Forum, September 2026

Maintaining Quaker testimonies and values?

I am very grateful for Sharlee DiMenichi’s excellent article on Jacob Hoopes (“Hoopes Sentenced to More Than Two Years in Prison for Assaulting an ICE Agent,” FJ June online; Aug. print). These are truly challenging times to maintain adherence to our testimonies and values as Quakers. I thank Jacob for his admirable statement of accountability. I hold him in the Light with hope that his faith is strengthened as he serves his time.

Carroll Ann Swanson
Marquette, Mich.

I would have hoped that Friends would refrain from violent protests in these difficult days. Friends convinced me years ago of the reality of the spiritual world. This would transcend petty political disputes and creaturely displays of emotion. In the past, Friends fed the starving in Ireland and Germany and rescued Jews from Hitler. This acting out is a failure of the communication of Friends’ traditions and practices to the contemporary world.

Kevin Johnson
Long Island, N.Y.

When Jacob spoke at the sentencing, he was filled with both contrition and determination, wiping tears from his eyes when he sat down. I believe that although this experience will follow Jacob for the rest of his life, his testimony of nonviolent resistance will have an even larger impact. Multnomah Meeting in Portland, Ore., is committed to supporting him through his incarceration and beyond.

Ron Braithwaite
Portland, Ore.

Let me get this straight: Quaker-affiliated Jacob Hoopes has been sentenced to 30 months in prison and more than $8,000 in restitution for throwing a rock at an ICE agent, who suffered an injury that required medical treatment? Meanwhile, since January, ICE agents have shot to death more than a dozen Americans and not one of them, to my knowledge, has paid any penalty. Did medical treatment help their victims? Did they pay restitution? Have they been held accountable for taking a human life? Where is the justice? What is justice? What is the Quaker response to this state of affairs? Do we seek an eye for an eye, or do we forgive? Is there a middle ground?

Neal Burdick
Shelburne, Vt.

Are we outsourcing our moral discernment to attorneys and insurance companies?

I know we take safeguarding very seriously (“Child Safeguarding in Quaker Spaces” by Sharlee DiMenichi, FJ Aug.). Because we are all good people, we want to make sure that our environment is safe for all.

I think we take it more seriously because we are all responsible. I think many churches assume the minister will handle it (wrong and mistaken, the minister might be the problem), but without such people, we all need to take our responsibilities seriously. I say this as safeguarding lead for trustees, so I know how seriously we take this.

Steve Clough
Via Facebook

As an advocate who has spent the last decade working with survivors of church-based sexual abuse, I read “Child Safeguarding in Quaker Settings” with concern. Safeguarding policies are important, but their primary function is protecting institutions from liability and decreasing the odds that sexual abuse will happen in settings for which institutions are legally responsible. They have little preventive utility beyond that. The safeguarding industry is now mostly a product of insurance companies, which have incentive to maximize profits and minimize claims. In more ways than I could list here, this industry has betrayed the survivors whose courage led to its existence. We further the harm when we mistake these policies for comprehensive prevention.

For communities that care about healthier responses to sexual abuse, I offer the following:

When people under your care are abused, admit wrongdoing if you’ve done wrong. I’ve seen many enabling leaders defensively brandish their safeguarding policies to distract from how they’ve actually treated victims. As I read the article, it struck me that the only interviewed person who expressed regret, horror, and personal responsibility for the care of survivors was Mike Hanas, head of school at Carolina Friends School, who took exactly the steps that every survivor advocate I trust would have recommended that he take.

We must face our communal histories of abuse with courage and honesty, or they will haunt us forever. We won’t break cycles of violence by outsourcing our moral discernment to attorneys and insurance companies, and we won’t learn from survivors when we silence them through legal bullying and non-disclosure agreements.

Cultivate emotional and spiritual maturity; when it comes to prevention, nothing matters more. Immaturity looks like defensiveness and evasion. Maturity looks like adults taking genuine responsibility for their own choices and for the wellbeing of children.

Stephanie Krehbiel
Lawrence, Kans.

Talking openly about our failures to protect

Without a full accounting we have diminished our ancestors’ testimony (book review by Addi Schwieterman of The 18th Century Enslaving Industry: Lancaster Quakers Involvement, FJ June-July). If we don’t learn from their missteps we will be doomed to make our own. Abomination is a real term that is over used, but American chattel slavery was a literal abomination.

Josiah Daniel Spriegel
Via Facebook

I come from a religious background where people are more likely to bury and whitewash the history, often backed by powerful institutions like the church. By contrast it’s nice to see books like these get published and Friends actively tackling these issues in pursuit of justice and honesty.

Properly documenting history and talking about it openly (including coming to terms with our ancestors’ involvement in atrocity) is the only way to move forward toward reconciliation and a more peaceful future.

Johnny Warren
Via Facebook

Nothing in, nothing out

Rufus Jones was once criticized for speaking prepared ministry in meeting (“Speaking with Spiritual Authority” by Peter Blood-Patterson, FJ June-July). He replied: of course I prepare. I read my Bible every day, as the advices say. I read the Bible and other books that reveal the works of God. I then spend many a time in quiet prayer finding communion with God. 

It has often been observed that Quakers have not done away with ministers but with the laity. It is the responsibility of all members of a meeting to be open to the possibility that they may be called to speak during worship. Like a computer program, if nothing goes in, nothing will come out.

Clive Nicholls
Via Facebook

While I understand the reasons behind no longer acknowledging recorded ministers or elders—Blood-Patterson describes it as reluctance “to do anything that could be perceived as elevating some Friends . . . above others”—I agree with the author that we are also preventing certain Friends from fully exercising their spiritual gifts.

It might be difficult to restore recorded ministers and elders in certain meetings, but I agree with the author that it could deepen the worship experience and allow Friends to explore and use gifts that they might not have even known that they possessed.

Mabon Finch
Duluth, Minn.

Don’t talk to strangers?

“Woman, Great Is Your Faith!” is a thoughtful rumination on this less discussed—at least at our meeting— Jesus story (Look to the Light, Quaker.org, Aug. 10 message by Ron Hogan). Living in Center City Philadelphia, I am occasionally approached by strangers for help (i.e. money) and also have had people knocking on our door for help. While it’s always annoying to my dark side, I always remember my mother telling us about how our Quaker grandmother, when approached by a stranger at their little farm, would always give them something to eat and a little money. When my mom would ask her why she’d do that, grandmother would say, “He could be Jesus.”

Signe Wilkinson
Philadelphia, Pa.

Jesus grew spiritually during his time here. He didn’t come fully formed as he would have if he was the God incarnate I was taught to believe. When reading the Old Testament and then the New, I wonder if God also matured from an adolescent, revenge-oriented, ego-driven god to a more compassionate and wiser god.

My personal understanding is that “Jesus” is a label we have attached to a concept that is much bigger than traditional Christian beliefs. It pains me to see that label now attached to a god that is more like Zeus than to the teachings of the man/prophet/emissary from God I have come to understand from my reading of the New Testament and my observations of people of faith in other traditions.

Suzanna Leigh
Vashon, Wash