Silent Auction is On!

Silent Auction is On!

The Woman’s Society is holding a silent auction to raise money for Tedford Housing, which runs the adult and family shelter apartments in Brunswick.

The auction opened this past Sunday (November 24) and will run until just after Meeting on December 15. Find gifts and treasures! Be generous as you can, as we support our neighbors in need.

Thanks to all who have donated items, and to all our bidders!

Wreath Making and Maker Café at Durham Friends, December 5, 2025, 5:30 pm

Featured

On Thursday evening, December 5, there will be a hands-on wreath making session at the Meetinghouse. Supplies will be provided (or bring your own). Also a light supper. Also Music!

Wreath making, 5:30 to 7:30

Makers helping all who come: Kim Bolshaw and Wendy Schlotterbeck

Cafe, 6:30 to 8:00

Light supper (feel free to volunteer to make something); Music by Craig Freshley

This will be the first of a series of Quaker Maker sessions on Thursday evenings at the Meetinghouse. Watch this website for further announcements.

Makers Sessions Planning Dinner, October 4, 5pm

Maker Sessions — A Planning Meeting, October 4, 5pm

Craig, Leslie, Ellen, Doug, Kim, and Ezra have met a couple of times to talk about “Maker Sessions” — a way build community within and beyond Durham Friends Meeting.

Please join us to share ideas, hopes and aspirations at 5 p.m. on October 4 at the Meetinghouse.

A pot-luck “soup-er supper” will be served.

Details about ideas generated up to this point can be found here: https://tinyurl.com/55fea32z And you can always ask questions or send comments to craig@Freshley.com. 

Listening Session, September 22, after Meeting

Ministrfy and Counsel announces:

This Sunday, September 22, we will be having a Meeting-wide listening session to continue our ongoing conversation regarding

the use of Zoom technology in the Meetinghouse during our Sunday worship.

We expect to allot1 hour for the discussion, which we will hold after fellowship and the rise of Meeting. Approximately, from 12:00-1:00 pm.

Please bring your thoughts, comments and questions so that we may discern our way forward with this important aspect of our community life!  

Respectfully,Tess Hartford, co-clerk of M&C

Singing for Shepherds, Worship via DFM, September 15, 2024


Here is some background to September 15 Worship presentation regarding Singing for Shepherds — Leslie Manning

Sunday, September 15, 2024
9 a.m–6 p.m. Eastern // 6 a.m.–3 p.m. Pacific

You’re invited to a joyful, hopeful drop-in Zoom event. Participate as a whole meeting, as a Sunday school group, as a family, or as an individual Friend. You can come anytime and leave anytime. Appropriate for all ages!
 
During this day-long gathering, we’ll focus on two missions among pastoralist people in Kenya: Samburu Friends Mission and Turkana Friends Mission. We’ll hear stories about these missions, watch videos, and look at photographs. We’ll sing hymns together, pray for the missions and the people, and have a little fun with trivia. Depending on when you come, you might hear a Scripture-based message, join a prayer, see photographs of the missions, watch videos about the missions, participate in a trivia game, or sing a hymn. The activities will switch often. If you come for a whole hour, you might encounter as many as nine different elements.

We’ll also set a goal for $1000/month in new contributions to these missions. Why monthly commitments rather than one-time donations? Because these two missions bear remarkable fruits. They create church communities, run schools, provide health care, give scholarships, and deliver emergency feeding interventions, and yet it’s perpetually difficult to raise the necessary monthly funds to keep them going. We pray for the opportunity to change that as a global community. Every commitment will help, no matter how small.
 
All are welcome to participate in the event, and the hope is to have a Spirit-filled, brimming-with-love celebration of stories of faithfulness. If your Meeting or church has Zoom capability, you can join all together during your social hour or religious education time or even for a half-hour period as part of your business meeting agenda. Or join in as an individual, couple, or family. Please come.
 
Register here to receive a Zoom link:  tinyurl.com/singingforshepherds. Registration is free. You’ll receive the link to participate right away, but if you lose it, don’t worry. It’ll come again a week before the event, and the day before,  just to make sure everyone has it.

