Guests

An interview with Raye, a member of Ohio Yearly Meeting Conservative who serves on their Electronic Outreach Committee. You can also watch it on QuakerQuaker: Quaker Video and Electronic Outreach.

Raye: Ohio Yearly Meeting holds our yearly meeting in Barnesville Ohio--some people know us as those Barnesville folks. We have an electronic Outreach Committee and that includes the oversight and ministry associated with our website. We spend time thinking about how to open up to people who might be interested in Friends' ways and might want to know more about us whether or not they've ever read the Journal of George Fox. We're trying to expand our witness, if you will.

One of the questions that has come up in this electronic outreach group is: what types of communication or video are useful for someone to get to know us but also respectful of the fact that we do worship and that worship is a spiritually intimate time. We're trying to bridge and deal with respecting the worshippers, the Friends themselves, to not put on a performance and yet to try to communicate what it is that is edifying in practice and worship.

Martin: How do you give newcomers a taste of Quakers without directing it too much? If you just have that silent empty box it's hard for newcomers to know what should be filling that box.

Raye: One of the things Friends have done for hundreds of years is to publish, to keep journals and to share that. But that's not all there is to the Friends experience. There are those quiet times and those moments of ministry that we believe are Spirit-inspired. Many of us wish we could give people a little taste of that because that doesn't show up in a lot of published writings. That spontaneous and timely, and at times prophetic, witness that we see in our Meetings. We have considered digital video as a way to do that.

Martin: I love the video possibilities here. Video can be a way of reaching out to more people.

Raye: It's not just anything that can be written. Certainly the writings that have been published are very helpful in getting some sort of a glimmer of where we have been, or in some cases where we are headed or where we are. But there is nothing like that experience of being with Friends in meeting. It doesn't always happen but there are these moments called a covered meeting or a gathered meeting where everybody seems to be in the same place spiritually and when seems to be messages and gifts coming through people. That's difficult to get across.

We're hoping that with video we can discuss these kinds of things after the fact. We don't want to turn it into a spectator sport or performance.

Martin: Authenticity is a key part of the Quaker message. You're not practicing what you're going to say for First Day or Sunday. You're sitting there and waiting for that immediate spirit to come upon you.

Raye: We don't know when that will happen. There are meetings where everybody is very quiet, where there's a sense of that spirit and unity but it may be an outwardly quiet meeting. I have been in meetings where someone stood up and began to sing their message or a psalm or someone had a wonderful sermon that was perfect for the moment. These things happen but we don't know when they will.

My friend Kevin-Douglas emailed recently about a new worship group he's helped to start in downtown Baltimore. It sounds like some of the other Christ-center worship groups that have been popping up the shadow of established Quaker meetings. It's consciously small and home-based, taking place at a non-traditional time with an implicit Emergent Church flavor. Experienced Friends are involved (I know KD from FGC's Central Committee for example) and while it's formed next to and out of large, active meetings, it's not schismatic.

I asked KD if I could put his description up as a "guest post.' I'm hoping a post here can let more seekers and Friends in Baltimore know about it. But beyond that, there's a definite small movement afoot and I thought Ranter readers might be interested in the example (here are a few others: Laughing Waters and Chattahoochee (thanks to Bill Samuel for the last link, some of these are indexed in his helpful Friends Christian Renewal listing).

From KD:

Before R. got sick and eventually died, we had been thinking of hosting an informal meeting for worship in the manner of Friends at our house that would be explicitly Christ-centered. We aren't talking Christian Orthodoxy here, but rather with the understanding of all involved that we come together to explore our faith through the teachings of Jesus and those who came before and after him.  It would be Quaker in that we'd follow in the tradition of Quaker Christians, gaining from their wisdom and experience.

Now, the Spirit is leading me back to this.  

So, what is going on? 

