I collect style guides and the only modern one I’ve found to address it is an early-aughts version from Friends General Conference, originally written in the late 90s by Barbara Hirshkowitz. Barbara more or less taught me everything I know about editing when we worked together at New Society Publishers in the early 90s. Bits of her personality come out in the guide so it’s fun to read it and remember her and later additions by Chel Avery are just as wonderful. I miss them both, both as editors and friends¹

Early Friends were well known for their idiosyncrasies. They weren’t afraid of looking weird for a principle they believed in. They would risk imprisonment, illness, and death for these principles. For example, their radical belief in the equality of all people under Christ ² led them to refuse to take off their hats in front of judges. Friends were hauled off to jail just for refusing this hat honor. Plain language, dress, and dates all set off Friends as a “peculiar people” who were easily recognizable for standing out. But this wasn’t necessarily a bad weirdness: it also reinforced their commitment to a radical integrity.

Succeeding generations of Friends chipped away and eventually dropped many of these peculiarities. Much of this was peer pressure I suspect: being strange got in the way of assimilating into the wider culture. Another motivation, especially among more evangelically minded Friends, was outreach. If we want to bring in the masses we should drop the silly, outdated markers that are secondary to the core message—that Christ has come to teach the people himself.

Another reason for the decline is ossification. It’s perhaps inevitable that every religious tradition will gradually forget why they do the things they do and start doing them simply because that is something they’ve always. Kids in Quaker First-day school will be told we don’t swear oaths or don’t gamble or vote in our internal decision-making because Friends don’t engage in those activities. Forgotten in this are the biblical and historical theological rationales for avoiding the practices. Margaret Fell described this process when she recounted the first time hearing George Fox preach: “We are all thieves; we have taken the Scripture in words, and know nothing of them in ourselves.” I think many Friends have taken our traditions mostly in words. It’s easy to abandon a practice you don’t understand.

So I thought I’d share my own personal test for deciding whether an old Quaker peculiarity is worth reviving. I’ve probably shared this before (the danger when someone with maybe twelve interesting ideas has a twenty-plus year old blog³). Here they are:

Can a peculiarity be explained to an outsider in a few sentences without the need to give any historical context?

Is it a practice that one could argue is applicable to any Christian?

I realize the Bible is a contest realm but could someone understand it from a straight-forward reading of the gospels in particular and maybe even more particularly the Sermon on the Mount , from which so many Quaker testimonies arise. One of my favorite Quaker interpreters is the Anglican antislavery activist Thomas Clarkson. He described Quaker practice for the education of his denomination—I think he thought some of the ideas were worth poaching. Is an old Quaker practice found in the gospels and could someone like Clarkson want to import it into their Christian tradition?

What babies in the bathwater are worth preserving with this test? Are there tests you use to think about Quaker practices?

It has been the task of the whole meeting not just of one or two; there has been an awareness that what they are doing now will need to change and evolve. And there has been a care and nourishing of us as parents too, with our own spiritual journeys and need for nurture.

I know, from talking to other Quaker parents – and, very sadly, from parents who would love to explore Quakerism but who have felt discouraged or unwelcomed – that we have been particularly lucky. Lucky not because we found a Quaker community with a ready-made children’s meeting, but because we found a meeting willing and ready to welcome, to make space, where there was a sense of gladness that we were there.

Welcoming families in meetings

How do we rejoice in the presence of children in our meetings and nurture their spiritual growth? Alistair…

Quakers

I suspect a process may be at work similar to the one that has made “that of God in everyone” the putative foundation of all our testimonies: an unselfconscious thought-drift in a culture increasingly impatient with intellectual/theological rigor, or even attention of any serious kind, not to mention care for the testimony of integrity. These ideas arise somehow, somewhere, and then get picked up and disseminated because they sound nice, they meet some need, and they don’t demand much. They apparently don’t require discernment, anyway.

