Quaker Universalist Conversations

Conversation Archives: 2018 > November

We cannot live outside of history

From the Editor’s Desk of Western Friend

Dear Friends: Our bodies cannot live outside of history, nor can we live outside of history’s cruelty, its “mixing memory and desire.” Rowing our boats with our backs toward the future, we despair at the carnage we watch flowing out from our wakes—oceans choked by our poisons, lives crushed by our bigotry, truth and kindness twisted by our greed. Some bits of beauty bob along, too. But it’s easy to view the whole scene as basically grim.

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Welcome to the Quaker Universalist Voice

Our Mission

In this time when the news is hard to watch or listen to, finding the Light in all and common ground among us is more important than ever.

During our annual Steering Committee meeting in October, we again affirmed that we seek truth to guide practice in the Quaker tradition.

We would love to hear your thoughts and suggestions!

Gail Rogers, Clerk

Our Mission

About Us

The Quaker Universalist Fellowship engages seekers of all religious, spiritual, and secular approaches in a dialog of free expression and active listening. Our aim is to learn from each other, and to identify the common truths and understanding that guide our lives and actions.
QUF welcomes participation from all branches of Friends (Quakers), as well as from the wider world community. We create opportunities for learning and dialog through such resources and forums as publications, website, blog, conferences, lectures, and social media.

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Ignore the news cycle. Cooperation is hardwired.

At the moment we are all afraid. All of us. On whatever part of the spectrum of belief we stand, there is nothing else in the pubic conversation right now except fear. Some of us express that fear as anger or resentment—or hope—but fear is the taste of this age.

And it’s all based, to put it bluntly, on what “sells newspapers”—on what distracts us, out-weighing what is real in our personal lives with what we are supposed to feel afraid of.

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