June 2024 – Meeting for Worship on the Occasion of Business
GRASS VALLEY FRIENDS MEETING
Of the Religious Society of Friends of the Truth
College Park Quarterly Meeting, Pacific Yearly Meeting
MINUTES & RECORD
Meeting for Worship on the Occasion of Business
June 9, 2024
We met in a hybrid meeting in person at the meetinghouse and on Zoom.
Present: Dorothy Henderson, clerk; Jennifer Smith, recording clerk; Reed Hamilton, Amy Cooke, Gordon Starr, elder for the clerk, Mary Starr, Dianne Marshall, Dean Olson, Stuart Smith, Keith Runyan, Nora Cooke, Juniper Lisette, and Peter O’Rourke.
The Meeting opened with silent worship.
Clerks’ Remarks and Query
Those who have ears, let them hear. Have you ever talked to someone who listened so well that it changed the quality of what you were trying to say?
Have you experienced being listened to so deeply that you felt completely heard? Have things changed in you because of someone listening deeply to what you have to say? Have you experienced this in a Meeting for Worship for Business?
Friends spoke out of the silence:
- Friends spoke of different people who have listened deeply and the impressions they left on us.
- One Friend spoke of the deep listening needed during the transition of the land ownership to the Nisenan.
- Another Friend spoke of needing time to listen to your inner self/Spirit, and being Eldered and allowed to have that time.
- Another Friend spoke of Mr. Rogers Neighborhood as an example of how you can listen deeply even through the lens of a camera, and through time and space. Children need to feel seen and heard by adults to help them feel valued.
COMMITTEE REPORTS
(see reports appended, committee clerk is noted in bold)
Spirit and Witness: Amy Cooke, Stuart Smith, Reed Hamilton, Sharon Davisson, Dean Olson, Dorothy Henderson (ex-officio, GVFM Clerk).
Amy Cooke gave the report, appended.
- Spirit and Witness is bringing forward the name of Keith Runyan for membership to season until the next Meeting for Worship on the Occasion for Business:
Minute (seasoning until the 8th month): The Clearness Committee for membership for Keith Runyan, consisting of Gordon Starr, Reed Hamilton, and Stuart Smith, met with Keith in May of 2024. The Committee reached clearness that Keith is well prepared to join the Society of Friends and Grass Valley Friends Meeting. Grass Valley Friends Meeting wholeheartedly approves his membership.
Stewardship: Mary Starr, Pat Phillips, Reed Hamilton, Gordon Starr, Doug Hamm, David Bowman. Dianne Marshall (ex-officio, Newsletter editor), Fosten Wilson (ex-officio, Treasurer), Don McCormick (ex-officio, Librarian).
Mary Starr gave the report, appended.
- Questions were raised about finding volunteers for the Archival Committee. One person, Don McCormick from Stewardship, has volunteered. We will send out a request for other volunteers in the Newsletter.
- Don McCormick is looking for help in the library.
- We need volunteers for the Friendly Audit. They do not need to be an accountant, but should be comfortable with numbers. We will add this request to the Newsletter.
- Another question was raised about the Organization Reports. It has been proposed that we can make these reports in the Newsletter, featuring one organization each month. Because the Organization Reports are structured and recorded in the past by a meeting Minute, and because this would be a change in several Committee job descriptions, we need to send this back to Spirit and Witness to work on this at their next meeting.
Welcome Committee: Peter O’Rourke, clerk (ex-officio, Website and Facebook coordinator), Kathy McCreery, Don McCormick, Pat Phillips, Cheryl Hendrickson, Cindy Bliss, Lo Hamm, CJ Patterson, Hailey Wilson (ex-officio, tech support), Judy Hamilton (ex-officio, email coordinator).
Peter O’Rourke gave the report, appended.
Organization Report: College Park Quarterly Meeting (CPQM).
Peter O’Rourke gave the report, appended.
- A clarification that Fall Quarterly Meeting will be at Quaker Center, and not at Woolman due to the transition of the land.
Nominating Committee: (terms as noted) Judy Hamilton: 2022-2024, Gordon Starr: 2022-2024, Dean Olson 2023-2025, Sharon Davisson 2023-2025.
Dean Olson gave the report, appended.
- There was a clarification. The length of terms for Spirit and Witness were added to the final Slate document, which is a change from the document last month:
- Spirit and Witness: Amy Cooke (2024-2027), Stuart Smith (2023-2026), Reed Hamilton (2022-2025), Sharon Davisson (2022-2025), Dean Olson (2023-2026), Dorothy Henderson (ex-officio, GVFM Clerk)
- The Nominating Committee has not had any concerns arise for the Slate.