Still have questions? We have a question-and-answer page here.

Meet Mary Rowlandson, July 19, 2024, 7pm

Meet Mary Rowlandson, presented by Quaker storyteller Katie Green

Friday, July 19 at 7 PM, Durham Friends Meeting

Based on her own account, Mary speaks of her capture by Native people during Metacom’s Rebellion, aka King Phillip’s War, in 1670’s Massachusetts. 

This challenging narrative will be followed by discussion on issues that remain important today- racism, theocracy and right relationship with Indigenous neighbors.

It will also be made available by Zoom; please email durham@neym.org for details.

AFSC Briefing, June 29, 3:30pm, Friends School Portland

Invitation:

A conversation with Joyce Ajlouny, General Secretary, American Friends Service Committee, and

Keith Harvey, Director, AFSC Northeast Region

Saturday, June 29, 2024, 3:30 p.m., Friends School of Portland, 11 US-1, Cumberland Foreside, ME

Learn about AFSC’s life-saving aid in Gaza, support for immigrant rights, and ongoing commitment to confront injustice and promote healing among the Wabanaki communities in Maine.

(Click here for driving directions listed on the school’s website.)

Please RSVP by June 21

This is a rare opportunity to hear first hand about some crucial and desperately needed work bringing our Quaker witness to life in the world.

Keith Harvey, AFSC’s Regional Director, will update us on AFSC’s work in the Northeast, especially its advocacy on immigration and the rights of indigenous peoples in Maine. Joyce Ajlouny, AFSC’s General Secretary, will speak about AFSC’s work globally,  including an update on the work our Meeting has been supporting in Gaza. 

Please help us in spreading the word, and RSVP’ing at this link: https://secure.afsc.org/a/conversation-afscs-joyce-ajlouny 

Also, we welcome some help! We could really use 2 set-up helpers, 2 break-down helpers, and those of you who feel led to hold this very important AFSC mission and presentation in the light, to do so in person. If you can be one of those helpers, please contact Becky (steelebecky@gmail.com) or Doug (douglas_mccown@yahoo.com).

FWCC’s Quaker Connect Program

Durham Friends is considering applying to participate in FWCC’s Quaker Connect Program. (FWCC is Friends World Committee for Consultation, the organization that links Friends across the globe.)

Members of Durham Friends are encouraged to read these materials and participate in discussions around whether the Meeting should consider seeking to participate.

The three paragraphs below give a brief overview of the program. More information can be found on the Quaker Connect website.

Quaker Connect helps Friends meetings and churches to try new experiments and learn from each other how to connect the depths of our Quaker tradition and the breadth of our Quaker community with the living reality of our local context under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Quaker Connect will be a structured network of Quaker meetings across the branches of Friends
in the Americas. Each participating local meeting will nominate one to three Friends to join a cohort
of other energized Friends in virtual workshops over a two year period. At the heart of the program,
each meeting will choose one signpost of renewal that is lacking in their meeting, one Quaker,
Christian, or FWCC practice to address the need, and take three months to try the experiment, and then initiate further experiments. Robust evaluation and communication processes are essential parts of the program. Quaker Connect is designed to adapt and seed the continuing revitalization of the Religious Society of Friends.

In the United States, the project is being funded through Lilly Endowment’s Thriving Congregations
Initiative. An additional $200,000 grant from the Thomas H. and Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund
will extend the program to Friends outside of the United States—from Canada to Bolivia—and
enhance collaboration among Quaker organizations to support the growth and vitality of the
Society of Friends.

MEIRS Gala Invitation, July 12, 6:00 to 9:00 pm

Maine Immigrant & Refugee Services (MEIRS) is holding its 2nd Annual gala, themed “Connecting Cultures, Creating Community,” on Saturday, July 12, from 6:00 to 9:00 pmin Lewiston at the Agrora Grand Event Center.

