Quakers

Emily Stewart

Last year representatives from Friends General Conference, Friends United Meeting and Evangelical Friends Church International were invited by the Young Quaker Christians Association (Africa) to attend the YQCA Triennial in Kenya. Holly Baldwin (from New England Yearly Meeting) and I were the representatives for Friends General Conference. There were over 75 young adult Friends at the conference from Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Tanzania and South Africa, England, the U.S. and the Netherlands.

 

While attending the Triennial, I participated in an interest group session focused on our future as young Quakers, where we discussed the struggles we all face in the Quaker church and how we can work together to address them. I was shocked that almost every issue raised by young adult Friends in Africa was true for young adult Friends in the US and Canada. We talked about how to help churches support Quaker leaders, how to exchange information with other monthly and yearly meetings, how to work with older Friends, how to address the issues that are arising in our own meetings, how to nominate Friends based on spiritual gifts, and ways of reaching out to the global community of young Friends. We are doing such similar work, and though we may have different worship styles or theology, we each have a piece of the truth to bring to the table.

 

I spoke to Friends about what young people in Kenya are asking for in the Quaker church. Since many young people are not given positions of leadership (aside from leading worship and praise songs), many go to other churches.  Some young Quakers are asking for a more Pentecostal style of worship, which includes altar calls (an opportunity to repent of your sins and make a new commitment to Jesus), and what is sometimes referred to as being “slain in the Spirit” (when you fall to the ground because the power of the Holy Spirit is upon you and you become cleansed of evil spirits). We were able to witness this type of experience at East Africa Yearly Meeting-North Youth Conference.  

 

 

 

 

It reminded me of what a lot of young Quakers in the U.S. are asking for: opportunities to have visceral experiences of God. Though many early Friends experienced this in meeting for worship, that depth of worship-where everyone is opening themselves to be a vessel for God to enter- is less common today. I think this yearning for visceral experiences of God are why so many young people attend the conferences for young adult Friends in the U.S. The worship at the YAF conferences in 2007 and 2008 went deeper than any of my other experiences in meeting for worship. Friends were transformed by the united feeling of God’s presence and love in the room.  We experienced God’s love by loving one another.  

 

Emily Stewart lives in Philadelphia and attends Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting. She serves as the Youth Ministries Coordinator for Friends General Conference.To see more photos from her trip you can check out Emily’s Kenya photos.

Read the epistle from the YQCA-A Triennial.

If you are interested in hearing more about Friends’ experiences at the YQCA Triennial, Jez Smith, one of the international visitors to the conference, has published articles in The Friend on “We are family”, “Giving thanks to God on life’s highway”, and “Young Friends prepare for leadership”. 

Quakers and Worship

An Introduction

The form and essence of Quaker worship comes from a distinctive Quaker understanding of the sacraments, particularly the nature of communion. In Quaker sacramental practice, worship is communion: the faith community uniting in a single body to dwell deeply in the presence of God. We affirm that spiritual reality can be accessible, even palpable, without the intervention of symbols and rituals. Instead of wafers and wine, Quaker communion consists of hearts and minds and spirits, opened to the in-dwelling of the divine.

Quakers, even those who are called "unprogrammed", practice both open and programmed forms of worship: waiting (sometimes called "silent") worship, and meeting for worship with a concern for business. Starting in the mid-19th century, Quaker worship broadened significantly from earlier forms. Many contemporary Quaker meetings sometimes include planned singing, scripture reading, corporate vocal prayer, or preaching in their worship. What characterizes all Quaker worship, regardless of form, is the intention to submit to God as head of the worshiping body, to become one in the Spirit, and to be faithfully used as the bearers of whatever ministry God gives to the gathered Friends.

This summary was written by Kody Hersh, who is a member of Miami Monthly Meeting and serves on the Youth Ministries Committee of FGC.

Lisa Rand
My aspiration is to be conscious of God throughout my day, every day.  Meanwhile, times of intentional worship, with Friends and on my own, help me to cultivate this consciousness.

 

In the 16th century, Hindu poet Mirabai wrote a beautiful phrase that captures a sense of my experience of worship:  “The energy that holds up mountains is the energy I bow to.”  When I sit in the meetinghouse or in my home, and try to open the ears of my heart to hear Spirit, I am connecting with my life energy.  It makes me feel grateful, humble, and connected to the rest of creation.  The life energy that is in me is also in my neighbor, in the grass, in the mountains.  When I pay attention to this reality, I am filled with awe and reverence for my Creator, the source of this life energy.

