2-session series: Quakers, race, & reparations

A 2-session series: Sundays, November 9 and December 14 at 9:00 a.m. Sponsored by BFM Adult Religious Education coordinators and the Ad Hoc Committee on Financial Reparations.  Held in SFS classroom 211. This series is to further BFM’s ongoing efforts to more deeply understand racism and build a sense of the Beloved Community among us.

• The series will focus on the Pendle Hill pamphlet entitled “Hypocrisy, Racism, and Self-Interest on the Path to Reparations: Quaker Complicity with Slavery (1657-1776) and White Supremacy” by Mary Watkins. 
• This pamphlet is about far more than “just” reparations. It is an excellent survey of some oft-neglected aspects of Quaker history and helps us discern ways in which that history continues to influence us today. Most of us have learned about early Quaker abolitionists and that Quakers were pioneers in ending enslavement, but the history of Quaker involvement with enslavement, the slave trade, and its profits is far more complicated. 
• We see these sessions as opportunities to stretch ourselves as a loving community: to think, feel, process, and learn together by looking at the complex legacy of our Quaker forebears.   
• The November session will focus on the first half (pages 1-14) of the pamphlet. In December, we will discuss the remaining portion of the pamphlet as well as overall experiences of the reading. You are welcome to join for only one session, but we hope as many as possible will be able to join for both.
• Please register by October 26 using our Contact Us Form if you are interested in attending, so we know how many pamphlets to order. To offset costs, we are asking those able to contribute $8 for the cost of the pamphlet.

For those unable to come in person, we hope to have two Zoom sessions each month; if you are interested in these, please let us know.