News and Resources from the FGC Religious Education Committee
Issue 9 / Spring 2005
In this Issue:
The Nurture of Women in Salem (NJ) Quarterly Meeting, by Mary Waddington
Aboard the Wodehouse curricula review by Jason Stacy
Helping Prepare Children and Teenagers for Quaker Worship, by Margaret Katranides
Review of Lives That Speak, by Ian Graham
And More!
The Nurture of Women in Salem (NJ) Quarterly Meeting
By Mary Waddington, Salem (NJ) Monthly Meeting, Philadelphia Yearly Meeting
It was in 1991 that I began to wish I lived in some small ancient village or primitive tribe. I could picture myself sitting on the ground within a circle of huts preparing food with the other women. My pain would be absorbed by this collective body that listened as they worked. I would be consoled in my misery by the rhythmic grinding of grain and the silent nods of their knowing.
Women Supporting Women
by Susan Hopkins, Grass Valley (CA) Monthly Meeting, Pacific Yearly Meeting
Grass Valley Monthly Meeting in Northern California has been led to create
a spiritually nurturing support group titled “Women in Transition as
a Result of Aging. ”“Aging”means anyone who is getting older!
The goals of the group are to hold one another as we share our joys, fears,
and sorrows related to the changes in our lives which bring us to transitions.
We are loosely organized using a rotating planning committee to plan our 9
AM to 3 PM Saturday sessions once every other month. The schedule includes
brunch, worship, worship sharing around a query, and a presentation—all
planned with much time for dialogue. The query is presented in the meeting
newsletter announcement in order to share the focus for that day. Most recently
we had a panel present their thoughts about William Bridges’ book Making
Sense of Life’s Transitions. Once, when we had to postpone a session,
several calls to the planners clearly communicated that these meetings of
sharing together are deeply cherished! This confirmed that we were offering
a valuable and important opportunity for women to hold one another.
My divorce was inevitable. It was necessary and would eventually be a huge relief, but I didn’t know how I would get through it. I had gone to my monthly meeting’s overseers when they met as a committee, and this was my first public announcement of the beginning of the end of a 30-some-year marriage. My proclamation had blurted forth fresh and raw and choked with tears. I didn’t exactly know why I was there or what I needed. One member offered me a room in her house and another asked if I could use some financial support. I was deeply touched by these generous offers, but no one thought to suggest a time and place where I could be listened to.
Shortly after this, I awakened one dawn knowing that the need for women to gather is archetypal. We each hold a piece of the wise woman within us. What happened in tribal circles since the beginning of time can still happen today. I went to the coordinator of our quarter and asked if she would help me establish some sort of support group. Surely there were other women in transition and feeling as fragile as I. We made announcements in our seven monthly meetings and, with amazing speed, a small group coalesced and began meeting monthly in homes. We called ourselves the Salem Quarter Women in Transition Support Group until we grew weary of trying to wrap our mouths around so many words. One member offered the insight that all women are in transition in one way or another and suggested we simply be the women’s support group so no one would exclude herself from joining. Nonetheless, the memory of its birth name slips easily into the title line of our emails as the acronym WIT.
Although our group has developed a familiar and comfortable routine, we are open to change. We gather on the first Saturday evening of each month in those members’ homes large enough to accommodate us. We arrive with food to share. We take turns “checking in. ” In this way we report our progress. Most of us learn to share ourselves as generously as we share our food. We avoid strict timekeeping in favor of trusting ourselves to portion our evening fairly. Sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn’t. The need to be listened to is great. Often a theme rises to the surface that, time permitting, we look at collectively before parting or plan to do so next time. Such topics are lifted up in a worship-sharing manner and move us to deep places.
Our group still contains a few of its original members, but its numbers swell and ebb like a small river tide. Currently we’re as large as we’ve ever been at 15. Should we become larger, we feel we should split into two groups geographically. We ebb through changes in residence, death, schedule conflicts or resolution of the particular reason for joining. We swell, I think, because we wear our benefits like new clothes. One member moved to the Harrisburg area a few years ago but remains so bonded to the group she eagerly makes the 6-hour round trip just to be with us for 3 hours. She does admit, as a secondary reason, there is no comparable support system for her out there.
I often wish young women would join us but perhaps, in their robust striving to experience independence, they are yet unaware of the rewards of interdependence. They would help us broaden our perspectives. Although we all have a history of youth, time tends to fade or warp our memories of it. Perhaps these younger ones are shy or intimidated and need to be encouraged. The first great grandmother type to come had done so reluctantly (and, yes, with encouragement), certain at first she was too old for us but realizing immediately there is no such thing.
