Quakers, social justice and revolution

Is it impractical to invite North Korean visit?

Posted on October 9, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

Yesterday I wrote about the visit by a North Korean delegation to Bear Creek Friends meeting in 2001, and the meeting’s hope a similar visit could happen again. The question of whether such a visit would even be allowed was raised at the meetinghouse, and comments since also mentioned the travel ban in place against North Korea. The meeting approved the letter extending the invitation anyway.

Following are reasons I believe it is good to offer the invitation. Regarding the travel ban specifically, who knows how long that will be in place, for various reasons? It is being challenged in the courts. And the current administration will only be in power for a limited time. It may be upheld or continued in one form or another by subsequent administrations.

I don’t believe it will because it doesn’t represent the ideals of our nation, such as the free exchange of ideas and respect for others. It represents a mistaken view of security, which wants isolation, classifying and fearing others, closing borders, and building walls. Real security is achieved by building a society based upon valuing all of our people, and those of the world, celebrating diversity. By engaging in and sharing the things of real value in life–family, community, faith, recreation and the arts.

Extending the invitation to North Korea is an expression of faith that somehow, in some way we don’t yet know, perhaps a way will be found. Or it may not happen, but serve a different purpose. Perhaps those in North Korea, whether government officials or the people, maybe through some sort of underground communication, will hear about it. That might have some unknown influence in the future.

Maybe the impact will be on people in our own country, to encourage a different way of looking at our relationship with the people of North Korea and other nations.

We don’t know. But it feels like something similar to Martin Luther King articulating a dream. I’m very glad Bear Creek Friends were led to approve the letter and extend the invitation.

Martin Luther King, Jr memorial

Martin Luther King, Jr Memorial, Washington, DC

Martin Luther King, Jr, Memorial Washington, DC

Korean War Memorial

Korean War Memorial

Korean War Memorial Washington, DC

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Bear Creek, faith, North Korea, security | Leave a comment

Bear Creek Friends Meeting and North Korea

Posted on October 8, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

I just wrote about the current interest in the idea of “farm diplomacy” after a couple of editorials were published in the Des Moines Register. Sept. 1, 2017, Kenneth M Quinn, President of the World Food Prize suggested inviting a North Korean delegation to visit the United States as a way of easing tensions. In 1959 the Des Moines Register invited Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to come to Iowa to discuss agricultural practices. The Register’s Lauren Soth won a Pulitzer Prize in 1956 for that editorial, in part because Khrushchev accepted the offer.

Then Jon Krieg, of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) in Des Moines, shared the story at the bottom of this with Des Moines Register editor, Lynn Hicks, about AFSC hosting a North Korean agricultural delegation’s visit to Iowa in 2001. October 5, 2017, the Register published the editorial Could North Korea’s Kim visit Iowa, as Khrushchev did? Trump administration should try farm diplomacy.

In response, the author of the story about the 2001 visit (below) published in the Register:

Thanks to the Register for its Oct. 6 editorial, “Let’s Invite North Korea’s Kim to Iowa.”
It was my distinct pleasure and honor to accompany the five North Koreans who visited an Iowa farm in 2001. What a warm and friendly evening it was, as we gathered for a delicious potluck with friends at the Bear Creek Meeting House.
That kind of one-on-one conversation and exchange of ideas is sorely needed today.
Why not invite Kim Jong Un to Iowa? “Farm diplomacy” helped ease tensions in the 1950s. Why not now? It could be a powerful way to move the conversation with North Korea from bombs and missiles to food and feeding hungry people.
Herb Standing’s words still ring true today, “We must tell people that it is not through missiles and bombs that we find security and peace, but rather through the one-on-one sharing with persons of different countries, cultures and experiences.”
Let’s give it a try.
— Eloise M. Cranke, Des Moines

Several of the people who had participated in that visit in 2001, were at Bear Creek meeting this morning, 10/8/2017. They shared their memories of that time. Winifred Standing shared what she had written in her journal that day:

Wednesday, February 28, 2001
2 degrees above zero this morn. Sunny
I made an Economical Sponge Cake and a soybean casserole. Browned roast. Lots of phone calls this morn about wood and about tonight. I went to meetinghouse–cleaned a bit, set dishes out, got coffee pot ready, etc. I started cooking roasts at 2:00. Peeled potatoes. Eloise Cranke arrived just before 4. We visited with her until Randy Iverson and 5 North Koreans arrived. They looked at our heifers and quizzed Ellis. Eloise took me to meetinghouse about 5:15 to get supper started. Ellis brought Dads and Dorothy later. A good crowd gathered. A good supper and questions and answers around fireplace after–Home about 9. We visited and rested. Seemed a good evening.

