PALM SUNDAY 2010

This morning, thanks to my Ffriend Michael Newheart, I had a chance to read a blog about the book by Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, called The Last Week:  A Day-by-Day Account of Jesus' Final Week in Jerusalem.  It gave me a new look at Palm Sunday, one that is much more closely related to my journey as a Friend.

Michael Westmoreland-White's blog (http://pilgrimpathways.wordpress.com/2010/03/27/palm-sunday-anti-imperialist-street-theatre/) tells us that this book reveals:
"When we celebrate Palm Sunday, we don’t just remember the fickle crowds (so soon to desert Jesus, along with the 12) and their brief recognition/celebration of Jesus’ triumphal entry. We also remember that Jesus presents us with a deliberate choice:  Following His Way of meekness, humility, and peace or the Way of Empire and military might.  There is no Way to follow Jesus that does NOT break from the military option."

Wow!  I'm going to have to read this book.  I struggle so much with the meaning of the resurrection and the cross to my own life, compared to the obvious meaning I find in  the example of Jesus' life.  This simple couple sentences has opened a door wide, to see more of the radical change of Jesus presence in people's lives, even on the way to the cross.

I don't have much more to say right now, except, stay tuned.  I'm going to purchase and read this book this week, my humble tribute to the Lenten season.  When I feel a leading this strong, the best I can do is listen and obey.  I'm looking forward to what develops.

This morning, in worship with my community, I will be contemplating "the contrast between Jesus’ entry into the East Gate of Jerusalem with Pilate’s military/imperialist entry into the West Gate of Jerusalem on the same day."  I love having the opportunity to open my heart even more deeply to the experience of the peace that passes all understanding.

I invite you to do the same, and please, share your journey with me.

Talk to me about True Community

"The great danger in our utopian dreams of community is that they lead us to want association with people just like ourselves. Here we confront the third myth of community -- that it will be an extension and expansion of our own egos, a confirmation of our own partial view of reality. But in true community we do not choose our companions. Instead, they are given to us by grace. In fact, true community might be defined as that place where the person we least want to live with always lives!"

Parker Palmer, A Place Called Community

Pendle Hill Pamphlet

For a long time, I have been thinking about Friends Community.  In fact, it was the fact that Friends were a 'Religious Society' that played a large part in my feeling this was where I belonged spiritually.  Something inside of me has railed against the notion of rugged individualism, since I was too young to know what that meant.  As I came to understand the concept of ongoing revelation, I came to understand that Spirit had been leading me for a long time regarding this issue.  

In seminary, I was studying pastoral counseling, and I was searching for a way to talk about spirituality and family therapy.  It seemed clear to me that one could not counsel one person in a family without considering the whole.  Gradually it came to me that this was like the passage from 1 Corinthians 12, which refers to the varying spiritual gifts.  Indeed, I came to see that each member of a family possessed different gifts, and these each needed to be brought into the light.  A Meeting functions much in the same way:  those drawn to be a part of each bring different gifts, and the manner in which all of those gifts "fit" together comprises the personality of the Meeting.

I wrote my master's thesis on the Body of Christ as a model for pastoral family therapy.  I can look back now and say honestly that I barely scratched the surface on the use of this metaphor.  I was more a therapist than a Biblical scholar, and really what I was trying to say was how we cannot ignore the whole of any organization, and that if we treated each part of the whole as though it could not simply be ignored because it didn't fit, then we would all be better off.

This is still my theoretical belief, although quite a few years more of living has certainly shown me how much more difficult this is in practice.  In my years as a convinced Friend, I have seen meetings struggle with virtually every kind of community issue, from mental illness, to diversity, to the rights of individuals vs. the rights of the whole, to politics, to religious beliefs.  Often, in practice, we, and I in particular, have come up dreadfully short of the spiritual ideal.  Still, our desire and willingness to struggle with the queries, to worship listening for direction, and to continue to strive towards what we believe God would have us do, has led me to believe more and more that I am a Friend in as many the ways as George Fox and the early Friends were.

I remain convinced that our experience of living community combined with our desire to live our beliefs is the single strongest corrective  we present to the world against the cold shoulder of individualism in our society.  It has led us to develop and practice methods of peaceful resolution to conflict, to see the global issues as our own issues, and to practice creative ways of being Present with others, no matter their condition.  It has led me to begin to study more in the Bible, and to begin to read the history of Friends in community from a desire to live these principals more deeply.. 

Here is where you come in:  As I embark on this project, to write a book about what it means and has meant to be in community over the history of Friends, I am interested in knowing your thoughts.  I would like to hear what it is you have read and the role community plays (or doesn't) in your being a Friend. I am interested in knowing what you have read that has piqued your curiosity about how Friends have lived in community, both the Light and the shadow sides.

As I am doing my own survey of literature, and re-reading the journals of early Friends, like Fox,  Penn, Barclay and Naylor,  on forward into more modern times, reading Parker Palmer, Lloyd Lee Wilson, Douglas Steere, and Thomas Kelly, it occurs to me that you may have resources within your meetings and yearly meetings that would be helpful in this regard.  I found one such resource in this regard in the Faith and Practice of South Eastern Yearly Meeting:

"Each of us has unique and creative contributions to make as we allow the Light to shine through us. A Meeting community needs the God-given leadings and spiritual gifts of each of its members. Individuals, in turn, need the Meeting community to be a safe place to explore whether their leadings are from the Light, and to exercise their gifts and abilities. This individuality and diversity of gifts can develop and be celebrated because the unity of the group resides in the Spirit through real connections and commitments to God and to each other, not in outward conformity. The spiritual understanding of individuality stands in sharp contrast to the “rugged individualism” which is rampant in our culture. For generations, people have abandoned traditional forms of community – small towns and extended families – for various reasons, among them the pursuit of personal economic mobility, “progress” and wealth. Individualism has become a value system in which the rights of the individual are often believed to be in conflict and competition with the needs of the community and the environment."

