Charity.

Charity

As far as I am aware all major religions emphasise the importance of Charity.
St Paul rated the three top virtues, “Faith, Hope and Love”. This is often translated as “Faith, Hope and Charity”. Jesus spoke of giving to prisoners, the poor, the sick and said, “Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.” (Matt 25:40)

As Quakers, and as a registered charity, gaining much from the government due to that status, and as an organisation “rooted in Christianity” we accept that our purpose is religious and charitable.

As an Area Meeting do very little charity – most of what we do is giving to our own members. (Individual giving is another matter.)

Area Meeting is allowing just one of its premises to be used to provide shelter to homeless people when not needed for other purposes. This was in response to an appeal by the City Mayor. We did not first decide to give to a homeless charity. After responding to the Mayor’s appeal we found that St Mungo’s (now renamed Mungos) are acting on behalf of the City Council. Presumably the Council can only do this because Mungos costs less than hotels, and that is because most of Mungo’s staff are volunteers.

This charitable action by us is not great; merely the cost of some lighting and heating, some toilet rolls and paper towels, and cleaning done at a less convenient time. (Mungo’s volunteers usually leave the premises clean and tidy.)

It would be wrong to treat it as hiring for a fee. Were we to offer use of a Meeting House from 2200 hours to 0730 on the open market what fee could we charge? Would it be worth administering?

I am convinced that rather than putting this activity in the same category as our revenue-raising room-hiring it would be more in keeping with our agreed purpose to accept it as the act of charity that it is.

To act uncharitably in this respect would be as unQuakerly as to cease using a Meeting House for meeting for worship. Would Trustees charge each Local Meeting a fee for use of a Meeting House? Corporate charitable action is as much our core purpose as is worship.

“Quakers” and “Quakerism”

I suggest it’s helpful in these discussions to differentiate between “Quakers” and The Religious Society of Friends or “Quakerism”.

“Quakers” are individual people, and as such each differs one from another. We cannot define ‘a Quaker’ precisely such as by saying ‘member of the Society’ because many truly Quaker people resist applying for membership, unfortunately. I suppose the only definition is that they self-identify as Quakers. Were they to be very unQuakerly all we could do was  formally or informally to disown them.

But anyone trying to define ‘Quakerism’ would sensibly look to sources such as the Society’s website and the book published by Quakers (very recently by the standards of most religions) titled “Quaker Faith…”.

The Society (actually, Britain Yearly Meeting) is a legal ‘person’ and this book makes very clear the Society’s religious position. When BYM applied for registration as a religious charity “Quaker Faith and Practice” (to which the authorities referred as our book of Christian discipline) was mentioned in order to clarify what in this context is meant by ‘religious’.

The Society itself is undeniably a Christian organisation. Other Christian churches bent over backwards to persuade it to join them, which it did after long and thorough consideration, and since then it has been active in the Christian community.

It’s quite common for members of an organisation not to accept its all aims – a communist can work in a capitalist company to everyone’s satisfaction. The Society of Friends accepts members who are Hindus, etc. and even atheist, but that does not stop it, and Quakerism, being essentially Christian. IMHO.

Christians and Jews

 

Yesterday I was one of about 30 people attending a lecture and discussion held by the local (Avon) branch of the Council of Christians and Jews (CCJ). The title was “The Elephant in the Room”. It was led by David Arnold, MBE, Joint Hon Secretary of the CCJ, a member of the Orthodox  Jewish tradition.

He first spoke for quite a while on recent major changes to the governance and objectives of the CCJ:  establishing a better balance between Christians and Jews (it had been predominantly Anglican!), becoming more outward-looking, appointing more younger officers. He then gave another talk on the causes of widespread anti-semitism, especially the work of a brilliant French secular Jew Jules Isaac. David Arnold then spoke about “Nostra Aetate” – (Latin: In our Time; this is the Declaration by the Second Vatican Council on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions.) Its effects had been very beneficial.

Finally David Arnold spoke on the subject most of us were anxious to consider: the relationship between on the one hand Israel and Jewry and on the other Palestinians and Israeli Arabs. He called repeatedly for mutual understanding, dialogue and other positive measures. He asserted that participation in the debate and activity in support of one side or the other was unhelpful – the solution could be found only by those in the locality.

