Spirit in Action

Broadcasting Activism, Song & Spirit

The tables are turned in today's program, as Spirit In Action's regular host, Mark Helpsmeet, is himself interviewed by Robert Park of WIDE-LP, Madison, Wisconsin. Topics addressed are the roots of Mark's broadcasts and activism, the mechanics of building a syndicated community radio based program, and the goals and future of creation of spirit-focused shows aimed at improving the world.

Duration:: 55m
Broadcast on:: 07 Jun 2015
Audio Format:: other

[music] ♪ Let us sing this song for the healing of the world ♪ ♪ That we may hear as one ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world alone ♪ ♪ And my lives will feel the echo of our healing ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark Helpsmeat. Each week, I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action, and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service. Hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred food in your own life. ♪ Let us sing this song for the dreaming of the world ♪ ♪ That we may dream as one ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world alone ♪ For quite a while now, folks have been telling me that I should feature an interview of me on one of my radio programs, and today we're going to finally have that. When advised to do this before, I wasn't so much shy as it didn't seem particularly urgent, nor did it seem very practical, given that I'm usually the interviewer as well. And people tend to look at me pretty strange when I talk to myself. But back in January, I was down in Madison, Wisconsin, and had generous hospitality from Robert Park, a central force behind WIDELP, one of the stations where this program is broadcast. Bob proposed that he would do an interview with, and about me, and about Norton Spirit Radio. So we sat down and did that, and I'm finally getting around to sharing it all with you. As a way of leading into my interview with Bob Park, a little music seems appropriate, so we'll start out with something by singer-songwriter that I just love. Her lyrics and her music touch me and take me deeper each time I hear them. Not surprising, perhaps, that the connection would be so deep considering that she is also, like me, a Quaker. So there's so much on the spirituality and activism levels that we have in common. Her name is Carrie Newcomer, and we'll listen to her song, "I Heard a Null," which speaks of my own sense of hurts, heart, and hope for the world. And then we'll listen to Robert Park's interview of me. Carrie Newcomer, "I Heard a Null." A good 'n' out call last night, homeless and confused, and us to naked and bewildered at, the evil people do. And up upon the hill, there is a tale sent, that tells the story of what darkness waits if we leave the light behind it. So don't tell me hate, 'cause every walk comes away. With all the wheels we put in motion, ourselves, and the whole world weaves. And as we paint still, the world is shaking. I still believe the best of what we all can be, and the only peace this world will know can only come from love. I am a voice that's calling out across the great divide, and I am only just one person that feels they have to try. And the questions fall like trees of dust and rice like prayers above, but the only word is courage and the only answer. So don't tell me hate, 'cause every walk comes away. These are the wheels we put in motion, ourselves, and the whole world weaves. And as we paint still, the world is shaking. I still believe the best of what we all can be, and the only peace this world will know can only come from love. Light every candle that you can, we need some light to see. In these days the deepest lost trait, each other tenderly. And the arms of God will gather in each sparrow that falls. But makes no separation, just fiercely loves us all. So don't tell me hate, 'cause every walk comes away. These are the wheels we put in motion, ourselves, and the whole world weaves. And as we paint still, the world is shaking. I still believe the best of what we all can be, and the only peace this world will know can only come from love. So don't tell me hate, 'cause every walk comes away. These are the wheels we put in motion, ourselves, and the whole world weaves. And as we paint still, the world is shaking. I still believe the best of what we all can be, and the only peace this world will know can only come from love, and only come from love. So that one gets me every time I heard an all by Carrie Newcomer, leading in now to Robert Park's interview with me this past January about Northern Spirit Radio and our programs. Take it away, Bob. We have a special guest here today at WIDE. Mark helps me to his programs. We broadcast on Tuesdays. Welcome, Mark, to WIDEELP. Thank you so much for inviting me to be here with you, Bob. I have a number of questions, and I'm looking to find out more about Northern Spirit Radio, which you have the founder of that in Eau Claire. Definitely for Northern Spirit Radio. It was a little bit of a process to get to the point where Northern Spirit Radio was founded. When W-H-Y-S-L-P radio in Eau Claire was getting ready to get on the air, discussion went around about what program they might have in the various days of the week. One of the suggestions that came up was, "Well, on Sunday, maybe we should have something that's kind of spiritual, something that's special to Sunday." Most people