Baltimore Yearly Meeting Workshops 2010

Please indicate your choices in the workshop section of the registration form. Our workshop leaders have worked diligently to prepare a meaningful experience for the participants. They count on our attendance. If you find that you cannot attend the workshop you registered for, please tell the workshop leader directly or through a Program Committee member (with the red dots on their nametags.) Please note that some workshops run more than one day or are offered twice.

Workshops are open to everyone including Young Friends unless otherwise noted.

T1 Quaker Advocacy in Palestine

- Friends have been active in Palestine since 1869. We’ll explore Quaker programs currently in Palestine: Ramallah Friends Schools; Friends International Center of Ramallah (FICR); Amari Play Center; AFSC Youth Leadership Programs in Gaza and the West Bank; and the newly re-opened AFSC Middle East Office in Jerusalem. We’ll discuss the Quaker history, current political struggle and volunteer opportunities in Palestine.

Workshop leaders: Betsy Brinson and Gordon Davies are Friends who volunteered this past year at Ramallah Friends School and Friends International Center. They are writing a history of the Ramallah Friends Schools.

T2 Learning from the Prophets

- We often overlook the prophets of the Old and New Testaments, but they speak to our times. There are numerous lessons, including concise and deep descriptions of what God requires of us individually and as communities and nations, buried deep in the Hebrew prophets. Was Jesus a prophet? Does the prophetic voice occur among us now? And if so, how can we nurture it? How can we tell true prophets from false ones? Is continuing revelation the same as prophecy?

Workshop leader: Steve Elkinton serves as Clerk of Ministry and Worship Committee for Langley Hill Meeting.

T3 Learning from our Quaker history: Traveling in the Spirit

- Friends United Meeting and Baltimore Yearly Meeting are part of each other’s history. So is the Quaker pendulum that has long swung from schism to re-unification and back again. Meet guests from other FUM Yearly Meetings and BYM travelers who have visited among Friends across the U.S. and Canada. Let’s learn from our common history and our individual struggles. Share your insights. The format will be a panel discussion.

Workshop leader: Georgia Fuller, a member of Langley Hill Meeting, has served on the Intervisitation Committee since its inception.

T4 Money, Values and Spirit

- Theologian John Wesley admonished the faithful to “earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can.” Jim Wallis of Sojourners reminds us now that “a budget is a moral document.” How are today’s Friends to navigate demands and desires to move toward sufficiency, sanity and Spirit in financial matters? We’ll have an open and supportive dialogue about Quakers, money, gratitude, generosity, and making financial choices in line with our deepest values by means of worship sharing, small groups, and a brief exercise to aid personal discernment.

Workshop leader: Robinne Gray is BYM’s Development Director. She worships at Friends Meeting of Washington.

T5 Qigong: Movement for Today Drawn from Wisdom of the Past

- Simple Qigong movements have been demonstrated to improve many health conditions, enhance the body’s ability to deal with stress, and create more awareness of the harmony and connectedness among all life. I’ll lead the group in two or three Qigong forms, demonstrating the physical moves, offering ideas about underlying energetic patterns and how they can help us open to our leadings and move through stuck places. I’ll invite input from participants as we do the movements together.

Workshop leader: Leada Dietz is an Acupuncturist and Chinese Medicine practitioner since 1993 and Qigong practitioner since 1987.

T6 Listening to the “Enemy”: Searching for that of God in Others

- The “enemy” might be your neighbor whose dog barks all night, a coworker with extreme political views, or a group whose political, religious or other views offend your own. Yet we know there is that of God in every person. Through discussion questions, participants will explore personal and cultural obstacles to finding that of God in those whose views are counter to our own.

Workshop leaders: Sheila Kryston and Debbi Sudduth are social workers with extensive experience running workshops using the AVP and HIPP models. Both are members of Goose Creek Meeting, where Sheila is Clerk and Debbi Asst. Clerk.

