Sunday Meeting, June 1
Early Sunday Morning - 10:00 a.m. - Ceremonial Hall, 4th floor
Singing Practice: Practice the songs sung on Sunday mornings and get some tips to improve your singing technique. Pat Debrovner and Jerry Ranck preside.
Sunday School - Ethics for Children - Will resume again in September
Sunday Meeting - 11:15 a.m. - Auditorium
Torture: The End of Democracy?
Tony Hileman, Senior Leader
Heather Grady, presides
Lunch - 12:30 p.m. - Social Hall
Afternoon Activities - 1:45 p.m. - Ceremonial Hall, 4th floor
PIC Program in connection with the Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf’s visit to the New York Society on Wednesday evening, June 4. Dr. Phyllis Harrison-Ross presides.
Video of today's event: June 1, 2008
Hileman - Torture
Video of today's event:
PIC - Iron Lady of Liberia
The Joy of Personal Writing – Spring Semester
Monday, June 2
6:30 – 8:30 PM
Room 508
Men's Group
Wednesday, June 4
6:00 PM
Room 508
Liberian President at NYSEC for Gala Event
Wednesday, June 4
6:00 PM, VIP Reception
7:00 PM, Program
Auditorium
The New York Society for Ethical Culture will play host to H.E. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Liberia’s and Africa’s first elected female Head of State. President Sirleaf, the granddaughter of a market woman, will be here to launch the Sirleaf Market Women’s Fund Adopt-A-Market Campaign to rebuild Liberia’s economy. The gala fundraising event is co-sponsored by the African Women’s Development Fund, the New York Society for Ethical Culture and the Social Service Board.
You are invited to be part of this tribute to Liberia’s Market Women, the backbone of their national economy. Tickets for the VIP reception and program begin at $1,000. Tickets for the program only are from $50 to $500. For more information or to purchase tickets, contact MaryLou Amarosa at 212-997-0100, or mamarosa@projectsplusinc.com.
Great Books
Wednesday, June 4
7:30 - 9:00 PM
Room 507
Gogol, The Overcoat (complete work)
Diderot, Rameau's Nephew
The Joy of Personal Writing
Thursday, June 5
7:00 – 9:00 PM
Room 508
Unforgotten Voices Creative Workshop
Thursday, June 5
8:00 - 11:00 PM
Social Hall - Lower level
A collective of visual and performing artists who are or have been homeless, or are otherwise living on the edge. An evening of poetry, song, music, and more in honor of the creative spirit.
Please call Judith Ginsburg at 646-496-6346 for more information, or if you plan to bring a group. Shelter groups are especially welcome. Admission: free. Refreshments served.
Take Out – A New Independent Film
Attend a screening of the new independent film Take Out and see two Society members, Barbara Levenson and Sylvan Wallach who appear in it. Take Out is the story of an illegal Chinese immigrant living in New York. The film is co-directed by Sean Baker whose parents were members of the NYSEC community.
TAKE OUT is a day-in-the-life of Ming Ding (played by Charles Jang), an illegal Chinese immigrant working as a deliveryman for a Chinese take-out shop in New York City. Ming is behind with payments on his huge debt to the smugglers who brought him to the US. The collectors have given him until the end of the day to deliver the money that is due. After borrowing most of the money from friends and relatives, Ming realizes that the remainder must come from the day's delivery tips. In order to do so, he must make more than double his average daily income. "Take Out" follows Ming on his deliveries throughout the city, in a feature film that Variety calls "deeply affecting" and Film Threat calls "an infectious watch". Intercutting between Ming's deliveries and the daily routine of the restaurant, Take Out presents a harshly real look at the daily lives of illegal Chinese immigrants in New York City.
Opens June 6
Quad Cinemas
34 West 14th Street
Click here for show times and to purchase tickets
Film Forum
Friday, June 6
7:00 PM (Doors open 6:30)
Ceremonial Hall, 4th Floor
The Third Man is a classic film noir based on a thriller by Graham Greene that takes place in post-war Vienna. It is produced by London Film Productions and won a number of prestigious awards in Europe and the U.S.
