First Stack of Author Proofs!
Sabbath Economics published on November 11, 2020
Announcement in Friends Journal
Very Excited to announce that, with ReadersMagnet, I am publishing
a major upgrade to a book I wrote early in my writing career.
Please give this brief entry a good look!
In Brief: Sabbath Economics: A Spiritual Guide to Linking Love and Money
Steady & Clear
Trouble called me by name one Sunday afternoon at California Central
Women’s Facility. I had just finished co-leading a weekend Alternatives
to Violence Project workshop with three Quaker volunteers and had
walked with them from the cellblock to the exit gate. The moment I
passed through the Xray detector into the visitor’s room, the watch
sergeant called my name. His tone was stern. When I turned, an even
sterner voice added, “Miz Favor, I need to talk to you. In my office.” He
jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
Lieutenant and sergeant gave me hard looks as I stepped around the
end of the counter and followed them. Why did each man keep a hand
on the holstered pistols at his hip? Why address me with harsh eyes and
clipped voices? What was so threatening about a sixty-year-old
grandmother?
“What’s the problem, officer?”
“You broke the rules.”
“What rules?”
“Department of Corrections rules. You are prohibited from doing
volunteer work in the same prison where you visit an inmate.”
“I didn’t know there was a rule against that.”
“There is. We’re telling you. You cannot volunteer and also visit a Death
Row prisoner, or write to her. That is against the rules.”
“I’m trying see your point of view,” I began, thinking it wise to start off
diplomatically, “but I’ve been leading AVP workshops with the general
population for two years with no fuss. I know about the rule prohibiting
women on Death Row from participating in programs. Rosie is not
involved in the AVP program, so I don’t see the problem. Why can’t I
do both?”
The men shook their heads in unison. They folded arms across chests.
I tried another tack. “Getting to know Rosie was what inspired me to
train for AVP leadership. I want to show inmates how to solve
interpersonal problems nonviolently, because violence is what landed
Rosie behind bars.” More hard looks. I could tell they were not
persuaded.
“It is against department policy,” said the lieutenant.
“You can’t do both.”
I sensed it was fruitless to ask for an exception, but did it anyway.
“Could you grant me an exception to the rule? Everyone comes out
ahead when you give me permission to do both. Can you do that?”
Denied, of course. This conversation was not endearing me to the
lieutenant. I knew better than to insist on speaking to his supervisor, but
did it anyway. The sergeant punched a phone and summoned the watch
captain. Both guards kept arms crossed over their hearts. A stony
silence prevailed until the captain arrived. His furrowed brow showed
he was not happy to be here. I repeated my plea. He insistently repeated
the rule.
“No, you cannot do both.”
“But that’s not logical,” I protested. “Your policy doesn’t make sense in this situation.”
“NO,” repeated the captain. “Absolutely not!”
He gestured toward black binders labeled DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS.
“Prohibited. Period.”
“Well, you’re giving me a tough choice,” I said. “I’ll need some time to think about it.”
“No.” He gave me another hard look. “You can’t leave until you decide.”
I pictured my friends waiting in the parking lot. I met the captain’s stare. His jaw was set.
“Which is it? Decide now.” His eyes drilled into mine.
The pulse in my throat pounded so hard I thought my voice would shake,
but it came out steady and clear. ““Rosie. If I must choose now, I choose my friend Rosie.”
“Why?” The lieutenant sounded genuinely puzzled.
The other two exhaled noisily and shook their heads. One muttered something.
“Because she comes first for me. If you won’t let me facilitate workshops
here, other Quakers will do it. I can contribute at other California
prisons. Rosie is my friend. I will not abandon her.”
“Murderer.” The sergeant’s face twisted into a mocking sneer.
“You can all go.” The captain dismissed us and quickly left the room.
I felt discouraged as I drove away from Central California Women’s
Facility, where prison administrators and guards acted as if murderers
were monsters. They acted as if women on The Row could not be
redeemed. Their frozen faces seemed oblivious to my reasonable
questions, hardened against inquiry. Their scowling brows seemed
allergic to reflection. Their hard voices refused to consider any point of
view but Departmental Policy. Their hands on pistol butts conveyed
power and domination. The combination made mutual understanding
impossible. Compromise was totally off the table.
Soon after three armed men forced me to choose, I discovered “The
Abnormal Is Not Courage,” a poem by Jack Gilbert. His words about
World War II reminded me that Quaker volunteer service is not
accomplished with tanks or horses. Work for justice does not take place
on stallions, with sabers in hand. Witnessing to ‘the spark of God’ in
people occurs through everyday interactions. Sometimes it happens in
prisons, sometimes in homes, schools, retreat centers and cafes.