T7 Talking about Race, Age and Class

- What happens when we first meet someone? In seconds, often without much conscious thought, we ask ourselves: “Will we like them? Will they like us? Have we anything in common? Do they have anything to teach us? Are they ‘a part of’ or ‘apart from’ our group? How would we know?” Most of us make assumptions, but we are rarely aware of how we make them, and they don’t always serve us well. Through worship, sharing and play we’ll challenge our assumptions and explore how we use them.

Workshop leader: Jean- Marie Prestwidge Barch has long been active in Quaker meetings and orgnaizations. She carries a strong concern for helping Friends examine how enhancing our diversity can also strengthen and deepen our connection with the Spirit.

T8 Slaves among Friends: What we’ve learned and why it matters

– Recent scholarship shows that many 18th-century Friends held enslaved Africans in bondage, and invested in or captained slaving voyages. What does this knowledge mean for Friends today? Bring your questions, your information, your reflections, your wisdom, and your courage.

Workshop leader: Elizabeth Cazden, who will be giving this year’s Carey lecture, has spent the past five years researching slave-holding and slave-trading among Friends in Rhode Island and Massachusetts.

T9 God, Us and the Chesapeake

- In our region the health of the Chesapeake Bay and the streams and rivers that feed it is the best indicator of the fertility and habitability of the earth. We will start with a consideration of God’s covenantal relationship with humankind and with all creation, then share ideas and opportunities for practical action by individuals and communities of faith.

Workshop leader: Bill Breakey is the Executive Director of the Chesapeake Covenant Community, an interfaith organization that helps communities of faith to understand the importance of earth care as a part of their religious calling.

T10 Responding to Opportunities for Service

– Bring along your desire to serve. We will cultivate “The Ministry of Availability” and “The Ministry of Detail.”

Workshop Leader: Robert Fetter recently transferred his membership to Gunpowder Monthly Meeting from Roanoke. He has been a resident at Broadmead for almost three years.

T11 The Listening Project: Building Relationships and Change through Listening

- “Listening Projects” facilitate communication, understanding, and the empowerment of people and communities. They have helped organizations make significant progress in their efforts for justice, peace and community development. In this two-session workshop, we will learn the how to implement a Listening Project and develop skills in deep listening. We’ll hear several BYM participants discuss the peace and justice work of their Meetings. At the second workshop session, we’ll process what we’ve learned and discuss the use of Listening Projects in our Meetings.

Workshop leader: Gary Gillespie is the Director of the American Friends Service Committee-Middle Atlantic Region’s Baltimore Urban Peace Program. He has facilitated numerous Listening Projects.

T12 Whistleblowing: Speaking Truth to Power on the Job

- What happens to whistleblowers when they raise an issue of conscience on the job? We’’ll review the current patchwork of laws that sometimes protects whistleblowers, emphasizing the problems of protecting federal employee whistleblowers. The workshop will also discuss current proposals for improving whistleblower protections and the types of actions Meetings can take to support whistleblowers who experience retaliation.

Workshop leader: Richard Renner is Legal Director of the National Whistleblowers Center and a member of Friends Meeting of Washington.

T13 Kenyan Friends and BYM Friends: Call and Response

- The calland- response modality is fundamental to our humanity. It is an overt element of Kenyan Quaker community life. A speaker makes a point and someone shouts, “Amen to that!” A Friend recalls that God walks in the Garden of Eden in the cool of the day and calls out to the first humans, awaiting response (Gen. 3:8-9). Call-and-response is an identifiable strand in the North American faith heritage as well, such as George Fox’s admonition that we walk “answering that of God in everyone.” We’ll explore call-and-response as a resource for Friendship between BYM and Kenyan Friends.

Workshop leader: Ann Riggs of Annapolis Monthly Meeting is Principal of Friends Theological College, Kaimosi, Kenya.

T14 Meeting Finances Made Manageable

– Your Monthly Meeting depends on good financial order, and you can do it! This is a session on basic bookkeeping, including fund accounting, intended for Meeting Treasurers, any Stewardship and Finance members, and anyone interested accouning for Meeting finances. Bring your questions and share. We’ll find answers.