We discussed how this might relate to our current political situation. I said I had shared the previous blog post with Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative)’s Peace and Social Concerns Committee, Scattergood Friends School, and several people at the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL). If another North Korean delegation did visit, I think a visit to Scattergood Friends School’s Farm at West Branch would be very beneficial.

The meeting wanted to support the idea of the Register inviting another delegation from North Korea to visit us, and approved the following letter.

A letter to North Korea

Dear friends,
Many of us at Bear Creek Friends meeting, in the Iowa countryside, were present, and fondly remember the visit of a delegation from your country in 2001. We enjoyed sharing a meal, having you visit one of our farms, and talking together about farming and each other’s families and lives.
Most of us are either farmers or have been involved in farming, and share your interest in providing food for others. It deeply saddens us to know not everyone has enough to eat, in our own country and around the world. We are very interested in doing whatever we can to help improve this troubling situation.
We would welcome another visit from your country. It would be very good to continue to share each other’s work and stories. To talk about how we can provide more food for the world.

Bear Creek Friends Meeting
Earlham, Iowa

AFSC article about North Korean ag visit to Iowa Spring 2001 Edited 2

Bear Creek meeting

Bear Creek members

Bear Creek Meeting

Midyear Meeting at Bear Creek

Bear Creek Meeting

Bear Creek meeting

Bear Creek meeting

With Christine Ashley (FCNL) and Jon Krieg (AFSC)

FCNL

Sherry Hutchison

IYMC Peace and Social Concerns meets at Bear Creek

Bear Creek Meeting

Posted in peace, Quaker Meetings, Uncategorized | Tagged Bear Creek, diplomacy, food, North Korea, Scattergood | 1 Comment

Swords into plowshares

Posted on October 7, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

And He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. Isaiah 2:4

Jon Krieg, AFSC Des Moines, shared the story, below, with Des Moines Register editor, Lynn Hicks, about the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) hosting a North Korean agricultural delegation’s visit to Iowa in 2001. Jon said Lynn recently visited China and talked about various agricultural projects and investments under way.

AFSC article about North Korean ag visit to Iowa Spring 2001 Edited

This led the Des Moines Register to consider extending another invitation to a foreign leader to visit Iowa, as it previously did to Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1955, to learn about agricultural practices here. Khrushchev accepted that invitation.

The editorial Could North Korea’s Kim visit Iowa, as Khrushchev did? Trump administration should try farm diplomacy was published October 5, 2017.

That editorial referenced one published by the Register Sept. 1, 2017, Agriculture could be key to easing U.S.-North Korea tensions by Kenneth M Quinn, President of the World Food Prize.

Both editorials are fascinating reading. You are encouraged to write to the Register to support the idea of extending this invitation. The e-mail for letters to the editor of the Des Moines Register: letters@dmreg.com, and here’s an online link http://static.desmoinesregister.com/submit-a-letter/

I am fascinated by the story of the 2001 visit to my Quaker meeting, Bear Creek, because I wasn’t living in Iowa at the time. In the photo above, Burt Kisling is my father, Russ Leckband continues to attend Bear Creek and his wife Jackie is our clerk, Herbert Standing was a cousin, since deceased, and Arnold Hoge was the father of Win Standing, whose husband Ellis, is my mother’s brother. The delegation visited the farm of Ellis and Win. Then, after the potluck meal at the meetinghouse, I can easily imagine them gathered around the wood burning stove as described above, “…the conversation ranged from farming to families to religion, touching on many topics of curiosity and interest”.

Bear Creek Meeting 2017

Bear Creek meeting

Posted in peace, Quaker Meetings, Uncategorized | Tagged Bear Creek | Leave a comment

First they came…

Posted on October 6, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984).

