For those that might not have noticed, I have an article in the latest issue of the awkwardly-named FGConnections: “Witness of Our Lost Twenty-Somethings.” Astute Quaker Ranter readers will recognize it as a re-hashing of “The Lost Quaker Generation” and its related pieces. Reaction has been quite interesting, with a lot of older Friends saying they relate to what I’ve said. It’s funny how so many of us feel a sense of isolation from our own religious institutions!
The Witness of Our Lost Twenty-Somethings
By Martin Kelley
What is it like to be a thirty-something Friend these days? Lonely and frustrating. At least half of the committed, interesting and bold twenty-something Friends I knew ten years ago have left Quakerism. This isn’t normal youthful church-hopping and it’s not some character flaw of “Generation X.” They’ve left because they were simply tired of slamming their heads against the wall of an institutional Quakerism that neglected them and its own future.
I can certainly relate. For the last decade, I’ve done ground-breaking work publicizing nonviolence online. I’ve been profiled in the New York Times and invited on national talk radio shows, but the clerk of the peace committee in my achingly-small monthly meeting always forgets that I have “some website” and I’ve never been asked to speak to Friends about my work. I wouldn’t mind being overlooked if I saw others my age being recognized, but most of the amazing ministries I’ve known have been just as invisible.
It’s like this even at the small-scale level. I’ve gone to countless committee meetings with ideas, enthusiasm and faithfulness, only to realize (too late, usually) that these are just the qualities these committees don’t want. Through repeated heartbreak I’ve finally learned that if I feel like I’m crashing a party when I try to get involved with some Quaker cause, then it’s a sign that it’s time to get out of there! I’ve been in so many meetinghouses where I’ve been the only person within ten years of my age in either direction that I’m genuinely startled when I’m in a roomful of twenty- and thirty-somethings.
I recently had lunch with one of the thirtysomething Friends who have left. He had been drawn to Friends because of their mysticism and their passion for nonviolent social change; he was still very committed to both. But after organizing actions for years, he concluded that the Friends in his meeting didn’t think the peace testimony could actually inspire us to a witness that was so bold.
I wrote about this lunch conversation on my website and before long another old Friend surfaced. Eight years ago a witness and action conference inspired him to help launch a national Quaker youth volunteer network. He put years of his life into this; his statements on the problems and promises facing Quaker youth are still right on the mark. But after early excitement his support evaporated and the project eventually fell apart in what he’s described as “a bitter and unsuccessful experience.”
The loss of Quaker peers has hit close to home for me. When one close Friend learned my wife had left Quakerism for another church after eleven years, all he could say was how pleased he was that she had finally found her spiritual home; others gave similar empty- sounding platitudes. I felt like saying to them “No, you dimwits, we’ve driven away yet another Friend!” Each of these three lost Friends remain deeply committed to the Spirit and are now involved in other religious societies.
Young adults haven’t always been as invisible or uninvolved as they are now. A whole group of the Quaker leaders currently in their fifties and sixties were given important jobs at Quaker organizations at very tender ages (often right out of college). Also, there’s historical precedent for this: George Fox was 24 when he began his public ministry; Samuel Bownas was 20 when he was roused out of his meetinghouse slumber to begin his remarkable ministry; even Margaret Fell was still in her thirties when she was convinced. When the first generation of Friends drew together a group of their most important elders and ministers to address one of their many crises, the average age of the gathering was 35. Younger Friends haven’t always been ghettoized into Young
Audlt Friends only dorms, programs, workshops or committees.
There is hope. Some have started noticing that young Friends who go into leadership training programs often disappear soon afterwards. The powers that be at Friends General Conference have finally started talking about “youth ministry.” (Welcome!). A great people might possibly be gathered from the emergent church movement and the internet is full of amazing conversations from new Friends and seekers. There are pockets in our branch of Quakerism where older Friends have continued to mentor and encourage meaningful and integrated youth leadership, and some of my peers have hung on with me. Most hopefully, there’s a whole new generation of twenty- something Friends on the scene with strong gifts that could be nurtured and harnessed.