 

Worship can potentially occur in any time and place where we are filled with wonder and love for something larger than ourselves.  For me, some worship takes place in silence and physical stillness, while other worship involves movement and sound.  

 

Since the natural world triggers a sense of wonder in me, walks outdoors are an important part of my personal worship.  These walks refresh me, and I have found that refreshment to be an important spiritual tool.  When stress is minimized, I am more likely to be able to deeply listen to others, to be fully present to others, and to respond as my best self.           

 

My first experience that felt like true worship caught me off guard, for it came at a time when I had lost my faith and was feeling rather agnostic.  I was singing “Kyrie eleison” in a school chorus.  I felt awestruck that our Creator gave us the ability to discover music, and bodies that could produce these sounds.  When we sang, the physical spaces between our bodies blurred; my voice joined and danced with the others.  We were one body, in true communion.  I learned that even in times when we feel lost or spiritually dry, worship—in whatever form speaks to us—can help us to cultivate awe and reverence.

 

When we come together to worship as Friends, part of the beauty for me is that our different conceptions of God do not change our ability to come together and drink from a living stream, to come together and connect with Spirit, to come together to fill our wells of wonder and love.  

 

Lisa Rand is a member of Unami Meeting (Philadelphia Yearly Meeting).  She has worked at Friends Journal and at Friends schools.  Lisa writes, teaches yoga, and plays with her family on their small organic farm.              

 

 

Greg Woods
"For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst."- Matthew 18:20

My deepest experiences with worship, when I have felt totally immersed with the Holy Spirit, have happened when I have been worshiping amongst a group of people. I remember once being out in South Dakota and a group of us met for silent worship after a long workday. During the worship, we witnessed an amazing sunset and animals in the wild. Another time I sat in worship for ten hours with a group of peers discerning clerks for the next year's FGC High School Gathering. When we left the room, it had felt like only an hour had passed.

 

When I try to pray while I am alone, it is a difficult experience, I cannot keep focused, I feel antsy, but when I am in worship sharing the Holy Communion with fellow Friends, it is much easier to explore the Divine. This is why I love the above Bible passage from the Book of Matthew, because worship is a way to strengthen bonds within a community while seeking Divine guidance. This is why Friends have always placed a great emphasis on community a part of the religion

 

In thinking about my experiences in worship, I have realized that a majority of my deepest worship experiences have happened outside of a regular meeting for worship at monthly meeting. These experiences have happened at conferences, retreats, or occasions when I have gathered with a small group for potluck and worship. Recently I reflected on this with a small group of Friends, I realized, during our discussion, that in regular First Day meeting for worship, we let time break the silence, instead of the Holy Spirit, as early Friends did. Instead, we say that we are open to worshiping together only for an hour on the morning of First Day, no matter what God is calling to us to do together. Instead, we should listen for God's guidance for when we should end.

 

The difference is at conferences and retreats we generally have more opportunities to gather for worship over the weekend or during the week. Before we meet in worship at those events, we have prepared ourselves. On First Days, we might have spent the morning reading the newspaper, listening to NPR or doing something other than preparing ourselves for worship. I know that before going to meeting, I have usually read the front section of the Washington Post, which doesn’t prepare me to worship, because my mind usually becomes focused on whatever I read that morning, like politics or which famous person was seen around the city.

 

Quakerism is a unique religion. Our religion was founded on the basis that each person can have a direct relationship with God and each of us can be called by the Holy Spirit to give messages to the gathered community. The religion has changed in many ways in the last 350 years, but this element remains a key part of worship. I have no concrete answers on how to directly address how we find more time for worship, but I think if we try to operate more on God's time, instead of manmade time, we can improve the spiritual depth of our regular First Days.

 

Greg Woods, a member of Columbia Monthly Meeting in Missouri, now attends Friends Meeting of Washington. When he isn't working as the Coordinator of Washington Quaker Workcamps at the William Penn House, he can be found attending demolition derbies or monster truck rallies.

