hunger Posts

Interesting reading today about how our Quaker structures can choke the Spirit and hem in our communities. Johan M is no stranger to Quaker institutions, but in "Clerk Please" he writes:

But who will see and proclaim these things to new audiences if we are so busy trying to sort out our structures, nomination processes, and interpersonal animosities that we don't take the time to discern and honor leadings?

Susanne K echos some of these themes in her latest post, "Quakerism and Structure":

One of the key parts of George Fox's revelation was that religious structures can kill the free movement of the Spirit... My Ffriend R has advocated the practice of disbanding the Religious Society of Friends every 50 years. He believes that the spark of the initial vision and passion of religious groups only survives for about 50 years before developing structures start to choke the movement of the Spirit.

It's been about eighteen months since I was sidelined from the professional Quaker world (I work for some Quakers now, but on a contract basis and the relationship is much different). A year or two before this, my monthly meeting melted down and more or less devolved into a worship group and while I've found a more active meeting to attend, it's not particularly close and I haven't joined.

The result of these two changes is that I haven't sat in a staff meeting for over a year; I don't attend business meetings; I don't belong to any committees; I don't represent any group at conferences. After years of being what Evan Welkin called an uberQuaker, I'm an uninvolved slacker. Bad Martin, right?

Except I'm not uninvolved of course. I feel I'm doing as much now to help people find and grow into Quakerism than I did when I was paid to do this. I don't spend much time with that 2% skim of Quaker elite who attend all the same conferences and appoint each other to all the same committees, but then catering to their needs was pretty high maintenance and was never something I thought of as the real mission.

Suzanne talks about the "Sabbatical Year" meme, and of course lots of electrons fly about the blogosphere about the possibilities of the Emerging Church movement. There's a hunger for a different way of being a Friend. I know one Quaker who threatens to burn down the famous meetinghouse he worships in because he feels that the building has become an empty icon, a weight of bricks upon the Spirit (I'll leave him anonymous in case something mysterious happens to the meetinghouse tonight!). How tragic would it be, really, if some of institutional baggage was laid down and we had to find other ways to confirm and support one another's ministries?

I love teaching Quakerism, I love helping Quakers use the internet for outreach and I love reaching out to potential Friends with my writing. I'm doing all that without committees or staff meetings. No budgets to fight over, no mission statements to write.

Half a decade ago now I wrote about the "lost Quaker generation," active and visionary Gen X Friends who seemed to be dropping out in droves. We're all keeping in better touch now via Facebook but I haven't noticed much jumping back into the fray. What I have noticed is a phenomenon where Friends half a generation older are taking on Quaker responsibilities only to drop away from active meeting involvement when their terms ended. 

If we could pull together all of the dropouts together and start meetings that focused on worship, religious education and deep-community activities, I think we'd see something interesting. I envy those with less-musty, Gen-X heavy meetings nearby (Robin M showcased her meeting recently). And don't get me wrong: I also love the old Quaker ideal of the strong local Quaker community and the bonds of the community on the individual, etc., etc. But I don't see meetings like that anywhere nearby and the only clear leading I really have is to continue this "freelance" teaching, writing and organizing. It's not the situation I want but it's the situation I have and at this point I have to just trust the leadings as they come step by step and have faith they're going somewhere. Boy though, I wish I knew where all this was heading sometimes!

• Susanne K on rich liberals
  One of the more startling things to me during 2007 was the discovery that evangelicals give much more to charity than liberals do. Liberals tend to think quite highly of their capacity for compassion and insight into world affairs... How can that be?
  (tags: comment)

Francis has been mostly quiet for his nineteen months, prompting the beginnings of worry but no real alarm. He's sort of said some ma-ma-ma babel but it's not been definitively tied to Julie and seemed to indicate hunger as much as anything ("mother equals food" is a primal equation perhaps even though Julie stopped nursing last December).

Well in the last few days we've had his first clear-cut words: "La la LA la." Even without the accompanying notes, most friends of toddlers will recognize Elmo's theme song. Francis starts singing it whenever he sees his little Elmo doll. It's cute enough that we forgive him not prioritizing ma-ma and pa-pa first.

I hope to get a video of Francis's La la LA la for Youtube soon. In the meantime, here's a few photos. The first includes big brother Theo and--on top of the mess--Elmo himself. The second is Francis reading a book from the Thomas the Tank Engine Railway Series (not a posed shot, he climbed the rocking chair with the book himself).

In early February I'm leading a young adult workshop up at New York Yearly Meeting's Powell House. I don't have any desire to get into the "spiritual workshop circuit," but I was asked and it seemed like an opportunity to gather some interesting folks to talk about what we hunger for. The workshop is called "Food for Fire: Breaking into the Power of Quakerism" (already regretting the "breaking in" metaphor--shouldn't it be "broken in by?").

I hope that some of the extended Quaker Ranter family will be able to make it out. This could be a kind of Mid-Atlantic/New England gathering of whatever this of informal movement/network is. Because this is a workshop model I am expected to impart knowledge but while I'll come with an worked-out agenda, I'm happy to loosen and/or toss it aside if needed. The workshop description:

Many of the classic themes of Quakerism speak to the condition of a world wracked by consumerism, war, bigotry and environmental disregard. Friends have a history of uniting truth and love and turning it into action. We'll reach into the Quaker attic to dust off gospel order, plain living, traveling ministry, prophetic witness; we'll try them on and see how they fit into our experiences of the living Spirit. There will be plenty of time to share stories in small groups and together. How are our monthly meetings doing recognizing the gifts of ministry and service among younger Friends? How are Friends doing spreading the good news of the Quaker way? There is a great people to be gathered still but how can we enter into the faithfulness required? Jesus came up the fishermen and said "Come, follow me;" what would we do if we got that call? Like any programmed Quaker event the workshop is really an excuse to assemble Friends together in prayer and faithfulness to God. The most important thing we could do this weekend is build friendships: friendships of support, mutual accountability, and peer mentorship. Friends from all branches of Quakerism welcome, as are the newest of seekers.

The price is $180 for the weekend (registration form) but if that's a burden then try to get your meeting to pay--I suspect they'll be happy to see that you're showing an interest in Quakerism. I'll be driving up from South Jersey and will probably be able to pick up folks from Philly & New York. Email me if you have or need a ride from other points and I'll try to connect you with other travelers.

If you're too old or too impatient to wait for Second Month to roll around, pick up Brian Drayton's new book On Living with a Concern for Gospel Ministry and read that instead. Yes, I plugged it five days ago and yes, my paycheck comes from the publisher--but I've now now read the first chapter and it really is that good. Reading it feels like putting that soon-to-be-favorite pop album on the turntable for the first time. Where were you when you first heard Sgt Peppers? (for the YAFs in the audience: yes I'm being silly with the Beatles reference; if you remember first putting that album on a turntable in 1967 then this isn't your workshop!).

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."