Knowing the process that  Yearly Meetings go through to reach agreement of what statements will be made public and printed in Faith and Practice, I see this as one very valuable resource to my process.  It also leads me to see that my survey of literature could prove endless, so it is here that I ask for your help.

Please share with me your own leadings about community, and the resources that you have found most helpful.  Full credit will be given to each resource, and it is my hope that the information gleaned through this method will provide a rich and very deep understanding of the nature of Friends' community then and now, that will be useful to us as Friends, and possibly of value to the larger world community.

Gossip as the Dark Side of Community

 Exodus 20:16
You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

Matthew 12:36
But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken.

Ephesians 4:29;31
Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers... Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.

I've had my interest picqued to the discussions online about gossip lately (http://emergingquaker.blogspot.com/2009/11/gossip-and-quakers.html, http://www.quakerranter.org/gossip_and_ownward_spirals.php).  It's an issue that has alternately plagued and perturbed me, so I'd like to throw in my lot, including a bit of perspective I've learned from 12 step programs:

The attraction of gossip, as I see it, is that when I am involved in talking about someone else, I am able to avoid a host of other things, like taking responsibility for myself and my actions, saying uncomfortable things to people (like, "stop talking about others, please!").  Then there's the entertainment value of gossip, which, while occupying an extremely low rung in the intelligence/entertainment scale, I'll admit, does seem to be what gets people started.

Something in human nature has us crave information about others.  On a certain level, it is a part of what being community is, caring about your neighbors, thinking of others, etc.  However, almost as soon as a word is uttered, the dark side of community is out.  Here all of human nature turns on itself, and we are drawn to the colorful, the curious, and most certainly the weakest.

It's a little like the wounded cat in a den of lions; even though they know it to be one of their own, they cannot resist picking at it, sometimes even killing it and eating it!  It is a short route from caring for ones' own to destroying the weak link.  Is this a part of humans too?

I've seen it even in little children as they pick on the weakest in their lot.  This morning I was involved in a discussion with some friends about how we handled being bullied as children, and how we taught our own children. Even though I frequently felt defenseless as a child, something in me gave me the courage to line up my neighbor friends against the baseball backstop and rail at them when I felt they had hurt my little brother.   I raised my children to be non-violent, to be thoughtful of even the smallest or weakest in the group, to show mercy to all, and to have compassion as they would want.  Never, I told them, was there a reason to strike another, and the route to dealing with bullies was to ignore them.  I know for a fact they sometimes suffered at the hands of bullies as a result, but I know as well that they remain committed to non-violence, as I do.

Another friend told of her mom teaching her how to make a fist, and to hit once and as hard as possible, to deter bullies.  Another said her mother fought her battles for her.  We were trying to look at how these philosophies stood us as adults, when our neighbors or co-workers seemed determined to dog us.

I still maintain that my strongest offense is being prepared, and that planned ignorance gets me a long way.  What always comes to mind is Ghandi's refusal to respond to violence with violence, and how ultimately those perpetrators came to look foolish or weak in the eyes of others.  I have seen that same thing happen when one refuses to accept gossip about another.

This seems, however, like the hardest issue to make any headway with people about:  When people start to gossip, tell them you would rather not have this information, I say.  Even if it's about you, trust me, you don't want to know it.  In AA they have a saying, "what other people think about me is none of my business."  It's true, and it is good advice.  What I don't know can't hurt me, and when you tell me, trust me, it is going to hurt me, and you can't possibly know how much.  So while I can't stop you from gossiping, I can certainly try to keep you from giving me the information.

I have to be compassionate towards myself as well as others.  If I allow another person to pass gossip, I am as responsible as the other person for the results, which will inevitably be more far-reaching than I could ever have seen.  Try as I may, I can't guarantee (nor can you, I'd reckon)  that I won't pass information on, particularly if I think it could serve some "good purpose."   I can't predict what effect the information is going to have on me either, as far as coloring my otherwise good relationship with a person.  Try as I may, I am pitifully poor at remembering that this information is only one opinion about the person, and the more juicy the information it is, the more amnesiac my brain becomes.

I hate that part of myself, and I hate it in others.  So there seems to be only one solution, which is to never let myself hear the information.  I can't stop the harm that others might be bent on doing me, but I can certainly refuse to take notice of it.  I can refuse to lower my standards of living my beliefs, by not letting slander into my frame of reference.

I have been the victim of this kind of gossip, in my own meeting, so I speak from a place of knowledge of both sides of the street.  I know that the people who passed information about me that was hurtful were convinced that they spoke "the truth."  If it was, it was their own truth, not mine.  What they interpreted as ignorance or blindness on my part was in fact an attempt to be compassionate, in a way that did not fit those individuals; definitions.  The result was that we all felt separated and alone, wounded, in the midst of our community.