Despite some misgivings , I was very pleased indeed that the local CCJ branch had hosted this event, and I thank David Arnold coming a long way and for being prepared to face what he must have anticipated would be a difficult audience. The event has served to break an apparent taboo. Two of my sisters married Jews so I have many Jewish nieces and nephews. In the family the subject of Palestine is taboo. When I started attending meetings of the CCJ I was worried lest my pro-Palestinian allegiances would be a problem. They were not because the subject was never mentioned; it seemed to be taboo. Now I believe we will be able to discuss it. In the social period after the meeting I was able to raise an issue of terminology (the difference if any between anti-Zionism and anti-semitism) frankly with Jewish people. That’s a start!

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Religion or mere spirituality?

This is a letter I wrote to the editor of The Friend a year ago. I think it was not published.

Geoff Pilliner described graphically (’Phlogiston and stuff’, 21 August) the development of educated people’s understanding of our spiritual and physical environment over centuries past. But he assumed there had been no change in the understanding of ‘God’. Quakers have never embraced the Ancient Greeks’ notion, nor that of an autocratic, jealous old man obsessed with sin. It is to set up an Aunt Sally to invoke that metaphor as a justification for rejecting God. Our Elders and Quaker Life should act to dispel that ignorant mis-understanding. Until such time as Yearly Meeting discerns we need to amend our religious ’Purpose’ Quaker Life should stop promoting a vague ‘Spirituality’ and nurture our God-centred and Spirit-led Quaker religion.

Trying to meditate or pray (Revised)

I sit here in my garden, early in this glorious morning, under my old wool prayer shawl, trying to get to that deep blissful meditative state which I can sometimes reach.

But my mind slips away from my mantra, into a self-defensive and perhaps self-pitying rant against unfairnesses in my life.  So my mind drifts from potential bliss to the words of an essay by me listing all I have done – not to seek thanks but merely to plead for recognition.

I pull my mind back to the mantra. Or shall I pray? To God. Then I’m in the well-worn groove of my essays and vocal ministry about the essential heart of Quakerism being the worship of God and open-ness to divine guidance. “We commit ourselves to a form of worship which allows God to teach and transform us…”  We “trust” that good values such as love and truth are “the leadings of God”. But do we? In meetings for worship, how can I know who is with me and who firmly does not “allow”, refuses to “trust”?   Yes, “when two or three are gathered in my name…” But what when most aren’t?

Once again I brush these distractions aside and seek to clear my mind. But now I consider going to church for morning prayers. No, it’s still too early. Why do I feel this urge for church? It is not only that I love being in any kind of deeply spiritual place – churches, Hindu temples, pre-historic stone circles, ley-line crossings.

I’m not sure why I am drawn to Anglican services. (Those I go to usually have only a few or no other ‘congregation’. Just me and the priest.) I find part of the liturgy unacceptable, even repelling. I find some of the psalms and the Old Testament readings horrifying.  I feel I really should not be there, yet a few days later I find myself drawn back.

It occurs to me that a prescribed service helps one to stay focussed on “the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit”. There’s little time to consider one’s problems. (Sometimes a psalm, with anger directed at ‘mine enemies’ hints at them!) One is led to praise, to thanks, to concern for others, and by exhortations to go out and do God’s work.

But should I really be here, apparently accepting words that are at best irrelevant and at worst objectionable? Thankfully, the morning service which I attend (at St Mary Redcliffe) does not include the creed, though it is included in the low mass at the high church which I attend sometimes, early on a Sunday morning . When I discuss my discomfort with the priests they all make light of it. “Yes, we all have a problems with the creed!”, exclaimed one. “Just take what you can and leave the rest”, advised another.

I manage to repeat my own mantra a few times, then go in to get some breakfast.

From Here To Nowhere? (1600 words long!)

From Here To Nowhere?

A response to Diana Sandy’s article “From here to where” in The Friend, 8 July 2016.

