Bikes Rule!What is the EarthQuaker bike trip?
It's a just under 300-mile bicycle trip from Pendle Hill to Johnstown, PA in time for Friends General Conference Gathering-- although folks don't have to go to the gathering if they go on the bike trip.

What's the vision behind it, why do it?
Well, the primary reason is that, as far as I can tell, Quakers have had a hugely disproportionate effect on the course of history, and while we haven't been shy about being involved in the political system, or using money if we acquire it, the primary reason I think we've been effective is that we have been patterns and examples. So if we travel sustainably to Gathering by pedal power, a rolling faith community witnessing to others that we meet along the way-- that seems to me like a very important exercise for modern Friends. That's the primary vision. It also happens to, incidentally, involve having a lot of fun. I don't think that all faithfulness is about the cross. I think that some faithfulness is about the state fair.

When you meet with people along the way, what's the message that you'll be carrying?
We're going to visit three monthly meetings in the Caln Quarter, and we're going to sit down and talk with them about earthcare. Part of what I'm hoping to do is draw them out and find out how lively those concerns are in the meeting. So it's not just a question of us going there and telling people how it is, but a question of having a dialogue. Then we're going to do service projects with the meetings, and also service projects in the communities. Those might be working at organic farms or working in soup kitchens. That's one of the reasons it's an eight-day trip, when it's only 280 miles. We have two days when we won't pedal at all, and some half days of service as well.

How are you going to build faith community together?
Part of it is the work, part of it is the hardship of traveling together and having tolerance with one another, sleeping on the floor of the meetinghouse together. But also waking up in the morning and having meeting for worship, having yoga together, and just being in community. I'm confident that the community part will be what's richest about it, and I think we're going to bring leaven to the loaf of FGC gathering, because the forty of us-- forty, that's what we're aiming for-- we're going to come already knit together. It's an intergenerational trip, and I'm really expecting to have everybody there.

Is there a concern for earthcare in Quakerism historically?
Oh yeah. That was one of the interesting things to me when I first took it up. Woolman is the consummate earth Quaker. He goes to England and he's concerned about the abuse of the horses and the abuse of the post-boys. There's no distinction-- it's just cruelty. In a statement of faith pretty early on in the journal, he says he realized that to profess to love and God and to act with cruelty to the least of His creatures was a violation of faithfulness. He just gets it. William Penn, too. If you read Fruits of Solitude, he says some amazing stuff. He has that great quote,

It would go a great way to caution and direct People in their Use of the World, that they were better studied and known in the Creation of it. For how could Man find the Confidence to abuse it, while they should see the Great Creator stare them in the Face, in all and every part thereof?

If you look, the core is there all the way back. Fox walked up Pendle Hill. He didn't go into Canterbury Cathedral! For me it's there all the way through, everywhere.

In a world that is trying to figure out how to deal with issues of earthcare and sustainability, what is the specifically Quaker voice, if there is one?
Part of my sadness is that I don't know that we are running out front on earthcare. For instance, when I started talking to Quakers about earthcare in 1998, most Quakers still had a strong division between social justice issues and earthcare. The attitude seemed to be, "Yeah, that's fine kid, we'll pick up litter after we've abolished war." Now I think we are starting to get it.

We have stood for the notion that the abolition of war is possible. That's a completely crazy idea. There's never not been war. Most people consider war inevitable. With the environment, people are saying, "Well, how can we damage the environment less?" I think when Quakers get it together, what we may stand for is, it should be possible to have a mutually beneficial human-earth relationship. Not just, we're not doing as much damage, but straight up, people are good for the planet. That's a quantum leap from where anybody is. We're all at damage control. And damage control just means we're slowing down how long it will take us to kill it.

Anything else about the bike trip or Quaker earthcare concerns?
Please come out. It's going to be a good time. It's going to be physically intense, but not impossible by any means. We'll be an intergenerational bunch of folks. We're going to camp out, sleep on floors, cook food together, and clean up together. My plan is to swim in a river-- every day, if possible. It's going to be live. And there will be a lot of room for people to make it what they want it to be, because that's community.

For more information, please visit http://www.fgcquaker.org/gathering/2008/eqbt