Minute 2024.06.01: Grass Valley Friends Meeting approves the 2024-2025 Slate of Committees and Officers.
Children’s Program: Keely McDonald and Doug Hamm, co-clerks, Dorothy Henderson, Gordon Bishop, Judy Hamilton, Dean Olson, Reed Hamilton, Don McCormick, David Cowan, Lo Hamm.
There was no report.
OFFICER REPORTS and REPRESENTATIVE REPORTS
Pacific Yearly Meeting: No report given.
College Park Quarterly Meeting: Report appended.
Interfaith Nevada County: No report given.
Treasurer: No report given.
CLERK’S REMARKS:
This Clerk has no words, but opened it up to the meeting for any other messages.
- One Friend offered an update on the Woolman property as it transitions back to the Nisenan. There is a lot of excitement among the Nisenan as they visit the property and look to the future. The campus is quiet right now, but there is great beauty.
- Another Friend is feeling sadness at the emptiness she feels on site as fewer members are attending. We have members who come to worship, but they do not stay for Meeting for Worship for Business. She feels like our community is weakening.
- The Clerk recognizes the beauty and the pain in this beloved land’s transition. There is a sense of grief and loss, but also a sense of joy and wonder. It is clear that we can have grief and joy at the same time. There must be a sense of wonder and joy that the Nisenan feel as they come home.
ITEMS SEASONING or CARRIED OVER
Minute (seasoning until the 8th month): The Clearness Committee for membership for Keith Runyan, consisting of Gordon Starr, Reed Hamilton, and Stuart Smith, met with Keith in May of 2024. The Committee reached clearness that Keith is well prepared to join the Society of Friends and Grass Valley Friends Meeting. Grass Valley Friends Meeting wholeheartedly approves his membership.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
- Pacific Yearly Meeting 2024 Annual Session is July 19-24 onsite (in-person) at Whittier College in Whittier, CA + online (virtual) via Zoom. Registration opened May 15. Pacific Yearly Meeting
- Friends General Conference Gathering 2024 takes place on June 30-July 6: Rooted in Story in Haverford, PA. Currently open for registration. Friends General Conference
- Facebook: please follow the Grass Valley Friends Meeting page, or join the Facebook Grass Valley Friends Meeting group. If you share a post from the page, your friends will see it, and it helps our visibility. Follow this link.
- The 2023-2024 PacYM General Directory is temporarily unavailable while the website redesign is in progress. When available, the Directory is for use by members and attenders of monthly meetings and worship groups within Pacific Yearly Meeting and by Friends serving on Pacific Yearly Meeting committees. It is not to be shared beyond this community. Dorothy, Doug, and Don have the new password for the PacYM Directory.
- Carl Magruder: You can follow Carl’s healing journey on the CaringBridge.org website HERE. Friends have also set up a daily Meeting for Healing from 7:30 to 8 am (Pacific) on Zoom here or contact Amy Cooke at amylisette@gmail.com for the link.
- Contributions to Grass Valley Friends Meeting are gratefully accepted. You can give by mailing a check to fosten wilson or through Tithely on the website or our newsletter. Our treasurer is asking for additional funds this month as our expenditures exceeded our income.
READING OF THE RECORD AND MINUTES
The record and the minutes were read, corrected, and approved.
If you are giving a report to GVFM, please send the actual report to the recording clerk at jenniferjksmith@gmail.com THE WEDNESDAY BEFORE MEETING FOR BUSINESS. Please write reports in 12 point, Times New Roman font. This formatting will match the formatting in our Meeting for Worship for Business Minutes and Record. And, if possible, write reports in Google Docs and share with both Dorothy and Jennifer.
GVFM Newsletter Reminder: Please have items into Dianne Marshall by Tuesday at 10 am.
The Meeting closed with silent worship.
Respectfully recorded by Jennifer Smith, recording clerk.