were not very excited about the alternatives because I would say a number of the people were not in favor of having Bible Fumpers or however they might characterize it on the show. But one person said, "Well, we could have something with engaged social action." And so someone said, "Well, yeah, let's have Mark help meet. He's a Quaker, and he's not obnoxious that way." So I think that's the dialogue that went on there. It was reported to me later. The first time they came, you got invited to do something. So yes, they sent me an invitation. And the first time the invitation came, I said, "I'm too busy. I just can't even consider doing this. I've got to find what I'm doing with my life." A few months later, someone came to me. He's actually a member of an American Baptist Church where the Quakers rent space. And he came to me and said, "You're the one to do this. I'll do whatever I can to support you. We'll make this happen. I'm sure this is what Eau Claire needs on the airwaves." And at that point, I was in what's called Clearness Process. Clearness Committee Process is a method that Quakers use to discern way forward. Because of that, I went to the committee. I was sitting with it and I said, "Okay, maybe this is the opening. This is the time." And so under the care of Eau Claire Friends meeting, I went forward with the plan. Very good. Well, why don't you give me a little bit more about your background? Where were you born and raised? I'm a Wisconsinite, born and raised. I've lived in Wisconsin except for five months when I was about seven to eight years old where we moved on to Texas. Found out that my mother was allergic to the sun and we had to move back north. Literally allergic to the sun. The other period was my two and a half years when I was gone. I was peace-cored in West Africa. Other than that, I lived. I was born in southwestern Wisconsin. I lived there just short while and mainly lived within a 45-mile radius of Milwaukee up until I went into the peace-core. Then came back, was in Milwaukee until I moved up into Eau Claire 26 years ago. So Wisconsin through and through, although there's very different cultures between Milwaukee and Eau Claire, I'd say. How old were you when you went to the peace-core? Twenty-three, it was a year after I had graduated from college. From what college? At Carroll College, Carroll University in Waukesha, Wisconsin. I was kind of an odd duck though in terms of my studies. I figure we've got a right brain and a left brain and there's a reason for both the emphases that those have. So I was a math major. I was a computer science physics major. And I was a speech communications major and speech communications is considered fine arts department versus the others, which of course are the hard sciences. I've got my passion for international folk dancing, which I teach widely. I've traveled with as part of the Quaker group, the friendly folk dancers. So I've traveled all around the world teaching leading people in dance, which is so different than sitting down and doing a physics equation. My education at Carroll College, a professor, speech communications professor, who knew me pretty well because of debate and forensics, that kind of thing that was involved in, and having had me in classes, he spoke to another class that a roommate of mine was in. So the roommate carried back this. He said in the history of Carroll College, he had only experienced two true radicals in the student body. One was a guy named Barry who was from New York City who biked to Carroll College to come to class, to come to school, and the other one he named was me. And I'm not quite sure why he thought I was particularly radical, although I hope I would wear that label proudly. But Carroll College was not a liberal radical hotbed by any means. So I felt a little bit odd there. Where did your life go from there? You went into the Peace Corps, what country were you in? Togo in West Africa. I actually had several opportunities, places I could have gone to, Lesotho, which is right in the middle of South Africa was one option. One of the places I could have gone was Nepal. And that had some attraction, but then I learned more about it and decided that, well, I'd really rather see women than not see them for two years. That's what they basically said, don't expect to see women for two years, some other things like that. I was 23, you can't expect a young man like that to be complacent about not seeing women. But there were two other factors that were important there. So I ended up going to Togo in West Africa. I was teaching physics, chemistry, and math in basically a high school setting. They used the French system, so it was actually called the Lise. Were you teaching in French? Yes, yes, I had had French from 7th to 10th grade. Couldn't of course really speak it eight years later, but picked it up very quickly, and I'm still fluent in French. I've kept it up, and it's quite definitely my strong second language. I only know a spattering of Spanish, but French is very solid, and I enjoyed it by the second year there. I was very, very functional, and had a great time with it. Actually my best experience there with my high school students, I set up a science club. And for the science club I arranged their very first field trip of their lives. We went into the capital city, which was our trip away, but many of them had never been there. And took them to a