 

Mary Crauderueff
In my experience as a Quaker, speaking out of the silence during meeting was something that as a child I wanted to do, as a teenager I was intimidated by, and as a young adult I have started to actually do.  It was not until I was 20 years-old, after returning from a life-changing conference (the World Gathering of Young Friends 2005) that I finally did so.  For me, knowing that I need to rise and speak comes from the literal shaking that I get sitting in meeting for worship.  I often put it back down, but if the quaking is persistent enough, I know that God has a message not only for me, but for the whole meeting.  As an unprogrammed Friend, I learned that one does not bring anything into meeting with the intent to speak - one's message should come from God during that sacred time.  However, over the years, as I’ve listened to and been a part of other worship services, I have come to realize that words brought to a service can be just as powerful as those that arise during the silent worship hour.  Until almost exactly a year ago, I never thought those words could be mine.

 

I was asked to write an introduction of unprogrammed meeting for worship for the young adult Friends conference in Richmond, Indiana in May 2008. During the course of the conference, it became clear that what I had originally written was not going to be adequate enough to convey what I wanted. Throughout the weekend there were many worship times and other spaces where I felt God, and his Spirit moving through the conference. Although I enjoyed the other worship services, I felt discouraged that when we had silent times, they were not treated the way I felt unprogrammed worship should be.

 

On the last morning of the conference, I went into the worship time ready to do the introduction for unprogrammed worship like I am used to, as a former stage manager. As we settled into silence, however, I felt a quaking inside of me. Part of what I knew I needed to say was not going to be easy, and I was scared. A lot of work had been accomplished by the group during the course of the weekend. I did not want to take anything away with offending Friends in my introduction. As I prepared to stand, God shook me. I stood ready to speak, shaking, and as I started to read, tears flowed down my face. I am not used to having a message that was already written down be, or become, a message from God. Although the worship time was short, as I settled in after my message, I could tell that there had been a shift in the tone of the worship.

To read Mary’s introduction to unprogrammed meeting for worship, click on the attachment below.

Mary is a member of Radnor Meeting (Philadelphia Yearly Meeting) and a recent graduate of the University of Maryland's iSchool with a specialization in Archives and Records Management.  She has many Quaker-focused research interests, recently including Quaker blogs as an extension of Quaker Journals and the role of Quaker children's book in guiding Quaker identity.

 

Share your thoughts on the articles or the topic by commenting below!

 

What is Quaker Quest?
Quaker Quest is a program that explores how Quakerism is a simple, radical, and contemporary spiritual path for our time. Quaker Quest offers Friends an opportunity to articulate their faith, deepen relationships within their meeting/church, and share their spiritual stories with the larger community.

The public Quaker Quest sessions are structured gatherings for people interested in learning about Quakerism.  As part of the public Quaker Quest sessions, three people from a Quaker meeting share from the heart about their experiences on a particular topic.  These presentations are prepared in advance and include brief quotes from Faith and Practice or other resources.  Presenters mostly share stories that illuminate their journeys around the topic.  

For information on Quaker Quest, email quak..reveal emai..reveal email..@fgcquaker.org or call 215-561-1700. Quaker Quest in the US and Canada is a project of Friends General Conference http://www.fgcquaker.org/quakerquest/organizers.

Kody Hersh  At our annual sessions in the spring of 2006, my yearly meeting, Southeastern, wrestled for the second year in a row with the issue of our membership in Friends United Meeting. The body of about 150 Friends who were gathered there labored late into the night on our last evening together, struggling for a unity that evaded us. As midnight approached, only a few Friends left to go to bed. Most stayed, yawning but intently focused. We are fierce, we SEYM Friends, and we are passionate. We have a burning thirst for justice, and a deep love and respect for our LGBTQ members. We also have a broad theological spectrum among us as individuals, and an equally deep love and respect for those-- mostly Christian-identified-- Friends who draw support, sustenance, and affirmation from our FUM affiliation.

 

 
    We finally crafted a minute that was cautiously and wearily approved in the wee hours of the morning. It stated that we would lay down our formal membership in Friends United Meeting for a discernment period of two years. At the end of those two years, if we did not find unity to rejoin, our affiliation would be permanently laid down. That was two years ago-- which means that at this April's annual sessions, we will revisit the issue once again, and presumably make a more-or-less-final decision.

 

 
    To say that this has been weighing on me doesn't quite communicate the extent of my preoccupation. I have been worried, frightened, frustrated, and deeply concerned about this issue for the entirety of the past two years. Then, last week, the presiding clerk of FUM's general board circulated a letter he had received from the superintendents of five large, fairly conservative FUM-affiliated yearly meetings in the United States, referring to "current undercurrents [in FUM] that erode unity and undercut important ministry" and requesting that the board form an immediate, specific plan for confronting those issues. Since reading that letter, I have all but stopped sleeping.

