Earthcare activities in Pacific Yearly Meeting

PYM Committee on Unity with Nature

For more information go to http://members.aol.com/quakernature/

[On] our web site... you will find a selection of statements on the concept of "Unity with Nature" and our efforts to re-order our lives toward a more harmonious and Spirit-filled relationship to Creation.

One purpose for posting this literature is to enable us to read, comment and add to what has been written on the subject, so that we can come to unity on this "emerging testimony." This is the category under which "Unity with Nature" is found in the latest revision of the book of Faith and Practice of Pacific Yearly Meeting. Will it have fully "emerged" by the time of the next revision 10 or 15 years from now?

"What do Quakers mean by a 'testimony'?" you may well ask. A testimony, most Quakers will agree, is one of the essential principles by which we guide the living of our lives. Each Yearly Meeting examines itself every few decades and decides anew what these principles are ... but by and large, they are the same ones Quakers have tried to live by for 350 or so years:

• Peace
• Unity
• Simplicity
• Equality
• Community
• Integrity

From these principles we derive "Advices" - time-tested suggestions for our conduct as individuals and as worshipful communities, and "Queries" - questions to ask ourselves (again, many are the same that Quakers asked in the 1600s: "Do we live in the virtue of that life and power which takes away the occasion for all war?"). Queries are not the same as a catechism; there are no "right" answers. The goal is to remember to ask yourself the question, and the asking will lead you in the direction of the answer.

Given the short list of testimonies, the addition of a new one is not undertaken lightly. Is "Unity with Nature" truly (or at least ideally) a principle we believe in with the intensity that we hold the peace testimony? Would we lay down our lives for it? Or is it a variant on the testimony of simplicity, in conjunction with advices on stewardship, and therefore not so new as we think? The 1985 Pacific Yearly Meeting Faith and Practice queries on stewardship include: "How do we cherish and protect the natural world, of which all people are a living part?" Is this what we mean by being in "Unity with Nature?"

To help us reach unity on the subject of Unity with Nature, we offer writings by Quakers past and present, from within Pacific Yearly Meeting and elsewhere. The first group comprises material written or compiled by PYM-CUN itself, the second and third statements and quotations by individuals, and the fourth letters and minutes from meetings and other Quaker bodies (including Friends Committee on Unity with Nature, FCUN, which spans the North American continent). The latter, being collective works, will have been seasoned and revised until they convey the "sense of the Meeting" of the publishing organization.

Another purpose is to inform each other about ideas and actions that come about because of our sense that unity only within the human species (assuming that is attainable) is still insufficient. There are two new sections to this web site: one on current and prospective service projects undertaken by Young Friends (college age or recent graduates) with the sponsorship of PYM-CUN, and another on assessment of sustainability of Quaker meetings and their members. You may be able to help these new initiatives.

After the directory is a text window in which you may suggest other writings to be posted or write comments on any of the postings. Or copy them (see the notice at the bottom of this page) and make changes before e-mailing them back to quakernature@aol.com. Below the text window are suggested readings and links to other web sites for more information about the beliefs and habits of the peculiar people known as Quakers.

—Eric E. Sabelman, Clerk of Pacific Yearly Meeting Committee on Unity with Nature