radio station, one place, and we took them to a medical center, and we took them to the biological research center. Many of them hadn't traveled very far, and actually teaching physics, I was trying to teach them about air pressure. And so I wanted to say, "Well, like if you dive down into pool, you can feel the pressure on your ears." Well, most of them had never done anything like that, or you go up on a high hill or a mountain. Well, no, they hadn't had that experience either. It was very interesting, and mostly they didn't have electricity at all. There was very little of that in the village where I lived. So they had cars around there, or at least they saw cars, not that they particularly had cars. So it was a very interesting thing teaching them physics and chemistry, and the spiritual views of the local people. This was something I didn't really know how to deal with it at the time, but I had students, very smart students, very good minds. But they also were raised with, and perhaps had good reasons for believing in what we would call magic. And so, at one point, I had some very good students that I had tell me that if they wanted, if they had the money, they could go to a fetisher, which would be kind of like a whitened gish, if you will. They could go to a fetisher and get a charm, a gregri, like they could take a pen, and he could cast a spell, essentially, on the pen, so that he could bring it back. And they could put it by their test paper, and let go of it, and it would write all the answers for them. So it's kind of hard to teach science when that kind of belief undergirds everything they think about it is very interesting. And then I ran into people, including one who was Boston educated. He's from Togo, he was the assistant director for the Peace Corps. He said, "I don't know if this stuff is true or false, or what it is. I have seen things that I have no rational explanation for." And then I had another Peace Corps volunteer who was present for a ceremony where he saw some things that he says, "I have no idea how to explain it." So it was a very interesting experience for me. Have you kept any connections with Africa since coming back from the Peace Corps? I've only got connections with one family in Togo, but I've been back to Africa. Ten years after my Peace Corps service, I visited Togo again. It was very interesting to see changes in those ten years, dramatic changes. I've also traveled then to a number of different places in Africa. I've been to Kenya, Rwanda. I was there in 2008 in Rwanda, and just this past summer in August, I spent a few weeks in the Congo, far eastern edge of the Congo where there's been an incredible amount of violence. It's just over the borders from Rwanda and Burundi, where all the Hutu Tutsi massacres happened. And some of that spilled over to this area, plus they've got a lot of resources, mineral, diamonds, gold, kind of, and various minerals that are highly prized. So there's a number of corporations who want to take advantage of those areas. And so therefore they sometimes, I don't know if they directly supervise or encourage or whatever, but there's killings and violence over that. And then there's also a native, the Mai Mai. It's kind of like an ultra-nationalist Congo group. You might consider it like right-wing militia groups. They would go around and kill people who weren't in line with their beliefs. So this area right next to Rwanda, in just this little corner of the Congo, in the past 20 years, there have been some 6 million murders in this area. We know about Rwanda, which in a very short period had three-quarters of a million deaths. Well, there's been about 6 million in this area over 20 years. So the Quaker Folk Dance group I travel with, friendly folk dancers, we went to this area this past August. It had a wonderful time. We're in small villages, really, the whole time. No violence there. It was looking pretty good, but since then, people we stayed with, a woman was killed. It was part of this violence. Another couple, tortured and robbed, that kind of thing. So the violence goes on there, and I'm afraid we don't know about it because, I don't know, maybe it doesn't concern our oil. I'm not sure exactly why we're completely ignorant to this in this country. I can see where some of this background gives your interest in some of your guests on Northern Spirit Radio. Fill me in a little bit on the period between coming back from the Peace Corps and getting involved with the radio station in Eau Claire. Had some marriages and name changes? Yes, I continue. I've had and continue to have a very full life. December of 1979 is when I arrived back in Wisconsin, very relieved to be away from equatorial heat. And I located in Milwaukee for the first eight and eight and a half years after I got back. And while there, that's when I became a very active participant of Quaker Meeting down there. And that, I would say, strengthened and deepened a lot of my action. Amongst other things, that's when I became a war tax resistor, concerned that 50% of our income tax dollar goes to military. So that was one of the things that was spurred forward in me. Amongst other things that that led to was because at that point you could get tax credits for installing solar, hot water solar on houses. I did that up to the limit on two different houses that I owned, had lived in. Amongst other things that happened, I taught a bit at