Last October, I attended a Quaker lecture at Wilmington College on Right Sharing of World Resources (RSWR). RSWR is a Quaker non-profit based in Richmond, Indiana, that has two main organizational goals:
- To provide resources to marginalized women in developing countries (to improve the quality of life for the women, their families, and their communities) and to empower these women in a sustainable and self-determined way. Groups are located in four countries: Kenya, India, Sierra Leone and Guatemala.
As grant-making entities, these groups provide seed money to women in their community who are trained to set up a local lending organization. The women then lend the money to other women in that community who can start their own profitable businesses. In turn, the seed money is eventually repaid to the group, which continues to loan out the funds and empower more women.
Businesses started by the women can include selling green groceries and clothing, tailoring, baking, buying and selling fish, engaging in retail manufacturing (like brick making), and raising livestock. Women are empowered to provide or help provide for their families, with top priorities being given to educating their children and regrowing their family savings.
- To provide opportunities for those blessed with material resources to explore the burdens of materialism, the power of enough, and the global responsibility to promote balanced, sustainable lifestyles and to share rightly from abundance.
If you are interested in supporting the work of RSWR, you can make a general donation, sponsor an entire community in one of the involved countries, or raise contributions by hosting events such as a Simple Meal or a Simplify Life garage sale. Online resources include a PowerPoint presentation about RSWR and activities and games for children and adults, such as gratitude calendars and a food sharing game.
For its part, Cincinnati Friends Meeting collects stamps that are sent to a committee at Indianapolis First Friends. This committee sells the stamps to stamp dealers and gives 100% of the proceeds to Quaker organizations, including RSWR. Dealers pay bonus prices for domestic and foreign cancelled stamps; domestic envelopes with the stamp attached in its original condition prior to 1970; foreign envelopes with the stamp attached in original condition with current or old postmarks; picture postcards with the stamp attached; unused postcards; U.S. Mint sheet stamps; and stamp collections. To donate an individual stamp, cut it from the envelope, leaving ¼″ space around the stamp. You can put your stamps in the envelope on the bulletin board next to the library or in the Peace & Social Concerns mailbox in the office.
