It’s been a fascinating education learning about institutional Catholicism these past few weeks. I won’t reveal how and what I know, but I think I have a good picture of the culture inside the bishop’s inner circle and I’m pretty sure I understand his long-term agenda. The current lightening-fast closure of sixty-some churches is the first step of an ambitious plan; manufactured priest shortages and soon-to-be overcrowded churches will be used to justify even more radical changes. In about twenty years time, the 125 churches that exist today will have been sold off. What’s left of a half million faithful will be herded into a dozen or so mega-churches, with theology borrowed from generic liberalism, style from feel-good evangelicalism, and organization from consultant culture.
When diocesan officials come by to read this blog (and they do now), they will smile at that last sentence and nod their heads approvingly. The conspiracy is real.
But I don’t want to talk about Catholicism again. Let’s talk Quakers instead, why not? I should be in some meeting for worship right now anyway. Julie left Friends and returned to the faith of her upbringing after eleven years with us because she wanted a religious community that shared a basic faith and that wasn’t afraid to talk about that faith as a corporate “we.” It seems that Catholicism won’t be able to offer that in a few years. Will she run then run off to the Eastern Orthodox church? For that matter should I be running off to the Mennonites? See though, the problem is that the same issues will face us wherever we try to go. It’s modernism, baby. No focused and authentic faith seems to be safe from the Forces of the Bland. Lord help us.
We can blog the questions of course. Why would someone who dislikes Catholic culture and wants to dismantle its infrastructure become a priest and a career bureaucrat? For that matter why do so many people want to call themselves Quakers when they can’t stand basic Quaker theology? If I wanted lots of comments I could go on blah-blah-blah, but ultimately the question is futile and beyond my figuring.
Another piece to this issue came in some questions Wess Daniels sent around to me and a few others this past week in preparation for his upcoming presentation at Woodbrooke. He asked about how a particular Quaker institution did or did not represent or might or might not be able to contain the so-called “Convergent” Friends movement. I don’t want to bust on anyone so I won’t name the organization. Let’s just say that like pretty much all Quaker bureaucracies it’s inward-focused, shallow in its public statements, slow to take initiative and more or less irrelevant to any campaign to gather a great people. A more successful Quaker bureaucracy I could name seems to be doing well in fundraising but is doing less and less with more and more staff and seems more interested in donor-focused hype than long-term program implementation.
One enemy of the faith is bureaucracy. Real leadership has been replaced by consultants and fundraisers. Financial and staffing crises – real and created – are used to justify a watering down of the message. Programs are driven by donor money rather than clear need and when real work might require controversy, it’s tabled for the facade of feel-goodism. Quaker readers who think I’m talking about Quakers: no I’m talking about Catholics. Catholic readers who think I’m talking about Catholics: no, I’m talking about Quakers. My point is that these forces are tearing down religiosity all over. Some cheer this development on. I think it’s evil at work, the Tempter using our leader’s desires for position and respect and our the desires of our laity’s (for lack of a better word) to trust and think the best of its leaders.
So where does that leave us? I’m tired of thinking that maybe if I try one more Quaker meeting I’ll find the community where I can practice and deepen my faith as a Christian Friend. I’m stumped. That first batch of Friends knew this feeling: Fox and the Peningtons and all the rest talked about isolation and about religious professionals who were in it for the career. I know from the blogosphere and from countless one-on-one conversations that there are a lot of us – a lot – who either drift away or stay in meetings out of a sense of guilt.
So what would a spiritual community for these outsider Friends look like? If we had real vision rather than donor vision, what would our structures look like? If we let the generic churches go off to out-compete one other to see who can be the blandest, what would be left for the rest of us to do?
I guess this last paragraph is the new revised mission statement for the Quaker part of this blog. Okay kids, get a step stool, go to your meeting library, reach up high, clear away the dust and pull out volume one of “A portraiture of Quakerism: Taken from a view of the education and discipline, social manners, civil and political economy, religious principles and character, of the Society of Friends” by Thomas Clarkson. Yes the 1806 version, stop the grumbling. Get out the ribbed packing tape and put its cover back together – this isn’t the frigging Library of Congress and we’re actually going to read this thing. Don’t even waste your time checking it out in the meeting’s logbook: no one’s pulled it down off the shelf in fifty years and no one’s going to miss it now. Really stuck?, okay Google’s got it too. Class will start shortly.
Okay — I’m going to read it on Google as I’m a Quaker without a meeting and I just don’t have the energy to try out the ONE I have access to in fear I’ll find it disappointing.
Martin, I agree with you on this. Institutions over the long haul just strip the life out of things, of course it’s not the intention, but I think it is what happens. You know I agree we need a new vision too, the same ol’ same ol’ is killing me. I look forward to reading a long too with you.
Oh, and what can you tell us about this dude?
I think ‘finding a meeting’ might be overrated. What would it be like instead to just start in your street, your area, gather together a group of people who want to try the radical simple Quaker way of living with God? Reappropriation of the founding charism. Just a thought.
Alice said: “What would it be like instead to just start in your street, your area, gather together a group of people who want to try the radical simple Quaker way of living with God? Reappropriation of the founding charism.”