I summarise Diana’s article as saying that we, the members of the Religious Society of Friends, Quakers, in Britain (RSoF) have a crisis of confidence, or corporate identity, based initially on ignorance of the Quaker environment, particularly our history. In early days the notion of ‘God’ was normal, “humans were more at one with their natural world then and accepted ‘spirituality’ as fundamental and normal”. Little of this is widely accepted today. “Indeed, many challenge these concepts as delusions”. Originally our structures enabled all Friends to be guided by the Spirit – that structure no longer exists. “For many, our Society has become a friendly society, a sort of Sunday Club. Does that matter?” Is it simply a crisis of confidence in the guidance of the Holy Spirit? Early Friends were not afraid to tackle issues head on. Now we are too afraid of hurting one another. Finally, she writes, we “are unclear about what the Society of Friends is for… it is time for us all to find out… to start addressing the issues …”.
(Apologies if this summary does not do justice to Diana’s carefully crafted article, but I hope it conveys the gist of it.)

Personally, I agree with almost all Diana says and assumes. Here I hope to further illustrate her assertions and to suggest a way forward.

I fully endorse her view that we have lost confidence in the guidance of the Spirit. In my former Local Meeting (LM) we discussed Meeting House improvements for at least 15 years, with several successive working parties and with expensive professional advice, resulting on several occasions in decisions reached in right ordering. But we never had the confidence to implement those decisions. However, when a professionally qualified Friend transferred to the Meeting, his proposals, very similar to those reached previously, were quickly accepted and implemented.

When I, as clerk of my present LM, posted a document containing the Bideford Statement, (which is somewhat similar to Diana’s article) with its endorsement by our Area Meeting Elders, a Friend of long standing and a former Quaker Life Representative took it down explaining it was too divisive. My then local Elders backed him in this. See also “Quakers’ Ignorance of Quakerism” on my blog friendstephen.wordpress.com which describes how two long-standing Friends rejected the assertion that the RSoF was Christian.

The assumption made by Diana which I do not accept is I think an example of the individualism which permeates our wider Western culture. Individualism has its place: we all agree with personal freedom and that each individual should be enabled to reach their full potential. But there other bases on which to make judgements. Diana seems to see the Society as only a set of individuals. I believe a more useful analysis of the state and future of the RSoF should start with a recognition that it is more than that. The RSoF is a ‘person’ in its own right. It has its own history, property, funds, officers and legal obligations separate from those of its members. BYM is formally recognised, registered, and controlled by the Government, in the agency of the Charity Commission.  (The relationship between the RSoF and BYM is subtle but for all intents and purposes we can regard the two entities as one.)

The RSoF has a “Purpose” negotiated and agreed with the CC and documented in BYM’s Governing Document. It should be noted that BYM is not permitted to use any of its resources other than in furtherance of its agreed purpose. Also that each Area Meeting has a similar Governing Document which declares their purpose to be furtherance of BYM’s purpose. Yearly Meeting is entitled to amend any section of its Governing Documents except the “Purpose”.

The Purpose of BYM is ‘religious and charitable’. ‘Religious’ and ‘religion’ are terms with a very wide definition which the CC seems to accept. But when negotiating with them we defined our use of these words by pointing to “Quaker Faith and Practice” which is sub-titled our book of Christian discipline. (In fact the CC tend to use the sub-title. I shall refer to it as QF&P.)

So what is meant, in this context, by ‘religious’? First, there is the sub-title, which is pretty unambivalent. Secondly, the word ‘God’ occurs at least 700 time in QF&P, and any other similar Higher Power (other than ‘Spirit’) is not or is rarely mentioned. The word ‘Spirit’ (Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost) in the context of Christian language usually refers to God, or a part of God, or that which proceeds from God or Jesus. (As does the “Light”.) Thirdly, QF&P contains many references to the teachings and example of Jesus, and of his disciples. A recent article in The Friend suggested that George Fox was greatly influenced by St Paul’s writings. Then there is the title “Religious Society…”. A close association with the other Christian churches is maintained by BYM and the RSoF at most Area and many local levels. QF&P states that ‘we are rooted in Christianity”. Its section on Diversity clearly describes a diversity within the Christian domain. The section on applications for membership shows a similar attitude.

So the RSoF of which we are members is undoubtedly a corporate body with a clearly defined and virtually unchangeable (Christian) religious purpose. It is strong, well-resourced, well-staffed, and active.

