John Griffith, 99, died on March 27, 2022, in his home in Gladstone, Missouri. John was born in Columbia, South Carolina, 12/12/22, the second son of Robert Carl Griffith and Bertha Scott Griffith. He had two brothers: Robert Carl (Jr.) and William Garrett. John’s father was a Methodist minister and the family lived in seven different towns during his youth.
John’s residence in South Carolina ended in 1942 when he was sentenced to 30 months in Federal prison for refusing to register for conscription. He was both a conscientious objector to war and to the concept that government has the right to conscript its citizens to kill fellow human beings. John was released from prison “unconditionally” after serving 24 months. He again refused to register for conscription in1948 when conscription was reinstated. This time the government ignored his civil disobedience.
After prison, John attended William Penn College in Oskaloosa, Iowa where he met Reva Standing. John and Reva were married in 1947. Reva was a lifelong member of the Religious Society of Friends (Quaker) and John adopted that community as his spiritual home. They had four sons: Christopher, Timothy, Jonathan and Benjamin – all born in Iowa. Reva died 11/5/2003, Chris, was murdered in 1986. This experience led John and Reva to become vocal advocates for abolition of the death penalty. John’s professional life was with farmer cooperatives. He and Reva attended meeting for many years at the Penn Valley Meeting of Friends in Kansas City.
Surviving John and Reva: Timothy (Cheri Oehme), Jordan, Stephanie; also, Tim’s children by a former marriage, Jason, Alison; Jonathan (Jeri Burhans); Benjamin (Patricia Barnes), Treva, Carrie; and seven great-grandchildren.
John leaves us with these words: “As many before have articulated; birth, life and death are all integral to the natural life process. Also, as many have observed, the residue of our acts lives on in the lives of those we have influenced producing, as it were, a sort of hand-me-down immortality. Yet, I am convinced that there is something more: that human consciousness is independent of the body and that the death of the body is not an ending of consciousness – It is rather a passing. Into what? I confess that I do not know, but I have a deep, abiding trust in the Divine Ground of all existence that the major world religions have variously called God, Mind, Allah, Tao, etc.
My parting wish for my friends is that they nurture compassion and walk humbly in the presence of Unfathomable Mystery.”
At John’s request there will not be a formal memorial service, but he would want his friends to celebrate his life in whatever way they wish. If you wish to give a memorial gift, John suggests a gift to the Penn Valley Meeting of Friends (Quaker) Meeting House Fund, 4405 Gillham Rd., K.C. MO 64110 or