Our group is not a drop-in-when-you-feel-like-it arrangement. We take our caring seriously and know that, like wine and cheese, loving relationships improve with time and tending. We listen not out of curiosity but out of deep concern. This fosters a sense of sisterhood and the cherishing that goes with it. We are sticklers for confidentiality. We also ask for commitment because the revolving door approach jeopardizes intimacy. Newcomers will often sit quietly for months before they open up like flower buds in sunshine. We wait for them, knowing it takes gestation before the labor begins. And sometimes the birth is traumatic. All the more reason we need to know and trust each other as midwives.
The challenges and successes we share come in all sizes but usually receive the same quality of attention. Once, however, when a member came in crisis, we gave over the entire evening to her because it seemed rightly ordered. And so we adapt to the moment. We rise and fall on our tides. We try to be open to new thoughts and practices. One of us recently suggested we hold in prayer each woman as she checked in, perhaps physically move close to her, even place a healing hand on her if led and if given permission. The results were quite remarkable. We wondered why we hadn’t thought of it sooner.
And so it goes with our small group of women. We meet month after month, feeling in sync with nature’s cycles, paying attention to our individual seasons. We gradually learn to be more transparent, to trust, to believe in ourselves. In the process we honor the uniqueness and recognize the Divine in the other. As we become strong we can’t help but strengthen our quarter. Like the small river with its endless tide, we flow freely, refresh continuously and give unconditionally.
It’s been 13 years since I wished for the comfort and guidance I somehow associated with a primitive tribe. How many times throughout my adulthood had I heard it takes a village to raise a child? I now know from experience it also takes a village to celebrate properly, to grieve adequately, to be truly known by your own name. I have learned that, with a little effort and a lot of love, virtual villages can spring up just about anywhere. These days I call them spiritual communities. Who would have thought, back then in my era of agony, I could help create one.
Aboard the Wodehouse
A review of an upcoming FGC curricula tentatively titled Introduction to Quakerism: A Guide for New and Seasoned Friends, by Marsha Holliday
reviewed by Jason Stacy,Lake Forest Friends Meeting,Illinois Yearly Meeting
When, in 1657, some of the first Friends arrived in North America aboard the Wodehouse, they perhaps viewed the shore with much hope and a little trepidation. They knew that the future would transform them as much as they hoped to transform it. They prayed for the best and for the strength to withstand the worst. The rest was a matter of faith.
The newcomer to meeting approaches the Religious Society of Friends with similar hopes and trepidation. Friends present some interesting contradictions for the newcomer. The visitor to a meeting is often attracted to the elements of Quakerism that celebrate freedom. They admire the historical activism of Friends in the name of the downtrodden and dispossessed. They are captivated by the idea of “that of God in everyone. ”They are attracted to the celebration of the seeker and lack of dogma. However, upon regular attendance, the new Quaker discovers a more complicated reality.
Although Friends are loath to admit that theirs is a society wedded to ritual, the newcomer discovers early that Quakerism involves some very ritualistic activities and a specific lexicon. The novice notes the steady progression from “good morning” to joys and sorrows, to announcements. She learns to say “meeting” for church and wrestles with the differences between worship sharing and meeting for worship. There is the mysterious title “First-Day School. ”There are the strangely modern sounding “committees”and “clerks”and “conveners. ”
As a newcomer becomes an attender and, perhaps, a member, she enters into a society that for over three hundred years has maintained a careful balance between individual freedom and group cohesion. Faith, consistently, is the essential element of this balance. For the newcomer, the navigation of this new world can be fruitful and spiritually fulfilling. It can also be a little intimidating.
FGC’s newest curricula, Introduction to Quakerism:A Guide for New and Seasoned Friends, by Marsha Holliday, will be an expert captain for new and experienced Quakers. It is divided into short chapters for group discussion with self-explanatory titles like “Quaker Faith and Practice,”“Unprogrammed Quaker Worship,” and “Quakerism is Experiential. ” Each chapter introduces the reader to terminology and practice in the best way possible: by asking the reader to utilize new terminology and apply it to personal experience. Each chapter guides the newcomer in an authentic manner.
For example, chapter three, “Unprogrammed Quaker Worship” does not begin with a staid definition of “unprogrammed. ” Instead, it asks the study group to reflect on the query, “How do I experience the presence of God?”Thereafter, the author states unequivocally that “worship can happen anywhere and any time. ” By this process, the author has gently led the newcomer to Quaker practice through an authentically personal process. She has asked the reader to experience the truth that worship can happen any- where. Then, after various experiences have been discussed by the group, the chapter states what has now become clear to the reader and the members of the newcomer class: worship is an everyday event.
