24th, 2022 after he was removed from
life support.
During his daily row on the Schuylkill River on Midsummer, also
known as the Summer Solstice, Paul had a cardiac event and lost
consciousness, and never regained it. The fittest and most
athletically active member of Arch Street Friends so alive one
minute, and then the river claimed him.
Paul was an enthusiastic supporter of the shelter program at Old
First. I showed up the first time in the winter of 2017, and was
immediately hooked. Kindness with fellowship, and feeding men who
were grateful – that was not required – and talking with them.
Wonderful management at Old First, which is two blocks from Arch
Street Meeting House. This past winter the schedule had some empty spots in it;
volunteers had not come back to full force after eighteen months of
keeping the men quarantined during the pandemic. Arch Street had
always volunteered a team once a month; this time we needed to do
more because their dinner schedule had a lot of gaps. The men were
always going to have food, so many kind Philadelphians dropped off
casseroles which could be frozen, but as the men told me, they much
preferred fresh food.
Paul came through with food every time; the first time he made the
most enormous salad in the biggest metal salad bowl I had ever seen.
He told me he used it for events at the rowing club, which I believe
meant the Schuylkill Navy. The best was over Christmas. I could not
bear the thought of the men not knowing that we loved them, and
showed up on Christmas Eve to make a huge dinner, including cooking a
massive butternut squash I grew in my back yard. Paul showed up the
day after Christmas with a huge complete meal, and I was told the men
were thrilled and enjoyed every bit of it. Paul was an enthusiastic
baker, he often made bread for the shelter.
A smattering of emails: Paul was direct, no nonsense, empathetic.
Which is how he achieved so much in his life.
December 3rd, 2021
Susanna: I have
to be at ASMHPT Christmas event at 4:30 so I need to drop off bread
before. Confirming you will be there to receive.
Thanks
Paul
-
December 21st, 2022
Devan:
Yes, I will drop off the dinner at 6:30PM ready to serve at the
shelter. Who is the shelter supervisor? Can you share a
mobile number?
Paul
-
January 5th,
2022
Susanna: Will you be at Old Reform at 5:30 PM
tomorrow cooking veg so that I might drop off the beef chili and
rice?
Nice stories as usual. You have much to write
about.
Paul
=
January 7th, 2022
Steve:
I made beef chili and rice (and sourdough bread) to serve 30 men
tonight. If Susanna makes veg as planned, I do not think you
need to struggle into town today. It may be all fine by 5:00 PM
but I think you can avoid traveling today if you want.
Paul
=
Paul was Clerk of Worship and Ministry at Arch Street Friends, had
varying positions in the Schuylkill Navy, and a substantial career in
law, a husband of Margaret, father of three and grandfather of
five. I know he had five grandchildren because I asked in in what was
my last conversation with him. I told him I was jealous.
Paul and Margaret in the media:
Need to dredge Schuylkill
River:
https://www.row2k.com/features/2604/Schuylkill-Dredging-Project-Moving-Forward/
Paul
and Margaret at home:
https://www.inquirer.com/philly/business/real_estate/residential/20160522_Queen_Village_home_honors_the_crosstown_Schuylkill.html
Paul
talking about the Schuylkill River:
https://www.inquirer.com/philly/health/environment/need-to-dredge-schuylkill-river-nears-crisis-for-rowers-and-maybe-future-regattas-20180413.html
Margaret talking about the Schuylkill Navy https://youtu.be/uVdxW4MUrhk
About the Schuylkill River:
The Schuylkill River:
https://youtu.be/lMEMxe6B4CY
Schuylkill waterworks: https://youtu.be/InbKrx2pyHU
Yellow
fever and the waterworks then: https://youtu.be/9ailejQWsq8
---
Sudden, or slow
One thing I know about death is that death is binary; we can die
slowly, or we can die instantly. From a disease that can last two
weeks or two decades; or an accident that leaves those of us behind
saying that someone so alive, actively making plans, with no mental
or physical deterioration, how can they be dead the next day?
I was scrolling through obituaries to see if I could add anything
to my tribute to Paul when I found that John Lloyd Sheffield died the
same week as Paul.
I was a frequent attender of Haddonfield Friends when my children
were growing up, and joined Newton Friends Meeting in 2000 when my
then partner decided he would too. He stayed at Haddonfield and continued
taking my two younger children to First Day School; a system that
worked until I had enough of him, and he had enough of Haddonfield,
and he moved to another meeting. Quaker musical chairs. Luckily we
have enough Quaker meetings throughout New Jersey, and Philadelphia,
to do that.
Why did I not stay at Haddonfield? I am a foreigner, I feel more
comfortable with foreigners and Philadelphians of diverse
ethnicities. Although my main reason for heading over the Delaware
River to Philadelphia each Sunday is that I love walking through old
Philadelphia, passing by Independence Hall, waving at the grave of
Benjamin and Deborah Franklin and at the four white marble blocks
erected in memory of Jonathan Netanyahu.
And Arch Street Meeting
House, it is wonderful, especially in the summer when Carolyn, two
Sandras and Tom volunteer to make the flower gardens gorgeous while
Gary and Stephan do a terrific job keeping Arch Street grounds
immaculate.
