Overview

In this topic we will look at practices used by Friends meetings managing their business, by individuals asking for help in discerning their way forward, by couples wanting to marry under the care of a Friends meeting, by Friends seeking to witness to the world, and by small groups hoping to build community and deepen their spiritual life.  Each set of practices is a little different, but all share the same intent.  They create space in which listening is valued over speaking, unity is valued over winning, and the possibility of transformation is kept alive.  They remind us that if we submit to the Light, and stand steadfast in love, we can be part of the healing of the world.

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Credits

Nancy Bieber (PhYM), Elise Hansard (BYM), Tony Lowe (PFYM), and Betsy Meyer (BYM) – Content Collaborators
Anne Collins (SCYM), Sally Farneth (PhYM), Susan Hopkins (PacYM), and Erika Mittag (SCYM) — Materials for Children

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Grounding

Introduction to the Topic

Introduction: What Are Friendly Practices?

We are stewards of a powerful tradition. One that the world desperately needs.
View Introduction: What Are Friendly Practices? Exercise

Scripture

Ground your work in scripture. Quaker faith and practice can be compared and combined with a wide variety of other traditions such as Buddhism or ethical humanism. But we will find our deepest and fullest reasonaces with the biblical Christian traditions that nurtured early Friends and with the Jewish traditions that nurtured Jesus.
View Scripture Exercise

Friendly Voices

Ground your work in the voices of Friends. Friends from George Fox to Bayard Rustin have written about Quaker faith and practice. What have Friends shared with us across the centuries?
View Friendly Voices Exercise

Videos and Podcasts

Learn from Friends near and far through video and podcasts. From informational histories, to instructional guides, to deep ministry, we can use these media to learn more and build community.
View Videos and Podcasts Exercise

Queries and Questions for Worship Sharing and Discussion

A query is a question for reflection. Queries can be used in worship sharing, discussions, or to prompt journaling or art activities.
View Queries and Questions for Worship Sharing and Discussion Exercise

Practicing

Experiential Activities

Experiential Activities

Activities like yoga, labyrinths, and mandalas are designed to help focus and calm the mind and body. Explore what happens in your mind and your body when you try simple yoga poses or use a finger labyrinth.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Experiential Activities Exercise

Visual Expressions of Friendly Practices

Take a visual approach to expressions of Friendly Practices by looking at and reflecting on images made by people exploring the topic.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Visual Expressions of Friendly Practices Exercise

The Knight and the Dragon

Read The Knight and the Dragon, By Tomie De Paola, to consider what it takes to solve problems so everyone is satisfied.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Preschool (ages 3-5)
View The Knight and the Dragon Exercise

Approved! A Story about Quaker Meeting for Business

Young Friends can have their own Meeting for Business after reading the book Approved! A Story About Quaker Meeting for Business, by Nancy L. Haines.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Elementary (ages 6-11)
View Approved! A Story about Quaker Meeting for Business Exercise

We’re Going to Meeting for Worship

This lesson uses the book We’re Going to Meeting for Worship, by Abby Hadley, which focuses on Quaker Meeting for Worship, what it means to a young child, and his feelings about quiet, silence and listening.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: Preschool (ages 3-5)
View We’re Going to Meeting for Worship Exercise

Discernment: The Right Rock

Practice mindful discernment with this simple task.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Discernment: The Right Rock Exercise

Electric Pulse

A simple exercise that brings an intergenerational group together to demonstrate how it feels to shift from negative, fearful feelings to more positive, constructive ones.
  • Duration: 5 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Electric Pulse Exercise

Wagon Wheel

Practice seeking to understand one another with this activity.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Wagon Wheel Exercise

What’s for Lunch: Voting, Consensus, or Sense of the Meeting

Participants will role-play ordering lunch with two options. They will experience different ways to make a decision, then name each and discuss which is the best choice to build community and good feelings.
  • Duration: 15 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View What’s for Lunch: Voting, Consensus, or Sense of the Meeting Exercise

Threshing

Practice threshing with real problems.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Threshing Exercise

Individual Preparation for Group Discernment

Readings from Bill Taber and John Woolman help one evaluate her or his state of mind in Quaker activities. Queries encourage reflection, and practices help in reaching and holding centeredness.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Individual Preparation for Group Discernment Exercise

“Real Play” of a Clearness Committee

This activity allows a participant to bring forth a real issue and a few others to sit with him/her and experience having a clearness committee about the issue.
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View “Real Play” of a Clearness Committee Exercise

Quaker Way of Individual Discernment

Individual practices focusing on decision-making and spiritual discernment.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Quaker Way of Individual Discernment Exercise

Sharing

Conversation Starters

Queries for Friendly Practices

Worship sharing with queries is one way for Friends to explore a topic through self-examination and in community. This exercise has worship sharing guidelines and suggested queries for Friendly Practices.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Queries for Friendly Practices Exercise

Culminating Celebration

As a final session, this set of activities provides an opportunity for celebrating and reflecting on your time together as a Spiritual Deepening group.
  • Duration: 2 hours
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Culminating Celebration Exercise

Worship Seeing of Spiritual Gifts

The discernment of spiritual gifts is enhanced by the time we've shared together. That's why exercise is used as a closing activity.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Worship Seeing of Spiritual Gifts Exercise

Sharing Stories of the Presence in our Midst

A story from Patricia McBee in which she learned, as a new clerk how to listen to the movement of Spirit in a Meeting for Business. A Friend confronted her over the style and content of her clerking and walked out. She wanted to respond in kind, but the business of Meeting kept her from reacting. “Later, I was amazed at how the Spirit had taken over the clerkship and kept me focused on what the meeting needed.”
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Sharing Stories of the Presence in our Midst Exercise

Painting the Practices

Explore the spirituality of art and the art of spirituality.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Painting the Practices Exercise

Wandering in the Wilderness

A play for Friends of all ages that invites Friends to live into the Bible story of the wandering Israelites. We do not know whether the Bible story is based on historical events; but by living into the story, we can discover why this story has survived for perhaps 3000 years. The story provides a safe context for exploring the feelings that rise up among members of a spiritual community.
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Wandering in the Wilderness Exercise

For Children

Friendly Practices for Children

Readings for children that introduce them to Quaker discernment, worship, and ways of being together in community.
View Friendly Practices for Children Exercise
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