Friends General Conference 2004 Annual Report

Stretching in Faithfulness

“Our experience has been that spiritual gifts are not distributed with regard to sexual orientation or gender identity. Our experience has been that our Gatherings and Central Committee work have been immeasurably enriched over the years by the full participation and Spirit-guided leadership of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer Friends. We will never go back to silencing those voices or suppressing those gifts. Our experience confirms that we are all equal before God, as God made us, and we feel blessed to be engaged in the work of FGC together.”

— Approved by FGC Central Committee, October 2004

“The basis for discernment is that we have given ourselves wholly to God, so that our minds might be renewed and our whole being transformed.”

— Lloyd Lee Wilson, Essays on the Quaker Vision of Gospel Order

The past year at Friends General Conference has been one of discernment, of striving toward faithfulness in our work and mission. Turning ourselves, and our work, wholly over to God is not easy, but we have moved forward trusting that Divine Light is illuminating the path on which we are led.

In our efforts to be faithful, we have stretched ourselves to name and reach for new goals. We have wrestled for direction and made difficult decisions on controversial matters. We have continued to serve Friends daily, believing that our work makes a difference in individual lives and in the life of our meetings.

Early in 2004, FGC’s Executive Committee received out of worship a minute concerning our experience with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer Friends. The truth and power of that minute struck all present and continued to live in us throughout the year. In October, FGC’s Central Committee affirmed this minute (see text above) as true of its experience and decided to send it with an epistle to our affiliated yearly meetings.

While unity in the bodies of Executive and Central Committees came powerfully, we recognize that Friends in North America and the world are not in unity regarding their experience of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer Friends. While we labor to make the Religious Society of Friends a place where all may be welcomed as God made them, we also mourn for our Quaker and non-Quaker brothers and sisters whose faith communities are being rent by this issue.

In the area of religious education, FGC is also stretching to meet emerging needs among Friends. This year, FGC launched a new free publication, REsources for the Journey, which provides meetings with new resources for racial justice work in religious education. We also undertook a comprehensive survey to assess the religious education needs of meetings and worship groups.

“The FGConnections on “Friends and Clerking” was outstanding. We have been passing my issue around our small meeting.... Any chance you could send me a half dozen copies?”

— Sharon Hoover, Herndon MM, Baltimore YM

FGC’s publishing arm, Quaker Press of FGC, continues to seek new ways to meet the needs of Friends and meetings. For many years, FGC has provided training for clerks through workshops at our Annual Gatherings and other venues. In the spring of 2004, FGC published one of its best-received issues of FGConnections, one concentrating on “Friends & Clerking.” Encouraged by the enthusiasm with which it was met, we entered into a contract with Arthur Larrabee, leader of countless clerking workshops, to prepare and publish a handbook on clerking. We look forward to the publication of this important resource.

Also this year, FGC began a new Monthly Meeting Contact Program that is changing the way we communicate with monthly meetings. FGC Monthly Meeting Contacts receive four focused mailings of information on FGC services and programs throughout each year and share them with appropriate committees and individuals in their meetings. Contacts also serve to communicate concerns and suggestions from their meetings to FGC. During this initial year, we have recruited volunteer contacts in more than 160 meetings. We’re striving to have a contact in each of the 600 FGC monthly meetings.

Laboring to be Faithful

FGC has experienced the Spirit calling us to labor slowly and carefully to discern the work we are being called to do. Some of this work has involved tender concerns held by individuals and has required much prayer and worship to bring us to a place of unity.

One such decision requiring faithful discernment involved reconsideration of our earlier (2003) decision to hold the 2005 Gathering in Blacksburg, Virginia. In May 2004, we learned that the Virginia legislature had adopted a particularly draconian “defense of marriage” act, which would threaten the legal rights of lesbian and gay couples attending the Gathering. After much shared worship, prayer, and discussion, FGC and Friends for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Concerns became clear that God is calling us to Virginia and that we will go in witness.

A different sort of discernment was required when deciding to hold the 2006 Gathering in North Pacific Yearly Meeting. This will be the first Gathering west of Oklahoma, and also our first time in a yearly meeting that is not affiliated with FGC. There are some risks, financial and otherwise, in making such a bold move and FGC spent several years finding clearness. We have been buoyed by the extensive support we have received and we believe that our faithfulness in going west will bear great fruits of the Spirit.

As part of our corporate discernment process, we created a Long Term Plan for 2004–2009. During 2004, we labored together to develop priorities and discern how we are called to implement them. In order to accomplish this, a small Operational Planning Subcommittee has been working with all FGC committees to develop an operational plan.

One indication of FGC’s care in discerning how we are truly led was Central Committee’s decision to take an entire year to discern the proper use of a $2.4 million bequest received in September. We know the question is not “how to spend this money,” but “how should we use this extraordinary gift to support the work of the Spirit and in line with the priorities of our new Long Term Plan?”