Bopnnie Lewis (MEIRS) wrote Wendy Schlotterbeck, “Here is the Gala information for your crew! Let me know if they are interested. I think everyone would have a wonderful time and they would get to meet some incredible people who are new Mainers!  Along with the fabulous food there will be dancing and music!!!! We would ask you to come as our guest!”

Thopse interested in attending should contact Wendy. More information on MEIRS available here and also below.

Falmouth Quarterly Meeting & Potluck Dinner, June 8, 2024

Falmouth Quarterly Meeting will hold a community gathering on Saturday, June 8, 2024 at 3pm at the Durham Friends Meetinghouse. All are welcome. We will plan family fun, some worship, purposeful connection time and singing.

Potluck- Quaker Feast at 5:30.

Please come for any or all of the day on Saturday- “Sing and rejoice, ye Children of the Day and of the Light” (G Fox)

Gathering for Friends with a Concern for Gospel Ministry

June 8, 2024, 10:00 a.m. to mid-afternoon

Location, Durham Friends Meeting

Brian Drayton (Souhegan) and Noah Merrill (Putney), following a concern, invite Friends active in gospel ministry to gather for worship and conversation at the Durham (Maine) Friends Meetinghouse from 10 a.m. to mid-afternoon, June 8th, 2024.

You may travel in ministry, or your service in speaking as led in worship may be primarily in your own meeting. If you contribute to the vocal ministry under a sustained sense of duty and concern, you are invited to join us.

If you hope to attend, or have questions, please email Brian and Noah.

Diana White Memorial Service, June 22, 11am to 2pm

The Memorial Service and Potluck for our member Diana White will be held Saturday, June 22 from 11-2 at Durham ME Friends Meeting (durhamfriendsmeeting.org) and available on Zoom. 

The memorial service will be from 11:00 to 12:15, with the potluck lunch to follow.

Diana, formerly of Farmington and Portland Meetings, was also a clerk of Friends Committee on Maine Public Policy and active in New England Yearly Meeting in several leadership roles.  She was the first woman to serve as Treasurer of the Yearly Meeting.

To learn more about her, please read her recent First Day message postyed on this website, “What I Bring to the Spiritual Potluck.

And join us on the 22nd to celebrate her life and spirit.  All are welcome.

Getry Agizah at Durham Friends on Sunday, May 19 and again on Monday, May 20

Getry Agizah will bring the prepared message to Durham Friend’s semi-programmed worship this Sunday at 10:25 

and

visit with Woman’s Society Monday evening at 7 PM.  Both events are available by Zoom or at the Meetinghouse, durhamfriendsmeeting.org.  FMI contact durham@neym.org

Getry is the Programme Coordinator for FUM’s Africa Ministries Office in Kisumu. She coordinates the work of the Friends Church Peace Team, as well as overseeing the Girl Child Education Programme, and guiding the formation of the new Shepherd Boy Scholarship program. She also manages FUM’s relationships with Turkana Friends Mission and Samburu Friends Mission.  Her ministry has been financially supported by the Falmouth QUarter for many years.

Getry’s will and heart are in peace work. She has spent the past fifteen years working for peace, both in and outside Kenya in countries like Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Southern Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, China, South Africa, Guatemala, and Ireland. She has also traveled within the U.S.A. to raise support for Friends Church Peace Teams, visiting Quaker churches and Meetings in many of the States. Her hobbies are traveling, doing reconciliation work, and helping her society to know real peace.

Annual Family Campout, June 8-9, 2024, Now Cancelled

UPDATE June 2, 2024:

Due to a major broken water pump at Betsy’s cottage in Georgetown, we need to cancel the Family Campout scheduled for next weekend- June 8-9. Instead, we invite Friends to gather at Durham Friends meetinghouse on Saturday only (no planned events on Sunday)

For those interested- come at 10am Gathering for Friends with a Concern for Gospel Ministry with Brian Drayton and Noah Merrill

At 3pm all are welcome to a FQM Quaker Community Gathering at Durham Friends Meetinghouse. We will plan family fun, some worship, purposeful connection time and singing.

