The building is now open for committee use.
The sidewalks at the meetinghouse have been shoveled, however they could freeze over again. To get to the sidewalk, you have to step on some ice. Both Kensington and Commonwealth have not been plowed. They are drivable but parking could be problematic.
If your group decides to meet, please use utmost caution and remember to schedule with the building scheduler, Ada Hammer.
Meeting for worship in the meetinghouse and RE are canceled for Sunday, February 1, due to icy conditions on Commonwealth Avenue.
Due to weather and driving conditions, Old Clerks/New Clerks has been rescheduled for Sunday, February 8, at 9 am in the community room! For both seasoned and new committee clerks, please join Nominating Committee for the annual clerking overview with coffee, tea, and bagels at 9 am, Sunday, February 1. The meeting starts at 9:15 am. Subjects covered include:
But, don't worry, you'll do fine!
Friends wanting to look at clerking resources may wish to visit the FGC site on the subject https://www.fgcquaker.org/fgcresources/practical/practices/clerking/ and this thoughtful article from Friends Journal https://www.friendsjournal.org/3011047/
December 7 - We are planning a Holiday Train Station Exploratory. If you celebrate a specific holiday during December (Chanukah, Kwanzaa, Bodhi Day, Christmas, Winter Solstice, etc.) and are interested in sharing it with our children, please talk to Elizabeth Price.
Upcoming Dates
The Adult Spiritual Education committee will hold a one-hour Reading Between the Lines (formerly known as Bible Workbench) on Sunday, September 7, through Zoom, from 9-10 am. We will discuss Philemon 1-21: the power of a personal letter clearing the way for a person to be accepted into a beloved community. The facilitator will send the Zoom link through the Newslist several days before our session.
Please contact any member of Nominating Committee for information or interest in these positions: Margaret Edds, Anna Marie Bolin, Diane Bowden, Don Miller, Carolyn Moul, and Catherine Roseberry.
Religious Education Needs
Religious Education’s (RE) greatest need right now is for teachers and assistants in classrooms. This is not a request for new members of the RE Committee. The RE year begins in September, so please volunteer now.
They anticipate needing 4 classes beginning in September: PreK/K, Elementary, Middle, & Upper Grades. We have found that having 2 teachers and 2 assistants per classroom reduces the requirement to only once or twice per month. We have curriculum and resources available for teachers to use if they find that helpful when planning lessons.
We are looking to confirm:
- 2 teachers and 2 assistants for PreK/K
- 1 teacher for Elementary
- 2 teachers and 2 assistants for the Middle School group
- 1 or 2 assistants/subs for the 7th+ class (The current 2 teachers would like someone to fill in when one of them is unavailable on a class day, but these teachers work great together and did very well last year.)
Peace & Social Concerns Needs
Peace and Social Concerns (P&SC)fosters greater personal understanding of peace in the lives of members and attenders; focuses on activities that promote understanding of wider (local, national, and international) peace and justice concerns. It embodies and reflects the social conscience of the Meeting through direct action; proposes RFM budgetary contributions to like-minded organizations; and informs the Meeting of current issues and events.
Recently, P&SC has given us awareness of local nonprofit organizations which have lost funding and opportunities to protest peacefully, to speak truth to power, and to advocate for a more just and inclusive democracy.
P&SC needs people to help with this important work.
Alice Paul and The Fight for Women's Rights, by Deborah Kops
Peace, by Miranda and Baptiste Paul
Something Happened in Our Town, by Marianne Celano
Susanna and Alice, Quaker Rebels, by Leslie Denis
Come learn and contribute to RFM’s on-going discernment around race and racism. After a two-year process involving deep listening, study, and prayerful reflection, the Ad Hoc Committee on Race & Racism presented a proposed action/implementation plan at the November business meeting. The committee will hold an information-discussion session about the plan on December 7 (Saturday) from 12:30 to 2:00 pm, both at the Meetinghouse and by Zoom.
Please join us for this important session. A summary of the plan is below. The full document is available by request to either of the ad hoc committee clerks. The full document is also available at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pBS2gc854JrvaGwB6Zj_rwNnLyKuHeRe/view?usp=sharing.
Join us on Sunday, September 22, in person from 9:15-10:30 am in the Community room. In this session we'll be exploring Quaker Process. Friends make decisions about how to tend to Spirit, how to care for each other, how to nourish ourselves and our families, how to contribute to the wider communities of city, nation, all nations, and the earth. We make these decisions without the ease of hierarchy, majority vote, and, for unprogrammed friends, without clergy or paid staff. In this session, we'll explore the process we use in moving forward.
