Let Your Life Speak Learning from lives that inspire

how to use these ca r ds

Let Your Life Speak Learning from lives that inspire

Dear Friend, Thank you for taking the time to read these stories. This project shares seven profiles of AFSC staff, program participants, and Quakers acting faithfully for justice, peace, and love. To enjoy these stories, first sit with those you love: your family, a committee, or your meeting during hospitality. Read each profile aloud once through, taking time between the sections. Settle into waiting worship. Out of the silence, speak to the query. How is Spirit moving you to respond? Share these thoughts with your family or assembled body. If used with your family, we recommend you read them once each night for a week and reflect over a meal. If used with a committee or another body, we recommend reading several at a time perhaps for two sessions. We hope you find joy, transformation, and inspiration in these stories of Spirit-led action. AFSC encourages you to find your place to support these efforts, be it a ministry of giving or one of action or accompaniment (find nine ways to work with AFSC for peace with justice at afsc.org/friends/resources).

Blessings,

Lucy Duncan, Director of Friends Relations

Find out more about getting involved with AFSC at: afsc.org/friends/let-your-life-speak

m a rsh a ll “eddie” con way

Marshall “Eddie” Conway“We operate off of the premise that all people have good in them. No matter what their past might have been, all people are redeemable. In order to do the work that we do, we have to love.”

As a Black child growing up in Baltimore in the ’50s, Eddie Conway visited a white school. Unlike his own, the white school was modern and clean, with proper materials and numerous amenities. He was shocked by the differences between the two communities, and the realization made him feel inferior. Aware of the disparities and determined to help his community, Eddie later joined the Black Panther Party and worked in many ways for change. In 1970, Eddie was sent to prison for a crime he maintains he did not commit. Eddie’s community activism continued even while he was incarcerated. Supported by AFSC, Eddie created Friend of a Friend, which builds relationships and transforms conflict. In 2014, Eddie was released after almost 44 years. He continues to remain actively involved with Friend of a Friend.

Read more about Eddie: afsc.org/friends/interview-eddie-conway

qu ery:Eddie says that Friend of a Friend works to “restore hope” in prison. How do you feel Spirit moving Quakers to work for healing justice?

crysta l gonza lez

Crystal Gonzalez“I feel like the sacred is really honoring each other and honoring each other’s value and each other’s experiences. Valuing that at the heart of who we are, the core of who we are, is really love and Spirit. Those spaces where you’re really just honoring each other, they’re ways to practice how to be in the world.”

Program staffer Crystal Gonzalez works with AFSC’s Roots for Peace program in Los Angeles. Roots for Peace is a food justice program. Participants learn how to grow their own food, and how to advocate for changing policies that impact their access to healthy food and livelihoods. Crystal works with youth in Lincoln Heights, a neighborhood on the verge of gentrification. Recently, the beloved local pollos rosticeria (chicken roastery) closed and was replaced by a craft beer store, despite a moratorium on bars. Mourning the loss to the community, youth created a moveable mural and staged an action in front of the new store. Youth read poetry and spoke about how these changes were affecting them.

Read more about Crystal: afsc.org/friends/interview-crystal-gonzalez

qu ery:How are you or your Meeting involved in your local community, and how do you support your community in working for economic and food justice?

ta bith a mustafa

Tabitha Mustafa“Maybe you complete your goal, or maybe the process becomes your goal … We find that a lot more gets done here when we do things the way that we know how to do them best.”

Born and raised in New Orleans, Tabitha Mustafa joined AFSC in Summer 2015 with Peace by Piece (PxP). She brings community organizing experience and a love and knowledge of New Orleans to her work. Tabitha loves seeing youth take the skills they learn and utilize them to analyze their experiences and tell their stories. Around the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, PxP created a short documentary, “Katrina X/Storm Surge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and Disaster Capitalism” with the Real News Network. One of the PxP interns took the lead on the project as the director. Her influence on the project was such that she joined experts on a discussion panel after a screening in August.

Read more about Tabitha: afsc.org/friends/interview-tabitha-mustafa

qu ery:Where is the place for Friends far away from places like New Orleans, Ferguson, or Gaza in the pursuit of justice? How can Quakers support these communities, while acknowledging that we do not know what is best for them?

flor ence n tak a rutim a na

Florence Ntakarutimana“I fell in love with Quakerism. To me this is my right place. Quaker faith is a process of reflection and action: You learn, then you do it. Healing and Rebuilding Our Communities (HROC), so much based on Quaker principles, is my everything, it is my doctor, my everything.”

