Quakers and Leadership

In this episode of Quakers Today we ask, What do you expect and need from a leader?

• Kat Griffith steps out of her comfort zone and runs for local office. The lessons she has learned about herself and her community will encourage, inspire, and challenge you. Learn more about her experience through her article, “One Quaker’s Excellent Adventure in Politics.”
  • Kat is a former high school teacher, homeschooler, and yearly meeting co-clerk. She describes her current circumstances as “cheerfully unemployed but awfully busy! Interesting times and no lack of meaningful work!” She is primary caregiver to her 91-year-old mother-in-law, is active in Northern Yearly Meeting, clerks the vibrant Winnebago Worship Group in east-central Wisconsin, writes regularly for Friends Journal, interprets (Spanish/English) for FWCC, and is editing an antiracist clerking manual—a work in progress. She is also busy with county board work and a range of local social justice, community building, and environmental initiatives. Personal joys include kayaking, snowshoeing, writing, cooking, tending a ridiculous profusion of houseplants, being a news junkie, and most recently, learning ASL.

• Windy Cooler shares a review and a reflection about the award winner film, Women Talking. See Windy’s longer written review of the film, “A Thought Experiment in Sympathy and Love.” Windy Cooler, is currently the convener of Life and Power, a discernment project on abuse in Quaker community.
  • Windy Cooler (she/her) is an embraced public Friend and the assistant clerk of Sandy Spring (Md.) Meeting of Baltimore Yearly Meeting. Her ministry has long centered on Quaker caregiving in times of crisis and in group discernment: finding the wisdom in communities to address sticky issues. A regular guest of Quaker communities in the United States, and more recently in the United Kingdom, she is also Pendle Hill’s 2020 Cadbury Scholar and a 2022-23 fellow of Odyssey Impact, a change-making organization that centers story-telling as a strategy for building social justice.

• Jean Parvin Bordewich tells us about Bayard Rustin and other Pacifists who revolutionized resistance. She reviewed the book War By Other Means: The Pacifists of the Greatest Generation Who Revolutionized Resistance by Daniel Akst.
  • Jean Parvin Bordewich is a member of San Francisco (Calif.) Meeting, now attending Friends Meeting of Washington, D.C. She is a trustee of Guilford College in Greensboro, N.C. A former senior staff member in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives and local elected official in New York's Hudson Valley, she now writes plays about politics and history.

You will find a complete transcript of this episode and more show notes on the Quakers Today page at Friends Journal.

Question for next month

In the July episode of Quakers Today we ask, What do you desire?

The question comes from listener Glen Retief. Glen asks us to consider this question, What do you desire? It is a broad question that you can answer in lots of ways. What do you desire for yourself? Your future? Your relationships? It could also be connected to the wider world around you. What do you desire for your community? The place where you worship? Or for other earthlings? What do you desire?

Here is our question for you to consider. What do you desire?

Leave a voice memo with your name and the town where you live. The number to call is 317-QUAKERS, that's 317-782-5377. +1 if calling from outside the U.S.

Quakers Today is the companion podcast to Friends Journal and other Friends Publishing Corporation (FPC) content online. It is hosted by Peterson Toscano, and it is produced for Friends Journal through Peterson Toscano Studios.

Season Two of Quakers Today is sponsored by American Friends Service Committee.

Do you want to challenge unjust systems and promote lasting peace? The American Friends Service Committee, or AFSC works with communities worldwide to drive social change. Their website features meaningful steps you can take to make a difference. Through their Friends Liaison Program, you can connect your meeting or church with AFSC and their justice campaigns. Find out how you can become part of AFSC’s global community of changemakers. Visit AFSC dot ORG. That’s AFSC dot ORG

Send comments, questions, and requests regarding our podcast.. Email us at podcast@friendsjournal.org.

Music from this episode comes from Epidemic Sound. You heard In Love with Myself (Instrumental Version) by Katnip, Hidden Fields by Clarence Reed, Shinjuku by Leimoti, Rising Hope by Reynard Seidel, Work Together by Isola JamesGuuter Gator by Benjamin King