In the truest reality, our chronological ages melt away in the ever-refreshing currents of the Living Spirit; we are all as children to a loving God. Will Friends come together to remember this before our religious society loses another generation?
Dear Martin and everyone,
I have desires about what I’d like the Quaker church to be, but I think the key issue is connecting with G‑d. I hope that the changes I want to see would be the outflowing of the miraculous Divine Holy power. But that power, G‑d’s Will, has to come first. Because without it we are dry, and locked in our human efforts. I have this idea that if we put G‑d first, worshipping and honouring and following the guidance that we receive, that will make us united. I think it’s not us who can fix the Quakers but only that G‑d will work through us if we can put Him before our own desires.
I think there is a pearl of great price in the Quaker tradition. I want to encourage everyone within Quakers to engage with our tradition, to take it on and understand ourselves as inheritors, to see how G‑d flows through our hundreds of years and into us. I feel the truth of the Quaker experience is alive today as it has always been. Christ has come to teach His people Himself. He is present in our meetings, present to teach and guide and transform us to live in His pattern, one change at a time, but with a power way beyond our own. That is the Good News for me right now.
So my message to the Quaker church at large is: “Trust G‑d, learn to know G‑d and to connect with the church that He makes. Worship G‑d, because there is nothing more important. Dare to connect with the history of Quakers and the Church as a whole and listen for how that same Christ is calling you.” I don’t know if this is a useful response to your request. Maybe there is something more than that necessary. I wonder if all Quakers are doing this fully already? In which case probably I don’t understand what G‑d is doing with Quakers right now.
I understand you were asking for detailed suggestions about what we feel is necessary for Quakers to actually live G‑d’s guidance, especially in learning how not to alienate the awesome talented people who come to us. I feel in Britain Yearly Meeting that we are overloaded with committees and structures and programmes and that what I most want is to worship with other Friends, and to live obedient to G‑d. So I am just talking about what I understand as the wellspring: follow Christ, wait in the Light he offers to illuminate you and strerngthen and comfort you.
But that’s not a very “rolling up sleeves” kind of message, so maybe not what you are asking. Maybe it’s my kind of thinking which creates the problem in Quakers? If each of us is attending to Christ, trusting that He Himself can teach everyone else who needs it the Quaker understanding, that’s how the church gets fragmented and people get lost? But I can’t see another way to G‑d apart from by putting worship first and trusting that He will lead us to the work that He needs doing.
Friends,
I agree with Alice. The beginning of all we are and do is our Creator and Redeemer. Living in The Presence and learning to be obedient to the guidance given are the foundation that will support the great weight of what we are called to do.
My sense of what is now needed involves the conscious, willing acceptance of and commitment to our assignment from our Lord. For each of us, there is a different job. Somewhere it is written that we are a body and the body has different parts, each vital to the body.
I am finding that the acceptance and commitment requires a corresponding change in self-image. Someone who may have always seen themselves as a teacher may need to become a student, at least for a while, in order to carry out the task given by the Spirit. A perpetual “kid brother” or “kid sister” may be called to become a spiritual nurturer and mentor, and so on.
The word that comes to mind is maturity. Another word is humility. Yet another is courage. The Lord charged Joshua to fear not, to be of good courage when he beheld a tremendous work ahead of him.
How might this look as we roll up our sleeves? It might begin with commitment to listening first for the Spirit’s guidance regarding one’s role here, now. It might include reading Samuel Bownas’ “A Description of the Qualifications Necessary for a Gospel Minister.” It might lead to several Friends coming together to pray and listen together, to seek to recognize one another’s roles. Some may decide to relocate in order to be in physical proximity to other Friends. Some may sell all they have and live the pilgrim life in traveling ministry.
(One side thought here — I am not envisioning an official committee or program. I am seeing Friends drawn together in the Love of the Spirit.)