In our meeting, we have since tried to address this kind of behavior by teaching each other that if a friend comes to us with information, we reply, "Let us go together to this person to see if this information is true or has any merit," or "Let us seek out the help of elders together, so that we can see our way clear of this."  We do not want to "accidentally" pass on erroneous  information, nor do we want to fail to address a situation that might be cause for alarm.  By going to the individual to seek clarity, or by seeking the help of wise others, we will hopefully avoid unnecessary hurt.

Over and over we have heard that this path of ours as Friends is one of attraction not of promotion.  How can we claim this and not see that the most powerful lesson we teach is the power of example.

Practicing refusal to lay claim to negative information about another, whether it be false information about a friend or the president, is one of the simplest forms of speaking truth to power.   I say, simply, "Please do not give me this information."   I ask, "What is your purpose in giving me this information?"  If I hear a cause for alarm, I say, "Let us seek the help of others."

I love my community, and I will go to any lengths to protect it.  Keeping secrets from others is never a safe or healthy form of protection.

"Quakers live their principles." (Friends as a Corrective for Culture, Part 2)

I found this apt quote in the exquisite article in November's Friend's Journal, "Living in Right Relationship:  How Does Spirit Call Us?"  The writer was told by a good friend that they might be a Quaker, because "Quakers live their principles."  Simple. This revelation, which also came to me quite a few years ago, on a wistful New Years' Eve, has turned out to be the making of a life's journey.  That year it came to me that rather than making the proverbial list, I need to only "Live What I Believe."

Simple is not always easy.  What's refreshing about Hollister Knowlton's article is the suggestions towards action, "10 steps you can do that give me hope."  I love queries, but I sometimes like suggestions too.  In looking at how others have answered their queries, I am offered the opportunity to come to new places myself, places I hadn't thought of before.

Originally, I saw Friends as the corrective to the hypocritical, Sunday-go-to-church crowd I was sick and tired of from my traditional church upbringing.  I was seeking, but I was seeking out of anger and disgust and frustration that it seemed the world of the 1970s was full of people who liked to talk a big show but were incapable of or uninterested in living it.   Gradually, as I became immersed in a community of people who walked their talk, I was able to shed off the anger at "those others," and focus more on the doing and being myself.

I have an acceptance of what is that serves me well these days.  I'm no longer frustrated with the empty  talkers, and sometimes I'm even able to let the negativity sowers be.  Why?  Because the business of living what one believes does not allow much time for my own negativity.  When I find myself sinking to that point, I know I am avoiding some part of myself I do not want to face.

I'm not going to review Knowlton's article here, other than to tell you that it is good reading, good food for thought, and it offers a bit of a roadmap for living in right relationship with the earth, something we could all use.  Please read it; I don't think you will be disappointed.

For this discussion,  I'm using the article as a jumping off point for my latest soapbox, Friends as a Corrective for Culture.

I've been alarmed by some of the posts that I've found on sites like wikipedia and expert.com that stated that Friends follow individualistic spiritual paths. This is a gross misstatement of our manner of being.  While Friends may welcome others, wherever they are on their spiritual path, the path is neither an individualistic or solitary one.  For the path of being a Quaker is one that can not be defined in a vacuum; it must be experienced as a part of the whole.

What makes Friends a corrective for culture is exactly this point:  Friends were formed in the image of the most original followers of Christ:  those disciples that formed the original community around him.  There was an attraction that Fox felt to this haggard group of strangers become friends:  they were the ones who were so filled with faith from the hearing of the words of God spoken through one who felt himself to be God's son, that they were willing to leave everything behind in order that they might follow him.

There was nothing ordinary or regular about the action on the part of the disciples.  There was no reason given, no proof offered as a reason for faith.  It was something felt at a pure level of love.  Those who were touched by the spirit of the teachings of the young Jesus were never the same again.  Often they left their families, their careers, their sense of everything that was secure behind them, and they followed him.  No wonder Fox, beleaguered in his seeking, found renewed faith here.

Most of us are not so privileged to have this experience in our lifetime.  But this is the experience Fox had as he listened inwardly to the voice of Christ.  "There is one, even Christ Jesus who can speak to your condition."  These are the words he heard and spoke to others.

Living one's principles is the hardest thing we do in this world.  Often there is nothing in the external world around us that supports us in doing this.  I imagine this is how Fox felt.  He had traveled around his world, speaking to professors, to pastors, to scholars, to the faithful, and there was none who could speak to his condition.  The regular rituals of his families spiritual. practice did not speak to him.  I imagine that after such a period of searching, he must have felt close to hopeless.   In times I have had like this, I have even questioned (and I know I'm not the only one) whether this life is worth it.  In this low time, George Fox heard the voice of Christ, speaking to him personally, and speaking directly to his condition.

He did not remain alone for long.  Fox himself was moved by the spirit that directed him, and he could not keep quiet.  It did not take long before others were attracted to his message and had begun to gather with him to talk about what was missing in the church of the day.  Those who were uncomfortable and disconcerted met to discuss what they felt was needed to re-value the spiritual life of Christians.  They became so excited by this discourse that they in turn could not remain silent.

Ever since I realized that this was the time of the Bible first being printed in English and becoming available at least to the wealthy, I have been struck by what a new era dawning this was!  No longer was the populace subject to priests and their interpretation of the Word.  People now had access to the Bible, and they were relatively free to interpret what the Scripture said to them, if they dared.  This is where Fox found his direction.  The Bible, and the words of Christ in his heart, did not speak the same message that preachers had tried to teach him; indeed he heard something that might truly be considered heretical.