 

 
    When I lie awake at night-- thinking about this unsettlingly ambiguous letter, about my beloved yearly meeting, about Friends United Meeting as a whole-- I often find myself writing letters and scripting conversations in my mind. In these imaginary communications, I explain to Southeastern Yearly Meeting, my Quaker family, why I, a transgender, queer, unprogrammed young adult Friend who couldn't talk un-ironically about Jesus until I was almost out of high school, am aching for us to maintain our relationship with Friends United Meeting.

 

 
    First, let me say that this position is a huge transformation from what I originally felt and thought when our FUM membership became a live issue. As a queer person who has experienced a vocational call to religious service, FUM's personnel policy seemed to me not only wrong in a general, moral sense, but also personally painful. I didn't see much reason to stay in an organization with such a discriminatory policy-- particularly since, as far as I could see, we didn't have much of a relationship to begin with. Growing up in SEYM, I was unaware for years that such a thing as programmed Friends or Friends United Meeting existed-- despite the fact that they constitute the majority of Quakers in the world today. I was shocked when, probably in my mid-teens, I discovered that my ultra-liberal yearly meeting was actually a member of Friends United Meeting. It didn't make any sense to me, mostly because I was embedded in the "us and them" mentality of a culture, in Quakerism and beyond it, that sees Christianity as a monolithic entity of socially-conservative fundamentalism.

 

 
    The deconstruction of those us/them categories is one of the reasons I long for us to have a fully engaged relationship with Friends United Meeting. As long as we are members of FUM, they (Christians, programmed Friends-- whoever) cannot be "the other." If we begin to think of them that way, our illusion will be shattered by the individual relationships that are facilitated by institutional affiliation. I don't mean to say that our cultural and theological differences across branches are superficial; I believe them in most cases to be quite profound. But over the past few years, I have made some wonderful connections with Friends from solely-FUM-affiliated meetings, and I have seen that they are my spiritual kin. They are people like Terri, the wonderful, warm staff person whom FUM has sent to our annual sessions for the past three years, who has become a beloved part of our community. Or like my friend Cheryl, who is in a committed lesbian partnership and has labored for years with her FUM-affiliated yearly meeting to have them endorse the recording that her monthly meeting has given her as a minister. Or like my friend Betsy, who loves Jesus, preaches like wildfire, and just opened a store in her town dedicated to eco-friendly living. FUM, like Christianity as a whole, is far from being a monolith-- but we will never know that if we don't maintain meaningful individual and collective relationships within it.

 

 
    But wait-- we have lots of Christians in our yearly meeting! We can learn these lessons from them, right? Which brings me to my next point. I had no idea how theologically diverse my yearly meeting was, until we started talking about our relationship to Friends United Meeting. I don't think this is a coincidence. Our discernment process has asked deep questions: Who are we, in SEYM? What do we believe? What language do we/should we use? Is Christianity a part of our identity as Friends, and if not, what is our relationship to a Quaker movement that has seen itself through several centuries as primitive/restorationist Christianity? Simply having these questions posed, and held firmly in our collective consciousness, opened up space for Friends in our yearly meeting to speak their most authentic spiritual language. Suddenly we were talking about the Bible, asking each other about Jesus. I experienced a new depth and richness in our worship, as we became more comfortable hearing each other's truth spoken on its own terms. It was struggle that pushed us to be more honest with one another, and I fear that, should we decide to give up on the challenge of authentic relationship with FUM, we will slowly go back to the way things were. Our spiritual language will shrink back to a tight, sterilized collection of un-offensive words.

 

 
    So... what about the personnel policy? We were advised early on in our discernment process that we should not choose to remain affiliated with FUM in order to change the policy. To carry such an agenda would only frustrate us, and everyone else in the organization. The personnel policy is not changing anytime soon-- not with the level of divisiveness that this issue currently carries in U.S. yearly meetings, nor with long-overdue efforts to more fully include African Friends in FUM's governance structures. But I believe that it will change, sooner or later. Sooner, if the Friends serving on the general board are given opportunities for loving, non-confrontational fellowship and service with LGBTQ Friends and their allies. Later, if we all leave. Hearts and minds change through relationship, not rhetoric. No one will re-evaluate the personnel policy because we withdraw. They might re-evaluate the personnel policy because we stay, and appoint brave and faithful people to the general board who can be open about their identity as LGBTQ or allied while focusing their attention and energy on FUM's powerful service work (instead of pushing, or being perceived as pushing, an agenda that detracts from that work). There are already people doing this work of transformation-- serving openly on the board or in leadership positions in constituent yearly meetings, sometimes without ever mentioning the personnel policy directly.

