Posted on 01/04/2017 5:37:52 PM PST by marshmallow
One of the last members of a nearly extinct religious society at Sabbathday Lake has died, a loss for a group that’s dwindled because members are celibate
Sister Frances Carr, one of the last remaining members of the nearly extinct religious society called the Shakers, has died. She was 89.
Carr died Monday surrounded by family and friends in the dwelling house at the Shaker community at Sabbathday Lake in New Gloucester, Maine after a brief battle with cancer, said Brother Arnold Hadd, one of the group’s two remaining members.
“She had a death with dignity and love,” Hadd said Tuesday. “She was surrounded by love, tears and a lot of Shaker songs.”
Their community at Sabbathday Lake was settled in 1783 and was one of more than a dozen such communities created in the New World by the Shakers, formally known as the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearance.
The group fled persecution in England. It practiced equality of the sexes, pacifism, communal ownership of property and celibacy.
Sabbathday Lake is now the only such active community remaining.
The Shakers’ numbers declined because members are celibate and the group stopped taking orphans like Carr, who arrived as a 10-year-old after her father died and her mother was unable to care for her.
Carr remained hopeful to the end that the Shakers would grow, and she bristled when those in the village were described as the “last” Shakers.
She never forgot her humble beginnings and devoted herself to helping the disadvantaged, especially children, stepping into situations to provide food, shelter and money, Hadd said.
“She had a great passion for being a Shaker and serving God and serving her fellow man,” he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
Bkmrk.
Group-enforced celibacy tends to have that effect.
“Shake, shake, shake along, Daniel,
“Shake out of me all things carnal.”
- Shaker prayer meeting chant
It later became known as Hanukkah Heights.
;^)
“...a group that’s dwindled because members are celibate”
Well just, duh.
It’s amazing that a group that practices both celibacy and communism has lasted for so long.
I read this book last year. The Shakers were not all pure and innocent. They his children from parents and figured in law suits over custody and property. Eye opening book.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129162937
Hid children
My g-g-g-g-g-g-g-grandfather, Joseph Cummings, was a Sergeant in this "independent company of Rangers" (Bates' description), of which Ichabod Dexter was the Captain, the regiment being under the command of Colonel Benjamin Ruggles Woodbridge.
Woodbridge's regiment fought and suffered casualties (both dead and wounded) at the Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775, and later marched against Burgoyne in the fall of 1777.
Issachar Bates kept a journal during much of his life, and among his papers are recorded his memoirs from the Revolutionary War.
For instance, Bates related an anecdote of how, during the Siege of Boston, General Israel Putnam offered a bounty of rum for any soldier who would turn in British cannonballs which had been fired at the Rebel positions.
Bates stated that General Putnam was forced to suspend this practice, however, due to the fact that several soldiers broke their legs as a result of trying to stop the fired cannonballs before they were done rolling...
OTOH, gays may not be celibate, but they are certainly unable to reproduce. And unable to build impressive stuff like the Shakers did.
Interesting. Thanks for posting. Shaking Quakers BUMP!
If only all libtards would practice celibacy....
Not a lot of young people in that group... it's a wonder they lasted as long as they did.
More Kwanzaa Heights, these days.
Very interesting people. They gave many orphans a good home and purpose in life.
They also invented interesting things such as the coat hanger.
Surprised some enterprising group hasn’t become members to take possession of the “Brand”.
They has standing as a recognized religion. Must be huge value to the “goodwill” value of the organization.
As I understand it, the Shakers had lots of young people. During bad times they offered a decent alternative to the workhouse/county farm which were the last resort of the destitute. They offered good food, housing, and employment in exchange for celibacy (which also was required in the workhouses).
Besides furniture they were also famous for packaging and selling vegetable seeds and the “modern” flat broom.
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