May 10, 2015

MEETING SCHEDULE AND PROGRAM

TODAY

9:00 AM    meeting for worship (unprogrammed)
9:45 AM    worship with attention to business: David Woolley, clerk; Tom Ward, recording clerk
11:15 AM    meeting for worship (semi-programmed): speaker, Sandy Olson; care of meeting, Lolly Lijewski

UPCOMING MEETING EVENTS

Adult Program next Sunday at 10:15: Care of the Future. Minneapolis Friends Meeting has launched a planning process to consider how to care for the future of the meeting. The strengths, challenges, risks and opportunities lists that have been generated at a previous adult program and online will be reviewed. Those in attendance will be asked to draw conclusions from this assessment. These conclusions and the brainstorm lists will inform the rest of the planning process. Please come!

Next Sunday, May 17th, is the last day of the school-year schedule. Beginning May 24th, there will be a combined worship at 10:00 on Sunday mornings. If there are volunteers, there will be time for relaxed coffee and conversation after worship on Sundays except for potluck Sundays, (the first Sunday of the month.) See the sign up sheet on the bulletin table to help host a coffee/tea time!

Renae and Tom are looking for volunteers to close the unprogrammed meeting and to carry the microphone for summer unprogrammed meetings (first and third Sundays). There is a sign up sheet on the table by the elevator and Tom and Renae will be around after unprogrammed meeting today to talk, answer questions, accept offers, etc..

Decisions made at April monthly meeting
* Approved Roland for membership in the Meeting.
* Approved Clifford as clerk of Semi-Programmed Worship Planning Committee.
* Approved these members of Nominating Committee:  Roberta, Sigurd, Tom, Ed, with Jeannette as clerk.
* Nominating Committee will recommend two or three people as coordinators for unprogrammed meeting.
* Approved the 2015 State of Society Report

MFM and Mayim Rabim will host a showing of Inequality for All, a film about wealth disparity in the US, on Wed, May 20th. For more about the movie, see IFA.com. Plan to come and bring friends or family members.

May 31st – Sunday afternoon clean up. Please stay and tackle a portion of getting the work done. Outside and inside tasks.

Zephyra and Roland Shepherd Scholarship applications and eligibility criteria are available on the long table in the east hall and are due June 1st.  This scholarship for post-secondary education was started by the Shepherds in 1977. Applications should be mailed back to the meetinghouse or put in the Shepherd Scholarship file in the blue box.

Robert and Gwen are being married under the care of the Meeting Saturday, June 20, in the late afternoon. Please mark your calendar and plan to come. All in a Friends Meeting are encouraged to take part in the called meeting for worship during which the marriage is solemnized.

Before summer turns your mind to mush – SAVE THE DATE for Fall Camp, a weekend retreat for Minneapolis Friends Meeting members and attenders, October 10 and 11 at Villa Maria. Put the date on your calendar and plan to come!!

Offering boxes are located on small tables near the meetingroom doors. Thank you, Friends, for your financial support of the Meeting’s budget. Copies of the Meeting’s new 2015-16 budget are available on the table in the long hall. Stewardship and Finance Committee will report on the final numbers from last fiscal year at a monthly meeting for business, likely today!

OTHER HAPPENINGS AMONG QUAKERS

Fellowship and worship at the home of Louise, Tue, May 12th, 7:00 – Sometimes a thought-provoking recorded program, sometimes visiting, often a period of worship. All welcome at this informal time of sharing.

Friends School of MN Plant Sale ends today! at the MN State Fair Grandstand. All Friends School plants are neonicotinoid-free (bee-friendly!)

There is still time to register for Northern Yearly Meeting Annual Session (May 22-25), “Climate Change: Turning awareness into action.” Registration and schedules are available – paper copies are on the elevator table; online, see: northernyearlymeeting.org/article/2015-annual-session-may-22-25 . There will be a reunion of people who were NYM teens in the  mid to late 80s and early 90s.

Are you interested in building broader Quaker connections and enjoying deeper involvement with Friends in the region? Minneapolis Friends is a member-meeting of the regional gathering of Friends called Northern Yearly Meeting (NYM). For some, the best way to build connections is by working together and Northern Yearly Meeting offers many ways to engage in the life of the yearly meeting. Working with children and youth, budgeting, annual sessions planning, inter-Meeting outreach, spiritual nurture, or connecting NYM Friends with national and international bodies of Quakers are some of the opportunities. If you already enjoy the NYM annual session and would like to deepen your connection, or if you would like to start to engage in NYM, let us know how!

Pendle Hill’s Continuing Revolution: A Young Adult Friends Conference on Equality, a six-day intensive exploration of spiritually-rooted activism, will be Jun 5th-10th, exploring the Equality Testimony. Work to unpack your own privilege and power, and develop a greater capacity to confront the many intersecting systems of oppression in our communities and in the world. Workshops, lectures, small group opportunities, fellowship, and both programmed and unprogrammed worship. Rolling application; space is limited. More at: pendlehill.org/learn/conferences-institutes/yafcon .

Friends General Conference (FGC) Gathering will be held July 5-July 11, 2015, at Western Carolina University in the Smoky Mountains. Worship, workshops, kids’ program, speakers, films, art, bookstore, Friends from all over the U.S. and Canada. Info at FGCGathering.org. Registration has begun. Financial aid may still be available from FGC. Funds remain through Northern Yearly Meeting. Thinking to help plan the Gathering in 2016? Take this opportunity to experience the event!

The Fellowship of Friends Of African Descent is sponsoring a conference this summer for Friends of Color and their families, Fri, Aug 21 – Sun, Aug 23, Arch Street Friends Meetinghouse in Philadelphia. To be included in the mailing list and receive information about the event, email Deborah Saunders: deborahsaunders1(Replace this parenthesis with the @ sign)aol.com with: last name – first name – phone – street address – city, state – zip code – email address. Info also on FB – Fellowship of Friends Of African Descent.

COMMUNITY EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES

Twin Cities Meeting is looking for a new resident caretaker to start in July! Live rent-free in the meetinghouse in exchange for taking care of the building. For more about the job and application, see tcfm.org . Applications accepted through May 15.

Every Church A Peace Church’s next potluck meeting is Mon, May 18th, 6:30 PM at St. Joan of Arc Church, 4537 – 3rd Ave. S, Mpls. Veterans for Peace’s Steve McKeown will speak on “The Path to Nonviolence: One Man’s Journey.” ECAPC is a national network of people committed to the premise that the Church could turn the world toward peace if every church lived and taught as Jesus lived and taught.

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Pat Jones will be in the office Wed. from 2:00-5:00 and other times Wed, Thurs, Fri. and Sat. Carolyn is out of the office this week. Bulletin deadline, noon Thur. Submit items via phone, email, or note in bulletin file in the blue box.