When I consider all this, it can be, as some would say, “a hard word.” My experience has been that a growing sense of the Love that is behind, around and through such life-changing devotion softens the hard spots.
First off, Martin, shame on me for not emailing you right away to tell you I read your article! In that way, I am part of the “invisibility phenomenon” about which you and I have similar concerns. If I had a tail, it would be between my legs right now… smile
And yes, I had noticed the “reworking” of your post on the Lost Generation. Nice to see you in print in a publication that goes to Quaker Luddites and non-Luddites alike.
But now to the questions you ask:
I’m mulling doing something around Gifts and Mentorship… It would be the positive “rolling up the sleeves” response to the FGConnections article. What do you all think? If we could get a message out to larger Quakerdom, what we want it to be?
I’m wary to answer your questions. Part of it is the “internet phenomenon” as it relates to a covenant community. If you get 12 responses to your question, “What message do we [does God] want to get out to Friends?”, then can we discern the leadings of the Spirit across email and in blog posts? Perhaps. But to be clear: Are you asking us to be part of that experiment? I don’t think that’s your intention here.
Also, you know that I believe in your ministry, in your gifts; in your ability to connect Friends, one to another, regardless of age; and in your ability to synthesize many ideas into a cohesive, rich, thought-provoking article. I’d want to tread lightly on whatever you (and others?) pull together, and instead be available to you to read a draft, ask questions to help you understand what it is that you or God wish to convey, and work with you to be faithful to your leading and to the right use of your gifts in crafting the piece.
Most important, I’d want to know:
If YOU could get a message out to larger Quakerdom on behalf of God, what would it be? What would GOD want it to be?
Isn’t this part of what you and I are reaching for…?
Blessings,
Liz, The Good Raised Up
My answer is in three parts.
The first is “Be not afraid.” I just read somewhere recently that Jesus spent a lot of time telling people this. So, to Friends everywhere: Don’t be afraid to speak your spiritual truths. Don’t be afraid to use the names for the Divine that are meaningful to you. Don’t be afraid of teenagers (especially if you are one). Don’t be afraid to say what you know and don’t know. Don’t be afraid to try new things. Don’t be afraid to try old things that you heard were outdated, but are curious about anyway. Don’t be afraid to say this isn’t working, let’s stop now. Don’t be afraid to say hello to someone you don’t know. I seem to remember Nelson Mandela quoting somebody that we are not so much afraid of how weak we are, but more afraid of being as amazing as we really are.
The second is that we need to be really articulate and explicit about teaching young people and newcomers and people who have been around a long time but are just now getting serious about Quakerism. It is not enough to say what we aren’t, what we don’t believe in. We have to work together to learn from our history, our scriptures and our community to discern what are our core beliefs as a Monthly Meeting especially and then as a Society, and then find ways to express them in concrete language and examples. It is not enough to tell people to just be quiet and be open in meeting for worship. The examples given in Steve Smith’s Pendle Hill pamphlet “Quaker in the Zendo” and Douglas Steere’s booklet, “Where Words Come From” are articulate explanations of what we do and why we do it. Steve had to practice Buddhism for a while to be able to hear how George Fox gave very clear instructions on how to worship. Steere walks a beautifully fine line of both drawing on a clear understanding that Christ is the source and being able to express it in non-exclusive language, of how to listen to God, what to do in meeting for worship and what personal spiritual practices can prepare us for corporate worship.
Learning to teach what we do is a further level of our own spiritual development. We should all have to try it.
Third, on a very practical level, I think we need to give young people real work to do, not just a good time, among Friends. I think the reason so many elderly Friends in my Quarterly Meeting are so attached to the institutions we have is that they built them. They poured the concrete, they built the cabins, they gave and raised the money to buy the land and pay the directors. It’s not that there isn’t still work to be done, it’s that we don’t do it ourselves anymore. And so young people are not developing either the practical skills or the emotional attachment to take care of the amazing institutions that we have.