Potluck- Quaker Feast at 5:30.

Please come for any or all of the day on Saturday- “Sing and rejoice, ye Children of the Day and of the Light” (G Fox)

Also Falmouth Quarterly Meeting gathering.

“Walking in the World as a Friend,” from QREC, 2nd Mondays in 2024 @7:30pm

an invitation from the Quaker Religious Education Collaborative:

Walking in the World as a Friend Discussion & Practice Group
Please join us for a free Online Practice & Discussion Group sponsored by Quaker Religious Education Collaborative (QREC)We meet monthly to enrich adult Quaker Religious Education for ourselves and our meetings/churches.Each month will open with worship and a message from the book Walking in the World as a Friend: Essential Quaker Practices. Then we will hold worship sharing to hear from each person, followed by a discussion on any questions, reflections, or implications for us as Friends and our witness in they world, then close with worship. We may discuss practices, such as journaling, spiritual companions, and faith and practice or scripture study, that help us and our meetings/churches.We are using Walking in the World as a Friend for reference. You may purchase the book at CourageousGifts.com or download the PDF HERE for free. You may also watch the videos on YouTube.
Monday, January 8, 2024 7:30pm Eastern US Time
Experiences of Living in the Spirit and the role of a Minister (pp 27-30 or relevant videos)
Monday, Febuary 12, 2024 7:30pm Eastern US Time
Experiment with Spirit and the Role of the Steward (pp 35-37 or relevant videos)
Monday, March 11, 2024 7:30pm Eastern US Time
Essential Quaker Structures as an Ecology of Practices (pp 45-58 or relevant videos)
In 2024, we plan to meet the second Monday of the month in January, February, and March and take a one-month break in April. We expect to continue this pattern of 3 months on and 1 month off through 2024. This is spiral curriculum. Every time we engage the themes, we bring more to the reflections and go deeper.

REGISTER HERE

FGC Changing Times Conference, January 18-21, 2024

Join Us Online January 18-21, 2024
Registration is Open
Dear Leslie, Registration is open for FGC’s Changing Times Conference –
In these changing times, how is Spirit moving among us?

Join Friends from across North America in seeking what messages Spirit offers us as we explore Spirit led growth and transformation. We will have time to deepen our spiritual lives, share ideas across yearly meetings and explore new ones as we meet online.

Our schedule will begin with a plenary each day followed by workshops and we will have the opportunity to reflect and consider the day’s events in Reflections Groups each evening. There will be morning worship and chances for fellowship online in the evenings.The main components of the conference are:Our connection to SpiritBecoming an Actively Anti-racist Faith CommunityChanging structures for Changing TimesThe Future of the Religious Society of Friends.Come, take a break, find community, share ideas and concerns and find refreshment as we seek together what messages Spirit offers us.
with excitement and gratitude,
Ruth ReberRuth ReberSpecial Events CoordinatorFriends General Conference1216 Arch St. #2BPhiladelphia, Pa 19107ruthr@fgcquaker.orgwww.fgcquaker.orgWhy this Conference now?
This online conference grew from the seeds of desires expressed by Friends in Gathering Anew Focus groups to have opportunities to share across Yearly Meetings and Monthly Meetings. It is one of four Gathering Anew Experiments to explore meeting Friends needs in these changing times.