APPENDICES:
- Spirit and Witness Committee report
- Friends World Committee on Consultation report
- Stewardship Committee report
- Recorder/Archivist Job Description
- Welcome Committee report
- Nominating Committee report
- Treasurer’s Report
- Pacific Yearly Meeting Monthly Report
- Interfaith Nevada County report
- Information: Organization Representatives by Committee
- Recorder/Archivist job description
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Spirit and Witness Report
June 2024
Our committee, which braids together the strands in our meeting that were formerly held by the Ministry & Oversight and Peace & Social Justice Committees, continues to be inspired by how our Meeting’s experiences of the Light within shine outward into the world. One of the foremost ways we see that Light is the transition of the Woolman land to Yulića, the name of this land before colonization eradicated both the name and the people who lived here. We have reaffirmed our commitment to listen deeply and move slowly. We ask ourselves, How do we as a Meeting hold the healing of this land and the Nisenan? Can we be an anchor? How can we nurture a sense of safety? We talked about how we are all making the profound shift to being guests here. And, while we can never make up for the tragedy of what happened, we want to be good allies. We hold that being good allies means being willing to witness other people’s struggles and remain steadfast while acknowledging that we cannot heal things.
We are grateful for the work that the Witness Committee – Toward Right Relation – is doing to support our drawing awareness. They are working to expand and widen their understanding to include other tribes, California initiatives, and our own community’s response to indigenous issues through the work of FCNL and PYM’s Indigenous Concerns Committee.
We held the offer of training in a spiritual care on-call program from Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital. Our sense is that, while it seems to be deeply worthwhile, this program is not calling to our Meeting at this time. We will respond if someone steps forward to say that they have a leading for this. Otherwise, we will let this rest.
We are looking forward to celebrating Mary Starr’s membership at the July potluck at fosten and Kathy’s.
Keith Runyan’s membership committee has met and both the committee and Keith sense that he is in the right place to join the Society of Friends, or, as one committee member put it, to join the Conversation among Friends. We bring this minute, to season until the next Meeting for Worship on the Occasion for Business:
The Clearness Committee for membership for Keith Runyan, consisting of Gordon Starr, Reed Hamilton, and Stuart Smith, met with Keith in May of 2024. The Committee reached clearness that Keith is well prepared to join the Society of Friends and Grass Valley Friends Meeting. Grass Valley Friends Meeting wholeheartedly approves his membership.
On June 16 we will hold a Spirit & Witness program after Meeting with Stuart E.W. Smith. The program is open to all. Stuart will share his work as a doctoral scholar with the Center for research in Quaker Studies at the University of Birmingham. His research centers on building learning targets to train nonviolent social activists, and involves using the language of military strategy to investigate historical protest movements like the abolition of slavery and the enfranchisement of women.
Our future Spirit & Witness programs are under discernment. We are considering programs on death and dying, a program on writing our life stories, and the Quaker Seminary. We want to know what programs the Meeting has felt to be meaningful in the past, and what programs our community would be interested in in the future. In light of the sometimes sporadic attendance at after-meeting programs, we suggest to Friends that they indicate if they are attending a Spirit and Witness offering so that the presenter can prepare. Please share your thoughts with us as we work to discern the best ways to offer programs to the Meeting.
We bring a recommendation that we rest our Meeting for Worship on the Occasion for Business for the month of July, and meet again in August. This has been our practice over the years so that Friends can feel free to attend the Friends General Conference (FGC) Gathering, held this year on June 30 through July 6, and then the Pacific Yearly Meeting Annual Session over the week of July 19-24.
In Friendship,
Amy Cooke, clerk
Stewardship Committee
Minutes from meeting on June 6, 2024
Present: Mary Starr, clerk, Gordon Starr, recorder, Dianne Marshall, newsletter editor, Fosten Wilson, treasurer, Don McCormick, librarian.
Finance. Fosten reported income in May of $371 which does not include a $200 donation to the Nisenan restricted fund. Expenses totaled $689. The $200 will be held for the month of June to see if there are any more donations to the fund.
As the new treasurer, Mary has begun meeting with Fosten to familiarize herself with processes and procedures. They will be looking to form a “team” of people comfortable with numbers to help with a Friendly audit of the books before Mary actually takes over. This is customary and recommended before a new treasurer starts. Several names were brought forward.
One of the areas Mary will be exploring is how long Meeting needs to keep financial records. In business, usually this is seven years. There was agreement that financial records are not really historical, and the Meeting pays no state or Federal taxes for which these records would be needed. Currently there are records going back to Harry Bailey, over twenty-five years ago.
Meeting House internet service. Questions arose about the continuation of internet service in the Meeting House once ownership is transferred to the Nisenan. Currently we split the cost with SFC for the service in the M.H. That account will likely be closed when the sale is finalized. Gordon will explore this as well as a closing date with Jennifer Dicky.
Archive methods. Dianne has contacted other faith groups to see how they handle their record preservation and found many approaches. Gordon and Don, when working on reorganizing the existing Meeting records, felt paper was still the simplest approach. However, there are other alternatives which could work. Meeting has asked Stewardship to form a sub-committee to research this. This work continues.