UW Milwaukee in the physics department. I had done some extra education. They asked me to teach there. It was intro courses because I don't have a master's or a PhD. I have two bachelor's degrees, but they recognized both my experience and my ability as a teacher. And so I taught there until the last time I taught was in 1986 and 1988 I moved up to Eau Claire. I was also married in Milwaukee in 1984. And I did something, and this would be, again, typical of kind of Quaker ideas. Alternate living, I guess you'd say, just thinking beyond the mainstream in which we all swim. I believe strongly in egalitarianism of all sorts. And so when I was getting married, I recognized the whole prejudice that said that it's important for a man to carry his name, but not the woman. But I also recognized the importance of a man and a woman when forming a household, a central identity, some kind of identity that is their own. So my first wife and I changed our last names. We took the last names and actually Judd Kins, which is the name I was born with, became my middle name. And I was Mark Judd Kins' friend for five years until we were divorced. So that happened, and actually you introduced me, Bob, as Mark Helps meet. That's the name that Sandra and I have had since we married in 1994. And I mentioned the clearness process before. Clearness, when making important decisions, it seems crucial to be clear that this is really the direction you want to go, to make sure you've looked at it. It's not a logical or rational thinking near as much as it is going to the depths of what's within you. And so the clearness process, you sit with a group of people who ask you questions that encourage you to do that thinking. When you get married, you get married. That question of whether you're going to get married is explored by a clearness committee. And so I have a clearness committee for marriage, clearness committee for membership. If you're considering changing jobs, going some direction, a clearness process is appropriate. And so I've had clearness process with respect to both of my names and helps meet, in particular was the name Sandra and I considered a lot of different names that would be about of who we are to be. We are together. It's an old English word that 350 years ago helps meet, would have been a normal word. It was in the King James Version of the Bible. And George Fox, founder of Quakers, he said at one point, and I'm paraphrasing this as a not exact quote. He said, "In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve were helps meet one to the other in service of the holy things." And Sandra wasn't totally taken with the word, although there is some history in my encounter with the word, which eventually evolved by the way to help meet, to help mate. Help mate is something that perhaps people might have encountered back in 1940 or something. It's fallen to complete disuse sense. But Sandra was not very taken with the words, it doesn't quite hang together, it doesn't make sense. Until I pointed out that there's a small town on the UP, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where a couple rivers come together, and the town where they intersect is called Waters meet. Helps meet. Okay, it makes sense now. So that's how that name came along. And you've mentioned how you were invited to do a program for W-H-Y-S, you know, what was that called initially? Well, when I was originally accepted the invitation, made a proposal to the programming group at that time. The first proposal was too wide and would involve more than I could have possibly done in a week. And eventually we came up with two programs, which you run or alternate or choose between on W-I-D-E. One of them, Spirit in Action, and one of them called Song of the Soul. And very different programs, Spirit in Action was the first one that came to me, but Song of the Soul fit in really well as well. Spirit in Action was completely natural in terms of how I'd always tried to live my life. The idea that whatever we have deepest within us, and as a Quaker I'm leery to be too definitive about words because we all have reality. Each of us knows, for instance, what love is. And love is central in our lives in one way or another, whether it's love of a partner or love of our species or love of the world. But defining it is not an easy thing. So Spirit is at the center of this. Spirit is this non-definable thing, and if you put it in a cage you lose it. But what's most important, and I think I hold this in common with you Bob, is that how we live that out makes all the difference, and that it's important that we live it out. So the motivation for me to create the Spirit in Action program, this started in 2005, that's when WHYS went on the air. Just before we had had, the year before, 2004, in November the election held that George W. Bush was reelected. And one of the things that was said was that key to his victory was Evangelical Christian section of the population that they gave him enough percentage points to push him over to beat Kerry for that election. And I pondered on this because this worried me, and it was clear to me, mind you, I find a number of things in common in terms of devotion with Evangelical Christians, although many of the beliefs that they've held central are an aftermath of me. Or the political stances, let's say that they've supported, have been very much different than what I've seen clear