In consultation, Yearly Meeting Clerks and Secretaries spoke of a deep desire to seek the Divine together. What messages might Spirit be offering to us at this time? Changing Times is a chance to explore together, some of the key questions before us. We are in a time of change, a time full of potential and choices.Who will speak to us?Tuning InFrancisco Burgos,
Executive Director, Pendle Hill
Francisco Burgos is the executive director at Pendle Hill and has facilitated spiritual retreats and lectio divina sessions for many audiences. Francisco was a De La Salle Christian Brother for almost ten years, serving in Dominican Republic, Guatemala, and Costa Rica, and has been a Friend since 2004. He is a member of Harrisburg Friends Meeting and an attender of meetings including Monteverde Friends Meeting in Costa Rica and Adelphi Friends Meeting in Maryland.Living into Continuing RevelationVanessa Julye,
Friends General Conference’s Associate Secretary for Organizational Cultural Transformation
Vanessa Julye, works on increasing awareness of White Supremacy and its impact in the Quaker and sectarian communities. She meets with and provides programs for BIPOC Quakers throughout the world both in-person and virtually. She has been recognized as having a calling to a ministry with a concern for helping the Religious Society of Friends become a whole blessed community. Vanessa speaks on racism focusing on its eradication and the healing of racism’s wounds.Changing Structures in Changing TimesTitle: Empower, Support, Cross-Fertilize, and Encourage
Paul Buckley is a member of Clear Creek Friends Meeting in Richmond, Indiana. Since his graduation from the Quaker Studies Program at the Earlham School of Religion, he has been a traveling minister and a writer on Quaker topics. He is serving as the Clerk of OVYM’s Restructuring Committee. His most recent publication is a 2023 Pendle Hill Pamphlet, Quaker Testimony: What We Witness to the World, the product of twelve years of thought and contemplation on Quaker Testimony.

Title: Restorative Quaker Design
Rashid Darden is a member of Friends Meeting of Washington and Associate Secretary for Communications and Outreach for Friends General Conference. He is also a novelist who focuses on the Black LGBT experience, whether in contemporary fiction or in urban fantasy. 

Title: The economic and sociologic context of contemporary Quaker experience and how it informs our future
Barry Crossno is a member of the Monthly Meeting of Friends of Philadelphia sojourning  with Cleveland Friends Meetings. He serves as the General Secretary of Friends General Conference. He brings to FGC a deep commitment to the future of the Religious Society of Friends and the  nurture and care for Friends.WorkshopsEach day offers a new selection of workshops focused on the topic of the day. Check out the website for a full listing of topics and leaders.
 Learn more about the Speakers and Workshop LeadersRegister Now
Some workshops have limited space.
And please consider making a gift.
Your support helps make FGC programs like the Gathering possible and accessible. Whatever the amount, your contribution connects Friends, newcomers, and meetings in spiritually powerful ways. Thank you for nurturing a vibrant Quaker faith!Support Friends. Give Today.Like what you’ve read? Please help us by sharing this Gathering update with your friends and Friends by using the buttons below!

Joy and Love, from Maine Council of Churches

For five weeks every year, songs about the incarnation of Christ can be heard playing everywhere—on your radio and TV, at the car wash, in the grocery store.  And just about everybody knows the words.  They might not be able to tell you what the first book of the New Testament is (just for the record, it’s Matthew), but they can tell you that all is calm, all is bright on a silent, holy night in the little town of Bethlehem where away in a manger the little Lord Jesus lay down his sweet head while certain poor shepherds lay in fields listening to angels on high singing “Gloria in excelsis deo,” and three kings of the orient bearing gifts traverse afar.   Christmas carols are, after all, the best known of all religious music, and these days, most people get the only theology they have from the carols that they sing.  This year our Advent blog series will explore a favorite carol each week, listening to familiar words with fresh ears and learning the story of when, where, and why they were written. (We also have an Advent message for December’s National Gun Violence Prevention Sabbath available at this link.)
O Holy Night
O holy night! the stars are brightly shining. It is the night of the dear Savior’s birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining, till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope- the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!
Fall on your knees! O hear the angel voices! O night divine, O night when Christ was born!
O night, O holy night, O night divine!