The “Testimony of Community”

I think about the people I’ve cared about who have needed to talk to themselves and make noises. Who need to pace and say things we don’t understand. Spirit is moving through them, in this incarnational way. Reminding them they still have bodies that can make noises, that they still can breath words into being.

http://www.meetinghouse.xyz/everything/2018/12/31/where-do-we-hear-gods-voice

What ways are we already diverse? Where do our strengths and weaknesses lie in terms of inclusion? Both these questions need to be answered if we are to understand the nature and make up of this old and important faith community that has a history of significant contributions to British and international equality.

This intro document leaves me little unsure what kinds of diversity they’re looking for. Demographic? Spiritual? Geographic? The one quote suggests that someone hopes the results might help advance their agenda. Is this just a one-off SurveyMonkey or will there be more to it?

Diversity: where are we now?

​Quakers in Britain are taking part in a survey to map the diversity of their faith and influence…

Quakers

Whether you believe in an intelligent Satan (along the lines of Peter Wagner’s ideas) or a more impersonal mechanism of demonic evil (Walter Wink), we shouldn’t pretend that such nodes just go away. Their evil persists. The basis for apology and repentance is not white guilt or shame or any form of self-flagellation. Instead, it is to conduct spiritual warfare against the demons of racism and oppression and false witness, to declare them off-limits in the land that we now share, so that we can conduct our future stewardship—and make our public investments— in freedom and mutual regard.

I’m drawn to the old notion of “The Tempter” as a force that leads us to do what’s personally rewarding rather than morally just. I think it explains a lot of internal struggles I’ve faced, even in simple witnesses. As Johan says, these massive injustices can’t just be undone but they need to be recognized for the immensity of their scale. I’ve also seen this weird way in which progressive whites can blithely disregard Native American perspectives on these issues. Listening more and waiting for complicated answers seems essential in my opinion.

Another good deep-dive for Friends interested in this is Betsy Cazden’s Friends Journal 2006 article, Quaker Money, Old Money, and White Privilege. It’s one I turn to every so often to remind myself of some of our monied Quaker norms. Johan gives a pass to William Penn but I think it’s important to remember that his colonial ambitions were deeply enmeshed in at least three different wars and conveniently served the political calculations of two empires, the perfect storm of an opportunity for a group of pacifist idealists.

https://blog.canyoubelieve.me/2018/11/quakers-and-native-americans-its.html

Standing up for peace means standing on the side of the oppressed, not throwing them into the lion’s mouth in the name of civility. And interrupting racist violence takes more than civil discourse: active disruption is needed in order for racism to be revealed and dismantled. What good is ineffective pacifism? My commitment to nonviolence is about saving lives.

I gave my take on Cadbury’s speech back in June. I was a little easier on Cadbury, mostly because I think we need to understand the Quaker worldview out of which he was speaking. It’s never good to lecture the oppressed on their oppression, but the classic Quaker idea of speaking truth to all sides still holds value and is something I think we miss sometimes nowadays.

Just a moment…

www.friendsjournal.org

When I read this, I asked myself if we Quakers are providing the equivalent of this type of spiritual guidance. Do newcomers and others see us as meeting their spiritual needs? If they do, do they see this right away, or does it take a while? To answer these questions, I had to learn more about the “clear pathway” that the Reveal literature described. Although Quakerism has great wisdom in the area of spiritual guidance, at first it seemed that it was inconsistent with the spiritual guidance described in the survey.

When I’ve taught Quakerism 101 classes, I’ve try to explain the branches of Friends—and the schisms—not just as theological or cultural phenomenon but as problem-solving preferences. What tools do we reach for in crisis? Do we go inward and recommit ourselves to distinctive practices that we’ve been slacking off on? Do we start reading groups and spiritual friendship programs to train each member to carry the work? Do we blame our Quaker oddities and start using the language and liturgical models of the more successful churches near us? Do we set up committees and produce curricula to support local efforts? Do we look to experts and craft nationwide programs and hire staff and problem solve? I’m not sure these tools need to be mutually exclusive, but in practice I see most Quaker bodies tend to reach for only one or two of these tools. And of course, the tools we chose largely determine both the problems we solve and the unintended ones we create.

Just a moment…

www.friendsjournal.org