Don't Blog About Quakerism Month?

I'm not going anywhere... :) I've been nervous too, because it all coincides with my joining the Quaker blogging world. Have I driven you all away? ;) I know I'm not nearly as articulate and insightful as most of you, but I can't be THAT bad... *wink*

In answer to the pertinent question, I did indeed see the butler and he was pilfering the silverware from the dining hall. You might want to hire a new one.

:D

I swear to you (although not on the Bible or by the heavens or in the Lord's name) that I had nothing to do with this rush towards taking vacations from the blogosphere in general and specifically regarding Quakerism.

Actually, check out my blog tomorrow...

Honestly? My bet is that blogging, particularly when taken more as a spiritual practice and less as something for fun, can take a lot more time and effort.

I wonder if this present situation of folks taking breaks or reducing their blogging is due in part to that.

Then again, many of us are now seeing the dawning of spring and might want to do others things than sit in front of a PC???

Finally: your description of feeling as if you were in some sort of haunted mansion looks fun: I'm a big fan of gothic literature so that's right up my alley! :))

I don't identify my blog as being Quaker as such: http://www.compulsivereader.blogspot.com/

I didn't really start it with any particular theme. However, I do post my impression of things Quaker sometimes. I was very moved by the memorial service held for one of our meeting members who had passed away.

Fran gave me my first opportunity to visit the sick in the manner of Friends. She moved to this area to be near her daughter, who was her caregiver until she died, and she joined our meeting. I visited her 3 or 4 times during her final bout with cancer. She had been a psychiatric nurse and a very, very spiritual Quaker, and I enjoyed visiting her.

Not sure if you remember studying the French philosopher Voltaire. Some people actually think he was a Quaker because his first four Philosophical Letters, as well as some other writings, are about them. Ol' Voltaire is sometimes hard to pin down and his humor a bit elusive. He has the unfortunate tendancy to sock it to Catholicism indirectly by making fun of other religions. It was his way of getting past the censors ... however, the hierarchy was never fooled. Voltaire lived on the boarder between Switzerland and France, and he would slip over the border to safety for awhile, out of reach of the law, after each of his books came out...

Nevertheless, something that Voltaire wrote about the Quakers --whatever his intention-- has stuck with me all my life. It's on my blog entry about Fran's funeral:

Nous ne donnons point d'argent à des hommes vêtus de noir pour assister nos pauvres, pour enterrer nos morts, pour prêcher les fidèles ; ces saints emplois nous sont trop chers pour nous en décharger sur d'autres.

"We do not pay men dressed in black to care for our poor, bury our dead, or preach to the faithful. These holy tasks are too dear to us for us to pass off on someone else."

This always stayed with me, even when I wasn't really curious about the Quakers. It came back to me when I heard that this was Fran's last illness. So I began to visit her... and I attended her funeral. The rest is on my blog.

I feel that I'm on the Quaker path. When I get around to it, I'll write my letter requesting to join. For now, I have to leave for a library conference in Minneapolis.

In the Light.
--Barbara

Joe: The arrival of what? It's spring? Really? What do you know. I guess I didn't notice. Maybe I'll take a peek outside as soon as I get my next entry or two done...

I think I have enough silly and/or embarrassing posts to prove I don't always use my blog for serious spiritual ministry. Sometimes ministry is just sharing our lives and what little glimpses we have of the Kingdom. The nature of blogs is to be personal, to air doubts, to show our different sides and to be human even in the midst of any religiousity. There are plenty of (boring) Quaker websites for those who want to speak in third-person model Quakerism. So if it isn't fun to post something serious this week, then don't.

Brandice: Thanks for sticking around! To be honest I'm also wondering if the "Quaker Quietist":http://quakerquietist.blogspot.com is the ringleader behind all this. After a great series of posts he blinked out exactly six months ago yesterday. A little too coincidental if you ask me.

Martin, you have me giggling at 8 am, and that is a miracle. A lot of these things have a cycle, and it strikes me that since a lot of us started up our blogs around the same time, it might make sense that the downswing would be concurrent.