Workshop leader: Letty Collins of Roanoke Friends Meeting is a CPA with extensive experience with religious institutions. She is Clerk of BYM’s Stewardship and Finance Committee.

T15 Living our Faith

– Let’s take time to think about our Quaker testimonies, using Britain Yearly Meeting’s “Testimonies Toolkit.” This is a recently developed activities resource to help Friends explore what we mean when we talk about (particular) testimonies. It is designed both for experienced Friends and those new to Quakers. It contains short articles, questions to think about, exercises to do in small or large groups, and references to websites, books and relevant organizations.

Workshop leader: Jocelyn Bell Burnell is a Friend from Britain Yearly Meeting who is active in Friends World Committee for Consultation. By profession she is an astronomer.

F1 Where have all our children gone? How do we nurture the leadings of Young Friends?

At age 26, Martin Luther King led the Montgomery boycott, Gandhi formed the Natal Indian Congress, and John Woolman began his ministry. Today it can seem like Quakers under 40 aren’t welcome to be full participants in the life of the Meeting. How can their gifts be recognized, nurtured and encouraged? To engage younger Friends, older Friends must change, and this is what we will explore.

Workshop leader: Byron Sandford is Executive Director of William Penn House and clerk of BYM Trustees. He’s had long involvement with Friends General Conference.

F2 Winds of Change

- “The wind of change is blowing all over the world today. It is sweeping away an old order and bringing into being a new order,” declared Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963. The workshop leader will share her “wind” story from the civil rights era, and participants will then be invited to worship-share that transcendent moment of how they first experienced the wind of change. We’ll share about how we discern a calling and how our faith community supports our discernment. (Come prepared to share contact information.)

Workshop leader: Patricia Wild of Friends Meeting at Cambridge (MA) is the author of Way Opens: A Spiritual Journey, chronicling her leading to find the two African-Americans who desegregated her high school (E.C. Glass High School, Lynchburg, VA) in 1962.

F3 The Mystical Presence of God in our Midst

- Doyle Penrose’s “The Presence in the Midst” has long been an icon for Quakers in the programmed tradition. We’ll focus on one Friend’s journey with attention given to both the Catholic and Protestant expressions, and also reflect on the place of The Religious Society of Friends among the larger World Religions. We’ll distill information useful to seekers new to our Meetings and will conclude with a time of adoration.

Workshop leader: Kevin Mortimer is a member of Middle River Meeting. He has had his place in ministry and education within programmed Friends, but more recently has also found sacred space as a Lay Monastic at a Trappist monastery in Iowa.

F4 Paying for War and The Peace Tax Fund

- For more than 25 years, The Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund has been responsible for the introduction of legislation that would allow those who conscientiously object to war to refuse to pay taxes for war.

Workshop leaders: Bethany Criss is Executive Director of the Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund. Harold Saunders is from Annapolis Friends Meeting.

F5 Both Eyes Open to Mental Illness: Accountability and Recognition

- Friends have a history of progressive attitudes toward people with mental illness. Some situations are managed by the individual and the Meeting seemingly effortlessly, while others involve pain and disturbance. We’ll review the basic characteristics of a variety of mental illnesses and offer suggestions to facilitate healthy relationships in the Meeting. We’ll dialogue on how best to consider both the needs of the Meeting and the needs of those currently involved in the criminal justice system. Topics will include: distinguishing pastoral care vs. mental health needs/solutions, the importance of referrals, interventions, and the limits of pastoral care.

Workshop leader: April Vanlonden is a licensed therapist and serves as the Mental Health consultant for Indiana Bar Association’s Committee on Civil Rights of Children. She’s an ESR graduate, a Recorded Quaker Minister, and the Director of Academic Services for Earlham School of Religion.

F6 Creating Safe Space Across the Gender Spectrum

– Let’s work to develop a concrete plan for making BYM Annual Session and Interim Meetings more welcoming and comfortable for folks across the gender spectrum, including housing and bathroom assignment. We’ll discuss what changes we’d like see. The workshop may also include a brief “Transgender 101” presentation.