The program will focus on two practices fundamental to Friends in making spirit-lead choices and for acting: Committees and Business Meeting. As part of this session, we'll focus on terminology that may not be familiar to newcomers.
It's our hope that longtime Friends will be refreshed and refocused in Quaker process and that new attenders will come to feel comfortable in the Society of Friends and Richmond Friends Meeting.
The Ad Hoc Committee on Race and Racism has been researching the history of our meeting through a racial lens. We will present our findings on Saturday, August 24, in the community room at the Meetinghouse. Coffee beginning at 9:30; program from 10:00 to 11:30. This is the second of three educational programs intended to help us discern ways forward.
Richmond Friends Meeting recognizes that inequality and injustice on race are deeply rooted in our society. Our faith community continues to deliberatively examine this cruel history and to face the on-going realities of systemic racism. We are committed to work with other groups who promote racial healing and seek to dismantle some aspect of structural racism.
We stand with others in calling upon Virginia Union University, an HBCU (Historically Black College and University), to abandon plans to demolish Richmond Community Hospital and instead explore plans to restore and repurpose this building.
Richmond Community Hospital stands as a witness to the harsh reality of segregation that necessitated its construction when Jim Crow laws prevented black citizens from being treated in white hospitals. This brick building also stands as a monument to the struggles and triumphs of the people who came together to care for each other. Historic restoration of this 1932 Art Deco structure is the best way to honor this legacy of determination.
Virginia Union University plans to raze the building for parking and apartments. An unspecified offer to “memorialize” the structure has been offered. The Historic Richmond Foundation has twice offered to convene a group of engineers and architectural historic preservation specialists to independently assess the state of the structure, but Virginia Union has not replied to their offer.
While we appreciate the financial challenges now facing VUU, we are called to add our voice to the chorus calling for preservation of the Richmond Community Hospital building.
Approved at Meeting for Worship with Attention to Business, May 19, 2024
Adult Spiritual Education invites all members and attenders, those new to Quakerism as well as seasoned Friends, to learn more about our history. Mark your calendars and plan on joining us on Saturday, June 22 at 9:30. Our topic will be Quaker History: Evolution and Revolution. Kelly Kennedy will get us started with a Zoom-easy introductory activity. Dan Shaw will cover early history from the 17th to the 19th centuries, and Scott Selby will address Virginia and Richmond history.
While no reading in advance is needed, some may want to brush up on Quaker history in preparation. Attached is an excerpt from Faith and Practice focusing on Quaker history. Feel free to read all, part, or none of it.
This session is ALL on Zoom. Please look for the link in the coming days as well as the day before June 22. We look forward to seeing many of you on the morning of June 22nd!
Please mark your calendar for the first of three educational programs to be sponsored by the ad hoc Committee on Race and Racism as we move forward on developing an action/implementation plan for Richmond Friends Meeting.
Ana Edwards, a public historian and faculty member at Virginia Commonwealth University who has been in the forefront of efforts to build a memorial park in Shockoe Bottom, site of one of the nation’s largest slave markets, will be our guest speaker. Edwards is chair of the Sacred Ground Reclamation Project and a founding member of the Defenders for Freedom, Justice, and Equality, which focuses on prison reform, education, and social justice.
She will speak and answer questions on Saturday, May 11, from 10 - 11:30 am at the Meetinghouse with light refreshments to follow. The program will be available on Zoom and in person.
Edwards subject is “Progress and Pushback: The Challenges of Changing a Race-Based Society.” Here is its description:
Richmond was founded as another trading center during Virginia's colonizing era and began to come of age as a southern political center following the Revolutionary War. Slave labor and race-driven social policies were well established and controversial enough by the start of the new nation in 1783 to be hotly debated at the legislative level--even as Black people hoped and struggled for freedom--from then until slavery's abolition in 1865. This session will use the event known as Gabriel's Rebellion to explore Black life and aspirations in the new republic's entrenched slave society, and the impact of this era on life today.
Quakerism 101, a four-session introduction to Quakerism, its history, writings, values, and beliefs held its first session on Sunday, April 28, at 9:30 am with more than 30 friends attending. This session addressed “The Light Within: What Quakers Believe" with a panel discussion from Howard Garner, Steve Humphrey, and Rita Willett. Three other sessions that are planned for later this year:
• Quaker History: Revolution and Evolution on June 22, 9:30 am on Zoom.