What was unique about this gathering of seekers was that each brought to the conversation their own leadings.  Fox was as interested in hearing what the others were hearing, as he was in communicating his own message.  The community that evolved was something new indeed: they were freed from the bondage of strict interpretation by powers above them, to be in intimate conversation with the Christ within.

Have you had moments in your spiritual life where you have exhausted your resources, internal and external.  Life is leaving you flat, lacking meaning or direction.  There is no good reason you shouldn't follow the common thought on an issue, yet it doesn't feel right.  You search for justification and find none.  Still their is a nagging feeling inside of you that will not let go and you cannot settle yourself.  After a long period of confusion, you begin to feel a stirring and to find a direction out of your conundrum that is creative, if not outrageous, compared to the common thought.  Is it a relief?  Or is it a point of further confusion?

You must know, as I do, that there are times you have turned inward, and you have "heard" that still small voice, leading you forward in the way you know, without a doubt is the right way.  But what about the times that the leading, while intriguing, seems a little outrageous?  You may feel frightened, because what you feel led to is outside of your comfort zone.

Quakers live their principals.  Not always, not forever, not perfectly, but yes, when we pause to listen, we generally live what we believe.  Just how do we do that?

I know of no healthy person who can individually set out to live their beliefs, and have any success at doing so, in a vacuum.  I don't think humans are built with the ego strength to do such a thing.  Our thoughts can be amazingly creative, but they lack the consistency and clarity to make a real path without one essential ingredient:  community.   Without the support and challenge of those around us, we are quick to stray from what seemed only a second ago a clear path.

It is the community of Friends that brings our inner leading to be the thing which we live.   The voice of God, which we may hear so clearly in that moment, becomes distorted if we leave it to live within our own solitary mind alone.   What separates the sage seeker from the solitary psychotic soul, is the willingness to let the leading stand the test of coming before community.  Without this seasoning, how can be sure one has not just heard one's own narcissistic yearning?

In a strictly individualistic society, everyone is free to develop their own view of what is "ultimate".  The rest of us, who are not such strong leaders, will be led by the charisma of that single leading, if we are not encouraged to question and to challenge.  What makes Friends community different, in my experience, is that it is not a community built out of static teachings from a book.  The mystery of ongoing revelation is constantly unfolding, and the teachings are constantly evolving. It is the community of seekers that brings wholeness to the experience: no one of us can possibly possess the whole picture.  Each of us, listening intently in our times of silent attentiveness, brings to the community table our piece of the puzzle and adds it to the whole. 

Accordingly, one of us may possess the gifts for holding together the physical structure of the commmunity, another the teachings, another the creativity to add a process to the information, another a gift for healing and so forth.  Individually, the pieces may not even make sense.  But if we are willing to worship together, to work together, and to break bread together, we will find that together we form a much stronger and more complete whole.

I may hold a principal that says I should stand for peace.  Individually, I may stand for that peace, by holding a sign, by writing a letter, by praying, or by being a conscientious objector.  If my government, my neighborhood, or the society continue to tell me that I am unpatriotic, or unfair, or unrealistic, I alone may not stand for long by that belief.  However, if in the course of a week, I have a conversation with my friend about my struggle, I may stand a little longer.  If in worship, I hear leadings that speak to the heart of why I am for peace, I may feel strengthened.  In my prayers, I find myself led to speak to others, and they are strengthened.  Perhaps we travel together to a demonstration, or we write letters after worship.  We gather with a family whose child is approaching 18 and we talk about what the choices are.  Gradually, simply, God gathers us together and strengthens us.  The resources God means for me to have to live my path on earth are present in that community. 

If my leading is off base, there is a good chance that in worship I will hear leadings, inwardly or from others, that do not support what I think I am to do.  Thus I will not go too far down the path without a correction, like using a compass to keep my direction.  Gradually, as I am willing to risk sharing my leadings with others, I am offered the direction needed, and I do not feel desperate or lonely on my path.  A friend, who knows me well from participation in the meeting, may feel a leading to talk to me about my own direction, or a wiser, more experienced friend may feel called to "elder" me on a topic where I seem off base.  It's a simple matter of being a part of the whole.

The outside world, as Knowlton tells us, sees that "Quakers Live their Principals."  It could sound like a grand concept.  In reality, it is the end result of living one's life in relationship with God, and in relationship with the community that God has called us to be a part of.  As we understand that God has brought us together, we do not take either our friendships or our community lightly, and we come to live what we are called to, in faith, and with the support of that gift of community.

Friends live their principles, it is true.  As we stand together, as we share a meal, care for each other, push each other to grow, we each find the strength and courage to live what we believe.

Call for the Question

Suppose you walked into a party, and the host said to you: "Folks, there's only one rule for tonight's festivities. You may ask all the questions you want, but the only statements you can make will be in response to a question.  In other words, you may not start conversations with statements about yourself or your observations, unless a question has been put to you.  I will be circulating among you to be certain that you do not digress.  And please, allow a little time to unfold between your responses; don't be afraid to take that moment to allow yourself to digest the question before you respond.  Have fun, and don't be afraid to ask any question."

Ponder this a moment.  Really allow yourself to imagine a past situation you were in, be it a social event or a meeting, and imagine all the characters and how they approach you, and see yourself in the situation, mainly asking questions (queries) and only responding to the ones that are put to you.  Drop your expectations of the event, and allow the situation to unfold.

Isn't this the quaker practice of worship sharing taken to a new limit?  How do your imagine your own behavior might change were you prompted to view all of your interactions from the perspective of worship sharing and to focus on the questions rather than the answers?  Is this the manner in which you go out to greet the world?

