I saw a fundraising letter from the AFSC

Context
The AFSC (American Friends Service Committee) is the social action arm of the Religious Society of Friends. I supported the AFSC before I became a Friend myself, but now I'm considerably more ardent about it. However, the latest fundraising letter I received disturbed me in some ways.

Commentary
This is easy; I'll just paste in the contents of the letter I'm sending to the General Secretary of the AFSC.


Mary Ellen McNish
General Secretary
American Friends Service Committee
1501 Cherry Street
Philadelphia, PA 19102-1403

Second Month 7, 2006

Dear Mary Ellen:

Your recent fundraising letter contained two passages that raised up concerns in me, one deep and one merely niggling.

The former concerns the passage about water purifiers sent to Iraq, in which you state, “As you consider your renewed support, please understand that for reasons of safety, I cannot always tell you about actions like this. But know, please, that your contribution will bolster our ability to do what is right . . .”

I cannot recall any examples from my Faith and Practice that prioritize “safety” over our testimonies regarding openness in our dealings with others. I believe that if the AFSC is considering an action that it is afraid to reveal to its membership, it should either not take the action or build up enough courage to talk about it and face the consequences. On a related note, it seems disingenuous for you to complain about Pentagon surveillance of the AFSC while still reserving the right to secretly violate federal law.

You could not have known that one of the reasons I joined the Religious Society of Friends was because I find myself unable to place blind faith in other human beings when it comes to faith matters, including pastors or say, wider religious organizations. However, now that I have told you, perhaps you’ll understand that I can’t just “know” that you’ll be exercising proper stewardship over the resources God has given me. One of the great strengths of Friends is our use of everyone’s light for discernment, not just that of a select few.

My other concern is minor, and you wouldn’t even be hearing about it if we hadn’t discussed it in the program part of our meeting last week. I didn’t like your use of the phrase “like-minded people” toward the end of your letter. It implies that there’s a certain group of people, let’s call them “us,” who are trying to change the world for the better. This, in turn, implies that there’s a second group of people (“them”) who are not. I believe the cause of peace is ultimately better served if we use the language of building bridges, not circling the wagons.

Please understand that the only reason I’m writing today is because I am normally so proud of AFSC’s work and the way it represents Friends in the wider world. You spoke about “bedrock principles” in your letter, so I wanted to share some of mine.

Yours in Christ,
Lynn Schlatter


If you're not a Quaker, the language of this letter might sound kind of funny. In spite of, and sometimes because of, the fact that our denomination embraces plain speaking as a religious principle, "Quakerspeak" definitely has some strange elements.

"Second month" is the traditional Quaker way of referring to February. Our founder, George Fox, objected to the fact that days and months were named after figures of mythology. He thought we should call them what they are, the first, second, or whatever month or day. Quaker children tend to go to "First Day School," not "Sunday School."

The passage I quote in the second paragraph pertains to a program whereby the AFSC supplied water purifiers to Iraq in violation of the pre-war trade sanctions. The "cannot tell you about actions like this" was a puzzler to me. I knew they were doing it at the time, although I cannot recall how I knew

A "Faith and Practice" is a Quaker catechism, essentially. Except we don't believe in dogma, so it's more like a collection of things "weighty" Friends have thought might be useful for spiritual growth.

If you don't know what I mean about Pentagon surveillance of the AFSC, here's their take on the issue. I use the term "you" purposefully in that paragraph, as Mary Ellen is one of the people who has gone on record decrying this action.

Actually, a great deal of this letter, which took up two sides of a legal sheet of paper, seemed to imply that the AFSC was going less in the direction of "building peace," and more in the direction of "bringing down the current administration." I don't know if that's the actual organizational culture or what they thought would play well in a fundraising letter. I actually hope it's the former. The latter would be a lot more Machiavellian than I'm comfortable with in my co-religionists.

What did you see today?