The mission of Circles RVA is to “offer a relationship-based model to empower individuals and families to permanently move out of poverty and thrive by engaging the strengths, goodwill and existing resources of the community and focus on the collaborative ownership of solutions to break the cycle of poverty”. Circles RVA is an area of focus for the Peace & Social Concerns Committee. As part of our support we are providing four dinners for their weekly meetings.*
Our third meal for Circles RVA will be on September 24. Mark Skolnick will be collecting donations to cover the costs for this meal. If you would like to help with the serving of this meal, please contact Rhonda Ligon or Verna Boos. *(RFM has made the commitment to support these four meals for Circles RVA).
Baltimore Yearly Meeting Queries on Peace (2013 Resource for Faith & Practice)
How does my life reflect “the virtue of that life and power which takes away the occasion for war”? Where there are hatred, division, and strife, how are we instruments of reconciliation and love? How do our lives illustrate our understanding of the basis of our peace testimony? As we work for peace, are we nourished by peace within and among ourselves? How do we regard those we believe have harmed us or others? How does this affect our spiritual lives?
Peace Voices (2013 Resource)
We must be prepared to make the same heroic sacrifices for the cause of peace that we make ungrudgingly for the cause of war. There is no task that is more important or closer to my heart. Albert Einstein, c. 1930
It is not our Quakerism, or our pacifism, or our knowledge, or skill, or emotion that overcomes hate and violence. We shall surely fail if we become proud of our virtue and traditions and become vain in our witness. We shall fail if we think the power that may move through us is our own. The power is not ours, it is God’s…. The foundation is faith in the power of God’s love to transform us and our society and to bring justice to the poor and the oppressed. Our task is to act, as best we understand what we are led to do, in obedience to that power. Mary Lord, 2002
