Support Whidbey Island Friends Meeting
Dear Friends,
Every year Whidbey Island Friends Meeting calls on our meeting’s members and attenders for financial support. The ongoing life of our community and its effectiveness in local activities and national initiatives depends upon this support as well as your gifts of time and involvement. Although we do not have paid staff, and most of our attenders serve on at least one committee, there is still a need for financial support for the cost of meeting space, maintaining a website, e-mail and other sundry day-to-day expenses as well as support for our many contributions to initiatives both local and in the wider world.
This year we adopted a policy to annually support both local and national service groups such as Ryan’s House for Youth, Whidbey Island Homeless Coalition, Friendly Water for the World, the Way of the Spirit series of retreats (Good News Associates) and American Friends Service Committee.
Civility First, a grass-roots movement promoting courteous public on-line dialogue and civil discourse with those of differing opinions, was developed by some of our attenders in partnership with others from across the political spectrum.
We are active in environmental affairs as members of the Greening Congregations Collaborative on Whidbey Island, which includes other faith-based groups and churches working to responsibly steward our planet.
We support the statewide organization Quaker Voice (formerly Friends Committee on Washington Public Policy) both financially and by annually attending Quaker Lobby Day in Olympia. Our Peace and Social Concerns (P&SC) Committee is leading a campaign to oppose the use of Washington State parkland for Navy SEAL training. P&SC also held a workshop in collaboration with the Alternatives to Violence team from Seattle in the spring of 2017 that was open to the public and are currently planning another workshop to take place in early spring of 2018.
Nationally we support the lobbying work of Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL). We contributed an extra amount this past year to support its capital campaign to upgrade an old house next door to its headquarters into a hostel/meeting space for young adults. FCNL’s lobbying theme this year was immigration, in 2018 it will be climate change.
Our projected budget for 2018 is about $7000. Help us begin the new year on solid footing with a gift now. You can donate via credit or debit card using PayPal on the Home Page of this website. Once there, scroll down to the PayPal button half way down the page.
Thank You!