Truly He taught us to love one another. His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother, and in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we. Let all within us praise His holy name.
Christ is the Lord! O praise His name forever! His pow’r and glory evermore proclaim! 
Christmas Eve 1906. The clock on Reginald Fessenden’s workbench in Brant Rock, Massachusetts, struck nine.  He carefully set the needle of his Victrola down on a spinning record and pointed a homemade microphone into the gramophone horn.  When a short aria by Handel finished playing, he stopped the record, and moved the microphone over to his wife, Helen.  He motioned to her to begin reciting the words from the second chapter of Luke’s gospel, the story of Jesus’ birth, but she froze in fear and couldn’t speak.  Flustered, Reginald brought the microphone up to his own mouth and blurted out, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace…to men of good will.”  (It should have been “peace, good will toward men,” but close enough!)  Then Reginald handed the microphone to Helen, picked up his violin, leaned in as close as he could and played the French carol “O Holy Night.”  He sang the final refrain before switching off the transmitter.
 
Somewhere out in the cold, dark, Atlantic Ocean, miles to the east of where Reginald and Helen sat wondering if their experiment had worked, wireless operators on several U.S. Navy and United Fruit Company ships sat in amazement.  Before that moment, the only sound they had ever heard coming through their radio headsets were the dits, dots and dashes of Morse code. But on that Christmas Eve, they heard music and the sound of a man’s voice saying, “Glory to God in the highest.”  It must have seemed like a miracle!
 
Three days earlier, Fessenden had transmitted a message in Morse code to ships at sea telling them to have their wireless transmitters turned on at 9:00pm on Christmas Eve.  He was going to test out his theory that if he combined two frequencies together he would be able to transmit more than just Morse code over radio airwaves—he would be able to transmit music and the spoken word.  This theory had gotten him nothing but ridicule—in the press, in the business world, even in scientific circles.  He was seen as a crackpot outsider with hare-brained schemes.  But on Christmas Eve 1906, it was his voice reciting the gospel of Luke, his violin playing “O Holy Night,” that were heard for the first time over the radio.  After his death in 1932, a stone memorial was erected over his grave bearing these words: “By his genius distant lands converse and men sail unafraid upon the deep.”
 
Fifty-nine years before that first radio broadcast, another pair of oddball misfits who lived in France had composed “O Holy Night.”  Placide Cappeau, misfit number un, was the wine commissioner of Roquemaure, a small town in the south of France where Monsieur Cappeau didn’t quite fit in. For starters, he only had one hand (his right hand had been amputated when he was 8 years old after a playmate accidentally shot him); then there was the fact that, unlike his devout Catholic neighbors, Placide Cappeau didn’t attend church; and finally, the icing on the gâteau—he was a political radical, affiliated with the socialist movement.  But he was known in his village as someone who had a way with words—he enjoyed writing poetry as a hobby.  So, when the town church’s organ was renovated and plans were made to include a rededication ceremony during Christmas Eve services in 1847, the local priest asked Monsieur Cappeau if he would write a special poem for the occasion.  Cappeau wrote the poem, “Cantique de Noel,” and then, realizing his words really should be set to music for maximum effect, asked his friend Adolphe Adam to compose a song to go with it. 
 
Enter misfit number deux: Adolphe Adam, a Jewish musical composer who worked in vaudeville, opera and ballet with a notoriously bad temper and a permanently empty bank account.  He had his fifteen minutes of fame as composer of the music for the ballets “Giselle” and “Le Corsaire,” but then a tantrum put him on the outs with the movers and shakers of the Paris opera world, and he spent the rest of his life in bankruptcy.  That day in 1847, he accepted his friend Placide’s request and wrote the soaring score we now know as the tune to “O Holy Night.”  The combination of music and poem made the carol instantly popular, and soon it was being sung in churches and homes all over France.
 
That is, until French religious authorities got wind of the fact that the carol’s composers were a non-believing socialist and a red-light-district musician with Jewish ancestry.  Immediately the carol was banned from churches throughout France.  For more than two decades it would not be heard in worship services there, though it continued to be sung in homes and loved by many.  It wasn’t until Christmas Eve 1871, during the Franco-Prussian War, when a French soldier laid down his weapon, faced the enemies’ guns and sang “O Holy Night,” the Germans responded by singing a carol by Martin Luther, and a Christmas truce began, that the French Catholic church relented and once again allowed “O Holy Night” to be sung in worship.
 