Sometimes it takes place in sunlight, usually in conversations that most
folks will never hear. Witnessing to “the spark of God” in myself, friends
behind bars (and you) comes through small moments of faithfulness and
simple actions that few will ever see. These days, for me, many faithful
actions take place on the pages of my forthcoming book titled
FRIENDING ROSIE: LIFE ON DEATH ROW.
At age seventy-nine, I lack the strength and energy to visit CCWF as
often as I once did, or as often as I would like, but my commitment to
Rosie remains steady and clear. My invitation to readers, to you, to hear,
see, correspond with and visit incarcerated persons is grounded in the
“normal excellence, of long accomplishment.” Twenty years after I first
ventured behind bars to meet Rosie, Gilbert’s poem reminds me that the
work of advocating for free people to befriend imprisoned ones is made
up of the “beauty of many days.”
Leo & Cordelia slide
The Beacons
SUMMARY
There’s a lot to love about the women of Saint Lydia’s in San Francisco. Head Beacon Beka and her sidekick Dot turned out to be very good at getting rid of a predatory male pastor. Female church leaders were rare in 1976, but they found an ordained woman to shepherd their flock. The five Beacons, their prickly minister and a young Mexican prostitute all took risks, made mistakes and followed their hearts to set a wild new course for their historic interracial, interdenominational congregation in “The City.”
The Beacons reveals the souls of lay leaders, how they sought spiritual guidance, earned the respect they deserved and gained the freedom to run their church in an egalitarian way. Younger readers of diverse ethnicities and orientations will glimpse pioneering feminine faith in action. Older women will almost certainly remember fights for equality during those chaotic 1970s, and San Franciscans will get a fresh view of that infamous era of sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll through the stories of a few memorable Christian visionaries.
BLURBS
Judith Favor offers us a delicious, saucy slice of mid-70s San Francisco. The Beacons provides generous servings of the beautiful city plus a kaleidoscope of characters, lifestyles and spiritual practices. Deeply textured and finely tuned, this novel crackles with lively energy.
Mary Atwood, Episcopal priest
It isn’t often that readers interested in religion have a chance to learn about the inner workings of a small but active congregation, especially when the story entails conflicts between clergy and parish leadership. Judith Favor has beautifully provided such a look with her fictional well-trained older Episcopal priest. The long-time church “Beacons,” each well-described, struggle with their pro and con emotions while the first-time reverend agonizes over her inability to persuade them to an orthodox faith. A carefully crafted microcosm of American congregational struggles in our post-Christiandom era. [Christendom?]
Jean Lesher, religious book editor
Judith Favor has created a delightful gang of deacons here in The Beacons! You will come to know and love them as they grapple with their own psyches, their collective mission, and the evolving conditions of their time and place. The superbly drawn focus of this tale—the trials and tribulations of their courageous choice for replacement priest—rings true and deep, and will leave you hoping for more.
Michael Kirk, artist/designer/editor
Judith Favor’s novel lives next door to Armistead Maupin’s San Francisco of the Seventies. In The Beacons we glimpse a radical Christianity—radical because women took over leadership of an interracial church. Favor gives an insider’s look at what happened in a place few of us have imagined.
John Brantingham, author of Let Us All Now Pray to Our Own Strange Gods
[John Brantingham’s work has appeared in hundreds of magazines in the United States and England, and his poetry has been featured on Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac. His other books
The Beacons slide
READERS’ GROUPS: Some Open-Ended Questions
Working Cover Draft for The Beacons
a new novel
by Judith Favor
Pick those that spark a strong response in you…
The GATE: ENTRY POINTS
- What pulled you into the story; conflict, collaboration or something else?
- Which character made you care? What about her sparked your interest?
- Which themes kept your attention? Say more…
- Have you ever served on a pastoral search committee? Any regrets?
- Have you ever made a life-changing decision, only to wind up doubting your own wisdom? Describe a bit about this…
The TUNNELS: UNDERNEATH
- Have you ever been groped? More than once? What happened?
- Have you ever confronted a sexual predator? When? Where? How?
- Have you ever worked with strong women to get rid of a predator, or bring about needed change in your school, church or neighborhood?
- Have you ever felt oppressed? When? Where? How?
- Have you ever led a guided tour with someone of a different class, age or place so she could come to appreciate your original neighborhood?
The SHORES: LAND’S END
- Do you usually say YES or NO when asked to serve in a leadership role? Why or why not?
- When does the fear of looking bad or sounding stupid keep you from speaking up?
- How might you rebalance a situation of power-over with someone in a position of authority? What might a power-with situation look like?
- Do you like the feeling of blood rushing to your head, making everything heightened and fast and wild? Why or why not?