The only (!) problem is that a very large proportion of its members are ignorant of these facts, or prefer to ignore them, or erroneously dismiss them as being out of date and irrelevant. A danger exists that these members may attempt to push through policies (or amendments to the Society’s Governing Document) that would not comply with its Purpose. Although, in my opinion, they could not legally succeed, the conflict would be at least depressing and a waste of resources, and at worst disastrous.

What do I propose? Firstly that Quaker Life Central Committee on behalf of BYM acts effectively to ensure that all members and established attenders are at least aware of the facts I have outlined above. Quaker Life issues much documentary material that supports these facts but does not ensure that their message gets through. Local Elders should accept similar responsibilities – to ‘nurture our faith’.

It needs to be emphasised that this does not mean that a member must accept that they are Christian. It is very common, indeed usual, for members of an organisation not personally to identify closely with the organisation’s aims. A communist can work for a capitalist employer to everyone’s satisfaction. Quakerism is inclusive. Quakers hope that newcomers will commit themselves to the form of worship which allows God to teach and transform them. Quakers exhort each other to trust that good values such as love and truth are the leadings of God, and that God’s Light will show them their darkness and lead them to a new life. These are Quaker aims but not exclusive rules.

Secondly, if and when our Yearly Meeting is to make a decision affecting our faith, such as whether to drop use of the word ‘God’, whether to withdraw from Churches Together, or to further relax membership criteria, then I consider that only members should take part. Not many other organisations would allow non-members to have an effective say on constitutional amendments.

Thirdly, I consider the RsoF needs urgently to introduce some form of learning mechanism. As far as I am aware every other religious body has some method of reminding its adherents of the purpose of their regular meetings and of the wider organisation. This does not mean we need a creed, but at very least Advices and Queries should be read out frequently, and applicants for membership required to have attended an introductory course which included some of our history, and an explanation of Quaker faith.

Daiana Sandys was correct in saying that for many our Society has become “a friendly society, a sort of Sunday Club”. I know that to be true of some of our attenders. But it is even more the case that it has become little more than a society of philanthropists and liberal reformers. These are admirable pursuits but are not all there is to Quakerism. My fourth suggestion is that those who want to be Quakers but cannot accept Quakerism’s Christian basis should form a separate Society, perhaps called the Spiritual Society of Friends (Reformed Quakers). The RSoF could maintain close links with the SSoF. Wealth from the RSoF should be passed to the SSoF in proportion to the number of Friends transferring their membership. QPSW could become largely independent of but supported by both, as is the case with QUNO and the AFSC, both of which report to several YMs.

Another option is to do nothing. Maybe God ‘wants’ (as it were) there to evolve a secular society with the aims and effectiveness that Quakerism acquired by being God-centred, Spirit-led, humble learners in the school of Christ. Maybe it’s OK to regard the purpose of Quakerism to be seeking to live up to the Testimonies. (The testimonies are the outcome of being a Quaker.)  But I fear that without their conviction that Quakers are subject to the leadings of God Quakerism will lose the fire in its belly. Once its reputation, based as it is on Spirit-led good works in the past, grows cold, the Society might become no more effective than many another small group of do-gooders, or meditator circle.

Quakers’ Ignorance of Quakerism

Quakers’ Ignorance of Quakerism.

I was saddened and hurt when vocal ministry that I was moved to make in a recent meeting for worship was argued against in later ‘vocal ministry’ and in the ‘after-words’ period. The critics included two long-standing members, but I was supported by a well-respected member of our Area Meeting. What I said I believe to be simply factual. The drive to minister was because I am led to believe that ignorance of these facts is a danger to our Society. People are being led into our Society unaware of its true nature.

My ministry commenced with a comment that I had been reading the chapter in Quaker Faith and Practice that we were urged by Sufferings to read this month, and that it included many quotations by still-living, leading members of our Society who frequently referred to the teachings of Jesus. I went on to assert that our accepted Quaker values owed their origin to Christ’s teaching – teaching which had become so absorbed by our Society and our wider culture that we took it for granted and were unaware of its origin. Referring to the Good Samaritan story, I suggested that no-one nowadays would criticize a person for teaching that to help a needy, injured stranger was an admirable act. I said that a student may know nothing of the development of eduction philosophy and techniques over the centuries, nor anything of the philosophy and politics that shaped the curriculum to which they were subjected, and that similarly many Friends were unaware of the roots of Quakerism. They understood Quakerism to be what they witnessed in meetings such as our present one. They witnessed concern about today’s injustices and militarism, they met sociable people, but they did not know about Quakerism’s Christian basis nor that our Society is an active member of the Christian community.

