Housatonic Friends Meeting

Friends,
Below is the proposed agenda for Purchase Quarterly Meeting on August 3. Also the flyer from Croton Valley that includes the schedule and directions to the meeting house.

august_3_2008pqm_at_cvm

Agenda

Housatonic Friends Meeting (Quakers) will hold a Meetinghouse Tag Sale on Friday and Saturday, July 4 and 5, from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at their New Milford meetinghouse (300 Danbury Rd, Route 7 just north of Lanesville Rd).

Included will be 21-speed Denali 7005; microwave oven; antique quilting frame; furniture including bed, double size futon w. frame, TV stand w. shelf, Pfaff oak cabinet c. 1927; lawn mower; rowing   machine; household treasures; kitchen equipment; small appliances;   children’s equipment; collectibles; books; and more.  All goods are   quality items – clean and in working condition.

Parking is available at the Red Barn just south of the meetinghouse,   with handicap parking at the meetinghouse.  For directions and more   information, please call 860-355-9330 or visit   www.housatonicmeeting.org.

It’s that time of the year!
Spring Cleaning!

Cleaning up around the building, interior and exterior. Building and Grounds will compile a list of tasks to be done. Friends are asked to contact Ann and Terry with any observations/concerns they have to add to the task list. The clean up day is this First day, May 4th.

Purchase Quarterly Meeting of The Religious Society Of Friends (Quakers)

Cordially Invites You To An Inspiring Presentation By

Ann Grieg

Vegans By Necessity:
Transforming Poverty With Protein
In El Salvador

Sunday, May 4 at 11:15 A.M.
Scarsdale Friends Meetinghouse
133 Popham Rd., Just East Of Rte. 22

More details here.

Web Manager Job Opening at Friends General Conference: FGC is seeking candidates for a six-month, renewable contract position as Web Manager. We have recently re-designed our web sites utilizing Drupal as the CMS platform and are working to change the sites from brochure-ware into dynamic Web 2.0 community-building tools. We hope to employ an innovative and creative Web Manager to assist us in moving this work forward.

The contract is ongoing work, budgeted at 21 hours per week. Responsibilities include creating and maintaining a consistent web site architectural structure, ensuring a consistent look and feel across all FGC web sites (www.fgcquaker.org, www.quakerbooks.org, www.quakerfinder.org, www.quakeryouth.org, and www.quakerquestfgc.org), recommending and implementing enhancements and modifications to the FGC web sites, and assisting staff in posting content. We are looking for someone who has good communication skills and can translate IT language for other staff. Strong HTML and CSS skills, familiarity with Drupal 5.1x , and basic PHP skills are all required. Candidates with project management skills and a familiarity with Quakerism preferred. Candidates within a half day’s drive from Philadelphia preferred, for availability for twice monthly meetings in the FGC office. Full job description is available. Compensation is between $25 and $35 per hour depending upon qualifications.

To apply, send letter of application and resume by May 15th to Lucy Duncan, Associate Secretary for Programs, FGC, 1216 Arch Street., Ste 2B, Philadelphia, PA, 19107, or lucyd@fgcquaker.org.

More detailed information available here.

This is excellent news from Old Chatham! Hopefully Housatonic will be able to offer an even wider array of movies to share with Friends.

Old Chatham’s new film lending library is finally open and ready to serve you!

We’re loaning films shown in our monthly film series over the past three years and offering our assistance to Meetings wishing to set up your own film series. It’s simple.

Go to http://terdix.googlepages.com/home and check out this NEW Quaker film lending library.

Celebrate with us: Take out a film to enjoy at home. Share our Quaker concerns and values by hosting a public showing or film series in your Meeting or community.

Questions or suggestions? Email quakerfilms@gmail.com. We’d love to hear from you.

Peace from,
Members of the Old Chatham Outreach, Peace & Justice Committee.