- What role has the public library played in your intellectual development?
The HILLS: STEEP CLIMBS
- Tell about a time you challenged authority or witnessed others doing so.
- Tell about someone you consider a saint? Describe why…
- Tell about your experience with spiritual-practice circles.
- Tell about someone you know personally who speaks truth with love.
- Tell about something that triggers your animosity, maybe aggression.
The PRESIDIO: TRAIPSING
- For you, is Holy Communion a revered sacrament, an occasional liturgical experience, a paradox, a sacred mystery or something else?
- For you, is heresy a holy truth, an outmoded concept, a way to separate insiders from outsiders, or something else?
- For you, is aggression your first response, a rare but useful form of expression, avoided most of the time, abhorrent or something else?
- For you, which person or situation irritates you like a thorn in the flesh? We aren’t sure what Paul meant by the metaphor; what’s true for you?
- For you, what emotions rise when you read of a modern woman giving herself a penance or setting out to become a connoisseur of pain?
The BRIDGES: CONNECTING
- What did you hunger for when you were a teen? And these days?
- What did you do to ground yourself when you were young? Now?
- What happens when people share food? How does eating together nourish emotional connections and deepen relationships between folks?
- What might happen if more transgender folks had a place at the table?
- What connection do you see between the Beacons’ total acceptance of her and Paige’s capacity to be merciful toward Rev Ruth?
The TENDERLOIN: LURES
- Have you had personal experience with someone who was lured into the sex trade? Tell what you heard, felt, wanted, said or did…
- Describe any links and/or tensions you might have experienced between your own emerging sexuality and your developing spirituality.
- What delights you about San Francisco’s Night Ministry? Discomforts you?
- How does your own faith community respond to the needs of those who are trapped in prostitution? Poverty? Madness?
- Does your town have a Safe House? Do you see the need for one?
The VALLEYS: SHADOWS
- How is your view of Holy Communion affected when you envision it as Rev Ruth and the Beacons do, as a sacrament of feeding?
- Have you ever had a crush on someone? Were you aware of God’s Presence with you during the crush, after it was over, now, or never?
- Have you ever had cancer? Describe your awareness of God during your illness. Did your connection with Sacred Presence change after cancer?
- Have you noticed the little phrase AS IT IS midway through The Lord’s Prayer? What might it mean to you now? In the future?
- Have you ever offered your traumatic memories to Creation for healing? What happened?
The AVENUES: PASSAGES
- Have you ever feared you were losing your mind? Say more…
- Nobody likes everyone. Is there one neighbor, one person at church or at work toward whom you feel a puzzling sense of aversion?
- When have the blues swept over you, and how did you get through it?
- Imagine yourself yourself sitting in the tableau, silently embodying one of the Twelve Madonnas. What are you wearing? Feeling? Wanting?
- Have you ever organized a rummage sale or shopped at one? How do you feel about hearing You can’t put a price tag on love, but you can charge a fair price for the accessories?
The MISSION: ANIMATION
- Have you ever been blessed by a great kindness, a kind of sunlight?
- Ever had an intensely lucid moment, a sudden solution to a dilemma? Some call this ‘women’s intuition.’ How do you name it?
- Have you ever observed someone near and dear, wavering on the edge of cognitive diminishment? Tell about it…
- Have you ever repeated the name of Jesus to connect with the mysterious power of love embodied in this frail scrap of language?
- Have you ever sensed the gravitational pull of love while listening to someone’s truth?
The PIERS: SUPPORTS
- Imagine yourself at the bedside of a loved one, someone who has not yet decided whether to stay alive. What do you say? Do? Want?
- Imagine yourself cleaning house in a flurry of righteous indignation. What do you think? Feel? Want?
- How does angry aggression, when expressed to a trusted person in a safe setting, restore vitality for females?
- How does voluntary withdrawal from everyday responsibilities help women gain perspective and renew inner strength? Can the same benefits come through involuntary withdrawal?
- If power is the capacity to move and be moved in relationship, how does Rev Ruth’s illness change power dynamics among the Beacons?
The BEACH: CURRENTS
- When have you had to put pieces of a challenging situation together without knowing the whole picture?
- Do you believe it’s possible to have a soul connection with someone who has died? Have you ever received a bit of ancestral guidance?
- What do you see, hear and feel when you witness flights of expressive imagination in others? How does expressive imagination happen for you?
- Have you ever gone through a dark night of the soul, a cloudy evening of the soul, or a spiritual rummage sale?
- How is being socially isolated similar to, or different from, choosing to live in a contemplative way? Does seeking to be rooted and grounded in Love have anything to do with it?