The opposer who spoke during the worship period meeting demonstrated this ignorance. First, of course, is that he defied the convention that we do not argue during worship. If apparent ‘ministry’ seems unacceptable one simple lets it pass, maybe to express one’s concern to an Elder later. When I mentioned this later he retorted that he was entitled to express his opinion! Secondly, he missed the point that I was considering the Society’s position, not his nor any any individual’s. To say a society’s position is Christian is not to say every member does or should identify themselves as a Christian. It is all too common to view a proposition from an individualistic viewpoint. One accepts that there is a wide range of beliefs among members of our Society. (As indeed there is in other denominations.) He argued that the Cadburys by (as he asserted) coming to meeting in Rolls Royces showed that they were not Christians. Presumably he meant to imply that this proved Quakers are not Christians, and therefore what I had said was wrong. The other member, who spoke during after-words, was very obscure but clearly opposed what I’d said. (On a previous occasion he took down a notice I’d put on the board – the Bideford Statement together with its endorsement by our AM Elders – on the grounds that it was ‘inflamatory’. )

I believe it is wrong of us to hide the fact that our Society is a religious one and that our religion is a form of Christianity, albeit rather untypical. Typically, members are God-centred, Spirit-led, “humble learners in the school of Christ”.

Many people’s hang-up is over the word ‘God’. I believe we ought to make clear that Quakers have never accepted the image (metaphor) of God as being a male control freak, jealous, angry, and obsessed with sin. Or anything like that. Quakerism does not claim to know what God is, but urges its members to trust that values such as love and truth are the ‘leadings of God’. Also that Quakerism’s testimonies are not personal development goals but the effect of commitment to a form of worship which allows God to teach and transform people. Early Friends were convinced of this by their own experience, but now it is apparent that newcomers to Quakerism need to have it clearly explained. I believe that to be the responsibility of our Elders.

(This is the essay I meant to head with the invitation for readers to comment – not only supportively)

– Stephen Petter, Bristol, 11/7/16.

My religious day

Comments (not only supportive ones) on the following are invited.

Tonight I meant to go to the monthly meeting of the CCJ (Council of Christians and Jews) but family commitments prevented me.  Actually I don’t think they had a speaker. Last month they were to have had an
Orthodox rabbi talking about the Israel/Palestine situation, but it got cancelled.  Though I am pro-Palestine I am also interested in learning more about Judaism. A few months ago we shared a Passover meal, which was complex with many symbolic features. However I’m more interested in the theology than the rituals.

This morning as I often do I went to St Mary Redcliffe church for Morning Prayers. Often I’m the only ‘congregation’. Occasionally, as today no-one else came so I helped myself to a prayer book and the lectionary, looked up today’s readings, and aloud but quietly started through the service on my own. The vicar (Rector?) turned up and invited me to carry on, saying the priest’s role.  Afterwards I (yet again) asked him if he was sure he didn’t mind me coming, since I am not baptised, let alone confirmed. He was as usual supportive and welcoming. I get the same response to a similar question at the High Anglican church I often attend very early on Sundays. This week we were down to two ‘congregation’ and three others.

I go though a lot of angst over this. I think it’s right brain left brain conflict. I feel very drawn to the deep spirituality of these situations, the ‘nearness to God’, the thanksgiving and exhortation to  ‘serve God’. But I find some of the liturgy
very off-putting, and feel I should not be there.

This evening I wrote  a difficult piece about how ignorant many Friends are about Quakerism.  I’ll post it on this blog.