Florence is a Burundian healer with HROC, an AFSC partner. After losing both parents after the civil war in the ‘90s, Florence focused her efforts on helping her community rebuild and recover relationships damaged by the conflict. Florence devotes her energy to these efforts in part because she knows their effectiveness firsthand – she was healed by HROC programs as well. During the crisis, her family fled to her mother’s sister’s house. Florence’s aunt was unhappy with the intrusion, and made demands of the family they were not able to meet. Her aunt poisoned her mother, who died in 1996. HROC’s trauma healing programs enabled Florence to heal from her mother’s murder and forgive her aunt.

Read more about Florence: http://afsc.org/story/transforming-pain

qu ery:Our world is besieged with violence and conflict. How does your Meeting heal from these injustices, and how can that healing be encouraged in the wider world?

sau l a lem a n

Saul Aleman“One of the reasons that I’m consistently inspired to continue to do the work that I’m doing is seeing people who don’t necessarily have to be part of the struggle [for migrant justice], be part of the struggle. A lot of black and brown folks and even white people who are joining the movement and becoming powerful allies of it and raising the voice of the migrant community and undocumented community. And I really encourage that.”

Saul Aleman is an organizer and activist who moved from San Luis Potosi, Mexico to the US as a child. Saul interned with AFSC Miami’s American Friends Immigrant Services (AFIS). Saul once participated in a protest against anti-immigrant policies. Migrant justice advocates were present as well as very loud anti-immigrant protesters. The police arrived and threatened the anti-immigrant protesters. The migrant advocates stood between the police and protestors, protecting them. Afterwards, many of the protestors thanked the advocates and a few joined their cause.

Read more about Saul: afsc.org/friends/interview-afsc-intern-saul-aleman

qu ery:How are Quakers called to be allies of the migrant justice movement? How can Friends support raising the voice of the migrant and undocumented community within our own towns and our nation?

sa n dr a ta m a r i

Sandra Tamari“As supporters of nonviolence, justice, and peace, we are required to take risks and be challenged about our comfort and privilege. We must examine how our lives contribute to war and injustice, and expend time and energy on efforts that oppose corporate crimes.”

Palestinian-American Quaker Sandra Tamari knows firsthand about the challenges and triumphs of standing up to systems of injustice. In 2012, Sandra was part of a group that protested St. Louis’ contract with Veolia. A major target of the Palestinian civil society movement for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS), Veolia owned bus lines that excluded Palestinians. In 2013, the group attended a meeting of the Public Utilities Committee of the Board of Aldermen, and stated their case before the Board and responded to a Veolia executive. Veolia later announced the sale of the bus lines, a resounding though far from conclusive victory for the BDS movement. Sandra continues to advocate for the rights of Palestinians and to end the Israeli occupation.

Read more about Sandra: afsc.org/content/sandra-tamari

qu ery:Where does your Meeting stand on speaking truth to corporate power? How do you answer the call to support Palestinians working to oppose the system of apartheid in their country?

gail a n d joh n fletcher

John and Gail Fletcher“Our only question was where and how to start … What we didn’t anticipate is how much we would learn from formerly incarcerated people, their families and friends.”

John and Gail Fletcher are members of the Norman, Oklahoma Monthly Meeting. The Meeting works to combat the system of mass incarceration in Oklahoma, which incarcerates women at the highest rate in the world, and the 3rd highest rate for men in the US. They started setting up a teach-in booth at unlikely public gatherings, like football games. Through this they’ve also heard the stories of formerly incarcerated people and their families, learning more as they go. John and Gail’s work with the Norman Monthly Meeting has spread beyond Oklahoma. In 2014, South Central Yearly Meeting’s annual gathering focused on ending mass incarceration. John and Gail are building bridges in their work, helping engage and connect Friends in work for a more just world.

Read more about John and Gail: afsc.org/friends/does-spirit-drive-work-one-quaker-meeting’s-response-mass-incarceration

qu ery:Do you or your Meeting hold a particular social justice concern as your own? What do you take from the story of the Norman Monthly Meeting that might be relevant for your Meeting?