By this point in a class session, the term “unprogrammed” becomes self- explanatory and, most importantly, defined authentically for the newcomer. Instead of the term seeming foreign or strangely echoing bad computer science, the word “unprogrammed” says exactly what it means: worship does not need to be programmatic because it is inherently deeply personal and experiential. Wisely, the author includes Maurine Pyle’s wonderful “The Hidden Ritual in Meeting for Worship” after the lesson on Quaker worship. This allows newcomers to engage Maurine’s “hidden” rituals after wrestling with elements of their own worship. This, itself, is a useful lesson in the delicate balance between the individual and the Society.
If I had one minor quibble with Introduction to Quakerism it would be that it is a little light on Quaker history. In the interest of disclosure, I must state that I am a history teacher and, therefore, might be more inclined than many newcomers to talk about very old things. However,I suspect that many newcomers come to meeting after having heard about our heroic past. I think some discussion of the origins of Quakerism, its quietist period, divisions in the nineteenth century, and modern diversity might be helpful for the newcomer who seeks her place within the greater Quaker community. Although chapter fifteen includes some of this information, it left me asking more questions than it answered.
This, however, is only a small, and perhaps personal, matter since having more questions than answers may not be a bad thing when it leads one to further study and exploration. This new curricula by Marsha Holliday, soon to be published by Quaker Press of FGC, is an excellent guide for the newcomer specifically because it allows the newcomer to practice finding herself in a new world of Friends.
Helping Prepare Children and Teenagers for Quaker Worship: Some of My Experiences Leading First Day School
by Margaret Katranides,St. Louis (MO) Monthly Meeting,Illinois Yearly Meeting
Multiple Friends have expressed concerns in recent years about how many children and young people seem to have trouble making the transition from Young Friend (in First Day School) to Adult Friend (in meeting for worship, committee work, etc. ). I think we need to be intentional about helping them cross over and stop underestimating their capacity for spiritual experience!
To that end, my meeting decided to offer classes in First Day School on waiting worship. One year we offered eight sessions for our teen population and the next year we offered three sessions to our elementary aged children. Both groups were team taught.
The 8-session unit was conducted with teens in the 13 to 17 year range. The basic premises of this unit were (1) that silence isn’t empty, and something is happening there that makes people come back week after week to experience it, and (2) nobody’s going to tell you what you will or should experience, because you have to experience this for yourself. Throughout the sessions, we affirmed every contribution the young people made, and pointed out how the experiences they reported would lead to even better things, if they pursued the practice.
This group had had a unit the year before on various religions, with guest speakers talking about their worship practices, so in session 1 we drew on what they learned from that experience. We then went on to a discussion of how Quaker worship differs from that of other religious traditions. The young people contributed to the discussion, but much of the input was from the adult leaders. We asked how the teens had experienced their 15 minutes in meeting for worship that morning. Then we assembled a floor puzzle in silence, followed by discussion of the process: what did you notice in your own thoughts and feelings? What did you notice about how people interacted or didn’t interact? We drew parallels from that experience to how people worship in silence as a group.
Session 2 began with a review of the previous week’s experience to refresh memories and to benefit three teens who had missed the first session. We did an exercise where one student talked about a subject, and the others provided competing chatter; this was compared to the chatter in our own minds when our minds are so busy in meeting that we can’t hear the speaker (God). We then did a hand-clapping exercise and discussed how it had felt to move very slowly, interacting with a partner. These teens had quite a lot of insight, observing how their attention changed as they moved more slowly, and how they focused on the movements of the partner more than on themselves. After reviewing the principles of worship sharing, we shared on the following two queries: How do I experience the holy? What is holy to me? At the end of this session, we passed out copies of William Taber’s Pendle Hill Pamphlet Four Doors to Meeting for Worship,explaining that reading ahead would be welcomed, but not required.
Session 3 we had a disruption in the plans,with a substitute teacher. After talking about the meaning and significance of “holding in the Light,” participants held in the Light individuals they were concerned about. We then had a general discussion of “good things that have happened in meeting. ”
Session 4 we talked about “Door One, the Door Before,” introducing some thoughts about what silent, or waiting worship is, and about how there is an invisible but living stream of reality, always present, which we can step into when we become quiet. It is easier to step into it on a Sunday morning if we have taken the opportunity throughout the week to allow worshipfulness to occur. We talked about what times during their week might be opportunities to focus on the holy. We reviewed Bill Taber’s suggestions for daily retirement, vocalizing, noticing beauty and wonder, and talking with a spiritual friend. We then passed out a “resource sheet” with Bible verses suitable for contemplation. I taught a song, Cause Me to Come, in FGC’s Worship in Song:A Friends Hymnal, and we ended with the usual waiting worship.