This poem was written, of course, about the silence of Germany and the rest of the world that led, step by step, to the concentration death camps during World War II.

But it is a broader statement about not speaking out against injustice. About the method used over and over, to impose government control and a cultural regime, by selecting one group of “others” after another to be oppressed.

The evolution of the Republican party and their recent win of the presidency unfortunately represents yet another iteration of this process.

On September 29 “the United States was one of 13 nations, including some of the most repressive nations on Earth, to oppose a United Nations motion condemning the death penalty for those in same-sex relationships, blasphemers and adulterers.” Why Did the Trump Administration Vote Against U.N. Motion Condemning Gay Death Penalty, Newsweek

“Then they came for me.” It is important to stress my family and community have always been supportive of me being gay, once they knew. But it wasn’t until I was 20 years old that I was able to tell them. I grew up in a time in America that we all know was extremely anti-gay. As hard as I’ve tried to rise above how that made me feel about myself, there are scars.

That made it easy for me to understand, even as a child, the concept of white privilege. But I also understood from the onset that my experience was far different from that of people of color. The color of my skin alone did not make me a target. I could “pass” in society as long as I hid being gay.

If you haven’t been a target, yet, unless you are an older, conservative, white male, you may be next.

We have concentration camps today. I wrote of our economic concentration camps. And a criminal justice system that targets people of color. Our for-profit prisons for people of color, making money from oppression!

And the militarized attacks on water protectors, praying at Standing Rock.

If you haven’t yet, isn’t now the time to “speak out”?

#noDAPL

Evalyn Kellum and Diop Adisa

With Christine Ashley (FCNL) and Jon Krieg (AFSC)

FCNL

Joshua Taflinger and Brandi Heron

Weekly peace vigil Indianapolis

Peter Clay photo

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged concentration camps, gay, LGBTQ, oppression | Leave a comment

What is racism?

Posted on October 5, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

I recently wrote “These past several days we have heard the qualification “the largest mass shooting (in modern history)”. I think it is important to acknowledge, unfortunately, numerous occasions in the history of this country when even larger numbers of people, people of color, and Native Americans, were killed.”

There have been a number of articles related to this recently, further explaining why this is important.

“This is not to diminish the tragedy of what happened on Sunday and the tremendous grief and suffering that the attack caused. But it is important to remember our past and not ignore other significant massacres that have left communities scarred for generations. It is especially important because many of these massacres happened to communities of color; failing to tell their stories, and their sufferings, only reinforces the narrative that their lives do not matter.” Media Called Out on Claim Las Vegas Was Deadliest Shooting in U.S. History, from Healing Minnesota Stories, Working towards understanding and healing between Native American and non-Native peoples.

Christina Woods, who is Anishinaabe, posted the following image and comment on her Facebook page.

The media claims the Las Vegas shooting was the biggest in our HISTORY. Not true… what kind of citizens forget their own massacres? The kind that practice several form of bias. … Don’t let the media white wash any of this!

wounded knee mass shooting

Michael Harriot writes in The Root, Las Vegas Is Only the Deadliest Shooting in US History Because They Don’t Count Black Lives

And German Lopez writes on VOX.com Is Las Vegas the worst mass shooting in US history? It’s surprisingly complicated. It depends on what counts as a mass shooting — and the typical definition leaves out some pretty bad attacks.

Posted in Black Lives, Indigenous, race, Uncategorized | Tagged gun violence | 1 Comment

NRA goads Congress to stop gun violence research

Posted on October 4, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

The refusal of many, mainly Republican politicians, to refuse to look for solutions for our society’s gun problems adds to the tragedy of Las Vegas, and all of the many mass shootings in the United States. It is simply callous and self serving to suggest that it isn’t appropriate to have these discussions immediately after such an event.

I have been involved in medical research most of my life, and have seen the value of the results of such research not only from our lab, but from the entire global medical community in all aspects of medicine. It is simply an outrage that the National Rifle Association (NRA)’s powerful lobby can block the most obvious thing to do, which is fund research into the causes and prevention of gun violence.

