Truth - Kindness - Necessity - Missing Ingredients in the Present State of Public (non) Civility

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/01/13/824661/-Is-it-true-Is-it-kind-Is-it-necessary-

My best friend when I was small was a Friend. Her parents were birthright Quakers active in prison reform and nuclear disarmament. As a child I saw the homelier side of Quaker practice - the silent meetings, the delicious treats at the annual bazaar and an early introduction to the three-fold sieve.

THE THREE SIEVES 

A LITTLE boy one day ran indoors from school and called out eagerly: "Oh, mother, what do you think of Tom Jones? I have just heard that ——" 

"Wait a minute, my boy. Have you put what you have heard through the three sieves before you tell it to me?" 

"Sieves, mother! What do you mean?" 

"Well, the first sieve is called Truth. Is it true?" 

"Well, I don't really know, but Bob Brown said that Charlie told him that Tom ——" 

"That's very roundabout. What about the second sieve — Kindness. Is it kind?" 

"Kind! No, I can't say it is kind." 

"Now the third sieve — Necessity. Will it go through that? Must you tell this tale?" 

"No, mother, I need not repeat it." 

"Well, then, my boy, if it is not necessary, not kind, and perhaps not true, let the story die."

.

John Linton – Universalist Friend - Obituary

”John Linton did not believe that any single religion had a monopoly on truth.”

John Linton

For my friend John Linton, who has died aged 99, India – and especially Mahatma Gandhi – was a major influence. In 1978, convinced that no one religion has a monopoly of truth, and inspired by his experience in India of meetings in which Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians worshipped together in Quaker silence, he founded the Quaker Universalist Group.

I thought I would pass this along. It would seem that the Guardian Obit is the only one printed for this man. Other obits are copies or excerpts of that one obituary.

Not much detail. Devil in the detail you know. I saw it and sent it to a friend into Universalism. I knew of Quakerism and I knew of Universalism. I did not know that the chocolate got mixed with the peanut butter so to speak in the form of John Linton.

The creation of one more tangent religion merits little or no news these days. The most profound religion of the last four hundred years, Quakerism/Friends, saw the need in the form of John Linton to merge into the Universal religion of the future. A belief, one that truly includes if not dogma, the spirit of man, in the spirit of the moment and sharing in silence the spirit of the Universe with out and with in.

Rest in peace John Linton.