Goose Creek Friends

Newsletter November 2022

Goose Creek Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), Lincoln, Virginia

Queries for Eleventh Month –

Stewardship of Personal Resources MARK YOUR CALENDAR!
• Do we regard our resources as gifts from God,
to be held in trust and shared according to the
Light we are given?
• What are we doing as individuals and as a meeting
to nurture our gifts? Second Hours –
• How do we encourage the members of the larger at the rise of Meeting
community to be careful stewards of their gifts?
November 13 – What book or other resource
has enriched your spiritual life?
Eleventh Month Meeting for Worship December 11 – Quakers and Christmas:
with a Concern for Business What does Christmas mean to you?
Patricia Barber presented the first reading of the
Nominating Committee’s report. Friends approved
the new Nominating Committee process. Goose
Creek faces real challenges in nurturing new
leadership as we lose the participation of long- Christmas potluck dinner
serving Friends in Meeting affairs. Peggy King has
agreed to be our Meeting Recorder. New committee and carol sing Sunday evening,
clerks for 2023: December 18, 6:00
Peace and Social Concerns – Jackie Kosbob GIFT EXCHANGE: If you’d like to participate
in the exchange of gifts at the Christmas potluck,
Burying Grounds – Allen Cochran (co-clerk)
here’s how. Right after Thanksgiving, a little box
Library – Elizabeth Evans will appear in the back of the Meeting Room.
Publications – Catherine Cox Write your name on a slip of paper (and age, for a
child), put the name in the box, and take one out.
Positions that remain to be filled: clerks for the
That will be the person to whom you will give a
Archive and the Peace and Social Concerns
simple home-made gift. The gift could be anything
Committees; Goose Creek representative
–cookies? A potted bulb? A child might make a
to Baltimore Yearly Meeting; Goose Creek
Christmas tree ornament or a special drawing.
representative to Friends Committee on National
Legislation. Some Friends are still in discernment
about their committee memberships. It was pointed
out that it’s possible to join a committee not just now,
but any time throughout the year. The Nominating Christmas Eve Meeting for
Committee will offer a second reading of their report Worship Dec. 24, 7:00 - 8:00 pm
next month.
Christmas Day, 9:45 am
Continued on next page g
Goose Creek Friends Newsletter | November 2022 | Page 2
Friends approved with thanks the annual report of
the Meeting Cares Committee. Committee members
stay in touch with and support Friends in ill health
or facing other challenges, including delivering
meals. They continue to send cards to Friends and
books to new babies. During the past year they have
worked with Loudoun Hunger Relief and Mobile
Hope and are currently collecting holiday gift cards
for Mobile Hope.
Meeting approved with thanks the annual report of
the Unity with Nature Committee, which educates
Friends, including our children, in ways to improve
the environment and achieve environmental justice.
Friends approved with thanks the annual report of
the Peace and Social Concerns Committee, which
described the many activities in which they’ve been
involved, including the support of Afghan refugees in
Virginia and of the organization Women to Women,
which is back working in Afghanistan. Goose Creek
Meeting contributed funds to Central World Kitchen:
98% of their funds go to the actual endeavor. Goose
Creek donated to Global Volunteers, under whose
auspices Amy and Adam Robinson and their children
went to Poland to aid Ukrainian refugees. The
committee has also been active in promoting gun
safety and has worked in cooperation with our Anti-
Racism Committee, with prison ministries, in local
partnership with Grace Church, and in support of
Miriam Westervelt’s work in Kenya. They continue
also to work with FCNL and the Virginia Interfaith
Center on Public Policy.
Friends affirmed that we are willing to commit to
involvement again with the newly reinvigorated
Loudoun Interfaith Bridges.
Ed Devinney reported for the Ad Hoc Committee on
Stewardship of our Financial Resources. They have
worked to compare Meeting’s foreseeable financial
needs with our General Fund and have prepared a
ten-year budget plan that would allow Meeting’s
regular expenses to be covered by our annual
contributions, allowing us to make use of capital
funds in various other ways. The ad hoc committee
realizes that this is a hard time, economically, to
think about giving. But they ask us to consider how
we are spiritually led to invest in the welfare of the
wider community and requested a Second Hour
threshing session to talk about the possible scope of
our giving. This was approved for January 22, 2023.
Other approved calendar items:
Christmas potluck dinner and carol sing – Sunday
evening, December 18, 6:00
A session on local birds and avian migrations –
March 19, 2023, after the rise of Meeting. The wider
community will be invited.
Friends who wish to receive copies of minutes from
Meetings for Worship with a Concern for Business
may contact the Recording Clerk, Catherine Cox.
At Herndon Meeting: A discussion of
gun safety on November 19
Herndon Meeting has invited us to this discussion,
to be held at their Meeting House or via Zoom
on Saturday, November 19, at 5 pm. Those who
can attend in person are invited to a potluck meal
following the conversation. Goose Creek’s Peace and
Social Concerns Committee will share what we have
done to promote gun safety.
Herndon Meeting: 660 Spring Street, Herndon,
Virginia 20170
For more information, please contact Eric Carlson
(ecarlson40@gmail.com).
Goose Creek News
The Meeting Cares Committee is collecting
holiday gift cards in small denominations for
Mobile Hope. Friends can bring donations of gift
cards to Meeting and committee members will
deliver them. Thank you!
Apologies to Friends who have not been receiving
their newsletters recently. We are in the process of
transferring the mail and email newsletter recipient
list to a central location and some Friends have not
received the newsletter in the past couple of months.
If you haven’t received the newsletter (via email
or regular mail) please notify Maria Nicklin
(marianicklin@gmail.com).
This cloud’s silver lining has been hearing from Ann
Thomas, a Goose Creek Friend from some years past,
who wrote the Ungers to ask about the newsletter.
Apologies, Ann, we’re so glad to hear from you, and
to know that you still value our newsletter.
 Goose Creek Friends Newsletter | November 2022 | Page 3

