# One of the last Shakers has died

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-of-the-last-shakers-has-died/776312>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [January 4, 2017, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-of-the-last-shakers-has-died/776312 "2017-01-04T15:49:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-of-the-last-shakers-has-died/776312/21 "2017-01-06T15:41:15Z")

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I have to wonder if the last two are looking nervously at each other just now and asking: “maybe just once, should we, y’know, do it? Who’s going to stop us?”

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**Author:** ![quiltguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/e47774/32.png) [@quiltguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/quiltguy)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-of-the-last-shakers-has-died/776312/22 "2017-01-06T20:55:49Z")

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I’ve visited the Maine community some years ago, and there were, I believe, 4 Shakers and a small group I guess I’d have to call acolytes(?) Young people who worked, ate, slept, prayed with the actual members of the Shaker community, but had not signed the covenant. Once the last 2 actual Shakers have gone to their reward, couldn’t these believers, or any others for that matter, declare themselves to BE Shakers, and reinstitute the covenant? As long as they fervently believed in the precepts, and practiced what the founder decreed, wouldn’t THAT be enough to make them able to claim the name? It does seem a shame for the Shaker flame to die out, when there would undoubtedly be those willing to keep it alive.

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**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-of-the-last-shakers-has-died/776312/23 "2017-01-06T21:03:47Z")

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> [@Shagnasty](#):
>
> Their villages are gorgeous but they should have realized that you can’t maintain what is essentially a religious commune through adoptions only.

It’s fortunate, then, that the Catholics allow priests to have children. :rolleyes:

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**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-of-the-last-shakers-has-died/776312/24 "2017-01-06T21:44:59Z")

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> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#):
>
> It’s fortunate, then, that the Catholics allow priests to have children. :rolleyes:

That’s a bit different, wouldn’t you say? Catholicism makes up for the celibate clerics by requiring the … um … lay people to have twelve children apiece.

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