Credo et Facio
Fancy title – what I intend to do is to use this blog to describe what I believe religiously and spiritually and what I am doing relevant to these. I shall not erase my previous postings to this blog but I wrote most of them many years ago. My thinking has moved on since then.
I shall start by copying a letter (i.e. an email) about a letter about a letter. This should quickly show the reader (you!) “where I am at”.
Dear R.
Thank you for this (a message of support); it is much appreciated.
I have not made up my mind but am thinking of asking J. to set up a Clearness Committee with the question, “Should I transfer my membership to Central England AM?” J. is clerk to our LM but in my opinion she is overshadowed by JB, who is/was my nemesis. J is also convenor of the Pastoral Team
However I feel a strong sense of duty to support my current AM (Staffordshire) which needs able people more than does CE AM.
On another matter. Are you aware of the correspondence in The Friend which was started by a letter from me? It was published on May 4. I stand by what I said but I am aware that many Friends disagree with me. Am I still qualified to represent our AM? For your interest I shall append a letter I wrote yesterday about my May 4 letter.
In Friendship
Stephen
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Dear David
You ask me: “i think two things about your letter – firstly
its had a very vigorous reaction the most i have ever seen
and second i don’t think i understood your letter.
“was your letter about non believers or attenders
“well done for writing”
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I shall try to answer briefly:
I think the reason you did not understand it was that it covers five different points.
This is a bad mistake which I regret I often make.
The first point is:
” I admire those attenders who are devoted to our Religious Society, who serve it in many ways, but who refrain from applying for membership because in all honesty they cannot accede to our God-centred religious basis.“
In this I make two contentious assumptions. 1. the reason they refrain from joining and 2. that we have aGod-centred basis. It is also contentious in that I am separating members from attenders.
Secondly I say,
“I deplore the fact that our procedures are such that avowed and even evangelical atheists can be and are admitted into membership.“
This is seen to go against the principle of inclusivity. But I don’t think any other organisation would accept into membership people who were actively opposed to that organisations’s ethos. (But that assumes that our ethos is “God-centred”.)
Thirdly,
“I consider that far too many attenders are permitted to attend Yearly Meeting. Once there, our decision-making process gives them as much weight as members. This will be particularly incongruous when the subject matter is in effect the fundamental basis of our form of Quakerism, or the basis of our membership. These topics will be inherent when we seek to approve a new version of our book of discipline. “
Again this is seen as non-inclusive.
Fourth:
“We have gone too far in accommodating ‘refugees from Christianity’. For at least thirty years we have refrained from using religious language for fear of upsetting them. Any expression of our religious basis is now so unusual as to seem almost offensive.”
Note that this is the assertion which has been most widely supported.
Finally:
“In the 1990s we almost entirely dropped ‘Jesus’ from Quaker Faith & Practice. If we now drop ‘God’ shall we still be able to present ourselves to Churches Together and to the interfaith community as ‘Religious’? Or should we adhere to our Testimony to Truth by renaming ourselves ‘The Spiritual Society of Friends’?“
In fact we are partly dropping “God”. The Book of Discipline Revision Committee are proposing to use other words (and occasionally “God”) in various chapters of the new edition.
So, yes, it was about “about non believers or attenders”. In the first extract I seem to be admiring them and in the third I am suggesting non-members should not take part in YM especially if the discussion is about changing the basis of membership.
David, I hope that clarifies my several opinions.
Perhaps I am mistaken. But so far no-one (except one member of my local meeting) has questioned my assumptions. And as you point out, several letters (so far, five) have been published in support, which is pretty exceptional.
In Peace
Stephen.
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End of letters about a letter.
I am disappointed in that none of the many Friends who disagree with me trouble to try to show me where they think I am mistaken. Sadly, I am reduced to being my own critic.
I am experiencing a very busy religious/spiritual life recently. I’ll report more of it in another posting. Meanwhile I hope to get some reactions to the above.
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