Despite its twenty-year ban in the churches of France, the carol had grown in popularity across Europe and even in America, where a young Unitarian minister who believed deeply in the movement to abolish slavery, was so inspired by the words of the third verse that he felt compelled to translate the entire carol into English.  It was an instant hit, particularly in the North, during the Civil War.  
 
You may not be surprised to learn that this American, Rev. John Sullivan Dwight, was…you guessed it, a bit of a misfit, an outsider!   Extremely intelligent, John Dwight had attended Harvard Divinity School and then took his first call.  But after only one year, he had to resign because he suffered from what we now know as agoraphobia. After leaving the ministry, he tried living in communes associated with the Transcendentalist movement (think Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson), but eventually found his calling as a writer and music critic, and the founder of an influential music journal.
 
And so, the story of “O Holy Night” is a story of outsiders, outcasts, misfits and broken people: a disabled socialist poet, a bankrupt Jewish vaudevillian, an agoraphobic abolitionist, and a ridiculed crackpot inventor playing his violin into a microphone that might—or might not—be transmitting his song to anyone. 
 
That sounds like a story that’s got God’s fingerprints all over it!
 
Outsiders, outcasts, the ridiculed.  It’s the story of Christmas, too.  Mary: the unwed pregnant teenager.  Joseph: the man facing the prospect of raising someone else’s child.  Together: part of a community oppressed by the occupying forces of the Roman empire, forced to deliver a baby in a stable and lay him in a feed trough.  Then there’s the shepherds: people not welcome in polite company—dirty and smelly, they slept outdoors, were often suspected of being thieves, their testimony wasn’t acceptable in a court of law.  What about the magi?  Strangers, foreigners from the East, who practiced a mysterious religion and had unfamiliar clothes and customs.  The oppressed, the poor, the hurting, the outsiders.  That is who comes to the manger. 
 
Even as an infant, Jesus was already turning the world upside down.  Dirty, smelly shepherds are serenaded by angels from heaven; foreigners who practice a different religion are among the first to be invited to meet the Christ child; and an unwed, pregnant teenager becomes the mother of God.  Once again, God chooses the foolish and the weak to transform the world; God stands with the poor, the outsider, the last and the least that they might be first in the kin-dom, that their souls, in the words of the carol, might feel their worth, that their weary hearts might feel the thrill of hope.
 
But God doesn’t stop there.  As the final verse of “O Holy Night” expresses so beautifully, God is clear about how we are each called to respond to that thrill of hope, to that great good news that our souls do have worth in the eyes of the Creator.  We are to love one another, to abide by God’s law of love and to preach Christ’s gospel of peace.  We are called to recognize every enslaved person as our brother, our sister, and to work to break the chains of oppression in all its many forms: poverty, hunger, addiction, racism, loneliness, greed.  When we hear the Christmas story, when we listen to the beautiful words and music of Placide Cappeau, Adolphe Adam, and John Sullivan Dwight, we should ask ourselves, “What am I doing to give others the thrill of hope?  What can I do to break the chains of oppression?  How can I show others the worth of their soul?”  There is a weary world out there in need of hope.  There are people in need of love and peace and justice.  Do we have a song to sing to them, a story to tell them of a new and glorious morn? 
 
I believe that we do.  I believe that we, like Reginald Fessenden, are meant to sing that song out into the night sky, even though we’re not sure anyone will hear it.  We sing because we have faith, trusting that someone is listening, and maybe, just maybe, because they hear us, will no longer be afraid to sail upon the deep. 
 
May it be so.
 
All of us here at the Maine Council of Churches wish you the blessings of hope, peace, love and joy this Christmas and in the New Year,
 

Rev. Jane Field, Executive Director
Maine Council of Churches
202 Woodford Street  |  Portland, ME 04103
www.mainecouncilofchurches.org

Click here to read the whole Advent Blog series. 

“Returning to the Land” Webinars from Toward Right Relationship

UPDATE: Peace and Social Concerns is asking that Friends meet at the Meetinghouse to view these webinars together (and to do the readings suggested beforehand). .