Frankly, I'm a bit put out. I thought my blogging crisis was my OWN SPECIAL UNIQUE SITIUATION, about ME and MY DOUBTS.

Hang you all for stealing my blog-doubting thunder.

:)

Actually, I'm really grateful for the discernment I see happening, even when it cuts down my reading opportunities. I'm also going to respong to the wonderful comments people have left on that entry in a little while, once my brain wakes up.

Hey Amanda: well it definitely seems the path less travelled is to blog in April. I think the pendulum is about to swing--Quaker blogging in spring is going to be the new hip yet unique thing to do so come jump on this bandwagon.

Howdy everyone. In the workshop I am preparing for the upcoming Gathering, I am taking a long look at the patterns we go through in our spiritual formation and in our development as Friends.

Some of those patterns might be seen as cycles between rest and growth, between conflict and reconciliation; or as movement between learning, integrating, discerning, and testing. Other patterns might be thought of as steps along a staircase, with rests and integration on the treads (i.e. "plateaus") and spiritual development and new learning on the risers.

For me, it's important that we Quaker bloggers are in some ways taking a collective breath to reflect on our work, individually and as a group (though of course there might be sadness or concern over the blog-silence...). When I consider spiritual maturation and development/deepening of one's Quaker identity, my belief is that any community will experience a similar cycle (or staircase) to that of individuals within the community. Why not us?

Blessings,
Liz

Hi all,

Maybe the bloggers who are pausing for a while are setting a good example of their commitment to following our Guide even when that means they are not conforming to my expectation of providing me with stuff to read. I'm glad they are not letting the demands of the blog overcome their leading.

Maybe like other kinds of speaking ministry, blog writing is a fruit of a spirit-led life, to be enjoyed but not mistaken for what is going on underneath. The "whole story" is the vine of Christ that the fruits come from. Maybe what we let go of is the fertilizer for that vine's growth through us.

Blessings

Martin, the affection in your post for other weblog authors was refreshing! Thank you.

Dear Brandice (Quaker Monkey), if constant articulateness and insight were a requirement, I'd be too scared ever to post anything. Sometimes I just want to wiggle my cybertoes with inarticulate delight about some music or idea, and sometimes I'm feeling down about our species' behavior -- and posting these thoughts is my form of anti-isolationism. Left to my own devices, I isolate myself too readily.

One thing I don't do easily is talk about my earthy daily existence, my conversations with friends and family, and the ups and downs of relationships. I'm grateful when others are able to do that; I read such writings with great appreciation and with absolutely zero inclination to judge them.

There is another reason that has not yet been mentioned as to why some might have decided to suspend their online journaling--maybe they are mucking about in their garden.

For those who are not, I hope, wherever you all are, that you are spending part of your down-time outdoors. Unless you are living in the Tropics, April is a transitional month no matter what hemisphere you are living in. Just outside your window either Spring or Autumn is coming into full force and some of the best weather of the year is occuring. It would be a shame to miss it. Push away from your desk and take some time to observe the flowers, etc. Your audience likely will still be around when you get back.

It's spreading beyond Quakerism! "Except for These Chains has announced a hiatus":http://njlilje.blogspot.com/2005/04/except-for-this-hiatus.html. Now that it's jumped over into progressive Christianity will it continue spreading outward across the theological and political spectrum? One could hope...

Maybe it's even more general than that:

Daddyzine's subtitle is also "Now with more hiatus"

This is just to let you know that the Brooklyn Quaker blog is back with another post about the advices of the elders at Balby (I like to keep up with current events and am only about 350 years behind).

In my case I "went quiet" with the blog for awhile, not because of any troubling self-doubts or sudden infusion of proper humility but simply because I had to triage my time commitments at a difficult time in our family. It's likely that I'll still be pretty busy with the family health crisis for awhile, but I think I can also break out some time for the occasional new post.

- - Rich Accetta-Evans