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