• What do Committees Do? RFM Organization, Business Meeting, and Terminology, date TBD
• Living in the Light: Quaker Organizations in the US and Around the World; How Quakers Live in the World Today, date TBD
Born of long-term Quaker tradition and originally established to help those suffering economic hardship due to acts of conscience, the Fund for Sufferings was reinstated at Richmond Friends Meeting in 2009 to be used for short-term help for members and attenders in financial need. A major distinction between this fund and the Meeting's annual operating budget for Care and Counsel is that Friends may contribute directly to the Fund for Sufferings by sending a check earmarked for that purpose to the RFM Assistant Treasurer. Applicants for Fund for Sufferings assistance submit a request in writing to the clerk of Care and Counsel. The process allows confidentiality for both donors and recipients.
The 2023 co-clerks of Care and Counsel are Sylvia Shurcliff and Denna Joy. (They are in the RFM Directory.) Reach out to them should you have need for guidance about or support from the Fund for Sufferings.
Since the transmission level for Richmond and the surrounding area is now at low levels, per CDC guidelines, mask wearing is now optional. We will still crack the windows to allow for proper ventilation and the air purifiers will be running.
There is so much happening in the realm of social justice, environment, and world emergencies.
How to keep informed and act according to our Quaker values? The following organizations can help you take timely steps to address various issues. Subscribe to get their updates.
“The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) promotes a world free of violence, inequality, and oppression. Guided by the Quaker belief in the divine light within each person, (they) nurture the seeds of change and the respect for human life to fundamentally transform our societies and institutions. (They) work with people and partners worldwide, of all faiths and backgrounds, to meet urgent community needs, challenge
injustice, and build peace.” They offer several workshops to increase our knowledge and develop skills to act.
In addition to these activities, they work directly with populations in need.
FCNL seeks a world free of war and the threat of war, a society with equity and justice for all and a community
where every person’s potential may be fulfilled. They lobby members of our national legislatures on issues
related to Middle East and Iran, Nuclear Weapons, Peacebuilding, US wars and militarism, gun violence
prevention, Just Immigration, Justice Reforms and Native Americans. They will keep you up to date on
upcoming legislation so you can communicate with your legislators most effectively.
Richmond Friends Meeting is affiliated with Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy (VICPP), a non- partisan coalition of 25,000 members, including 750 houses of worship, 1,000 clergy of all faiths, and people of goodwill, ten chapters (and growing!), many partner and affiliate organizations, most of the judicatory leaders in the state, and activists in every House and Senate district in Virginia, all working for a more just society.” Just as FCNL helps us make our efforts effective on a national level, VICPP helps keep us informed about current legislation initiatives.
RFM supports Virginia Interfaith Power and Light (VAIPL), a local branch of national organization which is dedicated to bringing together faith communities to “mobilize a religious response to climate changes through energy conservation, energy efficiency, and renewable energies." Similar to the other organizations they can help keep you reliably informed on current legislation and local initiatives.
Friends are asked to return to wearing masks during Meeting for Worship.
The community transmission rate in Richmond and surrounding counties is now High, according to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Transmission). Therefore, the Ministry and Worship Committee asks that starting January 8, 2023, we will wear masks for in-person worship. Friends may also choose to join 11:00 worship online using Zoom.
Here are the guidelines that the CDC provides:
• Wear a mask indoors in public and on public transportation.
• Stay up to date with COVID-19 vaccines.
• Get tested if you have symptoms.
• If you are at high risk for severe illness, consider taking additional precautions.
M&W committee will keep an eye on the community transmission rates and make changes in the future as directed by the CDC.
Barbara Myers, for the Ministry and Worship Committee
The “Aging in Community Support Group” restructured to a simpler format this past year. In July, the aging group approved a scaled-down organizational structure; essentially needing only a clerk and four care coordinators, dropping the “official” program and social chairs and donating the collected funds in our treasury. This donation was made to Faith Community Church to purchase supplies for the repair of houses of needy seniors.
In summary:
● The Mission Statement is “We want to help each other. We want to be a source of practical, emotional, and spiritual support to help each other as we age in community. “
● Membership is open to retirement age members and attenders of Richmond Friends Meeting. Membership is open to non-Quaker spouses.
● The aging group will have one yearly meeting in January. The upcoming January meeting will be held at the Meeting house on Tues. Jan.10th from 4:00-6:00 pm.
● The Aging in Community Group will function autonomously under the care of Care & Counsel.
For more information, contact the current clerk, Ada Hammer or the incoming clerk, Carolyn Moul.
Martha Jane Menk, an attender and member of Richmond Friends Meeting for over three decades, passed away on August 3, 2022, after a prolonged journey with Parkinson’s disease.
