Comment on the Quaker Universalist Group statement.

Apparently the QUG has declared, “Our vision for the future of Quakerism in Britain … is for … a society in which pre-eminence is given to the fact of Meeting for Worship … a future Society in which Friends with different beliefs about God and Spirit come together …”

In my opinion, if by “different beliefs about God and Spirit” they mean we (BYM) continue to accept the reality of God and of (God’s) Spirit, then, in this, they are saying nothing new, which is to be welcomed. We have always had different beliefs about these things. What is not helpful is to reject either God or Spirit. To do so would not be renewal but, at best, reform.

What I fear is that the phrase “different beliefs about God and Spirit” will be taken to include belief that these do not exist. One can hardly allow God to teach and transform one if one has set one’s mind against accepting that God exists. Meeting for worship without God is like a dinner party without food. It is meditation. But our religious society is not the appropriate environment for meditation, nor for atheism, non-theism, humanism, or whatever. There are plenty of other meditating, reformist, philanthropic societies and discussion groups available. A faith community is where one expects one’s faith to be nurtured, not negated.

I believe that our core problem is the widespread ignorance or gross misunderstanding of what our liberal Quakerism and most other mainstream Christians understand about God. Before rejecting the word, Friends should read “Quaker Faith and Practice”. The Ghastly God which they reject is nowhere to be found in it.

The Universalists’ statement goes on, it seems to me, in effect to declare that what should be worshipped is the Silence. But our use of silence is not our ultimate objective! It is but our method of reaching our objective. The object of our worship is God. However, as QF&P 1.01 points out, God can teach and transform us through our worship, though only if we allow it. So even if Friends act on the assumption that we worship Silence, but are open to the possibility that God is real and could be allowed into their lives, then all could be well.

In the Harvey Gillman quotation it seems to me that he has simply repeating well-established Quaker understanding, but has replaced the word ‘God’ with ‘Spirit’.To do so is in my opinion to fudge the issue. It panders to the ignorance and misunderstanding about God. In a religious context ‘Spirit’ means ‘God’s Holy Spirit’ – one of the Trinity. It is the one to which Quakers principally respond, while not rejecting the other two. But ‘Spirit’ can be understood as being the same as ‘spirit’ which has developed a far wider, looser, more vague definition; and ‘spiritual’ even more so, to the point that it is almost meaningless.

If we really seek community, unity and continued effectiveness for good in the world we need at least to understand our own religious language, so as to use it to discuss and hopefully agree on what it is that unites us.

An hour’s shared meditation every week is a fine thing, but Quakerism is even finer. I’ve done meditation, I hope to continue doing Quakerism. I seek its renewal, not its degeneration disguised as reform.