 

 
    And the work of FUM is worth being involved in. Having heard from those who are serving as staff and volunteers of its various initiatives, I have come to believe that FUM is doing important, transformative, and faithful work in culturally sensitive ways, and that work needs to continue as long as we are clear that God is leading us to it and it has relevance for those served. From educational and medical initiatives like Kaimosi Hospital and Ramallah Friends' School, to support for Kenyan Friends' peace initiatives over the past year, the work that I see FUM engaged in is, I believe, part of what Friends are called to in the world. Unlike Friends General Conference, which understands its purpose as service to North American Quakerism, FUM is committed to manifesting Quaker faith through an embodied, outward-focused commitment to a transformed world. The work is powerful and precious.

 

 
    Finally, I hope you will forgive me if I pull a card (to use a rather un-Quakerly metaphor). It is the card of youth.

 

 
    There is a broad, and I think growing, movement of Friends who are drawn to, and deeply invested in, cross-branch relationship building. Much of this energy is centered in young adult Quaker communities. My generation-- or at least, a large and energized subset of it-- is not interested or invested in the kind of isolationism at best, spiritual one-upmanship at worst, that has characterized intra-faith Quaker relationships since we started splitting into factions in the first half of the nineteenth century. We have been holding conferences and gatherings that reach across theological, cultural, and organizational lines. We are also holding a question in our hearts: How is God going to use the Religious Society of Friends... the whole Religious Society of Friends? Is there some vision, some wholeness, to live into?

 

 
    Personally, I see each of the branches of Friends carrying a piece of the original message of the Quaker movement-- and a piece of Quakerism's potential for a spiritually vibrant future. I believe that everything we do to create and maintain authentic, deep relationships among the different branches of Friends is a step toward a more vital Quakerism. Because I carry this conviction, I am proud to be from a dually-affiliated yearly meeting-- and sad and scared that we may cease to be one, and others may follow in our wake. I wouldn't be so invested-- or experiencing such anxious insomnia-- if I didn't think this is a critical historical moment for Friends. What one yearly meeting does for unity or disunity in a single meeting for worship with attention to business can affect Quakerism for centuries to come-- just pick up a Quaker history book and trace the impact of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting annual sessions in 1827, the year of the Hicksite-Orthodox split.

 

 
    I want to live out the next 60-70 (God willing) years of my life in a Quakerism that is committed to deep seeking, to dialogue, to relationships that challenge the people who are in them. I want to give that to my children and grandchildren. Long after the personnel policy is a dead issue, the fruit of our commitment to dynamic engagement, fellowship, and spiritual bridge-building (or the absence of that commitment) will be manifesting in the quality and vibrancy of religious life in Quakerism. It is to that ultimate goal that I hope we will turn our attention and focused discernment.

Dear Young Adult Friends and Leaders of Young Adult Friends,

 

Do you want to intentionally create a local community structure for Young Adult or Student Friends in your area?

Do you wish there were more roles for leadership for the younger generations? In connection to that, do you wish there were more ways for younger generations to engage our elders and cherish their experience and wisdom?

Do you want to engage and work with the wider Faith-based community on issues of social justice, community-cohesion, and peacemaking?

Do you wish to do more to share Quakerism with the world, and to strengthen your own Quaker identity?

Do you wish there were a network that would help you communicate among Friends of your generation to assert your collective voice and take collective action?

 

The letter below goes into detail about an opportunity to pursue an engagement with the WSCF, the oldest international student/young adult organization in the world. It is an opportunity to start something for Young Adult and Student Friends that could be considered a Quaker Student Movement. If people were inspired to try and build this among our generation, community by community, it has the possibility to address the concerns raised by the questions above.