I wonder if the word “mentoring” is too vague for most people to understand what is meant. I am currently all hot for the word “apprenticing.” Apparently, once upon a time, it was one of the main duties of a Quaker [or any other conscientious] parent to arrange for their child to learn a trade from another Friend. To make sure that they learned practical skills in an ethical environment. Yes, educational and employment practices have changed. But the need for young people to learn practical ways of running Quaker institutions has not. On one level, we may all be children in the eyes of God. On the other hand, some of us have more experience than others and should be asked to share it.
What if the senior members of our community, the clerks of our committees, were assigned, with good thought given to the pairings, an apprentice — a younger Friend who would work with the older Friend, learning the ropes of the trade, the way the Quarterly Meeting financial records are kept, the way the nominating process works, the way the arrangements and pastoral care and children’s programs all work. This should be seen as a normal part of a young person’s development, and perhaps they would be apprenticed to a new senior or “master” (in the sense of a master carpenter or master mason) every year or so, as way opened and the young person’s spiritual gifts became more apparent. There would also have to be an openness of the seniors to learn, maybe new computerized registration processes or how to provide pastoral care through text messaging or just a fresh way of thinking, and to giving the apprentices increasing responsibility, including the right to fail sometimes. Note: this will work best if it is not the parent of the young person who is teaching him or her. Also, it is more work to teach as you go along than to do it all yourself. But this is an investment we have to make, not because young people are just a resource to be harvested, or because it is our responsibility and their need, and because we are all parts of the body of Christ, and the Truth will not be found if we exclude a whole segment of our community from participating.
I hear too many older Friends complaining that they are overburdened, too busy, too stretched. And I hear younger Friends complaining that there’s nothing for them to do. Which gets back to not being afraid.
For older Friends, don’t be afraid to expect the junior yearly meeting clerks to come to the Finance Committee meeting. Don’t be afraid to hold young people accountable to their highest abilities. Don’t be afraid of the complaining – and there will be some, but I think that it is the responsibility of parents and teachers and elders of all ages to suck it up and hear the complaints and be really clear that if we don’t all work together, we will not have a Religious Society of Friends. Do be prepared to take the time to explain, not seven times, but seventy times seven, every year. Do try to listen to the questions, even beyond the words.
For younger Friends, don’t be afraid to come and ask questions. Don’t be afraid to assert your right to know how the Yearly or Monthly Meeting’s money is spent. Don’t be afraid to ask the clerk of a committee you’re interested in to tell you how they do their work. Do be prepared that in order to be taken seriously, you will have to do some boring, nitty-gritty, hard work. Do be prepared to forgive the older folks for not knowing how to teach well – they are learning on the job, too, since many of them did not get well taught and they may not have a lot of good examples to follow. Do try to listen first and ask questions second.
For everyone, remember to ask for Divine assistance. To trust. To forgive. To turn the other cheek. To cheerfully walk into the lion’s den. To look for joy and serenity and courage in community and in nature and in self.
Robin, your thoughts and writings on apprenticing and on giving young(er) Friends “real work to do” intrigue me.
I’ve already given some thought to “teaching clerking while clerking” (but that post won’t be ready for some time, unless Way opens and Spirit speaks a bit louder to me… smile), plus I literally just had a visit with a Friend who works in development for a certain Friends organization.
He shared a story with me that over the past year, in preparation for the clerk of the Development Committee to step down, the incoming clerk has been involved in all the conference calls, all the emails, all the agenda-setting discussions so that she will be well grounded in the work of the committee. She’ll know more about its natural cycle, its interconnectedness to the larger organization, and its relevance to other committees within the organization as well. Makes a whole lot of sense to me to prepare incoming clerks this way!
Regarding Friends and “real work,” a handful of experienced Friends in the monthly meeting have said that ever since the Meetinghouse was acquired and an addition was built, there has been no large project around which the meeting could bond. That was nearly 15 years ago apparently. I don’t think it’s only young(er) Friends who need to put “hands to work; hearts to God.” I think older Friends need that fellowship-through-labor as well.
