New Quaker Checklist #31
FGC recommends the following tip for newcomers to the Quaker faith: Learn about the history of the FGC Gathering through A Gathering of Spirits.
This sweeping book tells about the development of Friends General Conference up to 1950, primarily through the lens of the Conferences (now known as the Gathering). A Gathering of Spirits describes the ways that the biennial Conferences renewed the courage and resolve of Friends to face the daunting disappointments of the first half of the 20th century. Modernity promised such great advances in human society, and no one was more confident of progress than FGC Friends at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. But the melancholy of two world wars, the capitalist debacle of the Great Depression, and the stubborn blights of American racism were turned into the spleen of renewed hope and activism, as Friends gathered together to learn, network, and find new reasons for hope.
Readers will enjoy learning about an important era in Quaker history, faith, and life.