An artist whose wide-ranging interests included watercolor, pastels, pastel chalk, monotype, and fabric, Martha is remembered for a thoughtful, problem-solving nature; a sense of fun and adventure; an appreciation of nature, music, and children; and a deep capacity for friendship.
“The Quaker way of life was just perfect for her,” recalled Gary Janak, her husband of thirty-three years. Even as Martha’s health declined, she found joy in experiencing the Quaker qualities of love, kindness, and inclusion, he said. Up until Covid-19 temporarily ended in-person gatherings at Meeting in 2020, “she just loved the camaraderie and interaction [of attendance at Quaker worship]. It was very comforting for her.”
Martha was born on January 25, 1951, in Canton, Ohio. She was the daughter of Donald Appleby Menk and Dorothy Hull Menk and had two brothers, Donald Jr. and Bruce. After the family moved to Richmond, Martha enrolled at Mary Washington College in Fredericksburg. There, she studied art under acclaimed painter Julien Binford and made enduring friendships. She graduated in 1973.
Two years later, Martha and a girlfriend made a 6,000-mile trek to California, traveling largely on back roads. She remained on the West Coast for several years—working at a waitressing job where she made lifelong friends, installing solar-powered energy units, and completing a Master’s of Art degree from Goddard College.
Returning to Virginia in the mid-1980s, Martha worked with several public-interest groups, including the Virginia Action Coalition and Housing Opportunities Made Equal of Virginia (HOME). At a Contra folk dance in October 1988, she met her future husband, Gary Janak. Quickly smitten, they married less than three months later, on January 1, 1989.
Martha taught art for several years at Battlefield Elementary School in Hanover County, leaving after son Isaac was born in July 1990. A journal entry soon after Isaac’s birth reflects the deliberative, introspective way in which Martha approached life. “New thought,” she wrote. “In considering choices for work, I think about the possibilities of opening a private school and the opportunity it would provide to be constantly involved and mindful of the principles I want my son to learn. . .I believe the process of setting up a school would certainly help me to achieve clarity of thinking of what values and objectives I/we feel are most important to Isaac’s education as a whole individual.”
A decade later, Martha acted on that leading. As her son was approaching middle school, she gathered a group of like-minded parents and discussed the possibility of creating a boys’ middle school. Seven Hills School was formed. The school, where she later taught art, was continuing to flourish at her death.
For several years in the late 1990s, Martha managed the Art Studio at the Children’s Museum of Richmond. There, she was known to many families as a reliable source of inspiring ideas for creative uses of unusual and simple found materials.
An attender at Richmond Friends Meeting beginning in the 1980s, Martha served on the Religious Education Committee from 1996 to 2003. She became a member of the Quaker Meeting in 2005. From 2007 to 2009, she participated on the Care & Counsel Committee, serving as co-clerk the latter two years. Other assignments included the Newsletter Mailing, Library, and Spring Retreat Committees. In around 1996, she served on the planning committee for the Baltimore Yearly Meeting Quaker Women’s Retreat. In 2017, she and Gary led a merry workshop at the spring retreat on making whirlygigs and pinwheels. For many years, Martha was an active member of the Quaker quilters, freely sharing her knowledge of color and design.
In her Northside Richmond neighborhood, she was known for organizing July 4th bike parades and front yard croquet games.
After Martha’s diagnosis with Parkinson’s disease in 2000, she and Gary proved to be a remarkable team in navigating that illness. With Gary’s devoted assistance, she continued to enjoy art, games, the Nationals baseball team, and nature. For a time, they managed two cabins for the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club, of which they were members. Even as the illness reached its final stages, Gary recalled, Martha would sometimes sit outside on the ground for several hours, filling buckets with leaves and grasses, which they turned into poster art.
A celebration of Martha’s life was held at the Meetinghouse on August 27, 2022.
This recommendation follows three meetings over the last two months with a marriage clearness committee composed of Annie Salter, clerk, Catherine Roseberry, Don Miller, and Randee Humphrey.
The recommendation will be held over until January's business meeting, to allow everyone a chance to get acquainted (and reacquainted!) with Maddie and Cameron. Please reach out to them!
Their wedding is planned on Saturday, May 20, 2023 at The Clearing (RFM's retreat center in Amelia County). Care and Counsel will organize a Marriage Committee to assist Cameron and Maddie with their plans, as is the custom when a marriage takes place under the care of Meeting. If you feel led to serve on the Marriage Committee, please reach out to Denna Joy and Sylvia Shurcliff of Care and Counsel.