Workshop leader: Laura Goren (Baltimore- Homewood) has been involved in developing policies to make FGC Gathering and FLGBTQC Midwinter Gathering more inclusive across the gender spectrum.

F7 Learning from our Quaker Friends in Kenya

– More than a century ago Quakerism was introduced to Kenyans in East Africa. BYM Friends who recently attended the United Society of Friends Women International Triennial in Kenya will share about Friends there. Where do we unite as Friends? How is the Spirit working among Kenyans and BYM? How has the Peace Testimony helped Kenyan Quakers amidst recent election violence? How might we join with Kenyan Friends in furthering the Kingdom of God on earth?

Workshop leader: Joan Liversidge of Sandy Spring Meeting serves on the BYM Intervisitation Committee and has worshipped and fellowshipped with Kenyan Friends since 2002.

F8 Monthly Meetings Raising Money

- Monthly Meetings must meet daily operating needs, provide for buildings and properties, contribute apportionment, and plan for future. Some Meetings within BYM struggle to do it all. We will help Meetings become more comfortable with fundraising: planning, asking, thanking, and stewarding, and include some “best practices” from area Meetings through informal lecture and discussion.

Workshop leader: Robinne Gray is BYM’s Development Director. She worships at Friends Meeting of Washington.

F9 Children Can Discriminate – This Can Be a Good Thing

- When we act as if race doesn’t exist, we actually teach children (who observe it clearly) not to talk about it. Let’s turn this from an unintended taboo into a fruitful way to know other people. We’ll refer to the book Nurture Shock, by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman and other materials. We’ll discuss ways to have open and comfortable conversations on the topic of differences.

Workshop leader: Elizabeth DuVerlie is Clerk of the BYM Working Group on Racism (WGR). Gail Thomas is a member of the WGR and former head of Detroit Friends School, which had a largely African-American student body.

F10 Discernment: What does God want us to do? How can we know for sure?

- “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God;” John 4:1. Quakers have practiced discernment by listening for the Spirit to provide guidance in the gathered community and following its lead. Discussing our experiences, we will answer questions: Do we trust the Divine to be our guide? What decisions require the Meeting to reach out for divine guidance? How can Meeting get beyond personal interests, personality clashes, and power struggles? How can individuals and Meetings prepare for fruitful corporate discernment? How will Meeting structure opportunities in which to seek Divine Guidance?

Workshop leader: Lamar Matthew of York MM has been led to many places of service in this, his beloved Religious Society of Friends, finding peace, love and the desire to give back what he has been given.

F11 The Listening Project: Building Relationships and Change through Listening.

This is a continuation of Thursday’s T11 workshop.

Workshop leader: Gary Gillespie

F12 A Friendly Introduction to Facebook

– Now you really can communicate with a world wide web of Friends for the purpose of information and inspiration. The use of internet social network sites such as Facebook between Friends, Meetings, and community can be a simple but effective way of communication. Lessons from the past and leadings for today can forge and strengthen fellowships with this medium.

Workshop leader: Scott Brenner is from York Meeting.

F13 Visioning for Baltimore Yearly Meeting

- Some of BYM visiting ministers for visioning have been traveling to Monthly Meetings to listen to people’s thoughts/prayers/hopes for future. Participants will focus on BYM’s future with people from different Meetings. We will review different processes that Meetings can use to hold visioning sessions for themselves and for BYM.

Workshop leader: Linda Wilk is a member of the ad hoc visioning committee appointed by Interim Meeting to propose a process for Meetings to envision BYM’s future.

F14 Kenyan Friends and BYM Friends: Encountering the Incomparable

Some human experiences cannot be easily described from a distance. As principal at Friends Theological College I have come to see some differences between the faith life and day-to-day human experiences of Kenyan and BYM Friends that are at first hard to interpret. Yet we have ample basis for profound connection with one another. Let’s discuss strategies for building strong bonds of understanding among Friends while encountering the otherness of others.

