March 16, 2010

Mourning Jay (and Gene)

This afternoon my beloved friend Jay Worrall died. Jay was a shining, Light-filled elder of our Quaker meeting here in Charlottesville who in an earlier era played a pioneering role...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 08:47 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

March 07, 2010

R&R

I've had a wonderful time, these past few days, hanging out at home with Bill the spouse, doing a bunch of work on my (soon to be disclosed) Next Big...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:12 PM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

September 05, 2009

Qtube-- what a resource!

If you want to learn about the form of Quakerism to which I belong, you should head over to the brand-new "Qtube" website published by Baltimore Yearly Meeting and click...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:17 PM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

June 07, 2009

First-day thoughts: My latest trip

One cool thing about Quakers is that, by tradition, we don't use the Nordic/pagan names of the days of the week that are common in western society, but use a...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:18 PM | Fulltext link (7 comments)

November 08, 2008

A Gandhian talisman for Barack Obama

President-elect Obama faces many daunting challenges. Without a doubt the most daunting will be the still-escalating unraveling of the western-dominated financial system. By the way, yesterday I taped a segment...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:08 AM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

November 06, 2008

Thinking of My Son the Lieutenant

(This is Scott writing.... and reflecting) It's been a month since I last saw my son Keith, at a dinner where we said our farewells. I miss him; I am...
Posted by Scott Harrop at 08:02 PM | Fulltext link (0 comments)

September 14, 2008

Realism, war, and pacifism

Is pacifism the new Realism? Or is Realism the new pacifism? I've been toying with both arguments for a while now, including back in June when I made the first...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:38 PM | Fulltext link (4 comments)

September 03, 2008

Iraq: Another Quaker in the 'Red Zone'

The best-known U.S. Quaker to have undertaken a peace-witnessing mission inside post-invasion Iraq was Tom Fox, the widely loved member of Christian Peacemaker Teams who was killed there in early...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:13 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

August 08, 2008

At Baltimore Yearly Meeting

The reason I haven't been posting much here this past week is that I've been at the Baltimore Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. As nearly always seems...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:20 PM | Fulltext link (14 comments)

April 30, 2008

Great resources on Quakers... on YouTube!

I just found a collection of wonderful video shorts on YouTube, that show members of the Quaker meeting (congregation) in Watford, UK, both practicing and talking about Quakerism. They are...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 07:04 PM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

April 20, 2008

Fear and violence: Lessons from John Woolman

Today I co-taught the sixth of seven classes I'm committed to teaching to the second- and third-graders in our Quaker meeting's First Day School (Sunday school.) My co-teacher, Linda Goldstein,...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:58 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

January 27, 2008

Very important: Quaker peacebuilding, Kenya

Readers may or may not be aware that the largest body of Quakers anywhere in the world is in Kenya. I have thought and prayed a lot for them during...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 12:09 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

January 01, 2008

My article on the post-9/11 world in 'Friends Journal'

Earlier this year I had a strong leading, as we Quakers say, to do more writing for a specifically Quaker audience. This is a part, really, of the personal/spiritual journey...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:54 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

November 14, 2007

US Quaker activists gather

This past weekend was the annual conference of the Friends Committee on National Legislation. Veteran Quaker activists on peace issues and other issues of intense social concern had come to...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:13 AM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

September 09, 2007

Yo navego en ti...

I've been think a lot recently about interdependence. In particular, the specific form of interdependence that exists between the (less than) 5% of the world's people who happen to be...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:19 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

April 16, 2007

Tragedy at Virginia Tech

Tragedy has struck the community at Virginia Tech, our state's "other" fine flagship university, which is located around 120 miles southwest of my hometown, Charlottesville. Apparently a single gunman went...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:33 PM | Fulltext link (17 comments)

April 04, 2007

US citizens: where do our tax dollars go?

The Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL)-- which is the excellent American Quaker lobbying organization with which I have a loose affiliation-- has a great downloadable flier titled Where Do...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:56 AM | Fulltext link (4 comments)

March 24, 2007

Quakers and slavery, contd.