Controversial Decision Cancels Workshop at 2004 Gathering For several years, FGC has been engaged in a tender and painful process of discernment about Quaker Sweat Lodge workshops at the Gathering. These Gathering workshops have been transforming spiritual events for many Young Friends during the past decade. However, some Friends have carried concerns that these events, which incorporate major elements of Native American religious practices, are inherently disrespectful and deeply offensive to many Native Americans.        This past year, a Wampanoag community in Massachusetts conveyed its outrage to FGC over plans to hold Quaker Sweat Lodges at the Gathering. A difficult and painful process ultimately led to the cancellation of the Sweat Lodge at the 2004 Gathering. Three FGC committees — Long Range Conference Planning, Ministry & Nurture, and the Committee for Ministry on Racism-have labored with this issue, seeking to embrace our young people and the Sweat Lodge leaders while listening deeply to the hurt and anger of some of our Native American sisters and brothers.        We have not yet reached clearness about the long-term future of these Quaker Sweat Lodges, and we ask Friends to hold everyone in prayer.

Serving in Faithfulness

Our faithful service does not pause while we are discerning new directions. The stories of the Friends we serve help us recall the reasons for our ministry.

Making Friends Visible

Booktables from QuakerBooks

“For many years, I took book tables from FGC to my quarterly meeting. . . . Now, once a year, I choose six or seven different monthly meetings and just visit them, one weekend after another. I really enjoy seeing the different meetings and introducing Friends to books.”

— Bob Horvay, Mickleton MM, Philadelphia YM

QuakerBooks of FGC offers the widest variety of books and materials for Friends of any bookstore in North America. In 2004, more than 5,500 orders were filled. Many Friends purchased Quaker materials at more than 60 book tables supplied by QuakerBooks and run by monthly meetings.

Our website, www.QuakerFinder.org, has been instrumental in helping seekers to locate nearby meetings and to prepare to attend meeting for worship. We have heard stories from Friends who welcomed visitors who came to them via QuakerFinder.org.

For instance, a Friend from Winston- Salem Worship Group in North Carolina wrote:

“In August 2003, I announced our new worship group through QuakerFinder.org. We were very small at first. Over time I have received many calls from interested persons who found my number on< your website. We are now about to outgrow our morning worship space—a happy turn of events.”

Several technical changes this past year have made the QuakerFinder.org website easier to find on the Internet and have tripled its daily usage!

FGC is now preparing to launch a new component of QuakerFinder.org that will help isolated Friends find others interested in Quaker worship. The new QuakerFinder.org component will enable individuals to register in a protected database and then locate nearby isolated Friends for worship and fellowship. FGC is prepared to support these Friends in establishing new worship groups.

Connecting Friends Across the Miles

The Traveling Ministries Program has completed its sixth year of providing opportunities for service by seasoned Friends to individuals and meetings throughout the United States and Canada. The Traveling Ministries Coordinator works with volunteers and meetings to help arrange visits. Seasoned Friends with gifts of ministry travel with a companion in ministry, listening with care to the experiences of their hosts and then, as led by the Spirit, seeking to speak to their condition. This valuable program is beneficial to travelers and meetings alike. Traveling Friends, seeking to be faithful to their leadings, help meetings feel more connected with each other and the Divine. Moving from place to place, they are nurtured in the Spirit by those they visit and find fellowship with others also called to travel. This year the Traveling Ministries Program sponsored a retreat for Friends traveling in the ministry and a consultation on traveling in the ministry for representatives from the FGC yearly meetings.

FGC offered many events during 2004. The Annual Gathering of Friends in Amherst, Massachusetts drew 1,700 Friends from across the continent. Smaller events, including the Religious Educators Institute and the Annual Young Quakes Conference, attracted groups of 35 to 100 Friends.

FGC focused particular attention on connecting unprogrammed and programmed Friends in affiliated yearly meetings in 2004. In order to serve the pastoral meetings within FGC better, we have begun sending pairs of Friends to visit pastoral meetings in New England and New York Yearly Meetings.

Telling Our Stories

Quaker Press of FGC makes Friends visible through the printed word. Its most popular publication of 2004, Lives That Speak, tells the stories of seventeen 20th-century Friends and their individual witnesses of faith. The book has struck a chord with multigenerational audiences throughout the Religious Society of Friends. Editor Marnie Clark says:

“This book was a labor of love, a five-year project with the Religious Education Committee of FGC. We felt that today’s Quaker children heard a lot about the early Quakers like George Fox, but that they did not know much about current Quakers and how their lives speak their values in today’s world.... The youth in my meeting have responded to these modern stories with a lot of enthusiasm.”

Friends General Conference Financial Statement