Comments on: Quakerism 101

By: Martin Kelley

Martin Kelley — Sat, 17 Sep 2005 16:18:03 +0000

Hi Laura: there are Quakers all over and most have introductory Quaker classes. You can see if one is listed in your local phone book or you can use an online service such as Quakerfinder.
Your Friend, Martin

By: Laura

Laura — Sat, 17 Sep 2005 03:23:03 +0000

I was raised Baptist, in a small community. If I “converted” to Quakerism, would I have to move north, to Philidelphia or somewhere such as that?

By: Rosalie V. Grafe

Rosalie V. Grafe — Sun, 15 May 2005 10:49:36 +0000

Yo Martin,
So quickly I find your web presence and my Friend friends Johan and Christine responding to it! Great to see you at QUIP again and I echo Johan’s appreciation for our late pastor Jack L. Willcuts.
I have been a yearly meeting representative from Reedwood long ago and participated in some revisions of the NWYM Faith and Practice. In my view, it needs to be revised again. That was the beginning of my huge respect for the editorial process vs. Friends and consensus. Gracious!
Glad also to see your use of the materials by Thomas Hamm and by Ben Pink Dandelion. This is an exciting time to be a Friend.
Blessings,
Rosalie V. Grafe

By: Robin Mohr

Robin Mohr — Fri, 11 Mar 2005 02:03:29 +0000

One of the first things I did here in San Francisco (well, after six months) was to organize a Seeker’s Class. Some of my husband and my first dates were after a similar class at 15th St. in 1992. However, instead of a preprogrammed curriculum, I used the Pacific Yearly Meeting Faith and Practice as a text and invited Friends from our Meeting to teach different weeks of a six week series.
If I were to do it now, I would start with the premise that the main point of Quakerism is that God can change your life. And then look at how that happens and has happened in different ways at different times.
My favorite book of last year, maybe it’s the text for Quakerism 301, is Plain Living by Catherine Whitmire.

By: Amanda

Amanda — Fri, 28 Jan 2005 13:16:18 +0000

Absolutely, Christine. There are so many of us active online-Quakers who should meet up. Martin, thee, me, Jeff Hipp, my 15th St. Friend Ryan, just to name a few.

By: Christine Greenland

Christine Greenland — Sat, 01 Jan 2005 12:02:27 +0000

Hi, Martin -- Finally, I'm getting around to reading your materials. I like your approach. Every time I've taught Quakerism 101, I've started in a different place, depending upon the life and needs of the particular Meeting. I use the Q101 curriculum as a guide only, and have used Wilmer Cooper's A Living Faith, with Tom Hamm's book as a secondary text, along with Richard Foster's and Jack Willcuts' writings. I particularly like the questions at the end of each chapter in Cooper's book, and some of Richard Foster's reflections. When I teach Q101, I tend to start with church history, and weave into the discussion a comparison of Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, Calvinist and Pentecostal understandings. I feel it important to maintain perspective and to acknowledge previous religious experience as "spiritual stepping stones." We're not the "only kids on the block." I'm taking a break from all PYM committees/working groups to concentrate on writing and teaching. One of my hopes is emphasize deeper spiritual experiences within my Quarterly Meeting and my Monthly Meeting. Perhaps we should get together. All of us need something of substance... It isn't just the 30-something folks. Amanda, Martin, perhaps we should get together sometime in 2005. I hang out at the Tract Association office twice a week. We still have a few copies of the Bownas book.

By: Amanda

Amanda — Tue, 30 Nov 2004 12:34:35 +0000

Interesting development — one of our Elders discovered Quakers in America and LOVES it, and spontaneously decided it would be a great basis for a Q101 course. We were chatting about it, and so I sent him here.
This could be good!

By: Amanda

Amanda — Tue, 23 Nov 2004 23:34:05 +0000

Well, I was warned by the librarian that I have two months to think up good reasons why I shouldn’t be on the library committee because come January he wants me there. Should that come to pass, I will certainly turn to you for more suggestions. As it is I am going to ask Eli to order those books.
It was really very touching to see the eagerness with which some of the older friends responded to the comments that I, a bold newcomer who seems to have dropped out of the sky and this other young man, who had just attended his 2nd meeting there offered. While I agree that there can be a degree of smugness in the older generations, I think there has also been fault on the side of younger people for not speaking out and making their needs known.
I have taken inspiration from the way you don’t back down when rebuffed — and I think it is equally important not to back down if we feel ignored or unheard. I think that examples of that Early Quaker cleverness, humour, earnestness, and fire, administered in regular doses, might unblock some plugged ears. If we want to be serious and involved, we shouldn’t wait to be invited. Why the constant conversations instead of constant action? We should organise, attend our meetings for business, put forth our ideas, plans, dreams — and then put them into action. As long as we give up, drifting away, licking our wounds about how the present state of the society doesn’t speak to our condition, nothing is going to change.
I’m not sure where I am going to find all these other young people for our Weds. meeting — friends like you and I seem to be scattered. But if I build it, I have faith they will come.
I am going to take full advantage of what I know is perceived by some as typical newly-convinced overeagerness. Perhaps it is, but why not turn it to our advantage? We young and newly convinced Friends are not burnt out yet, we are not discouraged yet, we have not yet been lulled into a state of false complacency — and so it seems to me that this lot and responsibility falls naturally to us. Even if we are destined to become staid old back-benchers some day, why not leave something behind us?
Bah, I’ve just needed to blurt that for a bit. Thank thee for thy online ministry, Martin, it encouragesme, for one, very much.