Blessings,
Liz, The Good Raised Up
Hi all,
What great comments. Very helpful. A number of the people who read the _Connections_ article have sought me out by phone or email and it’s interesting just how supportive they’ve been. Even more interesting was the wide demographic who nodded in recognition. The issues we’re talking about are ultimately ones that are facing our whole religious society, not just one narrow age range.
The other part that Friends have lifted up so eloquently in the comments is that God really needs to be involved in all this. Left to my own intellect I’m very good at dissecting sociological trends. I have a essentially-completed post on mentorship (I’m sure Liz and Robin would drop everything to comment on it!) but I haven’t posted it because it feels too analytical. In worship last First Day, there was some amazing ministry that spoke issues of mentorship and it became clear to me that this might be merged in a way that would speak more clearly to what might be on God’s agenda for us. Now whether I have any time to write this??…
One more thing, briefly this time. The RSoF is facing a period when Friends will generally be less affluent than the previous generations. There will be a lot more rolling up our sleeves to get things done, because there will be less money to pay for things. This is not necessarily a loss, it is an opportunity…
Martin, you write:
I have a essentially-completed post on mentorship … but I haven’t posted it because it feels too analytical.
I don’t know how analytical my own posts come across to readers, but I do know that when I myself feel too analytical, it often means I am not sharing my own story, from my own experience.
I don’t know if this holds true for you or not, but I felt a quiet nudge to lift this point up…
Blessings,
Liz, The Good Raised Up
Martin — hello! One side of me says “This is a great ministry, raising crucial questions that Friends need to address”; another side says, “Not another cycle of recriminations that will simply illuminate our decline without empowering us to faithfulness.” Your persistence and the quality of the comments above give me some new hope. I referred to your posting and these comments, and put some of my own mixed reflections, on my “Can you Believe?” page.
Hi Johan: Well certainly we need to avoid too much in the recrimination department. Isn’t this the eternal balancing act of more prophetic ministry: doom and hope, doom and hope! I suspect that any particular article has to focus on one side of the equation, with intimations of the other as intro and exit.
In many ways I feel I’ve played out the “lost generation” theme. I’ve said what I have to say and shared the experiences I’ve had. It’s time for other people to blow that trumpet. I don’t think I would have written another essay like that for Quaker Ranter and I don’t think I would have written just that type of essay for a youth audience.
Hello Martin and Friends,
Thank you all for this wonderful conversation. It fills me with hope and excitement for the future of our Religious Society.
First off, I want to say that Robin’s ideas about Young Friend apprenticeship are very exciting to me. I think they should be developed and experimented with.
Next, I would like to respond to Martin’s question about “getting a message out” by saying that for me, this message would be inextricably linked to our relationship to the testimonies.
Two articles that have inspired me and shaped my thinking about these issues in the past couple of days have been Marty Grundy’s CHALLENGE TO FRIENDS (http://www.fgcquaker.org/connect/spring05/challenge_to_friends_grundy.htm), and Bruce Birchard’s SPEAKING TRUTH WITH POWER (http://www.fgcquaker.org/library/peace/bbtalk-06 – 12-03.html). If you have not read these articles, you should. They are worth the read.
In his article, Friend Marty reminds us that in the early days, Friends had no official membership; one became a Friend and was recognized as a Friend by his or her adherance to the three earliest testimonies: the refusal to pay tithes to the Church of England, the refusal to do “hat honor,” and the refusal to take oaths. If a person practiced these testimonies in his or her life – along with regular attendance at Meeting for Worship of course – then he or she was a Friend.
In his article, Friend Bruce suggests that the understanding that early Friends had of the testimonies was considerably different than the understanding that we modern Friends have of them. Often, when asked by non-Friends, “What do Quakers believe,” we modern Friends will respond something like, “Well, Quakers don’t believe in creeds, so different Quakers have different theologies, but we have these things called testimonies, which are things that most of us have agreed over time are things that are good (holy, loving, Christian etc.) to do – things like non-violence, simplicity, speaking plain and honest truth, etc.”