These are some of the queries that surfaced as I entered the Visioning Retreat at Baltimore Yearly Meeting (BYM), even before we began the actual process.  Thanks to the creative genius of Michael Marquardt, we were introduced to a new way to think and work on 8 challenges that the staff of BYM put before us.  We broke into small groups, each one addressing a query, and set upon our task.  

I was surprised to see how uncomfortable we seasoned Friends were with a process that we would view as a part of our core, when it was put into this context.  It tuned me into my own presumptiveness when I come into a situation like this retreat:  that I am already primed with ideas and agendas that I might not even consciously be aware of, and that are certainly not seasoned in the Light.

Michael Marquardt is a professor of Human Resource Development and International Relations at George Washington University and President of the World Institute for Action Learning, the organization that teaches "Action Learning," the process described above. (http://wial.org,     http://www.gwu.edu/~elliott/faculty/marquardt.cfm) He is a Quaker and a member of Herndon Meeting.  To my knowledge, this was his first time bringing his cutting edge process to his own "family" of Friends.  Michael is like so many other Friends over time, who have quietly integrated their own manner of living as a Friend into their business practices.  In this case, Michael has actually taken his translation of a part of our Quaker process into the secular world of business, across continents and around the world.  As one who has often pondered what impact Quakers might have on global decision making, this was very exciting to learn!



It was delightful to be called to accountability to live our own manner so succinctly.  In each group were coaches whose job was to keep the time frame, help with clarity, and hold us to the task of the day:   to consider the query and utilize questions to creatively move through the process of responding to that challenge.  Of course, being Friends and comfortable with queries ourselves we had some questions for Michael too:  "Can we have a period of worship?"  "Can we redefine the question?"  "What happens in the executive world, do people end up taking a vote?"  (Michael assured us that in all of his years working with this method, no one has ever come to a vote.)

I'll have another post on the actual challenges that were put to us to work on, but for now I'll just focus on the process.  While Michael was encouraging us to think outside of the box, I was aware of how much he had done just that in his development of the Action Learning method of problem solving. 

What's fun about an experience like this is the personal awareness it calls us to.  When what may be our usual practices are put into a different box, or called a different name, we may fail to recognize them as our own.  The difficult part of this is how we may struggle with the "new" concept, failing to see where it fits in our own toolbox of constructs.  The titillating part is in being called to look at our own process with new eyes, and see the way that process then reflects back through the rest of our being.


In our group there was a bit of a struggle to decide if we were doing things the "right" way.  We wondered if we should redefine the question as we went along, rather than just living the one we had.  We wanted to inject our own ideas into the mix rather than stay on the task of answering the ensuing questions put to each of us or the group as a whole.  We balked at trusting the process.  Some of us had to put our own agendas aside to be truly present.



To be fair, we were doing a condensed version, scheduled to fit in this 5 hour retreat.  This did put a bit of pressure on us to move at a pace much faster than our usual Quaker amble.  I believe that the whole concept of Action Learning is to move beyond the linear model of thinking into a more circular one, and this is probably a struggle for many of us even in a more accomodating time frame.

It was a breath of fresh air in what could have been an arduous process.  As we laughed and wrangled our way through, the time passed incredibly quickly.  I noticed no yawning or dozing.  Some of the ideas that rose to the surface were solutions we are used to hearing, but many were new observations or calls for a different approach.  


As I left the retreat, feeling energized, my mind whirling, I wondered what the continuation of the process will look like.  Will the new thoughts or out of the box ideas be raised to the top, so that they can be heard?  Will the spirit of ongoing revelation continue as we strive to bring vision to reality?  Will there be the opportunity for further use of this process to move us from suggestion to implementation?  Will the staid be able to move aside for the creative new?


I have no answers, only more questions.

Friends as a Corrective for Culture

I'm always grateful when reading something, be it a blog, or a classic text, or the Bible, or any other spiritual writing, wakes me up from the slumber of apathy or indifference that comes over me from time to time. I find the structure of society lends itself to such numbness. Multi-tasking is the new opiate of the people. At least I can say it is for me. If the demands of our society keep us so busy that we cannot think, what is to become of us?

I'm going on record against it. Nothing good can become of dividing one's self in six different directions at once. What can be said for transporting one's children across town to their myriad of activities while conference calling with one's staff, yelling food orders into the microphone at the fast food place, while contemplating the next move to be made in one's approach to their client. It's an accident waiting to happen, literally and figuratively.

How can this multi-tasking ability be considered such a positive talent to possess, when it means quite frankly, that no one gets my undivided attention? This is the antithesis of how I want my life to be. I suspect that is true for many others as well, but most of the time we are moving so quickly, we don't have the time to stop and regroup.

I was reading Plainly Pagan's post A Quaker Mask of Respectability, when I woke up. Her call to others to recognize her spiritual need for connection spoke to me, and led me to the place of this blog. It lead me directly to the history of my own same feelings. How long I have wandered in the wilderness, silently crying for recognition. I honor her ability to speak aloud.

Everything that being a Friend has led me to has been counter-intuitive to the prevailing culture of individualism.

Where my society would call me to be a staunch individualist in all areas of my personal and working life, my faith calls me to be a member of community. Where my government calls me to war to protect the peace, my beliefs tell me that peace cannot be borne out of violence. When culture tells me that I must protect what I have and hold on to it, lest I be taken advantage of, my conscience tells me that if I leave my door unlocked and give away what I have, there will be no way my enemy can take advantage of me.