ASKING WRITERS about The Beacons of Larkin Street
Working Cover Draft for The Beacons
a new novel
by Judith Favor
Reading connects people;
so does writing.
Writing helps clarify ideas,
keep track of details
and discover hidden meanings.
Expressing our truths with love
connects us—physically, mentally,
emotionally and spiritually—
to our readers
and to our deepest selves.
We read to know we are not alone.
C.S.Lewis
- The Beacons of Larkin Street is a Nineteen-Seventies historical novel written by a contemplative feminist great-grandmother, an ordained minister who once pastored a church in San Francisco.
- Where do you see contemplative perspectives influencing the stories? Feminist perspectives? Grandmotherly points of view? Ministerly perspectives?
- Set in San Francisco, twelve aspects of the City structure the novel. What connections do you see between the human characters and the character of San Francisco?
- Tales of The Beacons move between the perspectives of seven women. Do you find the author’s omniscient POV to be confusing, credible, clear, challenging or something else?
- If Beka were the sole narrator, the reader would get one singular angle on each character. Do you think Beka’s POV would have strengthened the novel? Why or why not?
- If she were the sole voice, Rev Ruth would have told the story very differently. Would you prefer her first-person voice? Why or why not?
- Which of Rev Ruth’s difficulties as a first-time pastor give you the greatest insight into her character? The most compassion for her?
- How about Beka’s efforts to guide things as Saint Lydia’s Head Beacon?
- The seven women have different sexual orientations and diverse attitudes about sexuality and spirituality. Did the author convince you that each is justified in her beliefs and practices? Why or why not?
- In Dot and Rev Ruth’s conflict over communion, do you think the resolution took too long, or came too fast? How might you have done it?
- Who was your favorite character? What about her intrigued you?
- Which scene was your favorite? What made it memorable?
- At the end, several story lines are left unresolved. Do you wish the author had resolved the characters’ dilemmas?
- Do you think Rev Ruth will live or die? Return to guide St. Lydia’s, or go to Cleveland?
- What do you think will become of Paige? Dot? Hope and Millienne? Luz?
- Are there other subplots you wonder about?
- This is the first in a trilogy. Which dilemmas and storylines do you most want resolved in a sequel?
Queries about Silence
Is silence collaborative, complicit?
“You know your part in this,” Sheriff Bowen once told him, and he did. Leo had not spoken up. He should have told someone about his brother torturing dogs. Leo knew he had been a coward.
- from Silent Voices, Part One: Boy
Is silence the space between words, a pause between heartbeats?
That evening, Cordelia heard Leo’s baritone sounding the overture to an opus, one she would be hearing for nearly thirty years. It took longer for her to discover the complexities of this opus, to make out its woodwind harmonies, its percussive dissonances and its long, silent rests.
- from Silent Voices, Part Three: Coming Together
Does silence signify absence? Does it entail presence?
Leo didn’t quite know how to be normal under the shadow of goodbye, although he had lived through it once. In Granny Phoebe’s case, he had her love to live up to. In Margaret’s case, his mother-in-law’s temper outweighed most everything else.
- from Silent Voices, Part Three: Coming Together
Does silence make you nervous? Can it be menacing?
The silence that followed Leo’s departure was like a held breath. Chastened by her husband’s outburst, Cordelia wilted into a state of rebuke. Little did she know it would become a permanent condition.
- from Silent Voices, Part Four: Wife
Is silence voluntary, even communal?
What are Leo’s mother and I doing here, sitting quietly like this, Cordelia wondered. Praying, she supposed, though neither said anything remotely prayerful. She didn’t want to break the peace by asking.
– from Silent Voices, Part Four: Wife
Is silence a refusal to speak, or to respond?
Nothing had ever been said about her husband’s mother leaving the convent. Cordelia felt the pressure to ask, but was relieved by the silence. She was not at all ready to hear about private matters between a failed nun and her God.
- from Silent Voices, Part Four: Wife
How may silence and gender be related?
On this winter day she felt it again, the race of her pulse that propelled her to keep after him. “You may have uncovered a terrible crime. What will you do, Leo? You must do something about this.”
He hung his head and went mute, not for the first time. She was desperate for him to speak, to say anything, but he was too busy breathing. No matter how hard she pressed, no matter how urgently she pleaded, Leo kept his mouth shut, saying nothing for such a long time that she eventually stopped waiting for an answer.
- from Silent Voices: Part Seven: Widow
Can silence be pleasurable, even palpable?
Nobody knows about our sexual chemistry during my first two pregnancies. Our secret. She used to wonder what the men at the bank thought when Leo came to work with his face aglow, but never dared ask.
- from Silent Voices: Part Seven: Widow