Based on Friend Bruce’s explanation of the early Quaker understanding of the testimonies, however, it seems that the response to “What do Quakers believe?” would have been very different. It would have sounded something more like this: “Quaker faith is based less on what we believe than on what we have experienced: namely, the all-powerful and all-consuming Love of God. And when one’s life has been transformed by this love, there are certain things one cannot do: one cannot lie, one cannot kill, one cannot own a gross excess of material goods, etc.” The testimonies then, are not a bunch of things that Friends have decided over time are good to do or to believe, the testimonies are what happens when one’s life is transformed by Christ’s love.
It is in this context that I think we should remember to not get so hung up or afraid of our Religious Society “driving away,” young Friends. It is not the Religious Society of Friends that has come to teach the world’s people, but rather Christ himself. When we as individuals faithfully practice our testimonies as did early Friends, people will see their fruit in our lives and will naturally want to emulate.
I have to say Martin, that I feel you may be missing the point when you write: “When one close Friend learned my wife had left Quakerism for another church after eleven years, all he could say was how pleased he was that she had finally found her spiritual home…I felt like saying to them ‘No, you dimwits, we’ve driven away yet another Friend!’ ” By suggesting that we are “driving people away” from the Society of Friends, you imply that it is our responsiblity in the first place to draw people into the Society of Friends. It is not. Our responsiblity is to draw ourselves and our brothers and sisters into the love of Christ. Inasmuch as our testimonies as Friends help us to do that, they are valuable. Apart from that, they are nothing. If and when Julie finds Friends testimonies helpful in drawing her nearer to Christ, she will take them up. If she doesn’t find them helpful to her right now in her walk with Christ, then it is no great tragedy that she isn’t a practicing Quaker.
In short, we don’t need to strive harder to do Quakerism better, we need to open up and let Christ do us better. Alice is right – what we need is to get in touch with God. When we get in touch with God, our lives will be transformed. When our lives are transformed, our testimonies will naturally flow from them. When our testimonies flow from our transformed lives they will speak to the condition of our troubled world.
Some great comments here, I appreciate the time and thought everyone has taken. My thinking’s now heading towards a previous question of Friend Martin — what’s the fifty year plan for Quakers? I think that is meshed into the question of what do we think G‑d is trying to tell Quakers as a body, and it’s a way for me of concentrating on the Light leading us rather than what troubles us about where we are.
I always feel struck when I reread your comments, Friend Martin, about how poor liberal Friends are at outreach. I think the Quaker understanding has precious gems to offer in this time when the whole Earth is under such great threat of climate change devastation and war. I am learning to trust the power of transforming love to lead me. I hope to feel ever more strongly a sense of accompaniment in Christ’s work of calling the world’s people home to live in the life-sustaining society His power enables. So my vision of fifty-years-time Quakers is a radiant, joyful and resolute people living in G‑d’s power and able to communicate it to those in need.
Hello Friends,
I like this fifty year plan question. It makes a lot of sense I think in terms of looking at what we CAN do, what God is leading us to do, rather than on our present troubles. Good call.
This question also speaks to me, I think, because I have had what seem to be some very strong leadings lately about how I am called to live the testimonies, and how I see our Religious Society living our testimonies as a corporate body over the long term.
The most radical of these leadings concerns the Peace Testimony. As we have been living for some time now in a period of great war and unrest, a period when our country is agressively promoting its policy of premptive warfare and military enforcement of its version of “freedom” around the world, I have been feeling more and more that I am not faithfully living our testimony of peace.
As we hear more horror stories on the news of the atrocities of war in the Middle East, in Central Asia, and elsewhere, many of us find ourselves asking the question, “Why?” Why is it that such terrible things, such unloving and violent things are being done by our government and military in our name and the name of our counttry?