Still it is hard to live counter to the prevailing culture, in fact, it is almost impossible. Living in this dichotomy, most of us strike our own level of comfort or balance in the midst. We may function in the society to the degree we must, and end up closeting some of our beliefs to be shared only with a close few. I believe it's fairly common for some of us to throw our beliefs overboard for a period early in life, in order to strike out and make our way in the wilderness of adult life. Perhaps we settle for a moderate religious life, when we begin to have children and want them to have the "right" upbringing. Some of us come to Quaker Meeting on Sunday, desperate for the hour of quiet and the chance to shed off the weight of the garments of our outer lives, then hastily returning to the demands of the day..

I'm grateful that not everyone feels such a need to pull on the garments of our society; not everyone rejects the inner pull toward community. We all exist along a continuum that reflects the paradox of our need to fit and our need to follow our beliefs. Those who stand in the place of holding their belief up for others to see, who are not able to hide their Light under a bushel, make clear the path for those of us not able.

I'm struck that by the period of late middle age, even those of us who have had to sacrifice our "idealism" have begun to search more ardently to find real meaning for our lives, and we have begun to re-awaken to the lofty ideas of our youth, of living more and more in accordance with our values. It's appropriate at this time, because many of us are also being freed from the bondage of daily work through retirement. Without the demands of providing for our families by working in the outside culture, we are now again free as we were as adolescents, to bring our creative, spiritual thoughts into reality.

This individualistic, multi-tasking, fast-paced world does not make it easy for quiet faiths like the Society of Friends to survive. In a world where loud and fast is the norm, we are quiet and slow.
Where being a staunch individualist is the highest cultural value, we base our actions and decisions on the sense of the whole. Yet it is precisely this that we can offer to the seeker, the unquiet one.

Our Society is the corrective for the frailties of the secular society. Where society breaks families and friends apart, we gather them. Where the wheels of industry grind loud and hard, we offer solace and silence. When the long hours and hard work deprive the individual of energy, we offer the place to recharge their inner batteries. Don't we?

So many an attender has commented to me after worship on how inviting the silence was, how there was something they had not felt before in both the quiet and the messages. Many have said they felt a Presence there, or felt the spirits of those come before.

We need to be certain that in our meetings, we do carry sense of Presence forth into the world, and certainly into the time surrounding worship. Are we greeting worshipers as they arrive in a spirit of love and grace? What are we doing to help our community to incorporate and carry the peace they gain from worship into the rest of their lives? Are we risking to be vulnerable amongst each other, so that the Spirit may flourish and grow among us?

Too often I hear people say that they wished they could participate in a meeting activity but were too busy to stay or come back. What are we doing to insure that the activities offered in second hour or religious education are meaningful and relevant to the needs of our community? Do we send our Friends forth into the coming week carrying something that will uphold and uplift them in their daily life?

I have no doubt that we are offering something of dire need in this lightning-paced technology-laden world of the twenty-first century. My own meeting seems to be growing with new attenders. Our anniversary celebration of this year has given us cause to speak out, and we have chosen to use this time to invite the curious and the seeking. I see that the task before our meeting is not just to attract those travelers to us, but to nourish and sustain them in ways they are not finding in their everyday world.

In my own life, I see that this calls me to a new place too. Like those travelers, I came to the Society of Friends seeking, starving and stretched beyond my limits. Slowly, as I worshiped among
Friends, I came to see that I was a Friend long before arrived, but had not until now found my home.
I did go through a period after a few years where I began to question whether Quakers could meet my needs. I was again feeling parched.

Thankfully, I had been given the gift of silent worship and prayer, which I now knew was available to me in any time and place. Here I learned the true meaning of Fox' words, "There is one, even Christ Jesus, who can speak to thy condition." Through the nourishment of the Light, I also came to see that I had to ask what I could offer, allowing God to work through me.

When I began to ask what I had to give, and I began to surrender to the power of Spirit working through me, I found that I indeed had not come to Friends by accident. I had been Led. But what was more amazing than opening to that leading, was finding that I really did have something to offer. The real gift was not in what I had come to receive, but in finding what I had come to give, most of which I am still uncovering.

If we are, as the Society of Friends, to serve as that corrective for our prevailing culture, then we must be willing to make ourselves available to be a growing community: What have you come to give to your community? What part of the whole are you holding? Would you deny to your Friends that part of wholeness that only you can bestow?

The paradox of community is the age old lesson, that it is in the giving that you truly are fulfilled.

Of Dream Catchers and Drum Groups

This entry comes from a conversation I had with my 21 year old daughter this morning, about the wonderful facebook group, Quaker Hippie Children. If you haven't seen it, it's worth signing on to facebook just to read it. If you're in your 50s or 60s and raised children you will be rolling on the floor with laughter.

My kids didn't have the experience of Quaker Camp. I wish they had, and I'm thankful for the experience of Young Friends and Junior Young Friends, which gave my children the sense they were part of a larger community (and that they were not the only one with weird hippie parents!).

Our conversation this morning was about the sensibility that we take into the world as a result of our being Friends. Such a simple word, with such simple implications. We treat others as friends. We greet strangers as friends. We even treat rude people who are obviously having a bad day, as friends. If there is something like Light or that of God in everyone, even if they don't know it, we strive in our family to treat them like Friends. Sometimes it is a real stretch, but it is the benchmark we strive to reach.