Session 5 began with the song, then a review of how their week had been. Few reported taking any opportunities to worship. However, one student shared that, having forgotten to take a book to homeroom, he meditated during a free reading period. We then discussed “The Door Inward,” with sharing coming from those who had read ahead, from those responding to our reading aloud in the session, and from the adults. We discussed distractions and how to deal with them.
Session 6, only one student was present. We talked about what new experiences he had had. I read Byrd Baylor’s The Other Way to Listen,and we talked about how listening to God alone can differ from listening with others. We then discussed, reading aloud, “The Door Within,” paying special attention to “deepening the quality of silence,” how speaking in ministry is related to the silence, and how to hear the ministry of others. We also invited the teens to consider whether they might want to join the last 15 minutes of meeting for worship rather than the first.
Session 7 we heard a report on worship at an FGC Young Quakes conference from a teen who had participated and was very enthusiastic. We talked about the experiential differences between choosing what to focus on in meeting versus allowing God to provide the focus. One of the teens had been hospitalized with exacerbation of a chronic illness. We spent the last part of this session holding her and her family in the Light.
Session 8 we talked again about how to hear others’ messages in meeting for worship, and how to know when to offer vocal ministry ourselves. Then I invited them to draw mandalas in silence, with a simple repeated tracing process that I led them through in the silence. After participants shared their internal experiences of this exercise, we closed with waiting worship, followed by expressions of gratitude for our time together.
As I wrote up this summary of the unit, I realized how much the teens had taught me, and how this learning had helped me when we did the class for the elementary age children. The teens were good observers of their attention processes, and showed me what each of these exercises may reveal; our discussions helped me clarify how attention processes underlie meeting for worship. The teens also came to understand more fully what a wonderful realm of sensitivity and growth they have within themselves. Within a year, four of these young people began attending meeting for worship instead of First Day School. I think we were able to point them to their Teacher.
Following is an outline of how we adapted the class for teaching the elementary children the same basic lessons, but in three sessions. With the premise that what happens in silence is that we pay attention to God, we used activities that explore ways of paying attention.
Session 1. After introductions, we invited observations on how Quaker worship is different from other religious services the kids have attended. We did progressive muscle relaxation, explaining that when our bodies are relaxed it is easier to listen in the silence. Then the children closed their eyes and passed a set of objects (a seed pod, a peach pit, a shell, a feather) around the room, paying attention to how each object felt, and trying not to talk about it. Then they listened while I read The Song, a book by Charlotte Zolotow, about a girl who hears a bird singing inside her; the idea was to trust your own hearing, and not depend on others to tell you what is real.
Session 2. We began with silence, reviewed together what had happened the previous week, and did some relaxing breathing exercises. We did a floor jigsaw puzzle in silence, then talked about the group process, pointing out that a group can help each other without talking about it, and also that this puzzle, like listening in worship, is easier for some people than for others, but that if we are patient with ourselves eventually we can do it well. This took quite a long time. We ended with silence.
Session 3. After silence, we taught a simple hand-clapping game, then tried doing it faster, slower, and much slower. The idea was to observe how we felt while doing it. Most of these boys found it quite difficult, however, and never got past observing that it was difficult. (Girls at this age can do it, and older boys can, but I overestimated the coordination of the 6 to 9 year old boys. ) I read the book Grandad’s Prayers of the Earth, then asked them to sit quietly and speak out of the silence about a time when they had felt quiet outdoors. We didn’t get much reflection or sharing during this exercise. We ended by thanking them, out of the silence, for the time we spent together. Should we try this unit again with this age group, we would need to revise this last session.
We feel this unit was well worth our investments of time and effort, for the participants were opened to new and deeper experiences of inner listening and worship. I highly recommend that monthly meetings venture into these waters with joyful, expectant hearts.
Reflection questions for First Day School teachers and RE Committees
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What is the core, or heart, of our Quaker tradition? How is this core lived out in our meeting through what we say, how we relate to one another, and who we are being?
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What does it mean to grow in faith?
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What are the roles of doubt in our faith walk? of knowing and unknowing? of humility? of confidence? of compassion? of social action?
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Does our meeting community communicate anything through actions or inaction, or through our policies or attitudes, that might hamper growth in faith and love?
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How is the past week has our meeting community acted to nurture one another in faith and love?