I very much appreciate universalism as a world view. I in no way believe that Christianity is the only way. I do believe, however, that Jesus is the Way, Truth and the Life.  The Way being one of love and compassion, of justice and sincere seeking of that mystery that I call God.  I don't think Jesus was the only one who brought that way, but I do see his way as leading to God, and that by his Way, we can get to God. It doesn't matter to me whether he was or is God; I do see him as a sacrament, a way to God.  For me he is the way to God.  He is living. I know this experientially.

So I want to share in this with others. I want to sit in silence, or sing in praise, or consider a query, scripture or word of advice from Friends past with others who also want to know God through Christ.  I'm not concerned about theology.  IT's about experience for me.  I don't mind if those who don't "know Jesus" come, as I know God can speak through all.   If those who come and don't consider themselves Christian are willing to wrestle with the teachings of Jesus and his ancestors and his followers, then I say WELCOME!  I'm not set on form either.  I do prefer unprogrammed worship, but I mean that literally:  that we don't necessarily set a program, but that there indeed may be silence or a query, scripture or advice read at the beginning of worship. Perhaps candles are lit, maybe even *gasp* incense!  I don't feel the need to be bound to our puritan roots and yet I feel the wisdom of allowing the Spirit to direct the worship is a wisdom we should continue to follow.  I believe in experiential and experimental worship. Perhaps we have the Friends hymnal available and one may feel led to sing from it and others can join if they too feel led.  As for now, it's been completely unprogrammed worship as one would find in most Conservative Friends meetings.   As for community, I hope God will gather together a community where we do recognize ministries and gifts perhaps in the way that Friends have done so traditionally but maybe in radically new ways!   I'm so tired of Evangelical/Liberal/Conservative labels.  Can we just be Friends?

I do so love being Quaker.  I do so love Jesus.  I hope to find a community where these are wed without qualifications.

We meet third Sundays of every month at a home (Mine right now) from 5-6pm and are listed in Quaker Finder:

Downtown Baltimore Worship Group
Christ-centered, unprogrammed worship is generally held on the 3rd Sunday of the month at 5:00 PM in a home. Follow link for current details.

A Guest Piece by Jeffrey Hipp

"I take this commitment of membership very seriously – to labor, nurture, support and challenge my fellow Friends; to walk in the Light together, and to give, receive, and pray with my fellow sojourners when the next step is unclear. My feet are on solid ground."

By James Riemermann

Here's a thought-provoking comment that James left a few days ago on the We're All Ranters Now piece. It's an important testimony and a good challenge. I'm stumped trying to answer it upon first reading, which means it's definitely worth featuring!

By QuaCarol

Sometimes I have to lift up comments and make them their own posts. Here's one of QuaCarol's reply to Uh-Oh: Beppe's Doubts: "I see this community of bloggers, reaching out to each other and connecting, when meetings (and here I venture to say “all”) are focused on keeping their pamphlet racks filled, rather than posting URLs on their bulletin boards or creating a newcomer’s URL handout."

A guest piece from Rob of Consider the Lillies

Rob describes himself: "I’m a twenty-something gay Mid-western expatriate living in Boston. I was inspired to begin a blog based on the writings of other urban Quaker bloggers as they reflect and discuss their inward faith and outward experiences. When I’m not reading or writing, I’m usually with my friends, traveling about, and/or generally making an arse of myself."

A guest piece by Amanda

Originally posted as a comment to "My Experiments with Plainness", Amanda's story deserves its own post: "I've noticed that I'm becoming really attached to my clothes. As I was grimly and methodically culling my closet, a whiny, desperate voice in my head piped up, and I began to have a serious conversation with myself... [A] reservation I have is that plain dressing may just be another way of telegraphing the image I want the world to have of me. Only instead of that message being 'I am cool and worthy of your attention and envy' the message might be 'I'm so hoooooly'."

Hi there!