to. I'm trying to state that as fairly and as balanced as possible, because with a little more wisdom maybe I'd see it their way, I don't know. But from where I sit, it looks to me like they had a certain amount of cohesion and energy that people, with political views, more similar to my own, were lacking. And so one of the things I conceived of was trying to find and create a program that would connect people with that deep source of spirit, whatever, wherever they find it, whatever they call it, so that it could help energize their lives to make a difference. And very important to me is a sense of community. Many of us who would be on the left or the more liberal, progressive, we often value individualism. It's like, no, you can't tell me what to think to be. And I'm one of those people. And yet I recognize how that militates for us against strong, cohesive community acting together. And by the way, I would define as spiritual, all kinds of groups that many people won't think of as spiritual. AA groups, or 12-step groups, are very definitely a strong spiritual theme in our society. And there's a very strong sense of community that goes amongst 12-step groups frequently. But I would also call labor unions a spiritual group. Now, it's become very diffuse in these later decades. But if you think about someone with a common belief in purpose who's really got each other's back, that is a spiritual community in my point of view. And it doesn't have to be religious, as we would call it. But it's got a central core of belief in worldview that empowers action and causes people to live as a community. So, anyway, all of that led me then to create the Spirit and Action program. And then the other program that I created was Song of the Soul. And that came a bit later. The Spirit and Action program was the first one I produced, but Song of the Soul, I started within a couple of weeks. It was very close on. That one came, there's a song, The Themes of Music that I use for it, by Chris Williamson, Song of the Soul. It's so clear, and I don't know, I suppose not everyone loves music, but I can tell you that probably a very high percentage of people, it's definitive to what we feel inside. Usually our coming-of-age music is special to us. It can touch us in ways that nothing, for myself, if I want to find the most perfect way to express the deepest things, that usually will come out in a song. So, I first started the program inviting just anyone on and saying, "What is the music of your soul?" And they would pick out those songs. I transitioned eventually, before, in a year or so, to mainly inviting on musicians, the people who are creating and performing music, to share the music that they're playing, creating, so on. And that's what I've been doing for the last eight, eight and a half years. So, you had two programs, two hours per week, going over the radio station, and did this lead early on to the creation of Northern Spirit Radio, and efforts to take your program to other stations? Yes, it did. I started the programming. The first interview I ever did was at an Earth Day celebration in 2005. I recorded it, but didn't edit it into a final program yet. I did a couple interviews coming in June, July of that year. And by the end of that month is when I first went live with programs. Very soon on, I recognized that I needed an umbrella identity for this. And that's when Northern Spirit Radio evolved. And Northern Spirit Radio, and that Northern part of it, comes from two different directions. Number one, WHYS Radio, which is where I started. The license was obtained by Northern Thunder, which is an environmental activist organization of the region. So, they have the license. Also, my Quaker identity, Eau Claire Friends Meeting, is part of a wider group of friends called Northern Yearly Meeting, which basically includes Minnesota and Wisconsin, and a few outlying areas. So, the Northern was central. And it's also true that I'm a Northern boy. Just when I lived in Togo, you know, on the equator, I sweated for two years straight. So, there's something very northern about me. How soon did you start looking for other stations to carry your programs? Well, really within the first year or two, I was doing that. By the way, I'd mentioned that Eau Claire has two low-power FM community radio stations. One of them is WHYS, and that is community in the sense of there's a board of directors. And they do a great job of bringing in eclectic points of view in music. It's just really great. And that's the first place that democracy now was played in Eau Claire. Something badly needed. The other station, the person behind the force of drawing up the proposal to get the first license, is Dan Drum. And Dan Drum is an awesome force for these things in Eau Claire. He got a second license, different station, W-I-E-C, and that license he actually broadcasts from his home. So, he totally controls that himself with both music in terms of, and he carries a whole lot of Pacifica programming. I'm so thankful for Pacifica Network, just the riches that they provide to the world and the programming that they share. My programming began being shared via audio port, which is the central resource that Pacifica uses. I think it was three, four years in. So, I think W-I-D-E was one of the first two, three stations that carried in order to spare radio programming. I noticed that you've got a list of stations on