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7 Butty Place
Hamilton, Ontario L8S 2R5
www.quaker.ca/hamilton
quakers@hwcn.org
Telephone: 905.523.8383
Oct 17 Ruth
Oct 24 Dawn
Oct 31 Janis
Nov 7 John
Nov 14 Don
Nov 21 Robbie M
Nov 28 **No one yet **
Dec 5 Christina
Dec 12 Betty P
Dec 19 Louise T
Dec 26 Andy
Oct 30, at Simcoe Muskoka Meeting
231 Westmount Drive Orillia
see map posted at HMM
10:00am to 6:00 pm, coffee and muffins from 9 am; potluck supper between 5 and 6.
Topic is "Leadings: from Silence to Service". Includes an address by Carol Dixon about the Quaker International Affairs Program. There is also a children's program. Registration to Amanda; phone (705) 792-2518
As always, the Minutes are posted separately on the Reading Room page. Here is a link to October 2004's meeting.
A recent announcement about Peace Dollars at Sunday worship piqued interest but left little time to explain. This new venture of the Hamilton Culture of Peace Network (an offshoot of the United Nations Association in Canada) has several Quaker members and is now offering Peace Dollars as another way to "wage peace" by raising funds not only for its own use but as a way to benefit many other socially conscious groups.
Peace dollars convey more than one message. One side is about raising funds, while the other side carries UNESCO'S six principles for building a Culture of Peace, first developed by Nobel Peace Prize Laureates for the United Nations' Manifesto 2000. Peace Dollars are designed not only raise funds, but gradually to spread the Manifesto's suggestions for a peaceable society to more and more people in the Hamilton area.
Of special interest to socially active Quakers is the offer to all peace, faith, social justice and environmental groups which support the Manifesto, of a fifty-per-cent discount when they buy Peace Dollars. This is an opportunity to help many worthwhile groups double their money while spreading the Manifesto's valuable advice.
A public explanation of this unique fundraising opportunity for the socially conscious will be held at First Unitarian Church, 170 Dundurn St. South, Hamilton, Monday evening, October 25th at 7-30 p.m. Peace Dollars will be fully explained, questions answered, and opportunities for individuals and groups to purchase. Buying and selling Peace Dollars is a practical peace activity, an opportunity to reach out beyond those already converted. For more information call Ray at (905) 628-4976 or e-mail ray (dot) c (at) cogeco (dot) ca.
General Secretary for the CFSC Jane Orion Smith has mailed to us a copy of the latest version of this Briefing Paper. Copies can also be obtained by phone (416-920-5213) or from the "CFSC resource section" of website http://www.cfsc.quaker.ca/pages/resources.html.
The section headings in the paper are:
We have also on file a copy of the October 12, 2004 Spectator article "A desperate crisis of conscience" on US army Private Brandon Hughey, and on his Canadian hosts Don Alexander and Marie Cipryk of St. Catharines.
I hope to be able to provide a brief book review each month over the next 6 months of a book dealing with this interface. The first one is Beside Still Waters: Jews, Christians, and the Way of the Buddha, ed Harold Kasimow, Wisdom Press, Boston, 2003
The book is a series of essays by some well known and not so well known practitioners of Buddhist meditation who are also identify themselves as either Jews or Christians.
Most of them tell a very personal story of their spiritual experiences, from childhood. Most found that Buddhist practice was a gateway which opened the mind and heart. While they struggled with conflicts between traditional religion and this practice, for most it is no longer a conflict.
American Quaker Sallie King, a professor of philosophy and religion, gave an address to Friends General Conference Gathering , and asked how many had been touched by Buddhism; 85-90% stood up. She talked about her struggle with the Buddhist notion of non attachment leading to bliss, when she became a mother. She found her attachment to her children was her fundamental priority, and in a dream she gave up entering bliss to return to her children. She also came to see parenthood as a great instructor in surrender, when she could not comfort a crying infant, and had to encourage her young adult children to leave home. She started at Quaker Meeting because it seemed like an easy way for a Buddhist to have a religion for her kids in middle America; but has found the opening to the Spirit and the practice of love and respect among Quakers as a wonderful and distinct path. She sees Quakerism and Buddhism as two different languages and doesn't try to reconcile them. "This Great Doubt that has seized me, this questioning mind fixed in not-knowing at the confluence of love and emptiness, has been in Quaker language, the movement of the Spirit , the presence of the sacred. I am glad that both traditions encourage me to regard this questioning mind with respect and seriousness."