Then one day in Meeting for Worship, the answer struck me like a (non-violent and appropriately Quaker) kick in the head. The reason our government and military are doing these things is that by submitting to our government’s war taxes every year, you and I are paying them to do these things.
Now of course, this isn’t a new idea. The historic peace churches have been attempting to open up legal pathways to war tax resistance for decades (centuries?) now. It just hasn’t worked.
Well here’s where I think the fifty-year-plan comes in. I believe that the refusal to participate with our tax dollars in war and military aggression should be just as essential a part of our witness to Christ’s love as our refusal to participate with our bodies. Before conscientious objection to military service was a legal option to pacifists, many of our Amish, Mennonite, Brethren, and Quaker brothers willingly went to jail rather than betray their witness. I believe the time has come to do the same thing concerning war taxes.
There are about 130,000 Amish, 160,000 Brethren, 400,000 Menonites and 300,000 Quakers living in the United States. That makes approximately 1.5 to 1.6 million American members of historic peace churches. What if next April, the IRS got tax forms from even half of these Americans saying simply, “I conscientiously object to fiscal participation in war of any kind.” What if these Americans willing took on the consequences of their civil disobedience, going to jail en masse when arrested, using public transportation when their vehicles were repossessed, living in their churches and meetinghouses when their homes were seized? What would happen? What sort of renewed witness and passion could be sparked among us?
None of this, of course, could be rushed into. All of it would require a massive clearness process, radical dialogue and co-operation within our Religious Society and between our peace church traditions. Financial structures would need to be set up in order for witnessing Christians to live while their accounts were frozen by the government. Community child care structures would have to be set up to ensure that children were well and lovingly cared for if parents should be arrested. Perhaps some sort of system could be set up to redirect the money being withheld for war taxes to charities and social service organizations.
A movement of this scale would require quite a bit of time, planning, hard work, tons of prayer and lots of love. But what could happen if we did it?
Do Friends think it could be in store for us somewhere in the next 50 years?
Dear Ryan,
Just for the record, I was not necessarily driven from “Friends Testimonies” (whatever they happen to be is another question entirely), and perhaps not even from Quakerism as I understand it. In the end I was driven away from Quakerism – and in this sense I’m talking largely about liberal, unprogrammed Quakerism such as we see in the FGC world – AS IT IS NOW PRACTICED and understood by most Friends. In the sense that much of contemporary Quakerism, for better or for worse, is Godless (“nontheist Friends,” etc.) and certainly there exists a hostilitiy (at worst) or ambivalence (at best) to Christianity (and therefore traditional Quakerism), I could no longer remain within Quakerism. My priority was when I left and now continues to be to worship God in Jesus Christ, in a community that espoused and supported this general view, and in my estimation this was unnecessarily difficult if not nearly impossible among liberal Friends.
So when Martin says that I was driven away by Friends, I actually think this is an apt description of what happened in a million ways. I was driven away by what modern liberal Quakerism has come to, and the wishy-washiness, the luke-warmness, of too many of its members. PERHAPS if I had been able to find a meeting where “really” being a Quaker and being a Christian was ok life would have worked out differently, but I have not found a meeting like this yet in any part of the US I have visited, nor have I found it abroad. Therefore I have concluded that such a meeting is a very, very, very rare and unusual thing. (Truthfully I suspect that it does not exist.) I have been fortunate that I have found a non-wishy-washy traditionalist Catholic church that I am now a member of. Having seen what I have in the Quaker world (and not entirely dissimilar sorts of luke-warmness in the Catholic world) I am very grateful and do not take Mater Ecclesiae for granted. I am grateful for the teachings of the Catholic Church and the fact that it is unashamed to proclaim them. I very much missed this in Quakerism as there was very, very little anyone could even agree on – not even the existence of the Almighty who we were supposed to be worshipping. Yikes!
