This YouTube video above describes how to make fire using yucca.
First Day School had a unique opportunity on October 2, when Matt Kipp a local forager led young Friends and some guests on a plant forage at the meetinghouse. Matt said of foraging, ” It offers me an abiding connection to my surroundings and a feeling of being at home in nature.
Many thanks to Matt for sharing with our young Friends that nature provides food and medicine, if we take the time and are aware of the plants around us. In these uncertain times having information about the world we live in could be a wonderful resource in the future.The First Day Program desires to nurture young people’s connection to God, Meeting, and the Quaker community, by providing a welcoming setting, and we hold that the Creation needs to be respected and valued. The foraging class was a wonderful opportunity to take a deeper look at creation as Matt identified often overlooked plants that provide multiple benefits to our lives. This First Day Young Friends program certainly helped us appreciate our creation by identifying some of the plants in the space behind the meetinghouse.
Bruce has been described as the “backbone” of Columbia Friends Meeting, and was clerk there. His thoughtful and forthright clerking style navigated the meeting through Quaker process and service. Bruce led Columbia Friends to work on upkeep of the Bush River Cemetery, once also the location of a thriving Quaker community. His efforts helped preserve this historic location where up to hundreds of Friends once gathered for quarterly meeting. Bruce’s ancestry included early Quaker settlers in South Carolina, who eventually joined the migration and left for parts north and west, including his home state of Indiana in the run up to the Civil War.
As an advocate against the death penalty, Bruce was active in Amnesty, International. He was the SC State Death Penalty Abolition Coordinator and a regular prison visitor. With others, Bruce was arrested when they attempted to block a delivery truck entering the Broad River Correctional facility. He organized execution vigils and edited the book The Death Penalty in SC: Outlook for the 80’s. He and his wife Julie adopted a man on death row. He created the first anti-death penalty group in SC. He worked with the Progressive Network, producing pamphlets and receiving the Thunder and Lightning Award, in recognition of leadership and commitment to human and civil rights in the mid-1990’s for his death penalty work.
He was a signer on the first statewide gathering of Quakers in modern times, the Palmetto Friends Gathering that met in Myrtle Beach at the Christian Retreat Center the weekend of January 12-14, 1990. He helped to plan PFG annual weekends and served as clerk for the 5th and 6th annual Gatherings.
Bruce was a skilled mentor, and worked closely with Rebecca Rogers as she seasoned her clerking skills. He is remembered fondly by Ron Caz who took over the Amnesty role in 1991, for his training and support.
In 2004 Bruce and Julie affiliated with the Salem-Black River Friends meeting for a short time before moving to Indiana.
Recollections provided by: Ron Caz, Grace Gifford, Sallie Prugh, Becci Robbins, Harry Rogers and Anna Shockley
The South Carolina Advocacy Team requests the following actions. Senator Tim Scott’s birthday is September 19th. That is on a Sunday, so please call his office on Friday 9/17. Tell the staff that you are a constituent and sending birthday best wishes, and ask that he request that SJ Res 10 come to a vote. The number is (202) 224-6121. This is not a group call, but a call-in action.
Please remember that if you get an LTE published, the SC Advocacy Team would like to send it to FCNL and we can share it on the Columbia Friends website.
The South Carolina FCNL Advocacy Team is focused on repealing the Authorization for Military Force (AUMF) for Iraq so that military actions and assassinations cannot occur without the approval of Congress. Please see the full text of the bill here: https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-joint-resolution/10/text . The following letters to the Editors are in support of this effort.
Due to unforeseen installation delays the dedication of the
Vista Peace Pole must be rescheduled.
The dedication will NOT be on September 21, 2021. The Columbia Peace Pole Initiative committee and One Columbia will let everyone know as soon as a new date is set.