Purchase Quarterly Meeting Peace and Social Concerns Committee has arranged for a major AFSC developed dramatic, colorful public exhibit on the Cost of War on Tax Filing Day, April 15, at the Westchester County Court House Plaza in White Plains.

This project needs 18 volunteers to make the exhibit effective over the full day in shifts of an hour or two each for the literature table and greeting functions.

Here’s why.

The Quarterly Meeting Peace and Social Concerns Committee, representing Amawalk, Chapppaqua, Croton Valley, Housatonic Valley, Purchase, Scarsdale and Wilton Monthly Meetings as well as other local Friends, will host the AFSC anti-war exhibit, Cost of War, from 8 AM to 8 PM on Income Tax Filing Day, April 15, Income at the Westchester County Court House Plaza on Martin Luther King Blvd. just south of Martine Ave. in White Plains.

The “Cost Of War Exhibit” is based upon the work of Nobel Prize winning economist, Joseph Stiglitz and his colleague, Linda Bilmes, who estimate the per day cost the Iraq War for the first 4 years has been $720 million.

The exhibit consists of ten full/color banners, seven feet high, and three feet wide, dramatically mounted back to back on five stands to the height of 12 or 13 feet. The title banner proclaims the cost of one day of the Iraq War as $720 million and asks the viewer, “How would you spend it?”

The other banners give examples of alternative uses for that daily sum: “93,364 Head Start places for children”; “84 new elementary schools”; “423,529 children with healthcare”; “34,904 scholarships for university students”; “12,478 elementary school teachers”; “1,274,336 homes with renewable electricity”; “6,482 families with homes” or “1,163,846 children with free school lunches.”

In addition to the banners, there will be an AFSC petition: Defund the Iraq War/Refund Human Needs, for viewers to sign; full color Cost Of War brochures; and “Frequently Asked Questions” fliers as well as an introduction sheet listing Monthly Meetings in the Quarter to hand out.

That’s where we need the volunteers.

This Cost of War exhibit is not merely an opportunity for members of all the Meetings in the Quarter to work together on an important and dramatic project, but a chance for us all to get to know one another a little better, become more familiar with other meetings in the Quarter to knit our Quaker community together a little more tightly.

We hope some of your members can find a little time somewhere during their Tax day to join with other Friends in the Quarter or at least to stop by. If they can actually put in an hour or more, they should call our Volunteer Coordinator, Virginia Auster at (203) 846-9288. If you have trouble reaching her or her answering machine, call Charles Sirey at (914) 238-0961. If any need more information, call Charles; Virginia; or Bob Bogen, Committee Clerk.

[This exhibit is one of the major projects planned by the committee this year. It follows a dozen other events over the last several years by the committee as well as three other exhibits developed by the AFSC that have been shown in Westchester over the last year or so. All four exhibits were and are coordinated by Charles Sirey of Chappaqua Meeting with major participation of Friends in other Monthly Meetings. Some Friends will remember the AFSC Eyes Wide Open Exhibit at this same location, with its solemn large bronze statues dead and wounded solders in earlier wars, with hundreds of military boots laid out in formation representing New Yorkers who died in Iraq. It generated major photo and written coverage in the local daily papers and their web sites. ]

Bob Bogen, Purchase Quarterly Meeting Peace and Social Concerns Committee Clerk

SCARSDALE MEETING TO HOST UNIQUE QUARTERLY PROGRAM
ON COMPASSION AND PROTEIN
FOR EL SALVADOR’S POOREST COMMUNITIES

The next Purchase Quarterly Meeting on May 4 will be at Scarsdale Meetinghouse, 133 Popham Road just west of Rte. 22 in Scarsdale. Worship will begin at 10:00 a.m. and the program at 11:15 will focus on the work of Maryknoll Lay Missioner, Ann Grieg, and her twelve years working in El Salvador to improve the health and diet of poor communities. She will speak on “Vegans by Necessity: Protein for El Salvador’s Poorest.”

