Business Meeting Minutes May 15, 2022
Posted: under Minutes from Meeting for Business.
Bennington Friends Meeting for Worship with Attention to Business
May 15, 2022
Present: Timmy Bullock, clerk, Auberta Galusha, Gabrielle Isenbrand, Priscilla Tracy, Juliet Wright, and Michael Wajda.
We gathered in the Senior Center for meeting for worship with attention to business again wearing masks for safety during the pandemic. The meeting opened with a period of worship during which the clerk read the following quote from Edward Burrough:
Being orderly come together, [you are] not to spend your time with needless, unnecessary and fruitless discourses, but to proceed in the wisdom of God, not in the way of the world, as a worldly assembly of men, by hot contests, by seeking to outspeak and over-reach one another in discourse as if it were controversy between party and party of men, or two sides violently striving for dominion, not deciding affairs by the greater vote, but in the wisdom, love, and fellowship of God, in gravity, patience, meekness, in unity and concord, submitting to one another in lowliness of heart, and in the holy Spirit of truth….
“A Testimony Concerning the Work of the Lord,” 1662 (letter)
The recording clerk read the minutes of our March 20, 2022 meeting for business for information.
2022-09. Priscilla Tracy reported for Ministry and Counsel. The committee is asking the meeting if and when it wants to resume singing before meeting. Friends feel that with the continued presence of Covid and our practice now of masking, that we will defer deciding on singing until a later date.
2022-10. The Treasurer had distributed in advance and presently a list of last year’s special donations. We were asked to review the contributions and to make any changes if wanted. We affirmed the list as is and shown below, which includes the $300 that the meeting children will decide where to send later. The Treasurer will send out these contributions.
| Powell House | 300.00 |
| QREC | 100.00 |
| Friends Journal | 300.00 |
| Permaculture Project | 400.00 |
| NEYM Additional Contribution | 300.00 |
| FCNL Additional Contribution | 300.00 |
| BROC Additional Contribution | 300.00 |
| Quaker Earthcare Witness Additional Contribution | 500.00 |
| Woolman Hill Additional Contribution | 300.00 |
| GBICS Additional Contribution | 300.00 |
| FGC Additional Contribution | 300.00 |
| Sunrise Family Resource Center | 300.00 |
| For the First Day School Children to Allocate | 300.00 |
| TOTAL FOR 2021 | $4,000 |
2022-11. Michael Wajda offered an update on his leading to help nurture Quaker corporate practices to be anchored in the Living Reality of “That Which Is Eternal.” Michael met with a group of ten Friends on December 1, 2021, which included Timmy Bullock, Priscilla Tracy, and Alison Levie from our meeting. The purpose of that meeting was to consider next steps with his calling.
Michael is clear that his call remains strong and that he needs to attend to his own deep faithfulness all along the way. Yesterday he and Jean Rosenberg from Middlebury Meeting hosted a day of extended worship at Woolman Hill. There were 27 Friends present from 11 different meetings, including Noah Merril, NEYM General Secretary, who is a member of Putney Meeting. Timmy, Gabrielle, Priscilla, and Michael were there from Bennington.
Following a three-hour meeting for worship in the morning and lunch, Phil Fitz from Northampton Meeting facilitated the afternoon worship-sharing around the query “What was rising in us during this morning’s worship.” Many Friends spoke movingly of their morning experiences. Friends left feeling the day had been fruitful. Michael and Jean are committed to offering more of these extended worship opportunities at various locations around the yearly meeting.
Noah Merrill thanked those there from Bennington for the meeting taking Michael’s ministry under its care.
2022-12. Michael Wajda also reported on a consultation of Quaker leaders that he just completed clerking concerning the serious threats to democracy in the U.S. and around the world. This group of 18 Friends has produced a document entitled, “An Urgent Call to the Religious Society of Friends” that emerged over three consultation sessions during the past several months. Some of these leaders are now committed to carrying these concerns forward with five areas of focus:
- Initiating national online discussions within the Religious Society of Friends
- Initiating discussions within Friends Meetings and Churches
- Seeking other individual and organizational endorsers of the “Urgent Call” document
- Beginning some nonviolent resistance training
- Building a communications loop for this work
Michael, Bruce Birchard, former General Secretary of Friends General Conference, and Sam Caldwell, former General Secretary of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, have been leading this effort. Along with his deep sharing of the concerns, Michael sees his role as helping to keep the work spiritually grounded.
Our meeting would value a meeting for learning around these issues once the document is ready to distribute. The meeting especially wants to identify some specific actions that the meeting or individuals might take in support of this effort. Michael will keep the meeting informed as this work moves forward.
2022-13. The meeting asked Michael to speak to Margaret Cooley about open weekend dates this coming fall or winter so that we might explore holding a meeting retreat there.
The meeting closed with a period of worship.
Michael Wajda
Recording Clerk
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May 15 2022