Greg serves as the Friends Relations Associate for AFSC in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Born and raised in rural Northeastern Pennsylvania, Greg grew up attending North Branch Friends Meeting at the Curtis family farm in the Poconos. Over the last ten years, he has facilitated numerous workshops for activists and Friends on a variety of topics, including anti-oppression activism, empire, and the "Inquirer's Weekend" at Pendle Hill with Trayce Peterson.

“Here, you might be interested in this. They’re a Quaker organization.” I look down at the title: "MARStar: Newsletter of the Middle Atlantic Region, American Friends Service Committee." The cover has a large image of protestors holding signs. “Cool,” I say out loud. I turn the pages and see words I’ve never seen before -- “social justice” “activists” “the prison industrial complex.” Immediately, I recognize that this magazine, this document, is something significant, something important, something I am connected to. For the first time in my life, I feel proud to be a Quaker.

Note: This is a poem I wrote for the New Year.  - Lucy

It rained all day on Christmas Eve this year

The sun slanted in the morning

I rode around the burial ground, circling

The mud clung to my tires

A brown leaf stuck in the spokes, ssshhh

The bare trees’ branches rested like bones

The damp earth waits

Holding sorrow, holding promise

A week ago I sat on the stairs in a church in West Philly

All the seats were taken

500 converge to mourn, to raise voices, to turn pain into r/evolution

St. Louis resident Diamond Latchison joined the protests five days after Mike Brown’s death. “Once I started seeing firsthand what the people were doing and what the police were doing, I never left,” she says.

Sterling Duns is a West Philly based hip-hop artist and musician.  His passion for music stems from his desire to make sense of the events that make our lives unique and intertwined, all at once. He holds a BA in English from Dickinson College and an MA in Poetry from the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England. Sterling has worked with youth from all different backgrounds, at summer camps and in classrooms, for the last 10+ years. He truly believes that if we empower and inspire the youth of today, our future will be in great hands.

The human experience is a beautifully complex one. In our 21^st century lives, it seems that our online newspapers, twitter feeds, and emails are filled with stories of hate, injustice, oppression and violence. We often need to look a little deeper to find the stories of hope, faith, compassion, and love, and by the time we get to them, we are often too weighed down with challenging stories to recognize the uplifting ones. But we must be resilient. We must stay encouraged.