your website, and I wondered what the significance of the order was. It's when I happened to notice when they were carrying my programs, because I wouldn't necessarily know. One thing that happened is, when my programs are shared via audio port, anybody can download them and broadcast them. And so, if they download them manually, I see that. But, if they take them from the RSS feed of audio port or of Pacifica, then I don't necessarily know. So, for instance, just this past, starting today, the broadcast, that I have is an interview with someone in Yukaya, California, the Mendocino Environmental Center, which is the umbrella group for their station there. K-M-E-C is the station. They started carrying it some years ago, my program. I only found that by doing a search via Google, because they were always downloading it via the RSS feed. So, anyway, the order of the programs there is sometimes when they started carrying it. So, like, for instance, the Pacifica owned radio station in Houston. They started carrying my programs just a month, month and a half ago, so they're at the bottom of the list. I'm still not sure if it has a regular slot on their schedule. So, the communications, it's very loose here. It's hard to know. So, that list of stations is all the stations that you know about to carry your program. That's what I know about, and they either do carry or they have carried, and I think maybe they still carry. It's hard to know. So, there's 20-some stations there. Okay. So, that has been growing over the years. It has been growing. It is this competition between some of the ideas of community radio. One of the highest-priced things that we have, of course, is we want to have local programming. We want to get the voice of our community out there. And so, one of the efforts I've made is any station that I know is carrying my programs, either Spirit and Action or Song and Solar both, I try and contact them and say, "Give me your local folks that I should be including in this because we are a community." But it's not just our town. Our community is larger than just our town. I noticed on your website there are some older essays that you posted, which were obviously recorded by you. I recognize your voice, but you don't identify yourself at all. Was this connected with radio? Well, I put them there because I've got too many projects on, you know, too many irons in the fire. But one of the things that happened, I serve as a representative from Eau Claire Friends meeting to a ministerial group. So, you know, Quakers of my ilk do not have paid ministry, that kind of thing. Silent meeting, Quakers. Silent meeting, Quakers. So, I'm not a pastor or anything in the sense that most churches recognize. But some of these essays could have been instruments. Well, yeah, they could have been sermons. And, you know, if life had been different, I was raised Catholic. Okay. And I actually had a very positive experience of that. I know a lot of people who would claim to be recovering Catholics did not have a positive experience of it felt like something was being pushed on them, brainwashed. That's the way they might characterize it. That was not my experience. Maybe that's because from an early age, maybe I'm a little bit pathological. Maybe I'm a psychopath or something that societal programming doesn't seem to be as effective for me. And, in fact, I think that's one of the reasons why I'm Quaker. I'm not told what to believe is a Quaker. I am told to go within and find what's true and try and live that out. So being that kind of independent-minded person that I am, I couldn't -- I think it's wrong to put me in front of a congregation telling them what to think. That does not fit for me. And, yeah, there's part of me, which is clearly evangelical. I'm evangelical that people should think for themselves. And those words don't -- phrases don't usually go together for people, but that's the way that I think. Anyway, and some of these essays, what I did is I wrote them and I contributed on them. The local newspaper I had asked the ministers' group to contribute a ministerial column in the paper. And so sometimes I have my turn, and so I wrote a couple of those, and then I recorded them and put them on my website. But I haven't done any of those for quite a while, although I actually had an idea for one just the last couple months that I may write up and put on there. I don't think people need to listen to my voice so much. And that's actually one of the interesting things about doing my program. I do an interview -- I do two interview programs, and a very small part of it is me talking. So I'm talking here more now than I probably have in the last nine and a half years on my program. And I find that as -- it's a spiritual discipline to learn, to listen, and to draw forth from someone else that which is deepest. That's one of the reasons I'm not writing so many sermons anymore. It's because what I really have is deep listening and questions to invite forth that which makes a change in the people and hopefully in our nation, in our world. What do you see in the future for Northern Spirit Radio and your other projects? Well, originally when Northern Spirit Radio was created, I had the Clearness Committee I was meeting with, and I became clear to go forward on this, and WHOIS accepted my offer of the programs. I was originally a DJ, and I'm not a DJ because I'm syndicated, just like Amy