 

WHO I AMStephen Dotson
My name is Stephen and all I want is to present this idea to Friends and see where it goes. I am a convinced Friend since 1997, a member of Goose Creek Friends Meeting of Baltimore Yearly Meeting (FGC & FUM) and a 2006 graduate from Guilford College and the QLSP program. Through my time there I became familiar with the rich history of the Religious Society of Friends and the practices of early Friends. Also at Guilford, I grew appreciative of the diversity among Friends and the building energy among younger generations to work across this diversity. We are eager to see it as a Blessing and not a burden, and found there are just as many older Friends who share that Spirit and energy.

 

After graduating from Guilford I became fascinated with how Young Adult Friends are asserting their Quaker principles, processes, and vocabulary to manage the challenges that the transition out of college brings. The last year and half I've been researching and interviewing YAFs to better understand and Witness to their journeys into adulthood. Through this endeavor and my attendance at the North American YAF gathering and QUIP's (Quakers United in Publication) annual gathering, I became aware of the vibrant welling-up of Spirit and Ministry that Friends of younger generations possess. By this work I have also intentionally built a large personal network of YAFs and people who work closely with YAFs.

 

Just after returning from the North American YAF conference in Richmond, Indiana I received an email from a Friend suggesting that I apply to be a Steward to the World Student Christian Federation's Global Assembly. I knew nothing of this organization and neither did any of my friends and mentors. After researching and deciding it was congruent with my values, I wrote an application fueled by the eager Spirit that was abound at the North American YAF gathering. I felt I had no chance at obtaining one of the few spots they offer, so I also felt I had nothing to lose and really put my heart into it. In June, I received an email congratulating me on my acceptance to the Global Assembly as a Steward. I was shocked, and unsure of what that would mean, what exactly this organization was, etc., but with the aid of my monthly meeting I went and found out.

 

Now I find myself in a position of being a connector. I have seen the tools that the WSCF offers, I am aware of the opportunities my generation is seeking, and I have clear access to the networks on both sides of this possible relationship. I have never had such a clear and sobering Leading as to write the following piece.

 

We have witnessed a hunger in this rising generation. We have witnessed a willingness to worship and work together amidst difficulties, and despite differences. In my peers and in myself, I see an eagerness to serve Love, Faith, and Community that has few avenues for full expression. We have witnessed an eagerness to speak Truth to power. We have witnessed a desire to build intergenerational connections, but few opportunities. We are interested in these relationships because we're aware of the truth: we can't know where we're going if we don't know where we have been. We have also seen how Quakerism's insular nature can produce in-fighting, and perhaps more seriously, often fails to engage the larger community of Faith and share the gems and tools that our Faith has produced. We are a shrinking tradition because of these boundaries, but we are a vibrant and inspired generation.

 

I am writing this letter today because I have found something that I hold to be a vital opportunity for the rising generations of Quakers, a tool that could help address those needs and concerns.

 

My aim is not to take credit for anything that comes out of this, but to be a catalyst, a spark. I am Called to equip Friends with more tools for deepening their relationship with each other, the world, and God. We have all seen instances where Friends turn their deeds, words, gifts, and leadership into badges that adorn their pride and ego, but I want to be explicit in asking you all to hold me and each other accountable to serving Spirit as we approach leadership within the Religious Society of Friends.

 

Below there are sections entitled:
-WHAT IT IS
-HOW IT MAY SPEAK TO OUR CONDITION
-HOW WE MIGHT MOVE FORWARD

WHAT IT IS
This August I spent 3 weeks of my summer in Montreal working with the World Student Christian Federation at their global assembly. Briefly stated, the organization is an ecumenical, grassroots-based organization of different student/young adult communities enacting their beliefs around social justice, humanitarian, and peace issues from the basis of Christian-rooted Faith. It emphasizes local community engagement with a perspective for global concerns. They believe in putting faith in to action in the context of autonomous community-based groups that communicate and congregate occasionally in national, regional, and global gatherings. Not all members are Christians, and not all members are still students, but the name remains.

