The 2001 Quaker Peace Roundtable
State College Friends School, State College PA
Opening Session & Plenary – Friday April 6, 7p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Notes taken by Marjorie Ramphal
Welcome by Chuck Fager and Music by Aaron Fowler and Laura Dungan
Chuck Fager welcomed the attenders and presented some of the 200 year history of Quakers in Centre County. There are two old meeting houses nearby, one in Half-Moon Valley (Hicksite, BYM) and one in Bellefonte (Orthodox, Phila. Yearly Meeting). Each of these meetings was a progenitor of State College Meeting which consequently affiliated with both Philadelphia and Baltimore yearly meetings.
Aaron and Laura sang folk-like activist songs accompanying themselves with guitar and mandolin and inviting participation.
Plenary: Quaker Peace Activists Share their Stories
7:30-9:30 p.m.
In introducing the panel, Chuck said that Quaker faith is built out of experience, not dogma and recalled George Fox's "Let your lives speak."
Joe Volk, Executive Secretary of FCNL, recalled that his concerns for peace came from early reading of the gospels which seemed clearly to urge peaceableness. He was at odds with his family's strong emphasis on the importance of military service. He was named after two uncles who served in WWII.
He studied religion at Miami University (Ohio) in the early 60's in the midst of the anti-Viet Nam and civil rights protests. He felt it was unjust for him to be deferred for study when the less privileged were being sent to Viet Nam, so he sent his deferment papers back and also refused to see himself as a conscientious objector. He had a conversion experience on the cold winter night when he dropped the deferment papers in the mail box. He felt convergence of values, experience, and risk with a resultant sense that his life had meaning and direction.
He was drafted. During bayonet practice, which involved indoctrination as killers, he came to see that the army had to "sandpaper" off the recruits' humanity and civilization supposedly so that they might go out to protect civilization. This realization led him to go to his sergeant and say, "I quit." Ultimately he was court-martialed. A chaplain steered him to Quakers who advised him as to what to expect in terms of sentence, etc. He was also advised to have someone phone in to inquire as to his condition every week and the Quaker offered to do it. Therefore the prison commandant would come once a week to check on his well-being which probably contributed to it.
Aaron Fowler & Laura Dungan, husband and wife, live in Wichita, Kansas. They knew each other before both attended Friends University College although both were Methodists. After reading George Fox's writings they became enthusiastic about his religious views and joined an evangelical Quaker church in Wichita. After a time they sought more meaning than they were getting from the rather conventional activities of the church and, joined a group which through reading Christ in the World, Agenda for Biblical People, and other books sought ways to pursue Christ's teachings. The group decided to tour Topeka and see if they could hook up with a group which was doing good. When they entered the ghetto area, they were stunned by its devastation and anomie.
They decided to follow activist writer John Perkins’ idea of "relocation" and bought a house in the ghetto with the idea of participating in the community with their neighbors to work toward a better life. They studied together such issues as racism and liberation theology. They called their group Friends of Jesus. Their evangelical Quaker church was supportive of their "missionary" work until they saw a TV news report of a Gay Pride parade with Laura and her little daughter participating. When the Friends of Jesus came to clearness on approving committed same sex relationships, they were more or less expelled from Mid-America yearly Meeting. Recently Aaron and Laura have moved to a house in the barrio with their three teen-age children.
Max Carter, now from Greensboro, North Carolina, grew up in Indiana in an Evangelical Friends Church. He had a conversion experience at a Billy Graham revival, began serious Bible study, and was impressed with the gospel's peace message. This Christian paradigm was in conflict with the prevailing climate of the 60's Red scare and "need to fight Communism." When he attended a presentation by a traveling peace team which included a Japanese woman who had been a child in Hiroshima when it was A-bombed, he became convinced he could never be a part of the military. He applied for conscientious objector status and went to Ramallah Friends School for his alternative service.
This was a life-changing experience for a naive, inexperienced Indiana young man. He was surrounded by people of different cultures and different religions. His colleagues at the school had varied backgrounds as well and his own religious beliefs were shaken and came tumbling down. When he came home he attended Earlham where he was able to put his beliefs together again, "to reinvest the old powerful metaphors" with new meaning.