Goodman is not a DJ on WHOIS. So I'm actually a class apart, even though I'm local, to WHOIS, and really love that community of people. So what happened after the Clearness Committee very shortly, in Quaker speak, and I have to introduce you to a foreign language. You should be grateful I'm not doing this in French. But my ministry was taken under the care of Eau Claire Friends meeting, which meant that this is a project of the meeting with oversight by them. Not a controlling oversight, but it's, again, they're asking me questions to keeping me to my central leading. And so that's the way that Northern Spirit Radio was, both with local group and with the regional Northern Year meeting group, until a couple years ago, at which point we transitioned. At that point, the meeting said you've been under our care long enough, you really should file as a 501(c)(3) organization, you should get that separate identity. So at that point, a board of directors for Northern Spirit Radio was assembled, we incorporated, and then just a little, well, this last year, we applied for and got 501(c)(3) status. And I don't know what your experience, I think that, is it true, that W-I-D-E, or city? Citywide radio? Citywide radio is a 501(c)(3). Not directly, we have a connection with the Losier Center that allows contributions to come in and out. So you have an umbrella, so you didn't go through the 501(c)(3) process application. Well, we decided to go through that. It's a little intimidating, because what I've heard over the years is it takes a long time to do this. It's a lot of work, and you know, higher lawyer, and it's expensive. Myself and another board member principally went through, prepared the application, we consulted a lawyer, just did an initial meeting with the lawyer, and he said, "You've done it perfectly, only one word suggestion here that you do this. I've learned things from you, so there's no charge for our long consultation." So, actually, no lawyer fees in there. There's the $850 fee, application fee. They said that, you know, expect, you know, six months, if everything's right, you might get it back in six months or a year, if not, if they have to go through some exchanges of correspondence. Within two months, they sent it to us, and everyone's mouth falls open when they hear, because that's not been done before. So, I guess, spirit and actions working, I don't know. So, actually, as a year and a half ago, two years ago, Northern Spirit Radio Inc. exists. There's a board of directors. On that board, there are seven members, two of us are Quaker, and five are a motley group of everything else. Someone who's a minister at Unity, someone who's a pastor at a UCC Church, and other people who are not affiliated or loosely affiliated with anything else. And the board members are all from the Eau Claire area. The board directors, five of us are right in Eau Claire, two are in Minnesota, one in Twin Cities, one done by Rochester, and we can have board members wherever. We're broadcasting from the heartland here. Sounds like things are going well. They are, and the board is getting more and more clearness. Part of what I hope and what we hope that Northern Spirit Radio will be. It's not just my programming, because at a certain point, I'll go on my way. I'll be too old, or doddering, or who knows what to continue my work. So we're really looking to bring in other people who want to do programming in the same idea. And if people go to NorthernSpiritRadio.org, right on the front page there, you'll see what our mission is, which is about world healing, and it's about finding the roots and encouraging that. That's not unique to me by any means. I think citywide and everyone else are trying to make this world a better place. We have some specific ways in which we try to do that at Northern Spirit Radio. So do you see this going forward as an inter-denominational effort, or Quaker effort? Well, inter-denominational, yes, and beyond that. Let me see, inter-denominational kind of, that seems to imply that someone is part of a denomination. As I said, at least a few of my board members are not part of any denomination, I wouldn't care to identify that way. And that's great. What's important to me, though, is strong community where we support each other and we go for those deep things and try and make that change in the world. So inter-denominational, that includes multiple denominations, yes. Northern Spirit Radio has a very strong Quaker cast right now because I'm the primary programmer. And there's a certain way that I think Quakers kind of span the world. We speak multiple languages in part because we speak silence. So definitely everywhere, if you've looked at my guests, places where I've looked for spirit, you'll find people who are Muslim or who are Jewish or Quaker or Catholic or Atheist. It doesn't matter. There's spirit working in all those places and people might not use those words, but that's not what's important. What's important is how it manifests in the world. When you think about all the programs you've done, are the ones that particularly come to mind that you especially enjoy? Well, let me just say that one of the first few programs, the spirit and action that I did, was an interview with John Shelby Spong. John Shelby Spong is one awesome person. And he was really one of the very first people I interviewed, which is kind of crazy. It's like starting at the