I’m hip to that idea, I’ve actually been a part of group like this and it was incredible.
Oh goody. A webinar on ancient Quaker practices.
Are we going to start with a discussion of marriage? I’m in!
On one hand, I’m clear that I’m happy with my monthly meeting. It’s not perfect, but it’s trying. Opportunities to grow in the Light and to practice Jesus’s teachings are a normal part of it.
On the other hand, I now live 12 miles away, instead of around the corner or on a direct trolley line, and I’m potentially interested in starting something closer.
“Oh, and what can you tell us about this dude?”
Thomas Clarkson was not a Quaker, but worked closely with Quakers for many years in his efforts for the abolition of the slave trade, and seems to have developed an interest in what drove all those Quakers to be so active in such social causes.
Sounds great! I’m in the midst of Barclay’s “Apology” right now, but shouldn’t take me *too* long to catch up with the reading.
An apple for the teacher,
‑Jeff (South Jersey ex-patriot)
No I will NOT leave Catholicism, even though it appears that some of the powers that be in the Diocese have. However, depending on how this whole thing plays out, there’s the possibility of leaving the diocese to attend a church that is acceptable, or even leaving ROMAN Catholicism for another RITE, like the Byzantine rite, which is of course still Catholic and under the authority of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI. Catholicism’s still Catholicism, Christianity’s still Christianity, and God’s still God, whether certain diocesan authorities acknowledge it or not. It just becomes harder to explain and justify one’s faith when, from within, there is serious misunderstanding and misinformation, when heresy is being promoted from on high. But we must remember Matthew 16:18 “And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” SHALL NOT. We must take God at His word and stay on the bark of Peter. Amazingly, the Church has seen worse than the likes of Bishop Galante and survived. Just wanted to clear that up.
Sounds like fun. Not sure whether our meeting has Clarkson in our library, but I’ll check. The Google link you provided begins w volume 2 — hence Robin’s excitement about marriage, which is a funny place to start, it seems to me — was that intentional, Martin?
I’ve read ch 1 – 2 already. What delightful clarity of expression and thinking, is my first thought.…
AliceM said:
I think ‘finding a meeting’ might be overrated. What would it be like instead to just start in your street, your area, gather together a group of people who want to try the radical simple Quaker way of living with God? Reappropriation of the founding charism. Just a thought.
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Thank you for posting this! I wish more Friends were thinking/acting on this concept (I know some are, but I wish more were). I’m working my way there, myself.
Cath
I suppose I’m one of the lucky ones. The Monthly Meeting to which I belong is quite Christocentric for the most part. When my partner and I want to be “uber-Conservative”, we attend West Grove Meeting (http://westgrovefriendsnc.org/default.aspx) in Snow Camp. There, it is not too uncommon to have such readings as the “Letter to the Governor of Barbados” after Meeting for Worship.
All this AND they recently put a welcoming statement on their website stating they are “Open and Affirming.” Now, if they’d only get indoor bathrooms and air conditioning.
It saddens my heart that there are folks like yourself that can’t find a Meeting in which they feel comfortable (that invitation to move to NC is still open). I have no advise on what to do other than to let you know you continue to be in my prayers. And don’t you DARE go the way of Rome (just picking Julie).
What strengthens my faith is reading the old Friends’ works such as “The Journal of John Wilber” and “The Journal of Joseph Hoag”. They wrestled with some of the very things you wrestle with today. It lets me know you, we, are not alone…we are surrounded by “so great a cloud of witnesses”.
God bless ya, Martin. Glad to see you’re back to doing some regular bloging.
Love and peace,
Craig
So why turn to an outsider’s description of the visible externals of the Quaker movement some time ago?
If you want to have what the early Friends had, do what they did! Turn to the Spirit that lives in us, which does new things because it is intrinsically creative, bureaucrat-repellant, and able even to heal the bland!
The mentality we need to struggle with is all-pervasive & deadly! It is right under our noses, and in them! And so very reasonable…
What do you do when faced with a decision? Sit down and think about what’s likely to be most effective? Thou are a Modern! (And obviously, it is not only particularly clueless people who suffer from that condition!)
God is present, and available for consultation, charging no more for his services than all you have and are! You can’t use him to forward your plans… but if he uses you, remarkable things happen! Quakerism without the knowledge of divine guidance and help is a dead husk – but you don’t need to be Quaker to live in that knowledge!
Martin, your words
Let’s just say that like pretty much all Quaker bureaucracies it’s inward-focused, shallow in its public statements, slow to take initiative and more or less irrelevant to any campaign to gather a great people.
made me think of a recent New Yorker article about the impending fall of conservatism.
Pat Buchanan was less polite, paraphrasing the social critic Eric Hoffer: “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”
So then my question back is, how do you institutionalize change? Because that’s what’s needed to keep the momentum of the Spirit alive.
But that’s the conundrum. Change, by its very nature, is opposed to institutionalization.
I won’t be participating in your study group, but I’ll keep checking back here to see what modern Friends have to say about Clarkson’s words.