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Closing time

This blog has been dormant for nine months, and it’s now time to close it down.

I just finishing writing about how the Quaker issues I was dealing with here have resolved themselves, in my letter of transfer from North Shore Friends Meeting to Friends Meeting at Cambridge (Mass.), and you should read that as the conclusion to this blog. In short, I’ve recommitted myself to the Quaker project after a long period of ambivalence.

You might wonder, why not revive this site then, instead of shutting it down? Partly I find it confining to have a thematic title like “The Seed Lifting Up.” Partly I want to segregate my Quaker-related writing from everything else as little as possible. (Same goes for Q and non-Q readership.) And I want to reduce the number of websites I run.

I’m not sure how long I’ll leave this up — perhaps indefinitely, though if so I’ll probably scrub it a bit, of the posts and comments I feel are not of great permanent value. On a live blog I like to avoid that, but now that it’s closed it feels different, like a manuscript that might be improved by editing.

I’d like to thank all the old school (and new school) Quaker bloggers who commented and/or inspired me to blog — Pam, Martin, Cat, Marshall, Simon, Richard, Wess, Forrest, Matt, Robin, Liz, Nancy, James, and others.

I expect to get somewhat active in the Quaker blogosphere again in the coming months. My new all-purpose blog is at www.zachalexander.com, and if you just want to keep up with Quaker posts there, you might bookmark this Google blogsearch page (feed). I’ll post a better link here when I reorganize my categories and tags.

If you want to catch up on what I’ve been up to in the last nine months, it’s included a research paper on the humanistic psychology movement, a Quaker workshop at a young adult UU conference, enjoying clothes, writing guests posts at John Remy’s site Mind on Fire, thinking about the presidential race, going to the recent YAF conference at Earlham, and taking trips to Montreal. Next week I am going to FGC for a few days — perhaps I’ll meet some virtual Quakers there?

Lessons on outreach from British Friends

A note on being constructive

The post-religious destiny of Quakerism

Business, Quaker chocolate and dried peas

Carrying the Society as long as you can

Mutual aid and Olympia Friends

La espiritualidad post-religiosa

Report on the Nontheist Friends interest group at New England Yearly Meeting

Nontheist Friends interest group on Tuesday




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  • There is a joke about the Russians, sometimes told by Russians. A young man from the provinces, inspired by a local doctor, travels to St. Petersburg because he wants to study “life.” He reads, he writes and eventually he enters medical school. On the first day of class the professor enters the hushed auditorium and announces, “Gentlemen, today we will discuss the pancreas.” The young man leaps from his seat, enraged. “The pancreas? How dare you mention the pancreas! We are not here to study the pancreas, we are here to study ... LIFE!”

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