Joseph Cotton is invited to Vienna to visit his old war buddy Harry Lime, played by Orson Welles. When he arrives, he learns Harry has been killed in an auto accident. So who killed Harry Lime, and is he really dead? Then he appears mysteriously, and Cotton has a harrowing time tracking him down and uncovering his nefarious story. Admission: $5 covers the cost of refreshments.
Sunday Meeting, June 8
Early Sunday Morning - 10:00 a.m. - Room 408
Colloquy - topic: "Words We Live By." Rather than reading from the usual text, we’ll bring in our own most treasured words, phrases, and quotes. Please type them, if you can. For those who cannot bring your own favorites, there will be many quotes available for all to share. Harriet Bigus presides.
Sunday School - Ethics for Children - Will resume again in September
Sunday Meeting - 11:15 a.m. - Auditorium
"Two Possible Futures for Ethical Culture"
Dr. Marc Bernstein, Archivist
Chris Bernhardt presides
Lunch - 12:30 p.m. - Social Hall
Afternoon Activities
Open PIC Meeting cancelled.
Kafka Comes to America – An Evening with Steven T. Wax
Discussion and book signing
Sunday, June 8
7:00 PM
Ceremonial Hall
“Our government can make you disappear.” Those were words Steven T. Wax never imagined he would hear himself say. In his thirty-four years as a lawyer, Wax didn’t have to warn a client that he or she might be taken away to a military brig, or worse, a “black site,” one of our country’s dreaded secret prisons. So how had we come to this? The disappearance of people happens in places ruled by tyrants, military juntas, fascist strongmen—governments with such contempt for the rule of law that they strip their citizens of all rights. But in America?
Under the Bush administration, not only have the civil rights of foreigners been in jeopardy, but also those of U.S. citizens. In Kafka Comes to America, Wax interweaves the stories of two men he represented who were caught up in our government’s post-9/11 counterterrorism measures. Brandon Mayfield, an American-born, small-town lawyer and family man, was arrested as a terrorist suspect in the Madrid train station bombings after a fingerprint was mistakenly traced back to him by the FBI. Adel Hamad, a Sudanese hospital administrator working in Pakistan, was taken from his apartment and flown in chains to the United States military prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, for no substantiated reason. Kafka Comes to America reveals where and how our civil liberties have been eroded in favor of a false security, and how each of us can make a difference. If these events could happen to Brandon Mayfield and Adel Hamad, they could happen to anyone. They could happen to you.
Steven T. Wax is in his seventh term as the Federal Public Defender for the District of Oregon. A cum laude graduate of Colgate University and Harvard Law School, he was a key part of the Brooklyn, N.Y. District Attorney’s prosecution of David Berkowitz, a.k.a. “Son of Sam.” Wax and his team are representing seven men held as “enemy combatants” in Guantánamo. He has taught at the Northwestern School of Law of Lewis & Clark College, serves as an ethics prosecutor for the Oregon State Bar, and lectures throughout the country. Admission: free. Open to the public.
The Joy of Personal Writing – Spring Semester
Monday, June 9
6:30 – 8:30 PM
Room 508
Conversation with the Leader: An Ethical Democracy
Tuesday, June 10
6:00 PM
Room 514
“Consider what the need of humankind is at the present day. Consider what your own strengths are, and where you can best make them count.” – Felix Adler, December 1923
At our last conversation we considered the above question, which Felix Adler posed 85 years ago, against the backdrop of today. What we found most lacking is a sense of true democracy that balances the will of the many with the rights of the few through a deep appreciation of the worth and dignity of all. Not only did we find a critical lack of that attitude on global, national, and personal levels, but we felt that this is an area where the voice of Ethical Humanism can be heard and make a difference.