Val Liveoak is from Texas. Her spiritual journey began with the book In His Steps which led her to start "taking Jesus seriously." The conventional religions didn't seem to correspond. She involved herself in the War Resisters' League and eventually found Quakerism. In the late 80's and early 90's she spent four years in a health ministry in El Salvador. She became close to the Mennonites. She was a Christian Peace Team reservist and in her last year spent her two weeks of active duty in Colombia. She now feels she can join the passion and anger of peace activism with her Quaker beliefs by participating in the Quaker Peace Teams. She feels she needs to be as willing as a soldier to take risks. Her other major interest is AVP and she recently did AVP workshops in Cuba. She finds AVP's team model of cooperation, forbearance, and love of fun consistent with Quaker peace-keeping--"expect the best, and trust the process."
Questions:
To Aaron and Laura: Chuck asked if their old neighborhood was "moving up."
Aaron said their old building is now a co-op. There is some stability in the neighborhood, but still it's the poorest in the city, with a transient population.
To all from a Guilford College student: You came to scripture with a willingness to learn from it. How to get others to do that?
Max said when he was in college in Indiana, an evangelical woman chaplain brought guest speakers in who were leading "lives of authenticity" and who had "alternative takes" on scripture and provided role models. Ths was very influential for him, in a quiet way.
Aaron added that it was important to get young people into real life experiences--e.g., living in the ghetto--which force redefining one's understanding of the gospel.
Joe recalled that a professor in philosophy of religion asked each student to say what he wanted to be and when Joe said "A career in the military," the professor asked ,"Why?" and Joe couldn't come up with an answer.
Val said that youth often are not clear about what they're for, but are very clear about what they're against. There's a lot to be said for the counter-culture as an attempt to find a way out of dominant assumptions.
Chick Nelson of Bethesda Maryland asked the panel to identify ways Quaker peace work had changed in the last 30 years and predict how it would change in the next 30 years.
Joe said this is connected to what's happening in the world--e.g., 30 plus years ago, Civil Rights and Viet Nam--each generating different approaches. The pre-World War II peace movement worked in harmony with government. Post WWII the government is seen as sometimes wrong. There is a more active, non-violent peace movement.
Val said there has been a professionalizing of the peace movement--e.g., AFSC. There is less hands on involvement.
Jean Carpenter of State College asked Max if when he was in Ramallah he had an opportunity to dialogue with Jews and Moslems.
Max said that at the time he didn't know the right questions. His dialogues with colleagues at the school led him to feel that the faith he had come with didn't work anymore.
Question to Val. What is the focus of efforts now, analogous to civil rights for example?
Val said service projects--Mennonite volunteer service, Quaker volunteer service, volunteer network--i.e., "hands onj." Envvironmnt, globalization are big issues. Three life stages for volunteerism: just out of college, mid-life, retirement.
Laura said sometimes institutions need to be cracked open. Right now, the hot issue for them is immigrant rights.
Chuck noted that for him the issue is organizing adjunct faculty--underpaid, no rights.
Steve Angell said that the 21st century will determine the fate of the planet. Peace is one aspect. He asked the panel for comments.
Max said we're raising a generation to address these issues. Exhibit A is his daughter. Young people have a new group of issues. Aging peaceniks are stuck on the old ones. He is concerned that the new movement is not deeply rooted in spirituality. The 2/3 world has a lot to teach us about conservation.
Charlotte Saji of Sandy Spring (MD) Meeting to Aaron. Had he found a niche for teaching peace in the public school?
Aaron said he had left teaching in the public school because of the disparity in treatment of white kids and black kids. He is now involved in Hope Street Youth Development project working to empower young people to speak for themselves. He thinks working with one kid at a time is the way to go.
Closing -- Carolyn Rudd, a volunteer for the Peace Roundtable, explained that the group was using paper plates because the noise of the dishwasher running six loads would disturb the meeting.
End of session. Two more sessions to come.