I'm very proud to have raised a child with this awareness at such a young adult age. She teaches children how to ride horses, and she is ever aware that no one ever learned to enjoy riding a horse by being yelled at. Some people may think they have, but she tells me that the horse taught them, not the screaming teacher. She is a gentle soul. She is teaching me, that even in the crotchetyness of old age, I do not have the right to let God or myself down by treating another in a manner less than as a friend.

Children are so clear on these things. Once, when our Meeting was having a major conflict that threatened to split the meeting, the children wrote us a note from their business meeting that said something like, "We wish the adults would stop making such a big deal out of things they think are affecting us. We're the ones involved, and we feel perfectly safe." Wow. Clear enough? I'm beginning to think that as adults we need to seek clarity because our initial direct channel with God has been covered with layers and layers of acculturation.

So when I happened on this little facebook group, "Quaker Hippie Children" http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/group.php?gid=2423821013&ref=ts
I couldn't help but smile, then laugh, then shed a tear. All the things that I thought were so important to impart to my child were there. You know you're a Quaker Hippie kid if (among other things):
*your threshold for weirdness, quirkiness, and everything avant-garde seems to be much, much higher than that of anyone around you

*you have a hippie bumper sticker present anywhere in your life

*you attend Quaker meeting (although not required; there are many of us who are QHCs at heart, but aren't actually Quaker...)

*you have ever been asked to use an "I" statement to describe your feelings

*you avoided bringing home your more mainstream friends for fear of subjecting them to your parents

*you have never been allowed to play with anything resembling a weapon

*you use eco-friendly products in your home

*you compost

*you remember attending protests from a very young age

*at least half the people you know are vegetarian (or vegan!)

*you know at least one person who doesn't eat eggs, dairy, wheat, refined sugars, or anything grown further than 50 miles from home

And my daughter's personal favorite :
*as a young girl, you read New Moon magazine and dreamed about becoming a woman (womyn?)

There are many more, along with references to the many songs, like Baby Beluga and This Land is Your Land, that we sang on car rides, and the essential Quaker games like Wink! Then our own quirky family things, like making dream catchers, drumming in the woods, putting on our "restaurant manners" like an invisible t-shirt, and stringing together as many idioms in a sentence as we could.

So what does this all have to do with me? It is a lightbulb, a snap on the side of the head, a reminder, of the awareness I carried with me when my adult children were wee babes; the gift their presence gave to me of wanting to keep their awareness tuned to the Light, in whatever forms I thought would "stick." Singing songs, making up crazy rhymes, praying silly prayers, eating whole wheat, talking to animals, going to demonstrations and being peaceful -- these are just a few of the ways Spirit spoke to us all. And every day was a gift of something new seen through a child's eyes.

I'm thankful that I can so easily call this state of being up, with a simple conversation. I'm even more grateful that my daughter so readily remembers. She's in a time where she doesn't really think she believes in God or praying or worship. But she definitely knows she's a Quaker, and she is happy to be one. She credits being raised Quaker with her own awareness of others, her peacefulness, and her joy of animals. When she was a mid-teen, and I was trying to impress on her the need to attend meeting for worship, she stopped me in my tracks one morning, when I went to get her from the barn, where she was tending her beloved horses: "There's more God right here in this barn, right this moment," she said, "than there is for me in that Meeting." I have to admit I couldn't think of an argument. I felt the truth she spoke.

For me, in those days, I was very busy contemplating, drumming, visualizing, and seeking contact with the Light in whatever way I could. I had the sense that I had to be tuned in as acutely as I could be, due to the responsibility of raising these children in the manner God would want me to. I hope the children benefited, but I know I did. I didn't worry about how theologically correct these things were in my own young adulthood, I simply followed my heart.

Over the years, as others, I have become busier and busier in my life. I find I have to set aside time for quiet contemplation, and often, no sooner is it done, than I am off to the rest of my life, the quiet calm swept away with the tide of the day. I'm not happy about this, and I don't really know how I evolved here. I've recently recommitted my life to the ministry God leads to me, and I can see already how this is the crux of some of my difficulties and unclearness.

I had a week at Baltimore Yearly Meeting's Annual Sessions, where each day I felt more and more refreshed and renewed in the Spirit. The first couple days home, I was basking in the halo of the Light I'd bathed in daily there. Gradually that halo grew dull, and by the end of a week, I was pretty much back to the daily rush. With the exception that I now carry with me this awareness. This morning I woke up and rushed off without even pausing for that quiet time. Thank goodness for children...I got on facebook and there was my daughter to remind me of the gifts God gives us in the smallest of moments.

We all have access to that Light. It doesn't take an hour of worship, it takes a moment of turning inward. That is the simplest gift we have to give to the world.

The Oasis of Community

It has been so long since I posted that I almost deleted this blog and started another. But there is something to the process that needs to be preserved. Having just come through a period in my life where I felt barren, like there was a desert inside, and no water to nourish my spirit, I trudged off to Baltimore Yearly Meeting Annual Sessions. I had the sense of a dying person approaching an oasis, hopeful against hope, yet doubting, as if that oasis might be just another mirage. Thankfully, it was the real thing. (BYM has never failed to refresh and renew me in all the years I have attended.) I was grateful I planned on attending the pre-sessions retreat, as it was like being plunged into a spring, and I emerged refreshed, already with a growing sense of clarity.

