Retirement, Remixing, and the Religious Society of Friends

I don't post much here anymore since I mostly use Facebook, Twitter, and the like to offer thoughts. But what I have to say here requires a bit more space.

As my faithful reader (notice, singular, not plural) knows, I retired from full-time, paid employment a year ago. And while I'm as busy as I've ever been, I'm busy doing mostly things I really enjoy -- writing, leading retreats, hanging out with friends, and the like.

I've also come to really enjoy something else -- and that's watching friends of mine who are a generation or two younger than me move into really significant leadership and staff positions in the Religious Society of Friends. What I especially enjoy about this is seeing how they do things differently than I (and others of my advanced age) would do them.

Now, when I was younger and way more insecure (I'm still insecure -- just not as much as I used to be), I would have been critical of how they do things differently. After all, I did them the right way. And I did -- for my time and with my understanding of what was needed. But times have changed (my gosh, I sound like my Grandma Bill!) and ways doing things in the RSOF and its institutions and organizations need to change, too. I'm pleased that younger (than me) leaders are doing just that.

I'm just going to focus primarily on one example (because otherwise this post would become a book -- and I'm already working on a book with a deadline looming!!) and that's my friend Wess Daniels who serves as the William R Rogers Director of Friends Center and Quaker Studies at Guilford College.

I've known Wess for a number of years and followed his thinking and writing -- especially about the RSOF and revitalization. He's a good thinker (but not as good a writer as I am -- kidding). And his thinking and writing have challenged me to rethink some of ways of how we do things. One of his most innovative ideas is that of remixing. I'm not going to go into it fully here (if you want to explore it further and I hope you do, check out his book A Convergent Model of Renewal: Remixing the Quaker Tradition in a Participatory Culture or his recent Michener Seminar at Southeastern Yearly Meeting), but as I understand it, it is remaining faithful to the bedrock of our faith tradition while reinterpreting it (remixing) so it is hearable, usuable, and useful for today. He posits that "remixing" is what the early Friends did to revive their understanding of the spiritual vitality of primitive Christianity.

And now Wess is remixing in his position at Guilford. The good work of Friends Center and, especially its Quaker Leadership Scholars Program, was founded and grew thanks to the efforts of my dear friend (and Friend) Max Carter. It's been a joy to watch this program grow and prosper under Max's direction (and with the help of other friends/Friends like Frank Massey and Deborah Shaw). I've even had the good fortune to lead workshop or two there. Friends Center and QLSP made a huge difference in RSOF and in young adults' lives. Max's contributions can not be overstated (I only wish my own to the RSOF were anywhere as significant as his!). And his vital ministry to Friends continues (which is one of the fun things about retirement -- all the ministry without all the administration, budgeting, etc!).

I see Wess taking the bedrock of Friends Center's "tradition" and remixing it in ways that embrace that tradition and make it accessible in new ways to a new generation of students. I think that's grand. In the same way that it's grand that Gabe Ehri and the Friends Publishing folks have remixed Friends Journal, Marta Rusek and Dan Kasztelan are remixing communications at FGC and FUM, and on and on.

Part of what I believe is that we, as created in the image of God, are called to create -- and re-create. I see that happening around me and am grateful.

My prayer is that I can continue to celebrate the "re-creation" (remixing) even when it rubs up against my ideas about how things should be done. While I continue my ministry in new ways, freed from the constraints of having to earn a living, may I support those who are re-doing our ministry in new ways. To borrow an idea from the Bible -- "the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!"  Well, the "old" (at least my personal part of it!) has not quite gone yet (and I hope it doesn't for awhile!), but I rejoice that the "new is here."

Seeds and Spiritual Renewal: Post 4

When Woody and I planted the prairie we used special seeds.  Because we wanted to plant a prairie and not a lawn or pasture, we started with warm season grass seeds and wildflowers seeds.  “Well, doh?!”  you say.  “Of course you did.” 

While our choice of specialized seeds for the prairie seems obvious, why are we so easy to use generic seed (or no seed plan at all) when it to renewing our spiritual fields?  If we want our fields to flourish, I propose the following seed mix (based on Diana Butler Bass’s recommendations in Christianity after Religion and intentional conversations Beth Collea and I have led on “Friends in a Time of Spiritual Awakening.")

