I said to a Friend in my meeting recently something like “I don’t want to move on, looking yet again for a responsive spiritual community. I want to work with the community I have, even when I feel pained or isolated here. I want to take the time to see my relationships– with Friends and with God– develop and deepen.” But that cold water numbs the fingers, and the heart.

Amen!

What is interesting about Quakers is that they draw in all different kinds of people: as long as you’re willing to live like us, we’re willing to have you in our community. The reality of Jesus is a truth that can and will come out, but it’s going to need to start with those within the Quaker fold speaking the name of Jesus confidently to our brothers and sisters, and teaching our truth to them in the spirit of love.

Quite frankly, as long as they’re living Christ’s love, I’m willing to count it a win. Many non-Christian Quakers are much better at expressing Christian love than most steeple-house attenders I’ve known, and that is a delicate flower we need to not harm while bringing the truth forth.

“… nascent ministers… start asking these questions… then taildive as they meet … reality of a local meeting that is unsupportive or inattentive. Many of them have left our religious society. … How do we keep them? … are [we] religious societies or communities.”

This mirrors my own experience in the evangelical church in America. I found myself questioning and agitating for change in what I saw as the straying from the original message of Jesus in the practices of the church. Of course this has been going on for centuries in the church, but it’s my turn now to be the prophet Jesus has called me for to my community today.

During this period in my life, I was drawn to Quakers as I believe they are organized and practice corporately a more faithful early church model. Sadly, many actual Quakers (at least where I am) do not know the Jesus whose pattern is followed to get the practices and inspiration for the organizational style. The egalitarian, non-hierarchical, non-institutional, non-consumeristic, unprogrammed, sacrament-less, graceful style of meeting looks more to me like the early church than any other group out there. But alas at the center (at least as I see it) is missing — Jesus.

As those who are fleeing the Quakers after having their concerns fall on deaf ears, they are populating more typically evangelical style churches bringing with them what could be a fabulous and necessary message for the church, namely that of Quaker organization and some practices especially peace, simplicity, egalitarianism, and no sacraments.

The peace testimony should speak to the people in these churches recovering from neocon/hawk stance that their fellowships come out of. And the simplicity testimony should speak to the consumerism that is crushing the churches effectiveness as the missional community that they should be reaching outside their own doors. The egalitarianism should speak to the overly hierarchical institutional church putting pastors/priests/teachers (let alone those higher institutional offices) on a different level than everyone else. Every follower of Jesus has the same responsibility to love God and love each other and reach out to rest of the community inside and outside the church with that message and the further specific leading of Jesus today. The sacramental-lessness of the Quaker style should speak to the churches problem with segregating sacred and secular. There is wheat and weeds inside the church, and there is wheat and weeds outside the church. No space, object, practice, etc. is sacred and none are profane. All can be employed by our Creator for his good will. Jesus can speak to us in the most mundane activities of everyday, on a nature walk, in a gathering of followers, or through less than productive behaviors and places. Jesus came to end the temple theology of his day. — The veil was rent in two! — We are no longer separated from our creator whether we know him or not. All can access God directly. The priest and the temple are obsolete.

This is a great message that Quakers can take to the institutional church.

And on the flip side I see myself as bringing to the Quaker meeting the one message that the institutional church (at least where I am from) does have right — Jesus!

For those in meeting who are atheists, Buddhists, pagans, and progressive secular humanists (to the exclusion of following Jesus), I can bring a message of centering on the grounding of our being. The lover of our soul is Jesus. He is the Inner Light that George Fox referenced in his journal. “In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it” John 1:4,5

Quakers, I come to announce to you that the “unknown god” (as Paul refers to in Acts 17, in the next Kelly post) that you seek is (as Fox said) “one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition”.

It’s true that the book of Matthew was written in a different time. This was a time when *not* being theologically pluralistic was what could get you killed! For the early Christian church, it was certainly true that they were trying to understand themselves within the context of Judaism (and also as a new “Way”), and as something separate from Roman theology – both of which got them in a heap of trouble!

It was also a time of great evangelism and missionary work – these people had a message to share about this new Way of being, much like early Quakers. But it’s also important to remember when looking at it through our modern eyes that when these words were first written, Christianity was about two centuries away from becoming institutionalized under Constantine and was definitely not the dominant religion (the state religion could be probably described as Roman paganism and “Caesar-worship.”) Declaring oneself a Christian could actually get you branded as an “Atheist” since you were denying the gods and the Roman Emperor as a god. So I don’t think one could accurately say that the writer of Matthew was being colonialist, although that could certainly be said of the Christian church in later times.

But I think Martin’s point here is not about colonizing other churches, but that in general, and even through the lens of our own time, Mathew 18 is still a good set of guidelines for healthy community. For instance, I don’t think you can read Matthew 18 and stop where Jesus suggests tossing out the unrepentant. Jesus proceeds to talk to Peter in the next verses about forgiveness: “Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?’ Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times”, and then goes on to tell the story of what happens to the “unmerciful Servant” – mercy was an incredibly important part of Jesus’ teachings (along with justice, compassion, generosity, etc.)