Resource on Bullying: Let’s Get Real
review by Susan Hopkins, Grass Valley Monthly Meeting, Pacific Yearly Meeting
I’d like to introduce you to an insightful video that can expand the work for social justice in our schools and communities: Let’s Get Real. This is a well- produced video about bullying and name-calling by an award winning documentary filmmaker, Debra Chasnoff. In the same interview format used in other videos by Women’s Educational Media, middle schoolers are asked how it feels to be the victim, the bully, and what helped them change. The comments from young people are passionate, thoughtful, and show deep self reflection. We can all learn a great deal from this video, whether or not we are working with middle schoolers. To purchase a copy, call QuakerBooks of FGC at 1-800-9664556 OR contact the “Respect for All” project at 415-641-4616. More information on this resource can be found at www.respectforall.org.
Lives That Speak: Stories of Twentieth-Century Quakers
reviewed by Ian Graham,Hamilton Monthly Meeting,Canadian Yearly Meeting
Lives That Speak: Stories of Twentieth- Century Quakers (by the RE Committee of FGC, edited by Marnie Clark) was published in 2004 with little fanfare or notice. Perhaps that is an oversight, which I would like to rectify with this brief review. Have you ever wondered about who the modern day larger-than-life Quakers might be? It seems we are preoccupied with the ancient ones, like Fox,Woolman, Mott and Frye, to name a few. Wonder no longer; here is a good list of sixteen modern Friends, twelve from the United States, two from Canada, one from Norway and one from Palestine who have lived lives that speak powerfully to the urge in all of us to build a better world. The list includes an equal number of men and women.
Friends’ Lives Highlighted in Lives That Speak:
Steve Angell, Alternatives to Violence Project.
Elise Boulding, world peacemaker.
Calhoun Geiger, conscientious objection to war.
Gordon Hirabayashi, resisting martial law in the United States.
Fay Honey Knopp, racial integration and service.
Bill Kreidler, gay rights, education.
Sigrid Lund, Nazi war resistance.
Marlene/Steve Pedigo, urban ministry, anti-racism.
Barbara Reynolds, protesting nuclear war.
David Ritchie, work camps.
Bayard Rustin, civil rights in the United States.
Floyd Schmoe, peace activism and service.
Carol Reilley Urner, local development.
Gilbert White, Quaker diplomacy, ecology.
Signe Wilkinson, cartoon as commentary.
Violet Zaru, Palestinian / Israeli peace process.
Quaker Nobel Prize winners Emily Balch (peace prize), Philip
Noel-Baker (peace prize) William Vickrey (economic
science prize).
One can pick up this 168-page book and start anywhere; each story stands on its own merits, including pictures of the hero/heroine at various stages of life. If you are wondering about the civil rights movement turn to Bayard Rustin, the African-American who first went to prison for refusing to sign his draft card. He went on to advise and support Martin Luther King, Jr. , in Alabama. If you are wondering about nonviolent change look up Steve Angell, or Gordon Hirabayashi, or Phillip Noel-Baker, all powerful exemplars of putting their lives on the line for matters of conscience. If third world development is your passion, read about Carol Reilley or Barbara Reynolds. Perhaps you or your meeting are focusing on urban poverty and renewal? Read about Marlene and Steve Pedigo in Chicago. Are you an artist? Read about cartoonist Signe Wilkinson.
Each chapter has a short study guide, with questions and activities. Some chapters include links to websites for further research and information. Some have crossword puzzles with words from the text.
This book is intended for a middle school and early high school audience, but I did not find my attention lagging as I read it. The language is simple and direct, the pictures bring the people alive, the thread of conscience from childhood experiences is fully evident. I found myself wondering how they become the people they were, and voila, the text usually lead me to the answer. (As though an adequate answer to what leads us in life is ever fully possible?)
I would like to see the scope of this book expanded as a series. There are many daring, courageous, inspiring human stories going on, lives being lived in the face of injustice to other humans, to the natural world, to the earth. These lives are not lived for the inspiration they may provide to others, they are lived in the service of the mission they are called to. This does not, however, restrict their value as examples to us, especially our children. Humanity has always been inspired by the greats among us, perhaps especially the unsung heroes and heroines who labour in obscurity.
Lives That Speak is not theologically doctrinaire. The brief vibrant biographical accounts in this volume speak to That which gives forth the Word. It is an inspiring book for that reason alone.
To order this or other publications contact QuakerBooks of FGC: 1-800-966-4556; e-mail bookstore@fgcquaker.org; or you can order Lives that Speak online.