Grieg, a trained dietician followed her leading to join the Maryknoll Lay Missioners, whose objective is to “create a more just and compassionate world by responding to the needs of the poor.” After working in Peru for nine years, she came to El Salvador to utilize her skills in nutrition, health education and cooking techniques. Her goal was to integrate high protein soy products into the diet of those with very limited economic means. The result was joining with a team of medical and childcare specialists to found the not-for-profit Salvadoran Foundation, which distributes food and trains community members in the use of soy products.

The project began in 2002 in response to the impact of earthquakes that devastated the poor areas. Initially the project was run in one community and has now grown to the point where Ann and others have trained at least 15 economically poor Salvadoran communities to become self-sufficient in the use of soy products for human nutrition.

As always, the program will be followed by a brown-bag lunch at 12:30 (drinks and desserts provided by Scarsdale Friends), and Purchase Quarterly Meeting for Business will begin approximately at 1:20 p.m. Childcare will be provided, and a children’s program is now being discussed. More information will be forthcoming later in the month. This is a program open to all and guests from the community are very welcome!

Please note that this is a bicycle Sunday, and the Bronx River Parkway will be closed to cars from 10 am - 2 pm. (See directions below). For further information: Mary Eagleson: mleagleson@aol.com or John Dempsey: juandempsey@yahoo.com.

Directions (map at www.scarsdalefriendsmeeting.org):

from Bx.R. Parkway before 10:00 a.m.: Crane Road Exit (coming South, the exit is on the left). Right at exit, continue straight to traffic light after train station (Popham Rd.), make left and go to just before Rte.22. Meetinghouse is on the left.

from Rte. 22, WP Post Road - to Popham Road, Scarsdale (pass Village Hall), make right, and go to second right into parking lot.

from Hutchinson R Pkwy: Weaver St (Exit 20), go to light (Weaver St.) and make right and go straight to “Five Corners” (l mile) and make 90 degree left turn so that you go down hill (Heathcote Rd.) to bottom intersection (1.5 mi.) to WP Post Road, Rte. 22. Make left onto Post Rd., one block passing Village Hall, make right, and go to second right into parking lot.

by Metro North RR: Harlem Division line to Scarsdale. Go to corner of Popham Rd. and face uphill (East) and walk l/2-mi.east on Popham Road.

“The End of Suburbia” will be shown at 3:00 p.m. on Sunday, March 30, at the Housatonic Quaker Meetinghouse in New Milford, at Route 7 and Lanesville Road (just north of Lanesville Rd. intersection). This provocative documentary film examines the history of suburban life and the wisdom of this distinctly American development. All are welcome and there is no charge. Healthy refreshments and discussion will follow. The program will conclude at 5:00 pm.

A post-World War II concept, suburbia has attracted droves of people, giving rise to sprawl and all that comes with it — good and bad. How has the environment been affected by this lifestyle, and is it sustainable? Canadian director Gregory Greene dares to ask all the tough questions.

Since World War II the suburban way of life has become embedded in the American consciousness. Suburbia, and all it promises, has become the American Dream. But as we enter the 21st century, serious questions are beginning to emerge about the sustainability of this way of life. With brutal honesty and a touch of irony, The End of Suburbia explores the American Way of Life and its prospects as the planet approaches a critical era and as global demand for fossil fuels begins to outstrip supply. And what can be done NOW, individually and collectively, to avoid The End of Suburbia?

Parking will be available at the Red Barn just south of the meetinghouse. For more information, call Bill Holcombe at 203-313-4438.

Friends, Spring Sessions will be held at Oakwood Friends School in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., April 4–5, 2008.

Spring Sessions this year include intergenerational fun and games, and an inspiring talk by Henry Lickers, a member of the Seneca Nation, Turtle Clan, who invites us to share in “the Mohawk’s worldview [which is] one of integration with the environment and not domination.”

Information is available on the NYYM Web site at www.nyym.org/events/springsess08

The registration form is www.nyym.org/events/springsess08/springsess08reg.pdf