I do not want to speak for Martin here, but I suspect that what he was saying when he relayed the bit about the F/friend (who happened to be on our marriage oversight committee, btw) who was glad I found my own way was this. We have heard very little regret or remorse for the fact that I have left Quakerism, but alot of sentiment which has implied that one religion or denomination is as good as the next. The important part for such people is that the “fit” between the individual and the Faith is good. For them, Quakerism is no different or more special or truthful than anything else.
Aside from that, it just felt pretty crappy that after eleven years or so as a committed Friend no one so much as batted an eyelash when I left. It felt really odd.
God bless,
Julie
I had a hard time picking out a reasonably brief quotable part of Ryan’s original comment. I was deeply moved by the whole thing. But here, this part:
“Quaker faith is based less on what we believe than on what we have experienced: namely, the all-powerful and all-consuming Love of God. And when one’s life has been transformed by this love, there are certain things one cannot do: one cannot lie, one cannot kill, one cannot own a gross excess of material goods, etc.” The testimonies then, are not a bunch of things that Friends have decided over time are good to do or to believe, the testimonies are what happens when one’s life is transformed by Christ’s love.”
This articulates my own revelation about why Quakerism is powerful. At its root, it is Christianity distilled to its pure essence. It is still simply listening to Christ who is come to teach people himself. I’m open to hearing this as “God who speaks in our hearts when we are willing to listen.” I’m not convinced that it is Jesus personally who speaks to me, but God speaks to me of the ways of Jesus. This is my current understanding, and it is still unfolding. A local church has a Gracie Allen quote hanging from their balcony: “Never place a period where God has placed a comma. God is still speaking, ”
The radical thing I envision for the RSoF is that we will see how these testimonies are so linked — that it is the excess of material goods and the lust for ever more material goods and social privileges that drives us — yes, us too — to war, to paying for war, to destroying our Earth and our fellow creatures. What are the sacrifices of our quality of living that we, North American Quakers, will be willing to make in order to live in the power that takes away the occasion of all wars?
If we are unwilling to pay for war, are we unwilling to pay for fossil fuels? Are we willing to live without the benefit of privately owned automobiles? Are we willing to live our lives in the smaller circles (geographically and socially) that a car-free sytem would require? Are we willing to focus more locally, to start with the people and places where we live, to visit the widows and orphans that we see and know, to comfort the afflicted among us that we don’t actually know now? Are we willing to live a purer life, to be more blameless, to keep ourselves unspotted from the world?
Will they know us by our love, and by our adherence to our own testimonies?
Dear Julie,
Unless I’m reading something wrong you are Martin’s wife and therefore a resident of South Jersey. I’d like to invite you and Martin to come visit my MM: http://www.nyym.org/manasquan/
We are the southernmost meeting within NYYM and might be described as conservative hicksite. I had not experienced the “Godlessness” in modern Quakerism until I ventured beyond my MM. The absence of twenty/thirty something Quakers does still exist though. Why this is I don’t really know. My guess is a lack of outreach and vision.
Matthew
Hi Julie,
I completely understand that it would have felt strange and crappy to have no one react when you left the Society after eleven years. I can’t imagine how a community of faith could behave that way. I’m sorry.
The other part thtough, the implication that “one religion or denomination is as good as the next,” or that “Quakerism is no different or more special or truthful than anything else,” I would respond, “Well, yes and no.”
The way I understand it, Jesus taught us that there is only one True Religion, and that is the religion of Love. He did not teach us to be Quakers or Catholics or Baptists or Presbyterians or Unitarians. He taught us to love God and love one another. For me, Quakerism’s reminder that the Holy Spirit (the Light of Christ, the Love of God) is directly accessible to me at all times and is always capable of transforming my life, combined with the practical proof of God’s love that I find in silent worship, helps me to better love God and love my neighbor.
If you find that you gain more power to love God and your nieighbor through the Catholic liturgy, then by all means I would say that for you, Catholocism is the better denomination. That doesn’t mean that I think Catholocism is more true than Quakerism, just that I believe you when you say that Catholocism speaks better to your condition.
Love,
Ryan