“Infuriated by CDC-funded research suggesting that having firearms in the home sharply increased the risks of homicide, the NRA goaded Congress in 1996 into stripping the injury center’s funding for gun violence research – $2.6 million. Congress then passed a measure drafted by then-Rep. Jay Dickey (R-Ark.) forbidding the CDC to spend funds ‘to advocate or promote gun control.’ ”
The NRA has blocked gun violence research for 20 years. Let’s end its stranglehold on science, Los Angeles Times, June 14, 2016

This is simply inexcusable. There is no possible justification to prevent efforts to try to understand why gun violence occurs, and explore how to reduce it.

As yesterday’s article in the Washington Post, Australian foreign minister to the U.S.: We can offer advice on gun law reform explains, Australia has not had another mass shooting since gun laws were enacted in the late 1990s:

“What Australia can do is share our experience after the mass killing in Port Arthur back in the late 1990s, when 35 people were killed by a lone gunman,” Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said during an interview with Australia’s Channel 9 television station on Tuesday.
“You will recall that [Prime Minister] John Howard then introduced national gun laws, which banned automatic and semiautomatic weapons and included a national buyback scheme. We have had this experience. We acted with a legislative response.”

As Diane Randall, Executive Secretary of the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) writes, “The mass shooting in Las Vegas is a national tragedy. It also brutally lays bare our elected officials’ failure to act on gun violence.” https://www.fcnl.org/updates/the-failure-to-act-on-gun-violence-1062

Tell Congress to act on gun violence.

Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) Washington, DC

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged FCNL, gun violence, research, violence | Leave a comment

Non/violence

Posted on October 3, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

As I think we all are, I’m overwhelmed with shock and grief at the killing in Las Vegas.

There are many who say now is not the time to talk about finding ways to reduce the chances of yet another mass killing happening in the future. But as many others are asking, if not now, when?

As usually happens, the focus is on this event, rather than the underlying causes and conditions. Why does our society feel the need for guns, so many guns? In a time when people hunted for food, having a gun for that purpose may have made sense to some.

But it is a tremendous failure of society today that people feel they need a tool that can so easily take a life, for their protection. A tool that tragically even children can and do accidently kill with.

As people whose lives are based upon nonviolence and loving our neighbor we have to create better ways to live together. While it has been proven there really are many ways to help reduce gun violence through legislation, it is also true that is not the complete answer.

A large part of that answer is building Beloved community.

One of the important steps in building community is to acknowledge past injustices. These past several days we have heard the qualification “the largest mass shooting (in modern history)”. I think it is important to acknowledge, unfortunately, numerous occasions in the history of this country when even larger numbers of people, people of color, and Native Americans, were killed.

Evoking the question “what would Jesus do?” often makes me uncomfortable, usually because of the context in which people are doing so. But I find myself pondering that question today.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged nonviolence | 2 Comments

Ecological Devastation-“The Gathering”

Posted on October 2, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

Pictures, video and stories are often the most effective ways to teach, motivate and inspire people. As many of you know I’ve been blessed to have been involved with Rev. William Barber in a number of ways over the past several years. https://kislingjeff.wordpress.com/?s=barber

One of Rev Barber’s main projects today is Repairers of the Breech. Following is the description of the Gathering about Ecological Destruction that occurred last night. Because of a last minute conflict, Rev Barber was not able to be part of this, as planned. But I would urge you to watch this, because it is the best, most moving thing I have seen recently that pulls all of the things related to our environmental situation, justice, faith, and stories of hope into one place.

Millions of people on the frontlines of climate change are struggling to recover from the extreme effects of ecological devastation this month – and that’s just in the United States.
We cannot claim to love our earthly neighbors and sit quietly while the Earth herself is made unfit for human habitation. We cannot love humanity and yet give way to forces that derail the very climate that gives us life. We cannot be silent in a world devastated by our predatory relationship with nature. We must choose community and care of the earth over chaos and greed, recognizing that to protect the Earth’s delicate climate balance is to challenge the policies that increase militarism, advance poverty, and suppress democracy.
On Sunday, Oct. 1 at The Gathering, co-hosted by the Rev. Dr. William J Barber II and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, we partnered with 350.org, Appalachian Voices and Our Children’s Trust to hear from people affected by ecological devastation around the world on how we can join the fight for climate justice.