Workshop leader: Ann Riggs of Annapolis Monthly Meeting is Principal of Friends Theological College, Kaimosi, Kenya.

F15 “In love’s service only the wounded may serve” - Thornton Wilder.

This is a meditative opportunity to consider the ministry of the wounded, and of being wounded healers. In becoming conscious that one has been wounded and responding to this truth, one may discover abilities that may bring healing to one’s self and others.

Workshop leader: Jocelyn Bell Burnell is a Friend from Britain Yearly Meeting who is active in Friends World Committee for Consultation. By profession she is an astronomer.

S1 Redesigning the BYM web site

- Help redesign of the Yearly Meeting web site! What works for you? What doesn’t? The current site is in need of serious updating. Ideas include dropdown menus, protected pages for committees, and calendar improvements. What you would like to see in the future?

Workshop leader: Jim Rose, the web manager for BYM for the last six years, is still learning new ways of doing things on the web.

S2 Strengthening Service Organizations

- The findings of the Faith and Organizations Project (see http://www.faithandorganizations.umd.edu), show how Quakerism is or isn’t reflected in the service organizations to which Meetings appoint members. Strategies for strengthening these organizations will be explored. Ideas arise from research on other religions and from in-depth exploration of local Quaker organizations. Your ideas and strategies are welcome.

Workshop leaders: Community psychologist Meg Boyd Meyer served as the Quaker researcher in the Faith and Organizations Project. Anthropologist Jo Anne Schneider is director.

S3 Religion and Psychology

- Why should Quakers care about psychology? Looking mostly at the spirituality and mysticism of Jungian psychology, we’ll seek an answer. Jung wrote of his fondness for Quakers in letters. We’ll look at how the mysticism of Friends like George Fox and Rufus Jones relates to Jung, who offered us a depth of insight psychology that awakens the unconscious and makes the individual more whole. Jungian concepts include the “Shadow,” way to look at evil, and the collective unconscious, which can be compared to the Inner Light.

Workshop leader: Walter Brown of Langley Hill Meeting practices Psychotherapy and has served in various roles in BYM, FGC and the Friends Conference on Religion and Psychology.

S4 BYM Response to Slavery

– Friends in the Mid-Atlantic area didn’t just talk about slavery. They were at the eye of the storm. How did Quakers in Baltimore Yearly Meeting respond? The workshop will present the results of a year of research into this history. We’ll discern what lessons for today can be drawn from that history.

See the recent historical timeline on slavery.

Workshop leader: David Etheridge is a member of the BYM Working Group on Racism and Coclerk of Friends Meeting of Washington.

S5 Libtards vs. Rethugs: the Downward Spiral of Political Despair

- Since the advent of political talk radio in the early 1990s, there has been a growing polarization in the political spectrum, particularly between selfidentified “conservatives” and “liberals”. Increasingly, the divisiveness affects our interactions in public meetings, in workplaces, in classrooms, and in families. We’ll identify sources and tactics of polarization and consider historical examples from the right and the left. We’ll focus on the impact destructive rhetoric has on civility and practices we can use to counteract its negative power.

Workshop leader: Kathryn Ruud of Frederick MM has an M.S. in German and Linguistics and contributed a chapter titled “Liberal parasites and other creepers” to the book At War with Words.

S6 Fresh Ideas in Religious Education Materials

– Religious Education Committee members and First Day School teachers are always looking for new and interesting material for children or adults on First Day. Come talk with us! Even experienced teachers will find some fresh ideas. Let’s talk about available materials and curriculums, including Faith & Play. Bring your favorite resources for show and tell.

Workshop leader: Sarah Buchanan-Wollaston has taught FDS at Deer Creek Meeting for many years, served on the Friends General Conference RE Committee, and has long been part of the Faith & Play Working Group of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting.

S7 What Canst Thou Say—about Jesus?

