Canada Yearly Meeting – Epistle 2002

91 A Fourth Avenue, Ottawa, ON R1 S 2 L ~ CANADA m 613-235-8553/ (F) 613-235-1753/ cym-office@quaker.ca / www.quaker.ca

Greetings to Friends everywhere from Canadian Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends as we meet from 1 0-17th of eighth month, 2002, at the Canadian Mennonite University in Winnipeg, Manitoba. 169 Friends, including 34 young Friends, have come together from across Canada for our 169th Yearly Meeting, our 47th as a united meeting. Among us are 17 newcomers and 6 visitors from our wider Quaker family.

"We need both a deeper spirituality and a more outspoken witness... Out of the depths of authentic prayer comes a longing for peace and a passion for justice." {Gordon Matthews, 1989, Quaker Faith and Practice.) Our Programme Committee this year placed this quotation on the front of our programme, and we place it here as a succinct summary of the sense of this Meeting. Our theme has been "Grounded in Spirit- Tending the Roots of Peace." In our study on this theme, we noted the paradox of grounding ourselves in breath, wind, spirit. When we are exposed to the Light, peace deepens and is renewed, but sometimes peace as we have known it is first removed, and we are uncomfortable until we meet a new requirement

Behind all our activities this year has been the sober recognition that Canada is effectively at war; it is easy in these times to feet despair. We find comfort in being part of a living community, but feel a need to renew our understanding of the role of our historic peace testimony. In a pre-gathering workshop, peace worker Karen Ridd encouraged us to imagine an ideal society, complete with well-channelled conflict. When, in a revealing role-play, this society began to be torn away, we discovered we already know and practice a wide array of non-violent strategies of resistance.

Botanical metaphors of root, tree; seed, leaves recurred in our morning Quaker study, our worship and play, along with the animals of the Peaceable Kingdom, and our business decisions included support for vigils for peace, and a letter and delegation to the government in the week of September 11111, 2002. Friends brought concerns that by then the war may have escalated to Iraq. We approved letters to the Canadian government urging support of the Israel-Palestine peace process and ratification of the Kyoto agreement.

Our food co-op is always a practical laboratory in the Peaceable Kingdom, teaching lessons of discerning a task, carrying through in faith, sharing leadership and nourishing both soul and body. A further practical lesson arrived midweek with a torrential downpour that soaked many Friends to ~e skin and washed out several tents. As we

helped one another find dry clothes and dry places to sleep, a brilliant double rainbow arced across the wide prairie sky. Perhaps we needed extra signs of hope, as another remarkable rainbow appeared the following day.

On the floor of Yearly Meeting and in our Special Interest Groups, we took hope from news of good work being done with passion and commitment, and of wonderful opportunities for service and growth among ourselves and in wider Quaker bodies. We welcomed the first draft chapter of our new Faith and Practice, which includes a section on peace. Our Yearly Meeting this year added 28 new members, but our total numbers remain ~mall

In the Sunderland P. Gardner lecture, titled "Doing the Work, Finding the Meaning," Kathleen Hertzberg outlined her life of service among Friends, ending with a call to find the "Golden Thread": "Faith must be reconnected to action." A Young Friend commented that Kathleen's work helping Jews leave Germany long preceded the outbreak of war, and that in such faithful work we tend the roots of peace. Kathleen's Christocentric language was pleasing to some, and to others offered practice in "listening in tongues," made easier by her absorbing story of danger and love.

The tension between individual leading over against corporate discernment and decision-making emerged at several points in the week. Individuals need to be heard and, at the same time, as a Society we need to move forward with clearness and resolve. Young Friends recognized their own need for better training and stronger roots as they grow into the future of this Society. Friends both young and old are making long journeys around the world, growing in awareness of the interrelationship of change within oneself, change in one's local community, and global change. Some memories: the joy of speaking with a very young person in a blue raincoat, clusters of Friends moving in the early morning to music or Tai Chi, long walks, late night conversations, chanting, singing, hours of silent prayer. During the week, we heard of the deaths of two beloved Friends; we mourned our loss, and celebrated their lives. As a Society we are coming to a more rugged understanding of peace, remembering biblical stories of wrestling with God and with angels. We hear the call for peace as a powerful and prophetic one that challenges us in everything we do. The world cannot make much use of expressions of hope that are too easy and not grounded in faith. From the ground and root of the deeper life of the Spirit may we be led to a clear and strong witness to peace.

John Calder. Clerk