I am 21, and the only member of my family who attends meetings of Friends. (I am not a Friend yet, being young to the whole experience, and an ex-catholic, and having wandered for several years in strange paths!! :) However, I am taking it very seriously, and reading all I can get my hands on. I feel a strong call towards plain dress, and have gone through fits and starts of it spontaneously, even as a Catholic child. At 12, I decided I would no longer wear colours in imitation of all the siants habits I saw in my books, and my friends and I (I grew up in rural Canada, homeschooled, the oldest of 11 kids, an anarchonism to begin with) tried sewing our own clothes ourselves, praire dresses and pinafores.

When I was 14, we moved to the States, to the suburbs, away from our uber-traditional Catholic enclave, and I began to normalize myself out of the "homeschooler uniform" (its own sort of plain dress - those terrible jumpers with ankle socks and canvas sneakers! Ack!) and into mainstream fashion, where I've been solidly entrenched ever since, especially since moving to NYC.

I am now in the process of purging a lot of my stuff, and seeking a simpler way of living. I quit smoking, and have decided that drinking as a recreational activity is out unless it's an organized event. This may become more strict in time, but I have to ease into it a little bit. I got rid of several bags of clothes and a bunch of household items I was hoarding "just in case I might need them someday". Classic. A lot of things have precipitated this, but one of them is my absolute horror at how I've gone from making $12,000 a year to nearly $30,000, and I still am saving no money at all, nor am I making any lasting purchase/investments, etc...I'm just spending it on vain and useless things. I've noticed as well, that I'm starting to have more and more big-salary fantasises, and recreationally go to stare in shop windows at clothes, not just to appreciate the asthetic value of some of the most gorgeous garments in the world (after all, this is Manhattan) but also to drool and covet. I found, while examining my concience, that it wasn't even the thing - the piece of clothing that I wanted, and it wasn't a simple desire to have something pretty. I saw myself linking these clothes and things to my self worth and future happiness. You know:

"Once I am thin and rich enough to wear this, I will be happy. I will be so happy. So very happy. Everything will be perfect, and my hair will always be straight, and I will have my teeth veneered, and I will have a handsome man who worships the ground I walk on, and three bright-eyed children who appear only on Sunday mornings to snuggle with me in my California-king-sized bed with the white crisp sheets, while I languidly smile at their frolicing and plan to buy them a golden retriever puppy later that afternoon as I stroll through an antique fair and buy a vintage wicker bird cage, which I will fill with finches and hang from my sun-drenched porch in my second house in the south of France, and I be happy. So happy. So very happy, if I am only thin and rich enough to wear those clothes."

I really, really woke up one afternoon to find myself standing on 5th Ave and 59th street, on my lunch break, staring in a window, and having that fantasy with absolutely no internal ironic monolouge at all. At all.

It completley panicked me.

I've noticied that I'm becoming really attatched to my clothes. As I was grimly and methodically culling my closet, a whiney, desperate voice in my head piped up, and I began to have a serious conversation with myself.

"You can't get rid of so many of your cool clothes. The clothes are you, they're a huge part of who you are."

"Wait," the other voice in my head, the stern one, said (I am a schizophrenic and so am I) "You are saying that I am what I wear. That's supposed to make me want to keep them? Do you even hear what you're saying?"

The first voice was totally backtracking.

"No, no, no, I didn't mean you were your clothes, or that you were only worth as much as your clothes, why do you always have to be so literal? I meant that your clothes tell people about you, about who you are and what you believe in. They're an outside sign of who you are."

"Ah." said the second voice, rather sarcastically, I thought, "So we'd rather have people learn everything they need to know about us by our clothes, instead of having them take the time to get to know us from experience of us."

"Well, that's all very well!" said the first voice. "That's nice in an ideal world. But the truth is, the sad truth is, most people won't take the time to get to know you if you don't seem cool."

"Wow." said the second voice. "Wow. This has nothing to do with fashion, does it? This totally has to do with your inferiority complex, dating back to about second grade, doesn't it?"

At this point the first voice began to suck its thumb, and I realized to my horror that the second voice was right. It's always right.

