Children’s Voices

28 July 2008 – 10:02 pm

A contribution from Tracy Bourne:

It seems to me that Quakers are great at nurturing children as people in the light of God: Great at loving them for who they are in the moment. Many inspirational discussions and artwork develop into challenging and exciting ideas in children’s meetings all over the country. I wonder what would happen if we brought these ideas, that come from our children and their connection with the Spirit, more fully into core Quaker business. I can see that it is difficult to involve children in adult structures such as committees, but there are other ways to do it.

In the Backhouse Lecture of 1996, Elise Boulding gently challenged the Society of Friends to consider ways in which we could include children more actively in our activities. I would like to continue this debate about how we regard our children including how we can make meeting for worship more meaningful for the children, how we can support Friends who have responsibility for children, and how we can bring the Quaker ideal of children being equal to adults more actively into our practice.

There are many ways of doing this. Researching and reflecting on effective structures for communicating with older and younger Friends would be an important part of the process of re-imagining our structures. The way in which we collect children’s ideas will be almost as important as he ideas themselves, if it can improve our intergenerational dialogue.

Children are born with an instinct for love; any new parent, or grandparent can tell you that. And since love is our most important gift and lesson from God, I believe that children are our best teachers. We would do well to give them space to speak so that we can listen and learn.

Tracy Bourne

By evan | Posted in Children, Reflections | Comments (0)

Living peacefully

28 July 2008 – 9:43 pm

A contribution from Brian Connor:

I must admit that I was a bit overwhelmed by the content and the unfiltered list of issues which we face as a human race. I spent 12 months helping with the organisation of probably Australia’s first Sustainable Expo over 10 days in March 2007 and now have just returned from 3 months in the Middle East helping a daughter with a very young children. Both these experiences have left me with the impression that we have very little hope for the future. This observation is underlined by the increasing gap between urban and regional Australia - especially in NSW.  So I am now left with the observation of a US prison facilitator (Bo Lozoff) that the way to live peacefully is to (i) live simply (ii) to try to help others and (iii) practice a spiritual discipline. That’s about as far as I can go now.

As far as the Quakers are concerned, I have only just handed your papers over to our Meeting Clerk. She lives about 150 km away and attending Meeting is quite a hike for her and her ageing husband. I have only been back for a fortnight - hence the delay.

Over the years I have written about these Quakerly issues many times and believe that they are now so complicated that I have very little to contribute. I have suggested in the past that AYM should confine itself to deciding what ONE issue Quakers are going to follow up nationally. Then the bright ideas from the various Regional Meetings can be demonstrated at “Show and Tell”. We should aim to keep a national Quaker publication going and the support for Meeting for Learning which I believe is where Quakers get serious. I want to make Friends in Australia less complicated rather than more complex. We cannot solve all the world’s problems ourselves but we, as Quakers, can do our bit in the areas which interest us most. That has been my philosopy anyway and I have not needed anyone’s approval just to act in the way that  I thought I should as a Quaker!

In love, peace and gratitude,

Brian Connor

By evan | Posted in Reflections | Comments (0)

Questions for all Quakers (2008)

23 April 2008 – 8:39 am

Katherine Purnell and Helen Bayes of Canberra Regional Meeting have prepared a summary of the first year of the Quaker Voices in the 21st Century concern (2007).  Katherine and Helen are also calling for a response to the queries raised in the summary. From the document:

We hope that during 2008, meetings all round Australia, will arrange many opportunities for worship sharing about the observations, references and questions offered in this kit.

We ask everyone to send us their original writings, discussion reports, photos and drawings because we are beginning to see potential for a new AYM publication – perhaps called ‘this we are saying’.

By evan | Posted in Announcements | Comments (0)

Quaker questions and Quaker Voices

1 December 2007 – 9:05 pm

It seems to be a perennial question—what is it that Quakers have in common with each other?  Can Quakers, as a Society, be said to believe anything when creeds and dogmas (so it is said) are neither stated nor enforced?

In the early days of the Quaker movement, there were obvious universal beliefs among Quakers.  Quakers were Christian and believed that Jesus Christ was the light, the truth and the way.  They believed that everyone (men and women) had access to the Christ within, their inner teacher and guide, with no need of priests or other intermediaries.  From these beliefs, which were always stated with utmost certainty, Quakers refused to participate in wars and believed in the equality of all people, neither of which made them very popular with the powers that were.

In the following centuries, Quakers began to adhere to the peculiarities that made them stand out in the societies of the day; plain dress (usually grey), use of ‘thou’ when addressing one person, avoidance of luxuries, and so on.  These little peculiarities were recognised by some, even from the earliest day, as spiritually stifling.

Beginning in the second half of the 19th Century and on into the 20th Century, Quakers began to modernise their faith and practice.  The outward peculiarities were shed—a Quaker could no longer be recognised by their dress or speech.  Advances in scientific knowledge were embraced and the place of the scriptures questioned.  By the end of the 20th Century, in Australia at least, many Quakers had come to question whether the Religious Society of Friends remained part of Christianity at all.

But what have been the effects of the 20th Century liberalising of the Quaker way?  Have we lost anything valuable in letting go of any of the  old beliefs and practices?  Have we rightly let go of some old practices but failed to discern new, spiritually vibrant alternatives to replace them?  Have we let go of old ways of expressing eternal truths only to find we now don’t have a common language to speak about our deepest experiences?  Through the Quaker Voices in the 21st Century process, I hope that we will begin to consider some of these questions rather than accepting the status quo unquestioningly.

Clearly, the Quaker way is something precious to many of us.  Our spiritual practices nurture us and help us to see, if imperfectly at times, a deeper truth.  I hope also that the Quaker Voices process of discernment will help us to recognise and nurture the strengths of the Quaker way, and find ways of better sharing them with others who may be seeking.

By evan | Posted in Reflections | Comments (1)