George Fox and the many like an insult, and some were even physically
assaulted for their refusal to get on the ‘you’
English Language bandwagon …
Excerpted from linguistics professor John
“Even on the spread of singular ‘you,’ the Quaker
McWhorter’s column for The New York Times
leader George Fox thought of it not only as
of October 28:
undemocratic but grammatically unsuitable. In 1660
“[I]n the Middle Ages across Europe, a fashion arose he wrote a whole, often heated book on the matter,
in various languages of addressing individuals with whose prissily didactic title says it all: ‘A Battle-
the plural pronoun as a mark of respect. The idea was Door for Teachers & Professors to Learn Singular
that using a singular form was too direct; the plural and Plural; You to Many, and Thou to One; Singular
form suggested a kind of polite distance. . . One, Thou; Plural Many, You.’”
“At first, this usage of ‘you’ was between people of
higher status, with the expectation then developing
that people lower on the social scale would address
their betters as ‘you’ while addressing one another
as ‘thou.’  
“This stage was paralleled in many European
countries, but the odd thing about English is that
‘you’ then edged out ‘thou’ completely in the 17th
century. Why English took it this far is difficult
to know. At a time when ‘thou’ was still a recent
memory, Quakers found the ‘you’ takeover elitist,
with its overtone of saluting and bowing creating
conflict with their egalitarian ideology. I attended
a Quaker school for a while in the late 1970s and
at least one teacher was still using ‘thou’ in this
way — I will never forget him reminding me before
an exam, ‘Be sure to put thy name on thy paper.’
However, in the 17th century, Quakers’ insistence on
using ‘thou’ even with people of high status felt to Artwork by young Friend, Will J

Artwork by young Friend, Nate J

Page 4 | November 2022 | Goose Creek Friends Newsletter

Sundays Facing Bench

Zoom Meeting for Worship at 9:45 a.m. In-person
NOVEMBER
Meeting for Worship at 9:45 a.m. For the weekly Zoom link,
Rich Weidner
contact Chuck at: chuck.hough@gmail.com
First Day School & Nursery, 10:00 a.m. DECEMBER
Patricia Barber
Wednesdays
Discussion Group at 7:00 (Zoom). For more information, zoom HOST
contact Chuck Hough: chuck.hough@gmail.com Chuck Hough

Calendar Family Programs

NOVEMBER We still offer two
monthly groups online:
11.06 Sun. 11:00 am Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business PARENTING GROUP
11.09 Wed. 5:00 pm Religious Education Committee Meeting (Zoom) 11/26/22, 7:30 PM
11.13 Sun. 9:00 am Unity with Nature Committee meeting TEEN GROUP
11:00 am Second Hour, followed by a simple lunch 11/27/22, 7:30 PM
11.20 Sun 11:00 am Mud Club ***
11.27 Sun. 11:00 am Ministry & Worship Committee meeting
MUD CLUB! Special date:
DECEMBER 11/20 at the rise of Meeting,
about 11:00 AM at the
12.4 Sun. 11:00 am Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business Meeting House
12.11 Sun. 9:00 am Unity with Nature Committee meeting ***
11:00 am Second Hour, followed by a simple lunch For the meeting links and Mud
12.14 Wed. 5:00 pm Religious Education Committee meeting Club info contact Cameron at:
12.18 Sun. 6:00 pm Christmas potluck dinner and carol sing cameron247@hotmail.com
12.24 Sat. 7:00 pm Christmas Eve Meeting for Worship
NEWSLETTER
The Goose Creek Friends Newsletter
Upcoming in First Day School & the Nursery is published monthly by the
Goose Creek Friends Meeting,
11.06 Burying Grounds Project, Teacher: Joey Coburn 18204 Lincoln Road, P.O. Box 105,
Lincoln, VA 20160.
Ages 8 and up, (outdoors, dress warmly)
CLERK
11.13 Burying Grounds Project, Teacher: Joey Coburn Allen Cochran, 540.338.6485
Ages 8 and up, (outdoors, dress warmly) Cochransstone@aol.com
TREASURER
11.20 Quaker Elevator Speech, Teacher: Sean Lloyd
Brian Burgher
Ages 8 and up goose.creek.treasurer@gmail.com
11.27 Quaker Elevator Speech, Teacher: Sean Lloyd NEWSLETTER EDITOR
Ages 8 and up Catherine Cox, 301-471-5330
blycox@comcast.net
NURSERY: Stories, drawing, painting, crafts, and play (ages newborn to 7) WEBSITE & FACEBOOK
www.goosecreekfriends.org
https://www.facebook.com/
Goose-Creek-Friends-Meeting-
“Of the interest of the public in our estates: Hardly any thing 150892438287560/?rc=p
is given us for our selves, but the public may claim a share DONATIONS
with us. But of all we call ours, we are most accountable Please direct donations for
to God and the public for our estates: In this we are but Goose Creek Friends Meeting to
Brian Burgher, P.O. Box 105
stewards, and to hoard up all to ourselves is great injustice as Lincoln, Virginia 20160 - OR -
well as ingratitude.” – John Woolman, 1720 donate online: http://www.goose-
creekfriends.org/please-support-
goose-creek/