- Personal spiritual experience was life-sustaining for many enslaved Africans and early Quakers. Both were immersed in a Christianity that insisted they submit to an outside authority. Based on their personal experiences, however, many enslaved Africans rejected Jesus as the master’s Master; many Quakers rejected Christ as the king’s King. But they didn’t reject their Jesus Christ. What did they say then? What can we say today? Can Christ-centered Friends talk to both Universalists and Fundamentalists, or even to each other? Let’s talk.

Workshop leaders: Kevin Mortimer, pastor of Middle River Meeting (Iowa-FUM), has wrestled with what is core in the Christian faith as understood by Friends in FUM and among Evangelical Friends. Georgia Fuller, of Langley Hill Meeting and a graduate of Virginia Theological Seminary, teaches biblical refection and experiential theology among BYM Friends.

S8 Global Climate Change, Peak Oil and the Future: How Can Quakers Lead?

- Will Quakers be leaders or followers on climate change and peak oil? How will we have to change the ways we live? Quakers have been leaders in the abolition of slavery, women’s right to vote, the death penalty and other social justice issues. Suggested readings include Lester Brown’s Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, Lyle Estill’s Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy and Plan C: Community Survival Strategies for Peak Oil and Climate Change by Pat Murphy.

Workshop leaders: Barbara Williamson is Clerk of the BYM Unity with Nature Committee and former Clerk of Quaker Earthcare Witness. John Hudson and Barbara represent BYM on the QEW Steering Committee.

S9 Spirit at Work: Friendly Networking in the Professions

- Unlike our foreparents, most contemporary Friends have had the opportunity to choose the work we do for our careers. This is an opportunity to meet other Friends in our respective professions and to speak deeply with each other about how our faith informs our professional selves. What possibilities are open to us for service? How do we attempt to bring Quaker light to our work? How are we able to “cooperate with God” in our workday lives? Possible affinity groups could include: Law, technology, small business, nonprofit administration, international development, social services, the arts, finance, environment, public service, body work/somatic arts, and more!

Workshop leader: Robinne Gray is BYM’s Development Director. She worships at Friends Meeting of Washington.

S10 Our Nuclear Legacy

- The U.S. is the only country to have used nuclear weapons. The fallout from Hiroshima and Nagasaki - physical, political, and personal - touches us all and is a legacy with which we must each come to terms. The impact was especially personal in my family because in 1946 my father took the only color film of the aftermath of those bombs. In trying to understand what this meant for him and for us, I lived in Hiroshima for a year and met many survivors whom he had filmed decades before. We’ll share our connections with this issue that threatens us all, reflect on what our nuclear legacy means and see what it calls us to today.

Workshop leader: Leslie Sussan is a longtime pacifist whose earliest memories include looking at photographs taken by her father in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

S11 The Religious Society of Friends: Simple. Radical. Contemporary?

- The fire of early Friends kindled faith and action in others. What can we learn from them? How can we be visible, even persuasive, today? This will be an chance for active learning rather than a history lesson.

Workshop leader: Maria Bradley of Sandy Spring Meeting has worked in outreach, Spiritual Formation, FGC’s Traveling Ministry, Quaker Quest & BYM’s Intervisitation program.

S12 “Clerk Please”

- “Friends are not to meet like a company of people about town or parish business . . . but to wait upon the Lord.” - George Fox. Are you needing encouragement and desiring more understanding of clerking and our Quaker practice and process? Join Friends to explore Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business, Quaker business manners, the role of the clerk during, between, and after the Meeting, and more. Bring your experience and questions.

Workshop leader: Lamar Matthew is a member of York Meeting.

S13 Kenyan Friends and BYM Friends: Being Part of One Another’s Stories

Friend Joseph Kisia, a long time leader among Kenyan Friends and a former faculty-member of Friends Theological College, will be sojourning in the U.S. during 2010. Kisia’s account of past relationships between Kenyan and North American Friends and his hopes for the future will be followed by consideration of how Friends can, in Fox’s phrase, “know one another in that which is eternal.”

Workshop leaders: Ann Riggs and Joseph Kisia