News of Calais

A letter to me from my sister, Anne:

CALAIS COMMENTARY

First, the less bad news. The refugee camp , ‘The Jungle’ on sand dunes beside a smelly chemical plant a few miles northwesterly of Calais, is teeming with volunteers. Volunteers from France, Belgium, Spain, Germany, the USA, Poland, and England. And probably other countries, but these were the ones I met during my week there.
France is noticably represented by Medicins Sans Frontiers, running clinics, advice centres, and organising the mammoth task of rubbish clearing, including the portaloos. The Belgians have set up a kitchen, staffed by refugees, and the English are everywhere, organizing kitchens, and distribution of clothing and setting up wooden self-build shacks especially important in the hostile weather. Calaid, are well-organised with rotas for distributing food, clothes, gas bottles and other necessities, and for work in the kitchens. Then there is ‘the Dome’ , an arts and theatre centre, which doubtless you will have seen on TV news. Performances of theatre, music and dance are organized there daily, with workshops offered to refugees who are interested.
Nearby the Dome is the Womens Centre, organizing a variety of events, and with a quiet place for talking, run by a Dutch girl and an Afghan who, importantly, speaks both English and Pushtu. Not far away is the ‘Jungle Box’ for children’s books and creative play. There are at least three schools, organized by different national groups, and the two churches, one Protestant the other, Orthodox, set up a year ago by Soloman, from Ethiopia, a year ago. There are services there every morning.
The volunteers wear cheerful smiles and show great bonhomie, and goodwill to all. Some have been there for over four months, like Sophie and Karim and their children, who came from Newcastle for three days in September to provide the most important necessity of all- food. On arrival, they were so moved by the situation that they remained. Four months later they were returning briefly to England so that their eldest daughter could resume her college course, but they were due to return a week later. As I peeled a mountain of potatoes, Sophie told me how she had felt compelled to go to the Jungle, feeling that providing spicy Eastern-type food she would be offering comforting home memories. She and Karim are Muslim and she feels that different religions come together in requiring each of us to help humankind with basic necessities like food . Then there is the Ashram kitchen, also offering similar food and ginger chai, hot and aromatic to ward off the cold and infections. Similarly the Belgian kitchen, tucked in a less accessible corner of the city, run by refugees who communicate in a mixture if Italian, French and Arabic. There, the always smiling Saladdin, the chef from Syria, said me when I was due to depart, “See you in London soon, Inshallah.” One of his helpers, Mohammed, had fled from Egypt via Libya and Italy, with is twelve year old son, and are now stranded.
Everywhere, the good natured atmosphere is infectious; one volunteer said to me “here it’s a bit like a festival…in a a bad kind of way”.
Another enthused romantically “It’s amazing to see all these people getting on well together when they were hating each other’s guts back in the part of the world they’ve all come from, like Eritrea and Sudan. It’s anarchy in the purest form.”
Shops have sprung up selling various groceries, and cafes, such as ‘Kabul restaurant’. Everyday, I enjoyed a hot cup of hot sweet chai , cosy and friendly behind the tarpaulins.
Graffiti bears witness to the complexity of feelings and dashed hopes-
‘England we love you’
‘Veni, Vidi, Vici’…with the ‘vici’ crossed out.
The very long walk from the bus stop to the camp is a quiet preparation for
the bad news. Bird song , curlew-like, hopefully greeted the dawn, as a stream of vans full of police passed me on their way to take up their positions at the entrance to the camp.
You will already have seen on TV news and newspaper reports that conditions are horrible, grim, and unsustainable. Mud and rubbish everywhere, an icy wind blowing from the sea, and portaloos dealt with once a week. A few standpipes for washing and collecting water. Rats creep around. Tents are crammed close to each other, though some are gradually being replaced by the shacks and a few caravans. However, the shacks contain no ventilation. Many families are used to sitting round a fire at night. During the summer two hundred tents were destroyed when a fire lit outside caught a tent. The increasing cold weather will doubtless tempt oil stoves inside (fortunately, so far, there are none available). The good relationships rhapsodied about by the volunteer above are less good at night- this same volunteer told me of being held at knife point at 3 a.m. on new year’s eve, and being relieved of laptop and phone. Another told me of her caravan being broken into. Similarly, Karim explained the necessity for a metal wall enclosing Sophie’s
Kitchen because people had been breaking in to steal food.
I talked with people who had fled from Syria, Aghanistan, Egypt, Eritrea and Sudan- the latter to a lesser extent for they speak almost no English. All have similar stories, of journeys across seas, and lands such as Libya and Italy, all their savings given to traffickers in exchange for a dream that had led them to this desolate blind alley. Some have suffered the theft of vital documents by the same traffickers who promised to help them, often beguiling them with fantastic tales. One victim believed a story that Paris is sprayed with perfume every morning .
The younger refugees cling to the dream of England, and London in particular, as the promised land. I spoke to a few of these young men and attempted to explain how much harder is the reality, and that taking offers of asylum elsewhere in Europe might serve them better- but the dream would not be shifted.
In a recent Guardian article, Jonathan Freedland praised the people ‘who have traded comfortable lives for working in the mud and squalor of the Jungle…simply because they were moved by the sight of their fellow human beings in distress’
( Guardian 26.12.15). Simply being moved to ‘do something’ was the reason volunteers gave for being there; some of those who have been there several months look crazed with exhaustion. My week there was less than a drop in the ocean, but I was able to use both my professional services as a mental health worker and my life skills, peeling over 80 kg of potatoes and washing up. As a lone diminuitive woman over seventy I was welcomed with curiosity and good humour, an honorary grandmother, and I shall return, in time after I have weighed up whether the expense might not be better used as a donation to MSF or Calaid because the paradox of voluntary work is that in fact it is expensive.
A dear friend asked me whether it had been worthwhile. For myself, yes, in facing down my own fears, which turned out to be unnecessary. But, in global terms, many contradictions spring to mind. Reflecting now from the comfort of my home the overwhelming memories from that ‘maze of confusion’ (G.K. Chesterton) are of the courage shown in the face of such an uncertain future by the refugees who have fled tyranny, and who are now facing obscene privations. Many have professional qualifications and want to lead their own lives, and who feel humiliated by constant hand-outs. And of the heroic efforts of many volunteers, building, supporting, cooking and cleaning. And the hope that good will ultimately emerge from a mess. that cannot be sustained, and , like any frustrating situation, will implode at some point. All the factors make this a huge crisis that has to call for an international intervention.
Anne M Jones.
1318 words.