- Eric Evans, CPMM

Hi Petey: good to hear your real voice. One thing that’s good about direct dialogue is that we can dispel stereotypes. One of those is the idea that Convergent Friends are trying to bring the RSOF back into one body. I’m not. I’ve said I’m not. I’ve written post after post about it. So have many others.

I don’t expect the Quaker branches to come together. It’s not a goal of mine. If you look at where Quakerism is healthiest, it’s usally in those parts of the country where there are multiple yearly meetings overlapping. I’m in agreement with your ice-cream/BBQ analogy. I’m also not necessarily in spiritual unity with the other Convergent bloggers. What we share is a culture and style. The point-of-interest Quaker-wise is that we’re interested in the Quaker roots of our particular tradition. In a liberal yearly meeting that might mean looking harder at the Christian stuff; among Evangelicals, it’s re-evaluating the relationship of the pastor and congregation. Conservatives might look harder at outreach. Stuff like that. There are people in every branch that don’t care about looking back from where they came and that’s cool. It’s not a one-size fits all kind of thing. It’s just a conversation. There’s no membership, organization, bylaws, board, epistles or mission statement.

Your point to talk over coffee but not force a uniformity of worship is exactly what the Convergent conversation has been all about. The “typical” Convergent Friends meeting is pizza and cookies after an FWCC meeting. Not very rabid. “Convergent” has become well-known enough that there’s half-a-dozen people who build themselves up by knocking down stereotypes about it. I don’t get it. There’s enough real battles and witnesses to have in the world that we don’t need to be scaring each other with tales of Quaker monsters under the bed.

FYI: I have the comment you posted in February. It was rude and signed in a way to deceive. I don’t really care. I expect people to act out sometimes. We all do. The way we keep the community intact is to forgive each other for being human beings with feelings. People give me that grace and I extend the courtesy to others. But don’t treat me like an idiot.

Martin — I am extremely leery of the moniker “Convergent Friends” — you’ll have to forgive me if it seems akin to the moves afoot in Mainline denominations by conservatives involved with the Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD). It seems designed to talk at us rather than talk with us. It converges upon us rather than converses with us.
I went to the conference at Earlham some years ago…was it 2008 or 2007? And I came away with this feeling that Liberal, universalist friends such as myself are less-than in the eyes of the Convergent movement. Not everyone feels this way, but I came away with this feeling like the movement was more about subduing liberal friends than it is about conversing with us.
I happily count Micah Bales and Betsy Blake as friends of mine, but we understand that we view spirituality differently — and I love what they do with their Christ-infused Quaker faith, but I don’t share it, and I don’t feel the need to. What I do feel the need to do is encourage them and be their friend and share good times and bad, and pray with them in my own way. The difference between them and some of the other folks at earlham that weekend is that we are equals.

I’ve been thinking about the idea of one body of Quakers… and I don’t think it is for the best. Conservative Friends have their strengths, and liberal friends have their strengths… and I think that merging it together would be like mixing BBQ sauce into your mint ice-cream… I love mint ice-cream and I love BBQ, but they squabble too much in my mouth when I eat them together.
Quakerism and Christianity both share one thing… we don’t need new buzzwords or theologies or categories. What we do need is people who can live out their faith the best they know how and understand that others are trying to live out their faith the best they know how.

I accept your desire for our friendship and I genuinely wish you all the best. I apologize for not posting by my own name, but I’m sure you understand that my desire to not have my name plastered on Google does not mean I am trying to deceive you.

For the record, I have not posted here in some time — perhaps maybe even over a year or two. I have read but have not felt lead to post because I do not want to appear to be going into some one else’s church and telling them how to worship. That’s not what I am about.

My bottom line is this — While we may share the same umbrella name “quakerism” we experience it differently and I do not want to detract from your experience but rather to emphasize that perhaps we might feel comfortable having coffee together, but for the sake of both our conversations with God, it might be best if we worshipped apart.

Hi Petey: You seem to toss out a lot of stereotypes in these anonymous comments you make. If you have a beef with me, I’d rather you just email me directly. Which goes directly to the point of what Eric brought up with his aside of Matthew 18, more specifically Matthew 18:15–18. That’s where Jesus talks about how to do conflict resolution. It’s an eminently practical set of steps and is easily adaptable for non-Christians and non-Theists. I’ve heard people attribute these steps to ancient Buddhist wisdom–it works.

The heart of it is that you don’t talk to people behind their back. It disrupts community. It starts factionalism. If we are to grow together we have to be honest with each other. I’d say that one way to start is by using your name in your comments. I don’t bite. I’ve tried to reach out to you at various Gatherings and remember some good conversations. If I’ve ever inadvertently been a jerk to you, then my apologies; I’ve always wanted to be friends, despite our differences. By the way have you read Joyce Kettering’s article in Chuck’s Quaker Theology? I’d be curious to hear your reaction.