Reconnection with our prime texts
            Friends need to connect deeply with the Bible.  This is true for both liberal and more conservative Friends.  The Bible was the foundational text for the early Friends.  In addition to their personal experience with God, they were well versed in scripture, studied it carefully, and quoted it often.  If we would understand the faith and practice of our movement, we need to reconnect with serious study of the Bible.  Some liberal Friends will need to lay down their resistances that spring from a number of understandable sources (misuse of scripture by others, woundedness, intellectual disagreement, etc) and look at what it says and examine how it informed Friends through the years.  Many programmed Friends will need to lay down their assumption that they “KNOW” what it says and read it again with careful eyes.  It is not enough for them to quote verses memorized as children or stories told so often that we have stopped really reading them.
            Friends need to connect with Quaker texts.  For many years Friends families often had, in addition to the Bible, core Quaker texts in their home libraries.  Fox’s and Woolman’s journals, Barclay’s Apology, Penn’s maxims, Faith and Practice, and so on.  Friends today know occasional favorite Friendly quotations, but have rarely studied these (and other) hallmarks of Quaker faith to find the essence, the life of the Spirit that empowered these Friends.  Of course, there are other Quaker texts that we could study.  We need to use these good seeds that we have – for they abound.

Sharing our spiritual stories
            We need to provide opportunities to share our spiritual stories with each other in community.  What possibilities are there in our meetings for us to share our spiritual journeys and beliefs with each other?  We may be worshiping next to someone we’ve known for years but not have any idea what brought them to Friends or any of the significant, formative spiritual experiences in their lives.  We need to create seeds of such opportunities – based on what will work for our community.  A seed of weekday evening sharing groups?  A five week adult religious education class on First day?

An Inward spiritual practice
            One seed is to enhance our spiritual life through a daily practice.  We might do a gratitude practice.  Or a daily prayer practice.  Or a meditation practice.  Intentional.  Regular.  Deep.  The strength of a regular practice is that it becomes a part of us while helping us deepen.  When regularly practiced, it becomes so valuable to our souls that we miss it and long for it when we aren’t able to do it that day.
            Think of the power of a meeting community doing this together – finding a practice for everyone to do for a month.  And then a different one the next month.  There would be personal and communal deepening from which The Seed could spring.

An Outward spiritual practice
            Another seed is putting our faith into practice in the larger word.  As William Penn said, “True godliness does not turn us out of the world, but helps us better live in it.” (Brent Revised Version).  What outward practices could we do that would connect our inner lives with our outer world?  Both as individuals and as a meeting?  What fits our spiritual life and our passion?  Work in a homeless shelter.  Work for peace?  Till up some of our lawn for a community garden? 

In the same way that a good seed mix makes all the difference in the establish of the kind of prairie Woody and I wanted to see spring forth, so will the above seed mix (with maybe a few local “wildflower seeds” that fit your community thrown in) help the establishment or reestablishment of a thriving Friendly faith community.

Prairie Management Practices and Quaker Revitalizaton: Post 3

In the middle of July last summer, on one of the hottest, most humid days, a wildlife biologist, our district wildlife and conservation specialist, and I took a hike through our prairie.  I was discouraged with the progress of the prairie.  We had planted in 2007 and it had burst forth with wildflowers.  It was beautiful.  Grasses began appearing the next year, though spotty.  We did a proscribed burn three years later – per our approved prairie management plan.  We kept down the bad plants (mostly thistles) and tried to leave the rest alone – per the plan.  But six years in to the plan, the prairie was not near the lush prairie of photographs.  There were wonderful pockets of tall grasses and wildflowers.  But there were also stretches of bad weeds and undesirable grasses.  In 2012 a friend of mine from Pheasants Forever and I spent six hours on an April Sunday afternoon and evening drilling (with a special seed drill) replanting the entire prairie with almost $1,000 worth of specialized warm grass and wildflowers seeds.

And then it didn’t rain for almost four months.  In 2013, I was bemoaning all the work and expenses and effort for so little yield.  So when the state wildlife biologist offered to come out and look over things, I readily agreed.