One of the great, moving interviews is with a youth involved in the https://www.youthvgov.org/ campaign, the Federal lawsuit that has been methodically moving through the U.S. Court system. Another is with an indigenous youth political activist.

Watch the video here: https://livestream.com/accounts/5188266/events/7708749/videos\

baber1

Posted in climate change, Indiana Moral Mondays, Indigenous, renewable energy, revolution, spiritual seekers, Uncategorized | Tagged Rev William Barber | Leave a comment

Ecocide of Puerto Rico

Posted on September 30, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

Quakers believe there is that of God in every single person, and that every one of us is capable of communicating directly with God. My experience has been with a God of compassion and justice. This morning I was awakened early, feeling the wrath of God. Now I know what others have written about fearing God.

What I am hearing is we can not be silent as the ecocide of Puerto Rico plays out. What I am hearing is to call on those who have the resources to find ways to get the people of Puerto Rico the basic necessities they need so they will not die. I don’t know who that is or how it will happen, but I have been led to write this, having faith.

I’m hearing we have to take personal responsibility for the environmental damage we have done with our personal automobiles, airplane travel, large homes, etc. We need to wake up to the direct connection between that and this summer’s hurricanes. Our lifestyles caused the environmental conditions that created these monster storms, and those that will continue to appear.

We need to also speak the heart rending message that Puerto Rico and the islands in the Caribbean should not be rebuilt because of the inevitability of continued, worse storms coming. The people there need to be evacuated. We need to find ways to help, and homes for these climate refugees.

Florida

Posted in climate change, Quaker Meetings, Uncategorized | Tagged ecocide | 1 Comment

Fly the “Friendly” Skies – Not

Posted on September 28, 2017 by Jeff Kisling

I wrote about a recent article in Environmental Research Letters, The climate mitigation gap: education and government recommendations miss the most effective individual actions, by Seth Wynes and Kimberly A Nicholas, that estimates the annual amount of greenhouse gas emissions that would be saved by various personal actions. Air travel creates significant amounts of greenhouse gases.

“We recommend four widely applicable high-impact (i.e. low emissions) actions with the potential to contribute to systemic change and substantially reduce annual personal emissions: having one fewer child (an average for developed countries of 58.6 tonnes CO₂-equivalent (tCO₂e) emission reductions per year), living car-free (2.4 tCO₂e saved per year), avoiding airplane travel (1.6 tCO₂e saved per roundtrip transatlantic flight) and eating a plant-based diet (0.8 tCO₂e saved per year). These actions have much greater potential to reduce emissions than commonly promoted strategies like comprehensive recycling“

As Friends and others have often discussed, there is a real disconnect when it comes to travel for Quaker, environmental, or other social justice gatherings by airplane.

When I was on the Friends Committee on National Legislation’s (FCNL) General Committee, I raised this issue, urging that we find ways to do our business using telecommunications, for example. Discussions with FCNL staff did not, in the end, come up with a solution. I know FCNL staff often ride bicycles to work, and there are staff showers and bicycle racks at the office building. I took the train to the FCNL annual meetings in Washington, DC, which was an admittedly grueling 20 hour trip from Indianapolis that I didn’t look forward to.

Update: As far as FCNL specifically, there is the added benefit of lobbying representatives while in Washington for the annual meetings. But lobbying can also be done at the local offices.

“Fly the Friendly Skies” has been a slogan of United Airlines, and I put “Friendly” in quotes in the title to call attention to Quakers’ use of air travel. Almost every time I raise the issue of using some type of telecommunication for meetings, I hear “I feel it is so important to meet face to face.” I long ago came to the conclusion that is environmental privilege, in the same manner as white privilege. And is often the case with white privilege, those who engage in environmental privilege either don’t recognize it, or choose to ignore it.

Or make a conscious decision that the meeting justifies the environmental consequences. I wonder, with the current state of our environment, whether that is a reasonable choice today.

There a multiple ways to conduct long distance meetings today. Several apps allow people to see as well as hear each other, making it more similar to face to face interaction. Scattergood Friends School and Farm recently connected to a fiber optic backbone, and have a system that will allow for very good quality audio/video connections.

I would encourage us to think carefully about the environmental impacts related to meetings, and urge the organizations we work with to consider alternatives.