QuakerQuaker This Week, 2/26/12

On the blogs, Robin Mohr wrote about Friends leadership and vision and the "Nakedness/You're Not a Quaker" responses continue with two more follow-up's among this week's Editor Picks. Elsewhere, the Modern Quakers and Clothing project has been collecting some great personal stories. And on a housekeeping note, donations for QuakerQuaker have been pretty light lately; please consider helping out, either with a one-time gift or by signing up for the monthly $10 plan.

This Week's Editor Picks:

• Nat Case: Nakedness

  Can real nakedness be the basis of identity? Could it be that all the stuff we use to bind ourselves together is getting in the way? If we wish to utterly open ourselves to truth, to go out naked into February, do we need to shed the very name itself? Is the truest Quaker the one who accepts no common identity—no meetinghouse, no clerk, nothing? How could such a Quakerism survive? How would it avoid frostbite? quaker
• Jeremy John: Fasting from Information, Finding God in the Silence

  [When do we] invite the river of the Holy Spirit to flow through [our] own channels? The channels that are already cut into [our] own mind and heart? occupychurch occupyDC faith qq
• Martin Kelley: Vision and leadership: keeping the long view

  If a need arises from outside of the boundaries of [an] internal structure, it is ignored: there's little incentive to address it. The only real solution is to keep remembering why we're doing what we're doing. It's the practice of self-reflection, it's the exercise of asking what we might be called to. Perhaps this is a leader's real job description. qq quaker quaker.leadership
• Robin M: Vision and Leadership

  I would love to hear a) any stories of Quaker leaders & committees/organizations that have functioned well together past or present or b) advice on how you or someone you know have successfully navigated this pathway and what tools (spiritual or practical) you think are useful. quaker
• Johan Maurer: watching "Einstein and Eddington"

  "Who are we? If we are anything, we Quakers are men and women of principle. We will never believe that any man, woman or child is unwelcome in our beloved England because they were born in another country." qq quaker.britainym
• Simon St. Laurent: Aspiring to be Quaker
  Reading early Quaker history, it is hard not to be struck not only by the commitment of the Valiant Sixty but by the number of people who were interested in the message but didn't stay around. Reading Pennsylvania history, it's hard not to notice Quakerism falling off over the generations because the appeal of worldly things - fashion, slaves, and many kinds of business - had a greater appeal than the Quaker message. Waves of Quaker revival (and associated conflict) brought in new people, and drove…