Elaine McInnnes, a Catholic nun who has practiced and taught Zen for decades, says her experience of God, the Prime Mover, is identical to "kensho", the breakthrough in Zen in which the self dissolves and the power and unity of the universe is felt as identical with the self. It is the "falling away of body and mind. In that place, one perceives that the Absolute Power, the original power, for that split second, not only activates life, but lives it." This is the "joy of the raindrop entering the ocean". She relates this loss of self to "I live, not I but Christ lives in me"; seeing Christ in all around me. She says for her kensho was an incandescent experience, lighting her fuse to be a compassionate teacher of Zen in prisons.
Ruben Habito, a Jesuit, found his awakening in Zen lead to his embodying the "ineffable infinite Mystery in every step. To put it in a Buddhist context, it is a way of embodying Emptiness in every Form." Encountering oppression, he found that to be Christian is to surrender the self in relief of suffering.
Robert Jonas migrated from Lutheran to Catholic. He describes how he was drawn by St John of the Cross, who teaches a prayer of emptiness, affirming both devotion to Jesus and willingness to let Jesus go. He says that Zen is a practice of presence; if one is present to Christ, is one Christian of Zen? Does it matter? The difference he found was that Christianity, while self emptying, was also relational.
There are also wonderful Jewish voices. Sylvia Boorstein, a well known meditation teacher and author, learned not to fight against her suffering. It is the nature of life to be fragile, and the fragility is not something to resist. She became grateful, began to pray, became an observant Jew. She prays, but doesn't think about whom she prays to. Prayer is what her heart feels like doing, and it is a state of connection.
As some of you know, I am working/volunteering with this NGO in Hamilton. We have opportunities for volunteers to do letter writing, support teams, and prison visits. Next volunteer orientation session Tuesday Oct 26, 7pm at Bridge House, 319 Barton St East. Bridge needs bedding, towels, kitchen utensils. Please contact Mary Jackson hamiltonbridge@netscape.net or myself at igraham (at) cogeco (dot) ca.
Our Mission: to provide support and healing for all those affected by crime: victims, families, offenders. Bridge volunteers and staff work inside and outside the Barton Street detention centre offer self-help groups, individual discharge planning, pastoral counseling, friendship and support, and transitional housing.
Bridge is a mult-faith chaplaincy program, funded in part by the Ontario Multi-faith Council on Spiritual and Religious Care. It has a $100,000 budget, a volunteer board and a meeting centre/office located three blocks east of the Detention Centre.
There are three staff persons: community chaplain & pastoral counsellor; discharge planner; caseworker. Volunteers do prison visits, lead groups and reintegration support teams, and serve on the Board.
Our Programs:
Contact information:
(905) 522-0283
Office hours
Monday and Thursday 8:30am to noon.
Mail address:
PO box 37037
Hamilton ON L8R 3P1
Street address:
319 Barton St East
Transitional housing:
317 Barton St E. L8L 2X6
The Bridge Program: Promoting restorative justice: challenging, supporting, informing, transforming.
At the most recent (October) Meeting for Worship for Business a report from the Library Committee was received. The lateness of the hour, the small number of Friends present for the Meeting, and the fact that no one from the Library Committee was able to stay to present the details of the report to the Meeting, combined to preclude it from being heard at that time. It was decided to revisit it at the next Meeting (November). However, it did prompt a discussion of changes that have taken place to the furnishings of the library since the spring, as well as discussion of the implications of some of the ongoing work of the Library Committee, particularly the plan to move the Meeting's computer from it's present location in the Pendle Hill room into the library in order to make it more useful as a research and book cataloging tool.
Some Friends expressed concerns over these changes, both for their own part, and on behalf of others who were not present at the meeting. It was decided to consider these matters further in November, after having heard the presentation of the Library report, and with time to consider the matter in greater depth. Hopefully at that time a resolution will be found which will both support the gifts of time and effort that the Library Committee is making to enhance and improve our Library, while at the same time addressing the concerns of some Friends with respect to the appearance and atmosphere of our worship space.
Friends who wish to participate in this process are strongly encouraged to attend the November Meeting for Worship for Business. Ian Graham can provide background information on the work which has occurred, and is ongoing, and copies of the library report will be available at the Meeting House to assist Friends in preparing for this meeting.
Last updated: 12 Nov 2004
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