[In midlife, Diane Faison and her family faced multiple traumas while living in Richmond, Virginia., including the murder of her mother-in-law and family conflict over her estate.] Diane writes, After all this, it was no surprise that my husband said he wanted to leave Richmond. I don’t want the children living in this atmosphere, he … Continue reading “Passing the Torch”, Author Speak #6: Diane Faison Mckinzie
From Marian Rhys, “Life: The Great Balancing Act,” in Passing the Torch Despite [a youthful] service-work connection with Friends, it was not until my early twenties that I became engaged with them on any regular basis. By that time, I had begun to feel the need for some spirituality in my life, and started attending … Continue reading “Passing the Torch,” Author Speak #5: “I stopped trying to talk with Friends about evil . . .”
. . . I grew up in a large, mildly liberal pastoral Friends meeting in Indianapolis. Amiable but tepid, it gave me little to rebel against, but not much to inspire or motivate me either. I did not attend any church or meeting during my college years. But I had a spiritual sense that gravitated … Continue reading “Passing The Torch”, Author Doug Gwyn: “I received a distinct calling . . .”
Quakers are often very interesting people. And generations come and go. These are the modest theses behind the new book, Passing the Torch. In fifty-plus years among The Religious Society of Friends (our rather pompous official name), its members, attenders, hangers-on and even antagonists, I have kept bumping into and hearing about interesting people. And … Continue reading Why “Passing the Torch”? And Why Now?
Helena Cobban I was born into a very traditional (Church of England, Conservative-voting) family of the British upper middle class. I was 14 when the Israeli-Arab war of 1967 broke out. As I recall it, just about all the news coverage on our grainy black-and-white television and in the two newspapers my father took, the … Continue reading “Passing The Torch” Authors Speak #3: “I utterly and humiliatingly lost my nerve. . . .”