NEYM P&SC Committee Meeting -7 January 2010
Monday, January 18, 2010 at 08:12PM www.Skype.com
Present: Mary Ellen Cohane, Bain Davis, Ian Harrington, Jane Johnson, Stephen McKnight, Aggie Mitchkoski, Patti Muldoon, Nancy Shippen, and Lillie Wilson
After a few minutes spent connecting to the people participating in the call, we opened with silence.
*Priorities*
We confirmed the draft statement of priorities for the committee this year. They are:
The NEYM Peace & Social Concerns Committee affirms the following priorities for the year ahead:
1. To collect and provide information to Friends, including but not limited to monthly meetings and their Peace & Social Concerns Committees, on a variety of important issues determined in consultation with Friends in New England (perhaps a web survey or other tool could help us discern what issues are of interest to Friends).
2. To assist monthly and quarterly meetings, as well as Friends individually, with networking (seen as helping make visible the work being done and the concerns being carried at the quarterly and monthly meeting level, and helping Friends communicate with one another, in order to help Friends cooperate and support one another in their work and witness.
(these first 2 functions will primarily be conducted through developing and updating the new P&SC webpages on the NEYM website)
3. To support the Planning Committee for extended meetings for worship at the quarterly meeting (or regional) level with a concern for the state of our world, in partnership with Ministry & Counsel and Earthcare Ministries.
4. To prayerfully prepare for Sessions 2010, including soliciting or accepting proposals for workshops on relevant issues, organizing witness, service, and educational activities for Yearly Meeting Sessions, and seasoning relevant minutes to be brought to Sessions as appropriate.
5. Articulating a one-paragraph, clearly-worded "charge" for the committee, defining its role in relation to the other committees of NEYM and other Peace & Social Concerns Committees at the monthly and quarterly meeting levels.
6. To identify and develop corporate action for the yearly meeting as way opens.
We decided to start working immediately on the fifth priority; everyone is urged to prepare a proposed “charge” for the committee before the upcoming Committee Day. Please send the proposals to Aggie or Ian; they will be distributed anonymously at our Committee Day meeting.
*Website*
We reviewed the committee website and highlighted the changes since our last meeting (some committee members’ pictures have been added, sections have been added for AVP and Friends Peace Teams, and material has been added to several sections). We hope to look at the website together at our Committee Day meeting. Stephen McKnight will check into the availability of internet connection at Wellesley Meeting (site of Committee Day).
*No More Guantanamos*
Ian received an e-mail from Frances Crowe recently which informed us of the efforts of a group she is part of – No More Guantanamos. Ian distributed links to information from the group. They supported a resolution passed by Amherst, MA’s Town Meeting which offered to welcome two Guantanamo prisoners to live there. Congress has passed legislation prohibiting their residence in the US.
Northampton Meeting (MA) is preparing a related minute to bring to the local council of churches. Some lawyers in Newton (MA) are also working on this. The Center for Constitutional Rights in New York City has provided lawyers who have been working with the Guantanamo prisoners. One estimate is that about 90% of the prisoners were just at the wrong place at the wrong time.
What should we do at this time? John Calvi’s experience with the torture issue might make him a valuable resource. Should we invite some people from the organization to make a presentation at Committee Day?
We decided to gather as much information about this issue as possible and discuss it further at our Committee Day meeting. Perhaps a section on this will be added to the website.
*National Religious Campaign Against Torture*
We reviewed the requests recently received from NRCAT. We noted that NRCAT is adding torture within US prisons to their area of concern and the eighth anniversary of the opening of Guantanamo is Monday 11th January.
How do we get such information to the monthly meetings? We decided we would like to start preparing a monthly “bulletin” for distributing information about NEYM P&SC activities, but we wondered if this would be possible (what are the rules?). We hope these could feed into the monthly meetings’ bulletins and announcement sheets and could also be sent to interested individuals who “subscribe”. Ian will check with Jonathan Vogel-Borne about undertaking this project.
*Other Issues*
How will this committee take on tasks? Should we form subcommittees to focus on specific issues? What role do we want to play as a committee – should it be different from the role of a monthly meeting Peace and Social Concerns Committee? We plan to discuss these issues further at our next meeting.
How do we carry out our priorities? Would it be helpful to assign each monthly meeting to a committee member?
Salem Quarter’s extended worship session is scheduled for Saturday 13^th March at Wellesley. Northwest Quarter’s extended worship gathering is planned for Saturday 6^th March.
Stephen McKnight and Ian Harrington offered to host committee members who need housing for Committee Day.
Ian will send the report on the Hartford extended worship day to the committee. Aggie will send the meeting e-mail addresses to Stephen.
Due to some unknown technical problem, the phone connections were suddenly cut, which left only the Skypers in the meeting. Unable to reconnect to the phones, we closed the meeting with a brief period of silence.
*Future Meetings *
Our next meeting is set for Saturday 30th January at Wellesley Meeting.