For two hours we walked through the prairie.  Not around it – looking at it from the outside.  But deep inside the plants over our heads – grasses and weeds.  The biologist pushed aside plants/weeds, knelt down, nodded, pointed, made short comments.  Then he’d move a few more feet and we’d look again.  “So,” he asked.  “Did you do the proscribed burns.”  “Yes,” I said, and gave him the dates.  “What mix did you plant?”  I told him. “What kind of seed drill?”  I answered.  “What are you doing to get rid of the thistles and briars?”  Each question he asked, I answered.

As we made our way out of the prairie, sweaty, weed-seed covered, I asked, “So what should I be doing?”  “Just keep on doing what you’re doing,” he said.  “There’s more going on than you see.  There’s lots of good growth going on.  It’s just down low.  It’s hungry for light.  And the weeds are choking out the light.  So, my suggestion is for you to get out your tractor, hook up your bush hog, and mow it all down to a height of 3 feet.  The heat and cutting will stress the weeks and they’ll die.  The heat and light will help the grasses and they’ll flourish.”

“But,” he said, “keep doing the things you’ve been doing.  It’s working.”

As I said in my previous post, I do believe the soil of Friendly renewal is being prepared.  Good things are happening, even if some are not visible to the larger world (Friends and the “real” world) yet.  I also believe that certain “management” practices need to be put into place.

The good news is that none of them require a proscribed burn!

Instead of saying the exact practices as a prescription, I want to offer then as queries, and invite y’all to dive deep into your spiritual wisdom and invite Christ our present teacher to teach us the “management practices” we are going to need to grow a new prairie that mirrors the life of the prairies that once covered much of the middle of our country and supported an abundance (and variety) of life.

Queries:

• Given that there is a correlation between being a loving community and the depth and quality of worship, what can be done to enhance the sense of spiritual community and love in our meetings?
• Given that there is a correlation between vitality and deep worship, what steps should be taken to increase our meetings’ vitality?
• Given that each meeting has its unique problems and challenges, how do meetings avoid focusing on the problems and concentrate on strengthening connectivity with God?

Again, I want to acknowledge my friend with whom I began this conversation – many of the queries were originally questions that she sent me and helped get this train of prairie thought going.

Soil and Quaker Renewal: A Prairie? Post 2

In my last post on the Quaker renewal (and by that, I mean the renewal of Quaker faith and practice, not institutions, per se), I spoke about how I feel that many of our meetings are like fallow fields -- involved in the invisible process of rest and renewal and ready to burst forth with life.  And I mentioned the questions that my friend asked me in follow-up, continuing the metaphor:

• tilling = ?
• planting = ?
• seeds of life = ?
• soil = ?
• deep soil = ?
• shallow soil = ?
• plants = ?
• fruit = ?

I am going to address a few of those in this post.  The ones about soil.  After all, in the prairie outside my window, it's the soil that is lying fallow. It's not the plants seed, and so on.  The soil has been getting ready for this coming summer since early last autumn.  The various plants -- warm season grasses (big blue stem, little blue stem, side oats gamma), forbs (black-eyed Susan, coneflowers of various shades, partridge pea, milkweed, ironweed, rattlesnake master, New England aster) -- are either dormant (the grasses) or dead.  All of the plants, dead or dormant, have been shaken by the wind and rain, releasing seeds that scatter across the land.  They've been buried in snow, borne down by the weight and pushed into contact with the soil.  They've been disintegrating.  They look ugly.  The whole prairie, but the world's standard of beauty, looks ugly.  Dead.

And yet that's exactly what's needed.  The dead plants are feeding the soil.  The rain is watering it and breaking it up so that the new seeds can find just enough depth to germinate and spread their roots.  The snow, in addition to adding moisture to the ground, insulated the dead growth from the bitter cold and sped the decomposition process.

So, back to the questions my friend asked.  In Quaker life today, what is the soil?  What is the deep soil? And what is the shallow soil?   Hmmm, her questions remind me a bit of story of Jesus from Matthew 13 --

Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants.  Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.  Whoever has ears, let them hear.”