top. He's an amazing, amazing person. So you can go back and listen to that program from way back in 2005. And you'll find riches. I mean, John has such wisdom and value to share. But, you know, every year I find more and more precious, deep, valuable people. Sometimes some of them are completely unknown names. I just really can't express how much there's that to be found in everyone. In Quakers, we have a phrase that's widely used. Don't take it as theological content. And think it as an experience. There is that of God in everyone. That if we look within, we will find that spark that is this mirror image or is the seed of this larger thing, which is all encompassing. Which is about transformation of the world, is about fullness and wholeness. Now, those are words that I would put to it. Maybe they aren't the words that work for someone else. But it's there in everyone. And so when I go to all these different kinds of guests, that's what I try and find. And I find it in an atheist just as much as I find it in a Quaker. But what usually happens is if you have a Quaker, they've got some sense of a vocabulary that allows you to work with it. Whereas an atheist is less likely to access some of the words that I would access. Actually, one of the best statements of dealing with that. I don't know how many people have actually read Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. I read it in French, of course, because I've taken French course at the time and so on. This is after I was back from the Peace Corps. And there's a certain passage in there where it talks about this bishop, who is the one who ends up saving Jean Valgéon, converting him or making his life move forward in a good way. It talks about a transformative experience that that bishop had, who was already a really an awesome guy doing really beautiful, humble work. Where he meets a person who is theoretically an atheist. People should go and read that passage. For me, it just makes me cry when I think of it. I noticed on your website, there wasn't anything that I saw about the history of Northern Spirit Radio. So, if this recording is of any use, feel free to use it on your website, and I think it'll make a good addition to my voices for religious pluralism on Wednesday. So, thank you very much, Mark, for letting me interview you. Well, thank you, Bob, and thank you to WIDE, Citywide Radio. I think there's a valuable niche that you have here in Madison that's going to be filled in. And I really appreciate the opportunity to be interviewed for once. Thanks so much. Thank you. In case you didn't hear my introduction at the beginning of this program, that was Robert Park, a principal force behind WIDE, a low-power FM station in Madison, Wisconsin, where this program airs. Thanks again to Bob for the invitation and the continuing good work on WIDE. They are, I understand, looking to move their antenna to reach a larger broadcast radius. And I'm sure they can use your support. We'll end today's program with one more song. At the top of the program, we heard from Carrie Newcomer. Find her at carrynewcomer.com, and we'll end with a song by John McCutchen, another perennial favorite of mine. His website, by the way, is folkmusic.com. Guess what genre of music he favors. John's music always grabs me, and it turns out that he's also a Quaker, which makes it likely that we share a number of activist ideas. And piece work is one of them I've been very involved with for 25 years, in which John sings about so compellingly. So we're going to listen to his song, Not in My Name, written right after 9/11/2001. I'm Mark Helpsmede, here is John McCutchen, and he has a song, Not in My Name, and we'll see you next week for Spirit in Action. See the plane in the distance. See the flame in the sky. See the young ones running for cover. The old ones wondering why. The tell us that the world is a dangerous place. They live in a terrible time, but in Hiroshima, New York, or in Baghdad, it's the innocent to die for the crime. Not in My Name, not in My Name, not in My Name, not in My Name. Witnesses watch through the window, their hearts lock in horror and pain, that the man lying strapped to a gurney. As the poison has come through his face, and I'm wondering who are the prisoners, who was the lock and the key, who has the power over life over death. When will we finally be free? Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. We stray and we stumble in seeking the truth. Wonder why it's so hard to find. But an eye for it, I am a tooth or a tooth. Need the hole, hungry and blind. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. We stray and we stumble in seeking the truth. We stray and we stumble in seeking the truth. We stray and we stumble in seeking the truth. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. Not in my name. The theme music for this program is Turning of the World, performed by Sarah Thompson. This Spirit in Action program is an effort of Northern Spirit Radio. You can listen to our programs and find links and information about us and our guests on our website NorthernSpiritRadio.org. Thank you for listening. I am your host Mark Helpsmeet and I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is Spirit in Action. With every voice, with every song, we will move this world along. With every voice, with every song, we will move this world along and our lives will feel the echo of our healing.