The Peace & Social Concerns Committee at Durham Friends Meeting Invite you to a Webinar Series, January-February 2024:

“Returning to the Land” by Nia To Go There (Cree) 

Nia To Go There, PhD will offer a series of four webinars that are co-sponsored by Toward Right Relationship with Native Peoples and Decolonizing Quakers (both national Quaker organizations). Nia will recommend short readings for each program. 

January 13, 3:30-5 pm: “Returning to the Land: Cultural Perspectives.” Readings for this first session are AT THIS LINK.

January 27, 3:30-5 pm: “Returning to the Land: Seeing with a Native Eye.” Readings for this second session are AT THIS LINK.

February 10, 3:30-5 pm: “Returning to the Land: Colonization.” Readings for this third session are AT THIS LINK.

February 24, 3:30-5 pm: “Returning to the Land: Decolonization.”

Durham Friends look forward to some collective thinking about how we bring the important messages from these sessions home to Maine.

We hope to see you for all or some of these sessions at our Meetinghouse, 532 Quaker Meetinghouse Rd, Durham ME 04222.

Please contact Ingrid Chalufour at ichalufour@gmail.com with questions or to ask to have recommended readings forwarded to you.

Meetinghouse Use Guidelines, 2024

Durham Friends Meeting continues to monitor the health risks associated with COVID and other infectious diseases, and adjusts these guidelines for Meetinghouse use from time to time. 

We hold worship services at our Meetinghouse every Sunday.  On the 1st, 2nd and 3d Sundays (First Days) of each month, we also provide the opportunity to participate via ZOOM. 

We use air purifiers  in the worship room. Please use them for all meetings and events. You may temporarily move an air purifier from the worship room to another room that you are using for a smaller meeting. Please return it to the Meeting room after your event.  We also ask that you turn on overhead fans when using the worship room

Masks are no longer required in the Meetinghouse. For the safety of those choosing to continue wearing a mask, there is a section of the Meeting room where we ask that no one without a mask should sit. We have a supply of masks available at the entrances to the meetinghouse.

We ask that those who feel If you feel even the slightest bit unwell, please stay home and join us on Zoom.  If you come down with Covid within 3 days of attending a meeting at the meetinghouse, please contact us so that we may let others know. 

Fellowship before and after meetings is encouraged. We are continuing to be cautious about serving food, but coffee and tea are available after Meeting for Worship. 

COMMITTEE AND OTHER MEETINGS

Meetings and events should be scheduled on the Durham Friends Meeting calendar. Committee clerks can schedule meetings; others need to contact our Trustees for scheduling events. At present the trustee to contact is Sarah Sprogell. There is a link to the calendar on the Durham Monthly Meeting of Friends website. Note if it is a Zoom meeting, in person, or hybrid.

These guidelines apply to all members and attenders, as well as families or any group seeking to hold memorial services or similar events.

Training to Be a Volunteer in Support of New Mainers

From the United Way of Mid Coast Maine, lifted up by Peace and Social Concerns

For those interested in volunteering with the New Mainers in Brunswick! 

I am pleased to announce that we will be holding a public volunteer orientation on December 11th and December 14th at Curtis Memorial Library in the Morrell Meeting Room from 2 pm until 4 pm on both days. 

The orientation will include: 

  • Overview of New Mainer Needs/ Background 
  • Cultural Competency 
  • Expectations of Volunteers 
  • Panelist discussion with community organizations 
  • Opportunity to sign up for volunteer opportunities 

Please sign up for one of the two days at this link: https://volunteer.uwmcm.org/event/

Again, thank you so much and I hope to see you in a few weeks. Don’t hesitate to reach out with any questions!

Best, Maggie Cummings, Community Response Coordinator, United Way of Mid Coast Maine

34 Wing Farm Pkwy, #201, Bath ME 04530

Phone: 207-295-3876

Main Office: 207-443-9752

maggiec@uwmcm.org | uwmcm.org