When I answered my friend (and we were having this conversation Facebook Messenger, hence short answers), I told her I thought "soil = our souls. the soul of the community/meeting."  Upon further reflection, I still think that.  The soil in which the Seed grows best is our individual souls and the soil of the meeting.  Does a meeting have "a soul."  I think it does.  I would argue that the soul of a meeting can be "felt" when we pay attention -- is it a deep, spiritual soul filled with love and life?  Or is it one of discord and disharmony?  Regardless, the Seed longs to spring forth.  But the soil must be made ready.

In the case of the prairie, natural, organic processes are at work.  The afore mentioned decomposition and watering.  But also, as the soil warms, worms and bacteria moving through, breaking it up, preparing it for growth.  Production farmers augment the processes, in their need to turn a profit, with chemical fertilizers and herbicides.  They increase the short term fertility and viability of the soil, but drain it, too.

That's why I believe that the processes for Quaker renewal have to be organic -- growing naturally from the Spirit doing spiritual work within us and the soul of the meeting.  There is no quick fertilization.  While we celebrate the past, we must allow it to die and thereby nurture new grow.  I'm not talking of people here, so much as the ancestor worship we often engage in -- remember how we worked for abolition of slavery, for women's suffrage, against the Vietnam war?  Yep we did.  But those are past.  What work is God calling us to now?  I cannot sit back and just look at photos of prairies past -- even though I have tons of pictures. They are glorious.  And each prairie in last seven years has been different.  Each one is new and unique.  Let's celebrate, let the past feed and inspire us, and move forward!

And, while we may not like to think of ourselves this way, some of us need to be worms and bacteria.  We need to be preparing the soil -- some with prophetic calls for justice as a spiritual enterprise, others by prayer and example, others by leading spiritual formation opportunities, some by...  Much of this may be "underground" and invisible to the larger field of the Society of Friends, but is happening across the US and Canada even now.  We need to do what we can to encourage this work.  And, instead of bemoaning the lack of visible "results", to keep at it.

For there is deep soil out there.  Deep soil, for me, equals souls/spirits who are hungry for God and community and real spiritual work.  Some people and meetings may not even be able to name that hunger.  But they know it when they experience it -- and find it nurtured.  We are called to move out of the shallow soil of being "cultural Quakers," of seeing the Quaker way as a system of ethics or as a "nice way of behaving" (i.e. the Testimonies divorced from their grounding spirituality).

I feel the soil preparation has been going on for a long time.  It needs to continue.  Organically, like I said -- from Friends who feel called to be at work, even behind the scenes. Spring is nearing, though.  Which means  is also time for some above ground work.

• tilling = ?
• planting = ?
• seeds = ?

Fieldward...

Living in a Time of Great Spiritual Awakening: A Conversation Among Friends

Are we living in a time of troubling trends?
• declining church/meeting attendance,
• dissatisfaction with institutional religion,
• the rise of “None” as the most common religious affiliation on surveys
• a feeling that old structures and programs don’t hold the new Life?”

Or, are we in a time of dynamic Spiritual Awakening and renewal?

Want to be part of the conversation??  If so, join us --

8 Reasons Most Quaker Congregations SHOULD Never Break the 100 Attendance Mark

Empty or Full??

Okay. I'm writing this in response to a re-post by my friend (and Friend) Adrian Halverstadt.  This morning on Facebook he posted "8 Reasons Most Churches Never Break the 200 Attendance Mark" by Corey Nieuwhof.  Since I'm a sucker for that sort of stuff ("10 Ways to Play Bogey Golf", "9 Tips on How Not To Turn a Tractor Over", "8 Sure Fire, No Fail ....") and am interested in churches, I read it.    His reasons are not bad --

1.  The pastor is the primary caregiver. 
2.  The leaders lacks a strategy. 
3.  True leaders aren’t leading. 
4.  Volunteers are unempowered. 
5.  The governance team micromanages. 
6.  Too many meetings. 
7.  Too many events and programs that lead nowhere. 
8.  The pastor suffers from a deire to please everybody. 

Some of these you might even feel helpful.  If so, you'll want to check out his blog post and see his reasoning why these eight things keep churches from breaking the 200 attendance mark. Maybe they'll help you on your way to meeting that goal. 

But these eight -- helpful as they might be -- gave me pause.  Not the eight items so much as the stated goal.  Breaking the 200 attendance mark.  Is that a worthy goal?  I don't think so -- especially for Quaker congregations.  And so I offer my 8 reasons most Quaker groups shouldn't even break the 100 attendance mark.

