Baltimore Yearly Meeting Sessions: Speakers 2006

Tuesday Evening Speaker: Rachel Stacy

Rachel is a former clerk of Baltimore Yearly Meeting Young Friends and is a student at Earlham College and Earlham School of Religion. In school, Rachel studies Chemistry and Religion, while outside school she attends Quaker gatherings across the country and throughout the world. Since 2000, Rachel has worked among the diversity of Friends, attending Youth Quake (2000, 2003), and serving as one of the organizers of the World Gathering of Young Friends (Lancaster, UK, and Mombassa, Kenya, 2005). Rachel serves as one of Baltimore Yearly Meeting’s three representatives to the Friends United Meeting General Board, as well as on Friends General Conferences’ Youth Ministries Committee. She was one of five Young Friends to edit Whispers of Faith: Young Friends Share their Experiences of Quakerism (QUIP: Quakers Uniting in Publications, 2005). Rachel believes deeply that the Religious Society of Friends is on the cusp of great divine transformation. While we see conflict and disagreement among Friends, “There is a way forward, but it will take work,” she says. Rachel is a member of Gunpowder Meeting, which has appointed a support committee for her.

“I pray that each of you opens your heart to the possibility of both transformation and conversion, perhaps not to Christ, or even God, but into love for one another that transcends our language and our interpretation of the Divine.”

Rachel Stacy

Carey Memorial Lecture: Marshall Massey

In 1985, speaking to Pacific Yearly Meeting, Marshall Massey proposed the creation of a nationwide Friends committee on environmental matters. After two years of labor, the committee was formally organized at a Friends General Conference summer gathering. Now called Quaker Earthcare Witness, it has a permanent staff and more than 1,000 supporters and volunteers, and facilitates activities ranging from environmental lobbying to earth-friendly agriculture.

Marshall also helped establish the first grassroots interdenominational environmental organization in North America, and has campaigned for a Nature Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

In preparing for his presentation to BYM Marshall has expressed the concern that Friends of varying persuasions are not working together on environmental concerns. “We have no organization that unites the branches of our Religious Society – FGC, FUM, EFI, Conservative and Holiness – in a common environmental testimony.”

Marshall is now a member of Omaha Monthly Meeting, Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative). He serves on his monthly meeting's Committee for Ministry and Oversight, and attends annual sessions both of Iowa (Conservative) and of Great Plains Yearly Meeting (FUM). He is at work on a book about the vision and practice of Friends, and how the underlying principles of Quakerism might bear on today's environmental crisis.

Friday Evening Speakers: The Transformative Power of Crisis: The Legacy of Tom Fox

The Friday night plenary session, “The Transformative Power of Crisis,” will be organized by Langley Hill Monthly Meeting, the home meeting of Tom Fox. Tom’s kidnapping, death and, most importantly, his example have deeply touched his Meeting community, the Yearly Meeting, and millions of others around the world. Suddenly the work of peacemaking and its risks have become clearer. Suddenly the plight faced by thousands of Iraqis daily has been brought home to us in a very personal way. We have been deeply affected, but we have found renewed energy for the work to be done.

Representatives from Langley Hill and members of the support team Tom Fox organized when he first joined Christian Peacemaker Teams will talk about Tom’s work in Iraq and how the events of November 2005 to March 2006 changed both them as individuals and their communities. They will also lead a discussion of what the Yearly Meeting can do to continue the work of “waging peace” to which Tom was dedicated.