Library. Don is asking for some help with some housekeeping chores in the library. Please talk to him if you would like to help.
Newsletter. Dianne has multiple years of newsletters ready to upload to the Google drive, but needs help showing her how to do it.
The newsletter will begin, each edition, having a report on one of the various organizations Meeting supports, who they are and what they are doing.
Dianne will be gone August 9 – 11 for a birthday and wedding anniversary get-away. (Happy birthday!), but will return on the 12th, so please have your submissions to the newsletter to her before that.
Next meeting. In keeping with Spirit and Witness, we will not be meeting in July, but will reconvene in August. With Mary taking over treasurer duties, she will be resigning as clerk of Stewardship committee, so we will be looking for a new clerk. Any volunteers?
Next meeting: August 1, 2024.
Welcome Committee
Meeting for Worship – Welcome Committee
June 3, 2024 / 7:00PM / Zoom
Opening Worship
Attendees: Judy, Don, Kathy, Cindy, Kathy, Nancy, Pete
New Business
- Greeting Checklist
- Going well
- Meeting directory
- Nancy will update Officers and Positions and send out Directory
- Monthly potluck
- Potluck was held at Judy and Reed’s home on Saturday, June 1.
- The next Potluck will be at Kathy and Fosten’s on July 27th from 4-7.
- Look at ideas on how to move forward with the Organization Reports.
- Newsletter could fulfill this task
- Judy completed June’s CPQM report and will send to GVFM group
- This is Welcome Committee report schedule which will remain on Welcome Committee agenda for future meetings
Welcoming Committee holds the “connect with Quakers” organizations:
- Ben Lomond Quaker Center (BLQC)
- College Park Quarterly Meeting (CPQM) – June 2024
- Friends General Conference (FGC) – August 2024
- Friends World Committee on Consultation (FWCC) – October 2024
- Pacific Yearly Meeting (Pac YM) – December 2024
- Sierra Friends Center (SFC) – February 2025
- Reports to Meeting for Worship for Business are made in even months
- Tabling – Don
- Discuss representing GVFM at events setting up information tables
- Group felt past representation resulted in only one response
- Group will instead pursue:
- Next Door app – Cindy
- Figure out how to have GVFM website appear in “Religious affiliation in Grass Valley’ search – Pete
- Friendly 8s – Don
- Reach out to friends who have not attended recent Worship – Judy
Next Meeting
- Monday, July 8, 7pm
Closing Worship
Organization Report: College Park Quarterly Meeting (CPQM)
Mission Statement:
CPQM doesn’t really have a mission statement. However, it is comprised of the unprogrammed Meetings in Northern California and Nevada (26 in all). A Quarterly Meeting’s main purpose is to strengthen the fellowship of Monthly Meetings, offer increased opportunities to worship together and to consider spiritual and worldly matters of local or broader concern. They offer youth an opportunity to build closer relationships. They have also worked to create institutions to serve the wider world of Friends. These include Sierra Friends Center (formerly the Woolman School), Ben Lomond Center and Friends House (located in Santa Rosa).
Current Activities and Plans:
CPQM meets three times per year on the third weekends of January, May and October. January’s meeting rotates between Berkeley, San Francisco, Redwood Forest, and Palo Alto. May’s meeting is at the Ben Lomond Center and October’s Meeting is here at Sierra Friends Center. In addition they meet at Pacific Yearly Meeting in July, where they share the State of the Meeting Reports (from the Meetings in CPQM) and bring to PYM any concerns that have risen over the last year.
How can friends get involved if they feel inspired?
Attend PYM or one of the Quarterly Meetings.
PYM meets July 19th to 24th in Whittier, CA. The next Quarterly Meeting will be October 18th to 20th presumably at Sierra Friends Center.
Is anyone in our Meeting involved in this organization?
A few folks from our Meeting regularly attend PYM and or the Quarterlies. Emma Smith is active in the teen group of CPQM. Doug Hamm is our CPQM representative.
Nominating Committee Report
2024- 2025 Slate of Committees and Officers
All committee members serve one-year terms with the exception of Spirit and Witness (3 year term) and Nominating (2 year term).
Stewardship: Pat Phillips, Reed Hamilton, Gordon Starr, David Bowman. Dianne Marshall (ex-officio, Newsletter editor), Mary Starr (ex-officio, Treasurer), Don McCormick (ex-officio, Librarian), HaileyWilson (ex-officio Tech Support).