1. Spiritual Intimacy -- I've been in some glorious and large meetings for worship.  One at FGC Gathering this summer comes to mind.  But for the most part, my experience of truly deep, gathered worship has occurred in groups of less than 100.  Sitting close, seeing and knowing everyone there -- their joys, sorrows, concerns, hopes -- seems to lend itself to an increased spiritual intimacy.  Both with each other and the Great Lover of our Souls.
2. Listening Together -- since we gather to listen to God together -- and maybe even be given a message to share to those gathered, the dynamics of listening well together seem to me to be closely related to the number gathered.  There are enough of us afflicted with monkey-mind and thoughts scattering around that the power of those who are truly centered and communing with the Living Christ is more easily defused the greater the number of people who come together.  The power of those gathered wafts over and around a smaller group, drawing it together more easily than a larger one.
3. Community -- how many people can we really know?  I mean really?  I am blessed with a bazillion Facebook friends, but I am not in deep spiritual community (or any other type of deep community) with them.  I attended a mega-church once with some family members who attended there.  They were greeted with, "Are you new here?"  That was after a couple of years of attending.  Perhaps a goodly number of the congregants there feel connected with and in community with each other.  But I fear not.  Smaller congregations can engender a deeper sense of spiritual community precisely because they can both know each other and be known by each other.  
4. Trust -- when we know each other, especially each others' spiritual and life stories, then that intimacy and community builds trust.  We trust the others' motives and reasons for doing things -- even things we disagree with them on.  We cut each other a bit more slack.  We learn to live in love, not fear.
5. Working Together -- all of us.  When we're smallish, we all chip in to do the work that God has called us all to do.  For example, when my meeting -- West Newton Friends -- decided to do Quaker Quest in 2012, we did it together.  Everyone.  Some were presenters, some were hosts, some made food, some did childcare, some prayed for the efforts.  It was a whole group effort -- one that would be difficult to achieve in a congregation of 200.  Since we were all involved, we all felt ownership, to some degree, of the program and its outcome. 
6. Work That Needs to be Done -- smaller groups, when they are alive, not dying and form-driven, have the chance to do only the work that needs to be done.  So what that "Faith and Practice" says that we need X number of committees with X number of people on them serving X number of years?  No way.  There's not enough of us to do that without all of us serving on 27 committees.  Instead we do the work that we feel God is calling us to do.  Sunday school teachers teach because they feel led -- not because a nominating committee asked them.  Same with other programs or projects we undertake.  We look at what God is calling us to do with the people we have and the space we have at this time.  We do what we're called to do -- and nothing else.  I heard recently of a Quaker meeting that only had two committees -- Us and Them.  Us is pastoral care, worship, etc.  Them is outreach, missions work, etc.  Hmmm... what a concept.
7. Growing Deep Together -- our adult Sunday school consists of all adults in the meeting.  Where that limits the offering of electives, it does keep us together spiritually.  We study together, talk together, pray together, and learn together.  And good work comes out of it -- as when we all studied (even the kids!) the causes and possible solutions to hunger issues.  As class ended one Sunday we decided -- together -- that next spring we would offer a community garden on our property as a faithful way to respond to hunger in our own township.  There was little discussion because we all had been studying this issue together and realized that we needed to do a witness together.
8. Missional -- being small gives us a chance to think missionally.  There's nothing wrong with numerical growth.  I hope our meeting grows in numbers as well as in spiritual depth as we are doing now.  But I also hope that as we do, instead of worrying where we'll fit the hordes who will join, that we will say our building and our faith community can be accommodate 75 people.  When #76 begins attending, we should look at spinning off a new group and empowering them to to be God's Friends in a new place. 

No.  I don't believe there is any virtue in being small.  And if we are not growing numerically, as well as spiritually, then we are not being faithful to the Good News which has been entrusted to us and which has made such a difference in our lives.  But I, even after being raised a good (well, I wasn't very good at being good) Evangelical Friend who studied the Bible diligently, do not recall one time where Jesus is recorded in the Gospels as saying, "Wherever 200 or 300 are gathered, I am with them."

Just sayin'.

-- Brent