Quakers and Me

Quakers and Me. 7/11/15

I have never been clinically depressed, but I’ve had periods of gloom, depression and anxiety. Perhaps the most memorable was when abroad, driving through the rain in the Netherlands in a cold old car through dreary flat fields, alone on my 50^th birthday, dwelling on my broken marriage – my cuckolding. But then, on arrival, I found that fellow-expat Quakers had organised a surprise party for me. My host had even recorded several episodes of a series starring my favorite actress – Harriet Walter.

Now I feel that same anxious depression, with little hope of a surprising lift-up, least of all from fellow-Quakers, since it is they who seem to be the cause of my malaise.

For the thirty-odd years prior to my moving to Bristol my Quaker life was very rich. Rich in satisfying my longing to be closer to God, satisfying in my desire to ‘do good’ especially in service to the Religious Society of Friends. They were indeed friends, and they were indeed religious. In the 1990 the whole Society worked together on the revision of “Quaker Faith and Practice” such that we felt we “owned” it. The variant of Christianity which it portrays has remained the bedrock of my religious conviction.

During those 30 years I served the Society at every level, from the international to the local. I attended the 1991 World Conference, and represented BYM at two FWCC Triennials. I served on the committee of the European and Middle East Section and was involved in the governance of Brummanah High School in the Lebanon. In another YM I was on the equivalent of Elders and Overseers, then was clerk to my Monthly Meeting.

Within BYM I attended almost every YM and MM/AM. I have attended countless courses at Woodbrooke and Charney Manor, (including a three-month residential at Woodbrooke) and also a few at the equivalent in New York. I served as an Elder almost continuously at Westminster Meeting. I was appointed twice to Central Committees, and to Meeting for Sufferings. In 2001-2002 I took a year traveling round the world, visiting and leading discussions in many Quaker Meetings, after which I moved from London to Bristol.

In sharp contrast to that rich Quaker life, since coming to Bristol it has been arid. I have continued to serve as a Trustee and with Premises work, but have not been appointed to any seriously religious position.  While I have made clear my desire to serve the Society as an Elder, I have been passed over, sometimes in favour of unsuitable or ineffectual Friends, such as those who very seldom attend any meetings.

