Paths to Quaker Parenting Using Quaker Beliefs, Testimonies, and Practices: The Quaker Parenting Initiative’s Guide
by the Quaker Parenting Initiative Writing Group, Harriet Heath, Editor
A group of Quaker parents asked:
- How should we respond to a three-year-old’s whining for a cookie at 5:30?
- Should a nine-year-old have both an IPod and a cell phone, or neither?
- How should we deal with a teenager who rolls his eyes and doesn’t move when asked to take out the trash?
To answer these kinds of questions, we, the writing group, met over a three year period. The group of Quaker parents were a mixture of less and more seasoned Friends and less and more experienced parents and grandparents. We shared our questions and our experiences of how our Quaker faith had supported and guided our parenting.
We found it was not easy to see parenting as a spiritual journey. But all the work we did was to take what we had learned from child psychology and daily practice, and surround it with spiritual silence, awaiting an opening. In this writing we explore the thing that parents of faith attempt and that parents of Quaker faith attempt in our particular way—to parent in the Light. Parenting was part of our spiritual journey.
This book is the outcome of our sharing.
CONTENTS
4 Writing Committee Members
5 Other Contributors
6 Illustrations
7 Acknowledgments
9 Prologue
13 Our Quaker Beliefs
17 Examples of trying to live according to our beliefs
25 Testimonies
28 Integrity
38 Equality
50 Peace
61 Simplicity
69 Stewardship
77 Service
85 Reflections on Testimonies
86 Practices
87 List of Practices
99 Examples of Using Quaker
Practices
107 Living Our Faith in Community and Family
110 Epilogue
To order:
Send a check for 14.95 plus shipping (3.00 for one copy 4.00 for two)
Make the check out to Harriet Heath
Mail check to Harriet Heath, Box 315, Winter Harbor, ME 04693