Welcome: Kathy McCreery, Don McCormick, Pat Phillips, Cheryl Hendrickson, Cindy Bliss, Lo Hamm, Pete O’Rourke (ex-officio, Website and Facebook coordinator), Judy Hamilton (ex-officio email coordinator), Nancy Anderson(ex-officio directory clerk).
Spirit and Witness: Amy Cooke (2024-2027), Stuart Smith (2023-2026), Reed Hamilton (2022-2025), Sharon Davisson (2022-2025), Dean Olson (2023-2026), Dorothy Henderson (ex-officio, GVFM Clerk)
Children’s Program: Doug Hamm, Judy Hamilton, Dean Olson, Reed Hamilton, Don McCormick, Keely McDonald, David Cowan, Lo Hamm.
Nominating Committee: (terms as noted) This will change after the clerks meeting and naming committee meets
- Judy Hamilton: 2022-2024 Sharon Davisson 2023-2024
Gordon Starr: 2022-2024 Dean Olson 2023-2025
ROLES:
Clerk: Dorothy Henderson
Elder to Clerk: Gordon Starr
Recording Clerk: Jennifer Smith
Newsletter Editor: Dianne Marshall
Newsletter Distributor: Pat Phillips
Email Coordinator: Judy Hamilton
Treasurer: Mary Starr
Tech Support: Hailey Wilson
Website/Facebook Coordinator: Peter O’Rourke
Librarian: Don McCormick
Recorder: Anita McCormick
Directory Clerk: Nancy Anderson
Mail Clerk: Dean Olson
Representatives:
Please note: Most organizations no longer have representatives from GVFM. They are held in two committees, Welcome and Spirit and Witness. The following organizations are the exceptions:
Interfaith Nevada County: Dianne Marshall
Sierra Friends Center: Open at the moment
Pacific Yearly Meeting: Doug Hamm
College Park Quarterly Meeting: Doug Hamm
Organization Representative by Committee
Welcoming Committee holds the “connect with Quakers” organizations: Ben Lomond Quaker Center (BLQC), College Park Quarterly Meeting
(CPQM), Friends General Conference (FGC), Friends World Committee on Consultation (FWCC), Pacific Yearly Meeting (Pac YM), and Sierra Friends Center (SFC).
Spirit and Witness holds the “Faith and Practice” organizations: American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Friends Committee for Legislation (FCNL/FCL-CA), Interfaith of Nevada County, Quaker United Nations Organization (QUNO), and Right Sharing of World Resources (RSWR) The Nisenan have been added to Spirit and Witness.
Each month, a member of one of the two committees prepares a report on one of their committee’s organizations based on the queries below.The committees alternate months, with odd months going to one committee and even months to the other one. That gives many people the opportunity to “discover” Quaker organizations, and to hear from different people so that we all get to hear from each other. The reports are structured around the following queries:
What is this organization’s mission statement?
What are their current activities or plans? What is exciting?
Treasurer’s Report
No report given.
Children’s Committee Report
No report given.
Pacific Yearly Meeting Monthly Report
No report given.
InterFaith Nevada County Report
No report given.
Information: Organization Representatives by Committee
Welcome Committee holds the “connect with Quakers” organizations: Ben Lomond Quaker Center (BLQC), College Park Quarterly Meeting (CPQM), Friends General Conference (FGC), Friends World Committee on Consultation (FWCC), Pacific Yearly Meeting (Pac YM), and Sierra Friends Center (SFC).
Spirit and Witness holds the “Faith and Practice” organizations: American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Friends Committee for Legislation (FCNL/FCL-CA), Interfaith of Nevada County, Quaker United Nations Organization (QUNO), and Right Sharing of World Resources (RSWR). The Nisenan have been added to Spirit and Witness.
Each month, a member of one of the two committees prepares a report on one of their committee’s organizations based on the queries below. The committees alternate months, with odd months going to one committee and even months the other one. That gives many people the opportunity to “discover” Quaker organizations, and to hear from different people so that we all get to hear from each other. The reports are structured around the following queries:
- What is this organization’s mission statement?
- What are their current activities or plans?
- What is exciting?
- Are there any concerns?
- How can Friends get involved if they feel inspired?
- Is anyone in our meeting particularly involved? How?
Four organizations continue to have a representative (PYM, CPQM, SFC, and Interfaith) who will report to the meeting as needed. However, these organizations will also be included in the once-a-year report to business meeting from either Welcome (PYM, CPQM, SFC) or Spirit and Witness (Interfaith).