Randee and Steve Humphrey are hosting a coffee at their home on Saturday, January 21 from 10-noon, so the Meeting community can greet and celebrate Cameron and Maddie. All are welcomed at 1604 Laburnum Park Blvd, RVA 23227. All are welcomed; questions /directions, contact Randee. Drop by and say hi and show your loving support!
On Sunday, November 6th at 11:00am, we’ll gather in worship at The Clearing for an opportunity to share treasured memories of those who have come before us, whether we are old-timers or newcomers at meeting alike.
Several years ago, the idea for a Meeting for Remembrance was formed, to keep alive the spirit and work of cherished Friends. We held our first Meeting for Remembrance in 2019, and decided to make it an annual tradition. We missed 2020 in the pandemic but resumed it last year at The Clearing. Join us again this Sunday, November 6th at 11:00am at The Clearing.
The CDC and the VA Dept of Health rate our region as LOW in community transmission of Covid. Hence, we are making modifications according to their guidelines and also in sensitivity to the desires of our Quaker community.
For the present:
These decisions were made by the Ministry and Worship Committee in consultation with the Clerk of Meeting, the Covid Working Group, and Building and Grounds. We thank the Care and Counsel committee members, our Greeters, for their support. Thanks to all for their input and for their Light in making these decisions.
Barbara Myers
Clerk of Ministry & Worship
Care and Counsel reminds everyone that the committee administers the Fund for Sufferings. This fund was born of long-standing Quaker tradition, originally to help those suffering economic hardship due to acts of conscience. Today, the Fund for Sufferings stands apart from our annual operating budget, and exists to support anyone in the RFM community who encounters sudden and disruptive financial hardship. The fund also relies on our individual contributions to help replenish it each year to a level that allows us to respond to personal and confidential emergency financial needs. To request assistance, contact the clerk of Care and Counsel. If you feel led to contribute, make a check payable to Richmond Friends Meeting and note in the memo line that the amount is for the Fund for Sufferings.
Friends, this is a quick reminder and update from the Care and Counsel committee that a Memorial Meeting for Worship for Jules Arginteanu will be held at 4500 Kensington Avenue at 3 p.m. on Saturday, October 1, 2022.
For those attending the Memorial Meeting via Zoom, here is the link.
Please feel welcomed to bring a potluck dish to share.
An outdoor reception will follow the Memorial Meeting at Ellen Arginteanu's home, 5303 Horne Street, Richmond, VA 23226. All are welcomed.
From the Care and Counsel Committee
It's been a long-standing autumn tradition at Richmond Friends Meeting to welcome new members of RFM at a reception held at the rise of worship. The Care and Counsel Committee will revive this tradition on First Day September 25, and invites everyone following Meeting for Worship to gather to welcome and recognize several new members and members by transfer. Covid protocols will be announced closer to the date.
This event is a good way for anyone contemplating "the fullness of membership" to learn more about the process of joining the Religious Society of Friends. Any member of the Care and Counsel Committee can be a resource on the subject.
F/friend Jules Arginteanu passed away Friday, August 5 in the care of hospice at home and surrounded by his family. Please continue to hold Ellen and Jules' family in the Light. Details of Jules memorial meeting will be provided later.
After a long illness, our F/friend Martha Menk died on Wednesday, August 3. Details about a memorial service will come later. Please hold Gary, Isaac, and their extended family in the Light.
From Care & Counsel: Friend David Hines passed away at 6:23 am today, July 18, from brain cancer. His wife Liza Bruce was with him. David and Liza were married under the care of Richmond Friends Meeting eighteen years ago.
Details about a Memorial Meeting for Worship will be shared in a later message. Please continue to hold Liza in the Light, with tender love.
The Baltimore Yearly Meeting (BYM) Annual Session will be in person for the first time since August 2019 with online programs as well. It is the time where folks from all over our Yearly Meeting gather to worship, conduct business and enjoy a wide variety of programs and activities, including morning worship sharing groups, evening plenaries, in person and on-line workshops, intergenerational activities, Meeting for Worship with attention to Business, interest groups and a two day retreat. There is programming for children, Junior Young Friends and Young Friends. Come up for the day or stay for as long as you like. ASE has funds available for people wishing to attend. Explore all the information about the Annual Session on the BYM website.
Commemorating 350 Years and 100 years of Camping Programs
Theme: Consider the Wildflowers- Rooted in History, Growing Toward Spirit August 1-7-In Person Hood College, Frederick MD
Pre-Session Online Workshops-6/26. 6/28 and 6/30
DEADLINE for In-Person Registration: July 15