"Fashion is what you adopt when you don't know who you are." ~Quentin Crisp

I've actually begun buying my personality in a store, and telling myself that it's okay because I'm buying it in a thrift store. I know from personal experience that the right headscarf or pair of vintage shoes, or funny t-shirt will suddenly raise the value of my social currency off the charts. And I'm becoming really dependent on that, to the point where I've started to actually feel anxiety around my "style" and my clothes. I ironically played the role of fashion police for a boy at a party who was mocking me for being from Williamsburg, and although I was kidding around when I excoriated him for his American-Eagle shorts and surfer-boy hair, it struck me, I'm spouting all these "rules" as if I'm mocking them, but I actually live by them, don't I?

And I've increasingly begun to obey them out of fear instead of out of a love of neat clothes or a sense of aesthetic. I have cooler clothes than ever, and sudenly I have a need to make more money so that I can keep looking cool, and keep fitting in, and keep proving to everyone, most of all myself, that I should be invited to Angelica's birthday party because the whole rest of the class is and it's not fair...oh wait. That was second grade.

Benjamin Franklin wrote: "Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. There is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of its filling a vacuum, it makes one. If it satisfies one want, it doubles and trebles that want another way."

This seems like a huge cliche, but you know, the more I think about it, the more it seems that the modern horror of cliches may have less to do with a love of originality than with a fear of the truth.

So those are the motivations - that much is worked out. But the practice of it is hard. Was I experienceing a genuine calling to plain dress as a child, or did I just read too much "Little House"? (Is there such a thing as too much "Little House"?) And now, am I just a costume-loving poser?

I feel a bizarre attraction to head-covering as well, though I recoil with my whole post-feminist self from those passages in the bible. I don't think I believe in submission to anybody. In fact, I'm not sure even God wants me submissive -I feel he wants my co-operation.

"I will not now call you servants: for the servant knoweth not what his lord doth. But I have called you friends: because all things whatsoever I have heard of my Father, I have made known to you." John 15:15

Another reservation I have is that plain dressing may just be another way of telegraphing the image I want the world to have of me. Only instead of that message being "I am cool and worthy of your attention and envy" the message might be "I'm so hoooooly". Or, perhaps more positively, it might be a message that is "witness" - a concept I am struggling with on its own - what if I make mistakes and my witness is mistaken, etc.

My compromise was to get rid of all the clothes I'd bought just for attention, all the clothes I was keeping for purely sentimental reasons, everything that didn't fit, or match with anything else, etc. And to be honest, that just pared it down to where I can actually fit all my clothes in my 1 closet and dresser, a feat heretofore unknown to me. Also, a big part of this move was to start taking care of my clothes, something I've never done. I've made an active dicipline of something as simple as hanging up my clothes each night, as an act of respect and gratitude. It occured to me that when I am so fortunate as to have many posessions, it seems extremely wrong that I should mistreat them the way I've been doing.

Wow. Forget plain dress, plain speech is going to be an even bigger problem. I've written a novel.

* blush *

Anyhow, it is wonderful to see it discussed, sometimes I feel like I'm just nuts. I mean, I know I'm nuts, but I don't like feeling that way. :)

in friendship,
Amanda

A guest piece by David, originally posted on the Plain and Modest Dress Yahoo Group

"Here are a few things I do know that apply to me. First, I feel very at odds with our society that focuses on the most superfical things. Our society spends BILLIONS on make-up, hair dye, plastic surgery, breast inplants, push-up bras, designer clothes... Beyond that, my feelings about plain dressing get less clear. Is a uniform what I am seeking? Those groups who were very uniform clothing tend to be insular and often attact as much attention to themselves as a belly shirt and designer jeans!"

A guest piece by Melynda Huskey

When I was a kid, I yearned for plain dress like the kids in Obadiah's family wore. I loved the idea of a Quaker uniform and couldn't imagine why we didn't still have one... And now, at nearly 40, after 35 years of balancing my convictions and my world, I'm still hankering after a truly distinctive and Quakerly plainness.