In the post I wrote here yesterday about Quakers and slavery I was arguing that it is probably just as important-- for Quakers and others-- to reflect deeply on the...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:25 AM | Fulltext link (11 comments)

March 23, 2007

British mark bicentennary of their slave trade abolition

Here in London, many people are making a pretty big deal out of an Act passed by Parliament in March 1807 that outlawed the involvement of British ships in the...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 06:49 PM | Fulltext link (14 comments)

February 15, 2007

New affiliation with the Friends Committee on (US) National Legislation

I am very happy to announce the start of a new affiliation I have taken up, as "Friend in Washington" with the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL), which is...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 02:18 AM | Fulltext link (6 comments)

February 11, 2007

A few random notes from Cairo

1. We're staying in "Garden City", a portion of the near-downtown that used to be filled with very gracious 1930s-style Art Deco homes. Now, few of those remain, and they're...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:53 PM | Fulltext link (6 comments)

December 25, 2006

More Light!

We've now gone through the period of the shortest day, here in the northern hemisphere. From now on, we will have more light. We Quakers frequently use the term "Light"...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:39 PM | Fulltext link (152 comments)

August 06, 2006

Quakers in America for 350 years

After arriving back in the US from Uganda, I spent most of last week at the Annual Sessions of Baltimore Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)....
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:02 PM | Fulltext link (5 comments)

June 20, 2006

Deborah J. ('Misty') Gerner

My dear friend Deborah J. Gerner (also known as 'Misty') died yesterday. She'd sustained a hard battle against increasingly invasive forms of cancer for the past eleven years. She was...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 07:27 PM | Fulltext link (5 comments)

June 16, 2006

Every heart a peace factory!

Whew!! I just finished the painstaking process of going over the page proofs for my upcoming book Amnesty After Atrocity? Healing Nations After Genocide and War Crimes. The page layout...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 01:58 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

June 04, 2006

Henri Nouwen on atrocity and violence

What a gift today was. This morning in Quaker meeting I found myself reading a little book called "Peacework" by Henri Nouwen. I don't usually read during worship, but today...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:30 PM | Fulltext link (5 comments)

March 11, 2006

RIP Tom Fox

My heart is so heavy I don't know what to write... about the discovery of Tom Fox's dead body. Go the CPT's website today and you can read the agonized...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:36 PM | Fulltext link (7 comments)

January 25, 2006

Religion, war, peace, and March 2 event

If you're in New York City on the evening of March 2, then you can come hear me and some other, much more inspiring folks. We taking part in a...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:15 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

December 30, 2005

Quaker prison ministry, California

I found a wonderful blog today, written by a Quaker from Sacramento, California who pursues a QiGong-based prison ministry inside some of the state's biggest and most inhumane prisons. It's...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 08:33 PM | Fulltext link (10 comments)

December 18, 2005

Christmas in our Quaker meeting

Quakers generally hold that every day is as holy as any other, every place is as sacred as any other, and every person equally as much a child of God...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 08:30 PM | Fulltext link (13 comments)

October 13, 2005

Quaker retreat coming up

Tomorrow afternoon, I get the huge pleasure of leaving town and joining many friends (Friends) from my Quaker meeting here in a weekend-long retreat over near Richmond. I'm really looking...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:21 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

December 26, 2004

Quakers, simplicity, and Christmas

I belong to the "unprogramed" strand of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), which means that when we come together to worship we do so very simply indeed. We have...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:59 AM | Fulltext link (7 comments)

November 27, 2004

U.S. Quaker activism against war

The Friends Committee on National Legislation is a public interest lobby founded by American members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), that for more than 60 years has sought...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 07:24 AM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

December 28, 2003

The planet as rickety boat

I got back home from my trip to China and California yesterday and managed to get to Quaker meeting this morning. It was SO good to be back. Quakers frequently...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:28 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

December 24, 2003

China, and the 'meanings' of Christmas

In many of the places I went to during my recent visit to Beijing--and certainly, throughout the whole of Incheon airport, in South Korea--I found massive, very obtrusive manifestations...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 02:30 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

August 02, 2003

Quaker gathering

I am still here at the annual session of the Baltimore Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). I have been a fan of Quaker process for a...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:40 PM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

February 16, 2003

New York Demonstration

I was one of the lucky ones yesterday, at the anti-war demonstration in NYC. That is, New York's finest (the cops) actually graciously allowed my daughter, her fiance, and me...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:10 PM | Fulltext link (0 comments)