This has happened once again and it has been a second blow. A few days before I found I was not to be nominated I had re-read the recently published leaflet, “Our Faith in the Future” which apparently is the replacement of our previous statement of our priorities. It is a well-produced, multicolored leaflet, full of admirable aspirations and assurances, but with almost no hint of us being religious. Even our name, “Religious Society…” is absent. The one mention of God is in parentheses and there are no other specifically religious – let alone Christian – words.

Studying that leaflet lead me finally to accept with sad resignation that there is now no hope of rescuing British Quakerism from its decline into humanism. My two most recent letters to The Friend have not been published. Ben PD’s 2014 Swarthmore Lecture has not had its desired effect. A letter I wrote to my AM Elders has simply been ignored. (I offered to start another Meeting for Worship, preceded by a short ‘preparation for worship’ which would remind attenders of our religious basis). The Society seems to have become no more that a philanthropic reformist meditation association – a Spiritual Society rather than a Religious one. Quakers’ claimed Purposes as a registered charity are “religious” and “charitable”. We do virtually no charity, except amongst ourselves. And now it seems we will be doing virtually no religion.

I find myself in flight or fight mode. Were I not the clerk of my Local Meeting I think I would take time out from Quakerism perhaps to go more often to Anglican services, or drop religion altogether. Walking in the forests and on the hills could serve as well. I could go for longer periods on Retreats and to my favorite ashram in India.

I long for the deeply spiritual, God-centred, Spirit-led Quakerism of the past, where we saw ourselves as ‘humble learners in the school of Christ’. It was Christianity stripped to its essentials, with all the bells and whistles, the rituals and pre-written prayers, all swept away to leave room for the promptings of love and truth, which we agreed to trust as the leadings of God, and which we agreed to heed. Now, in my Meeting, anything which smacks of this is verbally rejected by the preponderance of Attenders, a good proportion of whom are Buddhists and other non-theists taking advantage of our Sunday facilities and resentful of any challenge to their comfort zone. It has become a Sunday Social Club.

I ask myself often whether I am mistaken. The reason I have continued to fight the decline of religious Quakerism is that I am frequently encouraged to believe I am not. I obtained an interview with a leading academic Quaker to seek an answer, and was greeted with full agreement. Attending Yearly Meeting lifts my soul, and heartens me. In the current “Friends Quarterly” I read “…while recognizing God’s transcendence … [Quakers] have given greater attention to divine immanence…[But] humans are seen to suffer from a certain hardening of the heart that gets in the way of them seeing God’s presence in the world.” A leading Friend sought to correct me by drawing my attention to the section in QF&P on Diversity. But that section reinforced my conviction since it is clearly about diversity within the context of Christianity. Not within that of ‘anything goes’.

The same article goes on to say “all human images and all language about God are inevitably deficient because, ultimately, God is beyond comprehension”. Quakers have always left it to the Spirit to ‘teach and transform’ those who attend our form of worship. That and prior knowledge of Jesus’ teaching. Unlike all other religious groups we have no regular teaching ministry, reminding us of our organisational purpose. Thus those who start attending our meetings hear nothing of these Christian essentials, and conclude that none of what they expected of religion applies to Quakers. Few realise that the object of our worship is God. Warped concepts of the nature of ‘God’ persist, leading to evangelistic non-theism.

Despite many years of warnings, those in responsible positions in BYM have done little to correct these deficiencies. At a conference on “Quaker Identity”, following a lecture by the arch-evangelistic non-theist, all of us in our weighty “home group” disagreed with his views except one who was one of the leading paid officers of BYM. One can only conjecture that these powers that be in our organisation have decided that the future of the Society lies in development as the philanthropic, humanist association. Maybe that is what God (as it were) wants. Maybe there is a place for another such organisation. But my view is that without the core conviction of God’s unmediated inspiring guidance Quakerism will lose the fire in its belly which has enabled it so effectively to speak truth to power, and so has given it its fine reputation. Is it too late? Can I do anything effective? Do I deserve to retire from the fray?

I had hoped that writing this essay would clear my mind. But I am still undecided and unhappy. Perhaps some gardening will help!