This Palestinian American professor leans on his Quaker faith during conflict

PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."Atshan: So Quakers cherish silence. Silence is sacred for us and there's a power and a transcendent nature to silence, especially when we come together in community in silence.

The way Quaker worship works is that every Sunday, Quakers are encouraged to consider going to what's called Meeting for Worship. It's held at what can be called a Quaker church or a Quaker meeting house. And oftentimes the model is that you sit in silence for an hour. So you're sitting often with facing benches, with no icons or symbols or displays all around you.

It's a very simple atmosphere. It's non hierarchical, so there's no priest or pastor. And you're sitting in that deep, deep silence in community with one another. But you can break the silence if you feel moved to speak by spirit, and if you have a message to share. That's not supposed to be pre-planned, so you're not supposed to go in with a script.

And you're not supposed to be in this, what's called the popcorn style of responding to a message that came before you. You have to allow time for silence to process if there was a message preceding your message. And it should be your own unique message.

So at Ramallah Friends School, we had these silent Meetings for Worship. And when I was in high school, the second intifada was raging. And I remember sitting in the chapel, hundreds of people, you know, students, staff, faculty, etc. And outside, all around us, there was this cacophony of sounds. Helicopters, missiles, ambulances, funeral procession, demonstrators. You could hear all of these sounds all around you, but we were silent. And just being in that space was unbelievably healing. And I remember from a young age thinking, I need to hold on to this for the rest of my life."

I gave an up vote because this person seems to be authentic, but from the questions NPR asked it’s still difficult to gage how this person really is. Basically this whole article was about an attack by one nut against 3 Middle Eastern men. NPR asked no questions about all the atrocities Hamas committed that began this war.

It’s interesting that on the article he identifies their meetings are mostly quite, but that one can speak if they are moved by something. I would be interested to know if anyone said anything against the atrocities Hamas committed to start the war. We will never know because NPR didn’t ask the question.