A Quietude of Quakers: Or What Do You Call a Group of Friends?

As I've mentioned before, my friend Carrie Newcomer has a new CD coming out (you can, like me, pre-order it now!). "Before and After" is a wonderful album of of sublime songs with soul-felt lyrics. As we fans have all come to expect from Carrie, a thoughtful, deep, spiritual singer-songwriter.

But, there is this other side to her that folks who only listen to her serious stuff miss -- and that is her playful side. She writes some absolutely hilarious little tunes -- such as "Don't Push Send" on "Geography of Light." "Before and After"'s final track is a delightful example of a fun song -- "Crash of Rhinoceros." It's about Adam naming the animals (rather pedestrianly -- "Horse and cow and goat and sheep") and Eve thinking that the animals deserved something "a bit more unique and refined." And so she begins coming up with things such as "crash of rhinoceros," "pomp of Pekingese," "Parliament of owls," and so on.

As I said, it's delightful. A truly fun song.

And, though I am no songwriter (and certainly no singer -- as those who have heard me in my misspent younger days can attest!), it did remind me of a similar project I started a few years ago but never finished. That was coming up with names for groupings of religious people. I started with my own -- "a quietude of Quakers." Then came a "mass of Catholics." And then I was off:

• a presdestinarian of Presbyterians
• a bishop of Episcopalians
• a glossolalia of Pentecostals
• a healing of Charismatics

So I emailed Carrie about this. And about five minutes later she fired back:

• a litany of Lutherans
• a munificence of Methodist
• a boisterous of Baptist

And we were off to the naming races:

• a money of tele-evangalists
• a nest of snake handlers
• a sabbath of Seventh Day Adventists
• a tenacious of evangelical Quakers
• a visitation of Jehovah's Witnesses
• an aura of new-agers
• a brass of Salvation Army
• a momentum of Mormons
• an inclusive of Unitarians
• a dodecahedron of Disciples of Christ
• a singularity of Independent Christians
• a liberality of United Church of Christ

We paused for breath. Then she said, "Geeze Louise get two writers started on this. :-)" Geeze Louise, indeed.

This too much fun just to keep between Carrie and me -- so... submit your naming ideas!

And pre-order Carrie's new CD.

--Brent