 

2008 WSCF Stewards

The WSCF is the oldest international student organization in the world and was the starting point of the World Council of Churches. It has been a critical link between people of Faith, all over the world for over 100 years. It was one of the last channels of communication between war-torn Germany and America during WWII, used by Dietrich Bonhoeffer to inform his colleagues at Union Theological Seminary in New York of the full extent of Nazi atrocities. It has been the facilitating organization for countless dialogues of cease-fire, peace-making, and relief work on the local level. On the global level it's international office in is Geneva and it consults with the U.N. and various global aid organizations. Here are some useful links to familiarize yourself with the organization:

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Student_Christian_Federation
http://www.wscfglobal.org/news.php
http://www.wscfglobal.org/wscfInAction.php

 

Not many people have heard of this organization because the WSCF hasn't been around in North America for the last 40 years. In 1968, the members that made up the North American region were convinced that by participating in "the institution" of the WSCF they were part of the problem (remember, 1968 = hippies). They proceeded to vote themselves out of existence, and in the 40-year absence of an organization for progressive Christian/spiritual young people, the "religious right" (I use this term for lack of a better one) has super-organized and re-shaped Christianity in America.

 

In 2005 the North American Region was restarted and the Canadian Student Christian Movement was formed. Luciano Kovacs was made Secretary of the region at that time and describes the region as follows:

 

Members of the WSCF-North America (WSCF-NA) are called together in a common cause of ending injustice and oppression through grassroots and student-led activism. We seek to live out the vision of our Christian faith while supporting ecumenism and diversity in spiritual practices. The North American Region is set to re-emerge as a vibrant, functioning entity of the WSCF and to take its place in the continuing struggle for liberation and justice for all peoples. We are non-dogmatic and are accepting of diverse spiritual backgrounds, ethnicities, sexual and gender identities and economic situations.

 

The weekend of January 30th, 2009 there will be a conference in San Francisco to discuss how movements will be started and organized in the United States. If Friends are so moved as to become involved, this is the event that you should attend. At this event we could determine how we would want the (hypothetical) Quaker Student Movement to be structured, we would bring our concerns and our leadings from our home Meetings (yearly and monthly). This would be the beginning of intentionally structuring communities and local leadership among Young Quakers that could span the branches, and involve Quakers in the re-invention of a United States coalition of progressive Christian/spiritual young people. Simply put: it is all up for discussion, and we can’t have a voice if we don’t come to the table.

 

HOW THIS MAY SPEAK TO OUR CONDITION
This organization could provide us with a framework to intentionally develop Young Adult Friends and Quaker Student communities on the local level, and network them with other local YAF and QS communities across the nation. There would be leadership opportunities widely available for those so Moved as to try and organize their community. These are just my own ideas, others are welcomed.

 

With these leadership positions for our generation would come opportunities to engage the wisdom of our elders and ask for their complementary support. It is my sense that an endeavor such as this can only be successful if it is supported on the local community level by our elders. By this I mean that any organizer/clerk of a local unit of the (hypothetical) Quaker Student Movement would be asked to have a support committee of elders AND one particular Mentoring Friend. Moreover, there would be no threat to the current leaders in our communities (who are now living and staying in positions of leadership longer than ever before) because this organization is somewhat outside the structures of the yearly meetings, conferences, etc. In my eyes, this is a huge asset as it provides us the opportunity and flexibility to do things and exercise voice in a way that those other organizations can't, to work together in spite of differences that have pushed those organizations apart, and both challenge the larger community and be tempered by its wisdom.

 

Also, already existing in the WSCF is a body of older (mostly former-WSCF members) who are referred to as "senior friends"! They range from 35 to 100 years of age and have their own conferences and assemblies to complement the work of the WSCF with their wisdom, networking, and fundraising. They draw tremendous energy from bearing witness to the work of young adults and staying current with the pressing needs of their communities and the world.

 

In this way it could help us tie Young Adult communities closer to the existing Friends meetings and churches in their locality, which all too often lack roles or relevance for Young Adult Friends. Lastly, as a student organization, high-school students (Young Friends) can participate also, which helps increase the participation and engagement between generations and ensures the continuation of the community structure. Newell Pledger-Shinn put it very aptly when he told me that, "The last thing we need is an isolated young adult ghetto that fails to draw youth up as teens or fails to look both backwards and forwards, as people age but don't change in their essential thirsts and hungers for spiritual food."

 

If Young Adult Friends became involved in this organization, we could have a structure for upcoming generations to assert collective voice for common causes and values that transcend the differences among Friends. We could have a network to communicate between different local Young Adult and Student communities around the United States. It would also help us engage the wider ecumenical community and provide opportunities to Witness to the power of Quaker principles and processes. Undoubtedly, we would attract some new people to Quakerism through such Witness.