The Business of our Lives: The Transformation of Faith into Practice, was the focus of Annual Sessions this year. So the retreat promised us that "we will be exploring how our faith and testimonies can lead us to fulfill our role as representatives of God on earth. We will look at where we are now on our life/faith journey; where we are to go on our journey, and how to get there." I would say that the retreat more taught us the process that we could use to do this work. Most of the focus was on the deep listening that one can offer another in discerning their leading. I found this most helpful, and was also pleasantly surprised when one of my small group members stepped outside this format to say, "Well do you have a care/clearness committee?" and offered other tidbits about her own process that shed light on my own path.

I don't know if it's the fact I missed last years Sessions, or if it was that the agenda was truly so varied , or if my ears were just opened, but the week that followed offered me more nourishment and opportunity to learn than I can remember. I experienced it as though my spirit had entered paradise! What some might call the "work" of people's lives, I came to see as that which also fed them. The fulfillment of those involved in work in Africa, in the African Great Lakes Initiative, Friends Theological Institute, and Hlekweni Friends Rural Service was infectious. Workshops as diverse as Sabbath Economics, as basic as the Practice of Living Simply, helped me renew my faith in the Quaker process. Singing, worship, dining -- fellowship with Friends -- was the real food that my soul craved!

Our clerk, Howard Fullerton, is becoming simultaneously more amusing and adroit as each season passes. Business sessions were refreshing and succinct. Was it my imagination, or was every presenter cognizant of the listeners, striving to be not just informative but engaging? Even the memorial for our older Friends who have passed from this place this year, was like plunging into a refreshing pool. My thirst was quenched.

Out of this came crystal clear clarity. I cannot continue to live a life divided between my Quaker Life and my "other" life. Much like the parable of George Fox and William Penn, where Fox challenges Penn to wear his sword as long as he can, I feel that I can no longer wear the outside world's values and lifestyle. When I fall back into that lifestyle, it is only a matter of time before I feel empty, depressed and like life has no meaning.

This may sound extreme to some, but it is the way I experience it. It has become heavier to carry the burden of not listening to one's calling than it is to follow it. Somewhere inside I always have known it would come to this. The God of my understanding is loving, persistent, and never gives up on a soul. At the workshop on prayer by Daniel Snyder, I heard God called "the infinite, divine lover of your soul." In this week of spiritual retreat and renewal, I came to truly understand this. I can only hope to model an approximation of this love, and to someday pay forward the gift I was given this week. I am blessed to be a member of such an oasis of community in this difficult world.

Grant us Light for our Path

This morning another email arrived about the task before Baltimore Yearly Meeting, to take back to each monthly meeting the concerns over the FUM hiring policy, for their consideration.

We are trying to arrive at a baseline of material to distribute and carry with us, as we endeavor to help monthly meetings to find unity about our position on the hiring policies of FUM that exclude homosexuals in committed relationships. We have continued without any clear sense of how to proceed, for several years, and the issue weighs heavily on many of us.

This brings me to a concern that weighs on my own mind: how sometimes in the midst of a dire concern, and in the midst of our current hasty culture, we are driven more by the desire to solve a problem, rather than raise an issue to the Light for worshipful consideration.

It's something I have personally had experience with, having at least once seen my own leading dissolve into self-defensiveness and erratic problem solving. At the outcome of this I was initially oblivious, although my own clinging to my own position should have told me I was no longer laboring in the light. Only as considerable time passed, was I able to see, with the gentle eldering of my Ministry and Counsel committee, how my own position was affected by my defensiveness.

The heart of the conflict with FUM has appeared to me at present to be a theological one. It will never be solved, as I see it at present, by weighing the policies and procedures, or even by weighty discussion between various groups of Friends. Certainly knowing each other better can only help, as far as trusting that each of us brings to the table our best selves, desiring true kinship with each other in the Light.

I do, however, have complete faith in the Light that illumines all things. I believe that the solution rests in worship and prayerful consideration of this matter. We are at an impass because various individuals and even some whole groups of people differ greatly in their theologies: one group sees the inerrancy of Biblical text in defining what is sin and who can serve as a result, and the other defines who can serve directly as a belief that there is the Light of God in everyone and therefore anyone can and will have a leading to serve.

Certainly everything is not quite so black and white as that, but I think this defines the ends of the spectrum. My own position is somewhere in between, and not totally clear to me as yet. I want to respect the theologies of the different people involved. I am concerned that one group (and many more might follow, if one defines who can serve on the basis of sin and what it is) can be excluded when I have seen the leadings personally. I am concerned that someone who feels so clearly led to ministry might feel that the only way they could serve would be in holding secrets from the greater Meeting (as in the case of other denominational churches).

Perhaps God is leading us to a new place? Perhaps the act of holding the picture of such great theological differences up to the light might show us the way to this new place? Are we as a group of modern Friends, capable of such deep worship? Can we consider that we might be led by God to shed off some of this modern clothing, to return to the place of deep leading, such as George Fox and other early Friends were led?

I am sure that it was no easy task to shed off the physical practice of the sacraments as depicted by the Anglican and Catholic churches, yet early Friends did just that. Was this not against the Word as depicted in the Bible? What about the practice of keeping slaves or carrying weapons? Each of us must listen, truly listen to where God is leading us. Perhaps it is not so clear as we wish it would be.

You might be thinking that I have my own sense of leading, or my own agenda behind this writing. But I truly do not, beyond the fact that I believe when we bring two seemingly irrefutable issues together in the Light, there is the possibility that God may reveal or even create something new that is beyond what we humans can see.

I welcome comments or discussion on this. I am trying to expand my own understanding of the power of worship and prayer.