Why do I continue to be so lucky as to live in New Jersey
and hang out in Philadelphia, 44 years after my PhD thesis was judged
acceptable by Dr RE Forster II, and he invited me to work in his
physiology department at the University of Pennsylvania?
Haddonfield is well run, extremely well run, I have never heard
the whisper of a scandal in any handling of finances, and once in a
while I walk down the street to attend a meeting there, which is
usually a memorial service or funeral.
John Sheffield was a pillar of Haddonfield Friends Meeting. I
remember his delight at my son Allister, before Allister was 16 and
went to a Quaker summer camp and was shown a video made by PETA,
causing him to become instantly, and permanently, vegan. Before then,
Allister loved morning tea after Meeting for Worship and trying all
the different snacks. John said that a highlight for him was watching
Allister try them all, a small piece (Allister was never greedy), and
rating them. John worked with troubled kids, so he knew happy kids
when he saw them. John had been an avid skier and cyclist; when he
could not longer manage cycling he gave Allister his mountain
bicycle. A wonderful gift. John was a kind man.
We used to spend New Year’s Eve at Haddonfield Meeting House,
that started on New Millennium Eve, my daughter was 5 and I did not
want to risk her getting cold. So I made bread in the Meeting House
and we were in Meeting for Worship as the clock threw us into the new
unknown century. That tradition continued, and I remember John was an
organizer. I do not know which committees he was on, but I imagine a
few, he was a participant in life, not just an observer.
In the early days John came with his mother Ruth, who had been a
nurse and was a Quaker. I expect that John will now be buried next to
her, and that my walks through the Haddonfield Burial Ground will
include chatting with him as well as her.
I do not have any videos of John, but here is one he would have
enjoyed, on Sunday Paula Palmer spoke to Arch Street Friends about
Quaker involvement in Indian (ie Indigenous) boarding
schools:
https://youtu.be/QJKsAa41Szk
---
The divinity of rape
Last week a court dominated by rightwing Roman Catholic
religionists declared that the US Constitution has no place for women
having any say over their own reproductive organs. They claim every
joining of sperm cells and egg cells is a divine act, and thus every
product of conception needs to be allowed to continue as nature
permits, whether caused by incest rape, stranger rape, date rate,
coercive rape, contraceptive failure, and irrespective of whether the
female wrapped around the uterus has the mental, physical and
financial ability to withstand a pregnancy and giving birth.
I know that every fertile woman over 40 has had a miscarriage,
either spontaneous, caused by a violent partner, or helped surgically
or medically. Every woman. I had three, and in each case I was glad
that I did not give birth to a dead fetus or a child with a good chance of
deformity. My four children are all adults and tall as trees, I do
wish they would produce at least one grandchild.
I have read that dead bodies now have more rights than women,
organs cannot be extracted without permission from the person who
inhabited the body in life; and yet a woman with a fetus growing in
her Fallopian tube, or a dead fetus in her uterus, cannot be
surgically helped in states that claim that life begins at conception
and that removing anything from a woman’s womb is equivalent to crucifying Jesus all over again.
How did we get here? I am just so glad that I live in New Jersey
with the knowledge that any future pregnancies of my daughter (hey! I
want a grandchild!) or daughters-in-law (hey! I want fertile or
ready-to-adopt daughters-in-law and a grandchild) will be treated by
health professionals who understand that caring for their patients
properly should not be prevented by the absurd beliefs of rightwing
religionists.
Life begins at birth. That is the day registered as my
birthday. My life day.
---
Amnesty International 112
Quite a week for human rights activists in the United States of
America. Summed up by a women in Ukraine, wearing black and looking
at a tank captured from the Russian genocidal invading army, and
saying she was united in sisterhood with American women, who were not
being bombed and genocided, but had also lost human rights of safety
nets against gun deaths and deaths resulting from reproductive system
failures. https://www.amnestyusa.org/
Philadelphia’s Amnesty International 112 has a dedicated email
address: AmnestyInternationalPhiladelphia@peacescientists.org.
Don’t forget the “s” in peacescientists. I am working on having
this email deliver directly into the mailboxes of myself and Jessica
Kohn, who are the two happy co-coordinator of 112; we both have cats
and love goats. Well I have a cat, Jessica has cats, and we can
usually see one or more strolling across her during our monthly AI112
meetings. Watch the videos, you will see!
Hawa gives an update about Sudan: https://youtu.be/FI1b0GKVNYc
Amnesty International USA has published a report on indigenous
women which is interesting reading along with watching the video in
which Paula Palmer tells us about Quaker involvement in indigenous boarding schools:
https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/u-s-continuing-to-fail-indigenous-women-as-rates-of-sexual-violence-in-tribal-communities-remain-at-epidemic-proportions/
There is a lot going on in AI, please tell me if you are not on
Jessica’s AI112 mailing list, and would like to be. There is a call
tonight all are invited to join, email me back quickly if you want to
join it, and protests about loss of women’s rights, and demands to
make guns less available.
