Writing Opp: Food Choices (closed)

Are there any of our modern Quaker testimonies that aren’t affected by what and how and why and with whom we eat? We may not break bread as a liturgical act, but the Quaker potluck comes pretty close. Some of the deepest pastoral ministry I’ve personally experienced has taken place while washing dishes and putting away food in a meetinghouse kitchen. A few years ago I did a semi-methodical tour of a dozen or two meetings, and there was a very strong correlation between vitality and how long people stayed after worship to eat and talk over coffee.

Friends and food: there are really a lot of article possibilities with this theme:

• The politics of food, part one: I know there are many Friends itching to write an article about how we should all become vegans. There are lots of ways that less resource-intensive eating fits our testimonies.

• The politics of food, part two: how do kitchen-table spreads of tofu and chickpea dips reinforce certain stand-apart cultural norms (very white, very educated)? Are Friends who like their barbecue ribs less Quaker? What about meetings that still host the annual chicken dinner or clambake?

• Food as outreach: how have you used foods to re-energize a meeting or provide outreach to the local community?

• The Quaker folkways of food: You could probably ID a Quaker community’s theology and geography by looking at the selections on the potluck tables. There must be some good stories about our folkways! And what about those classic meeting cookbooks?

• Quaker producers: what happened to the Quaker farms that once dotted the countryside? Many have been falling away along with small- and mid-size agriculture everywhere; what have we lost? What should we try to keep? How have some adapted to changing food distribution? There continue to be great Quaker experiments in farm communal living and many Friends are involved in community-supported agriculture and community gardens.

Submit a piece for our issue: Food Choices

Learn more general information at Friendsjournal.org/submissions. There you will also find our newly updated list of upcoming issue themes through 2020.