 

It can strengthen our sense of identity as Quakers by living our Quakerism out in the larger context of the faith-based world. By my experience in the General Assembly I became more and more aware of what unique empowerment Quakerism offers and better understood how to be Quaker "in the world" and the ways it guides me to not be "of the world". It helped me further understand and own my Quaker identity and unique approach to the God/Christian gospel, by exposing me to what else is out there.

 

I'm sure the emphasis on Christian identity may challenge some of my fellow FGCers and non-theist Friends, but I would point out that this organization understands how complex and personal our relationships with God are in this day and age. Quakers are welcome to participate in this organization because we are a tradition that has grown forth from Christian roots, not because all Quakers are Christian, or use Christian language. This organization is about empowering young people to live out what they believe not telling them what to believe. The diversity of people I encountered there at the general assembly reflected a spectrum of belief and spiritual vocabulary just as diverse as that of Quakerism. It's not a place where people are saying: "wow isn't it great that we're all Christians and good people and can get along in spite of our differences", it's a place where people were saying: "Look how differently we interpret and live out our communion with God revelations! Let's see how our diverse sets of tools from differing interpretations of this relationship with (Christ, Light, God, Spirit, Creator, Liberator, etc.) might better the world in fundamental and profound ways."

 

HOW WE MIGHT MOVE FORWARD
As I mentioned earlier, there is a conference that will be the jumpstart of the United States region in San Francisco the weekend of Jan. 30th. If Friends feel a Leading to start and organize a local community unit of Quaker Students/Young Adults in their area, then I would suggest they come to this conference, contact me for more information (swil...@gmail.com).

 

I have also thought that it might be helpful for Friends to seek the embrace of their monthly meeting to attend the conference, and this would come in the form of a travelling minute. Any other thoughts are encouraged and welcomed.

Short of coming to the conference, if Friends wanted to support the concept and birth of this structure, I think the first step would be to put the word out in your monthly meeting, in your circles of Friends (both digital and analog) expressing a desire for something like this to be made real. If you can't go, encourage someone in your meeting that might be able to and whom you could envision taking on the role of organizer and servant leader for your community. Perhaps, encourage your meeting to help by financing someone to go.

 

Thank you for listening. And please help spread the word!

Hey Friends,

Some of you may have heard about this book that's coming out soon, but if not, check out the info below for ways to get involved. Peace, Emily

The new Moral Economy Project website explains its history and Quaker connections. Our book, written by an international Quaker team, Right Relationship: Building a Whole Earth Economy (forthcoming 2009) suggests a number of global governance measures to meet the threat of climate change, as well as a radical revisioning of economics to make it serve humanit and the biosphere. But it is an invitation to dialogue rather than a prescription handed down by aging white experts from the developed countries. We deem it essential to listen -- to what youth, women, aboriginal peoples and the cultures/faiths of the entire world need to tell us.

We invite YF and YAF to make suggestions for a worldwide environmental/peace/sustainable development network, and to exchange information about community projects and local actions. An online forum for these exchanges, with possibility for many languages, has been created at http://groups.takingitglobal.org/TMEE. Once you register with this site, you will not only have access to the forum, but also to many other youth groups worldwide (online, face-to-face, local and regional) with similar aims.

Many of you have internet skills. If you have suggestions for improving our networking, using other internet resources, and making the voices of the world heard, please post them on the TMEE forum. We will be delighted to work with you.

You may also contribute to our blog Towards a Moral Economy and to the wiki Building a Culture of Peace. Though intended for Friends, these are open to all people of goodwill.

If you have any further questions or suggestions, please contact Grace at Gra...@moraleconomy.org

 

Andrew Esser-HainesThe below is a part of a letter sent during my work in La Paz Bolivia, it references my experiences in an evangelical Quaker Church in the city of La Paz in which I was asked to share a personal testimonial in preparation to preach to the congregation.

Fourth month twenty fifth day two thousand and second year.

...As for this past Sunday and giving my testimonial in church there is much that I could say. What feels most present is to say that I felt like I was giving a performance (which is basically what I was asked to do). It was not giving a message, and I hope that when I do get the opportunity to serve as pastor it will be more spirit led. That said, it felt really good to share openly about my spiritual journey. I have found that one of the great things here is that I do not feel any need of being accepted and for that reason I feel much more comfortable going ahead and laying out ALL of my belief system, talking about Jesus and about social work, about following God and about interpreting scripture. I feel like most times in the US I hold back some pieces because I am worried of what people might think.