The Long Haul

Mike McKinley, pastor of Guilford Baptist Church, writes, "Young men tend to overestimate what they can accomplish in the short term and underestimate what they can accomplish in the long term." This has certainly been true in my own life.

I am a very passionate person; and when I set myself to a project, I want to see immediate results. When Faith and I founded Capitol Hill Friends, I imagined that we might get the Meeting up and running within a year or two. By year three, surely, the church would be ready to stand on its own, whether Faith and I could stay or not.

I can see in retrospect how much my expectations and imagined timeline revealed both my impatience and my ignorance of how human community actually works - or, perhaps, how it does not work - in 21st-century urban America. I thought that with a little determination and elbow grease I could start a new church and move on in just a few years. If George Fox or the Apostle Paul could do it, why not me?

It is easy to see now how naïve I was. I believed that the needs of post-modern America were essentially the same as those of 17th-century England, or the 1st-century Roman world. What I did not understand was that the ministry of Paul and George Fox took place in an environment where people were already organized into organic communities. These communities needed to hear the truth; but no one needed to teach them how to live as members of a community as such.

Our situation today in the post-industrial West is different. Most of us are locked into a society that is so intensely individualistic that our ability to live in community is severely hindered. Extended family networks and friendships are strained and broken through the unceasing quest for more money, status and personal well-being. Most of us no longer have any concept of what real community might look like; or, if we do, we are repelled by it. Community can seem like poverty when we are used to being autonomous individuals, ruled only by our appetites and our need for money.

In such an environment, simply sharing the good news of Jesus is not enough. The evangelist must demonstrate a new way of living that draws women and men into stable, committed community. In a society such as ours, genuine community is a striking witness to the power of the gospel.

This witness requires a different model of ministry from that of Paul or George Fox. I believe that the work that God is calling me to has far more in common with that of Benedict of Nursia. Benedict is considered the founder of Western Christian monasticism. He lived and ministered during the collapse of the Roman Empire, when civilization was falling apart and human community was in great danger. In this context, Benedict offered a new way of life - a disciplined community in which women and men could live faithful Christian lives. In the midst of social chaos and confusion, Benedict held a space for community rooted in obedience to Jesus Christ.

In many ways, Benedict provides a more helpful model of ministry for my historical context. However, I must admit, it is a tough pill to swallow. Frankly, I find the ministry of Paul and George Fox to be far more exciting than that of Benedict. I would rather hop from place to place, preaching and helping to gather a far-flung movement. Benedict's discipline, on the contrary, terrifies me with its admonition to stay in one place indefinitely, cultivating faithful community year after year, decade after decade. Frequently, however, God teaches me and helps me grow through those things which most challenge my natural inclinations. Though I find Benedict's model less appealing, I sense that it fits better with what God is calling me to.

I am convinced that the work that is needed here in Washington, DC is not primarily the fast, mobile ministry of George Fox or Paul. Instead, I believe Christ is calling me to the slow, patient work of cultivating the vineyard of God's people. I am here for the long haul. As long as it takes. As long as God requires.

Radical Christian Community in the New Rome

"Our life is love, and peace, and tenderness; and bearing one with another, and forgiving one another, and not laying accusations one against another; but praying one for another, and helping one another up with a tender hand..." - Isaac Pennington, 1667

During my studies at Earlham School of Religion, I was part of an intentional Christian community called Renaissance House, located in an impoverished area of Richmond, Indiana. There were five of us living there: The house's founder, me, and three other men, each of whom had physical or mental disabilities. We had an open door policy, inviting folks from the neighborhood to stop by and visit with us. Three nights a week, we hosted community meals, inviting folks from the neighborhood, and our friends from around town, to come and have dinner together.

These dinners were an amazing demonstration of what Christ's table looks like. A normal Wednesday night dinner at Renaissance House included seminary students and professors, area businessmen, the homeless, the mentally ill and physically handicapped. It included the young and the old, the middle class and the poor.

I was deeply affected by my experience at Renaissance House. The depths of community at Renaissance House were profound. We experienced the good, the bad and the ugly of life in community. It was beautiful. We relied on one another, chopping wood, remodeling homes, serving food and gathering around the Scriptures as a little church of misfits and outcasts.

The heart of Renaissance House was our commitment to being radically available to one another. We were not primarily concerned with advancing our careers or "getting ahead" in the world. Our main focus was caring for one another, sharing the gospel and breaking bread together. We bore one another's burdens and spent hours together every day. We prayed together.

Not everything was ideal. Life at the Renaissance House was very challenging much of the time. We were living on the edge in many respects, and the community was so intense that we had to work constantly on our interpersonal relationships. This was not always easy, and there were some pretty spectacular blow-ups while I was there. Nevertheless, on balance, these challenges seemed healthy. Though we were often uncomfortable and struggled with our human weaknesses, it felt like we were growing together in the Lord.

I wonder increasingly whether this kind of community might be possible here in Washington, DC. There are a lot of challenges here that we did not face in Richmond, Indiana. The biggest of these is the sheer cost of living. Unlike in Richmond, where houses were available in the low 10,000s, the DC housing market is intense. Life in general is more expensive here. Even living on the margins requires a serious income. Is there room in DC for the kind of radical Christian community that I experienced at Renaissance House?

I feel certain that there is. After all, just decades after Jesus' death and resurrection, Paul was writing to an established church in Rome. Life must have been difficult for the Roman church, living in the capital city of the pagan empire that ruled almost the entire known world. They were surrounded by a society that worshipped imperial power and reveled in the luxury that the might of caesar provided.

The Church in Rome must have had a particular role to play in bearing witness to Jesus and his Upside-Down Empire - an empire of love and justice that stood in contrast to the selfishness and violence of the wider culture. I believe that there is need for such a witness today in the new Rome. In a city that is so weighted down by the narrative of domination, power struggles and abusive privilege, there is a need for an alternative story.

Here on Capitol Hill, we witness the ways in which the narrative of Empire is expressed in the feverish scramble for control and power over others. This anti-gospel is a tangible reality in the offices of the many organizations that seek to gain influence here. In the face of this very real darkness, there is need for another story to be told, embraced and lived out. It is the story of a little baby who is born in a back alley, the Savior of the world. It is the story of the Messiah, tortured and executed by the imperial authorities for challenging the narrative of privilege and domination. It is the story of a community that serves a Risen Lord and is led by the Holy Spirit - a Spirit that reveals the falsehood of human empires and invites us into a life of sacrificial love and siblinghood.

I believe that there is a call for such communities here in Washington, DC. Despite the challenges that we face as residents in a wealthy center of imperial power, God is calling us to set aside our fear and our need for control. God is inviting us to live as the Body of Christ, not in a metaphorical sense, nor in a merely "spiritual" sense, but concretely. We are called into life together as a community, a life of mutual care and shared suffering for the Truth.

Surrender to Jesus in community will come in small, practical ways. We may be asked to surrender habits that upset our brothers and sisters. We may be asked to forgo career advancement that conflicts with the needs and mission of the community. We will most certainly be asked to give up some of the mobility that our present society so highly prizes.

During my time at Renaissance House, I learned that true Christian community is not a theoretical question. We can have all the right ideas about God and still fail to step out in faith. The Body of Christ only becomes a reality when we are willing to surrender control and live in community guided by the living presence of Jesus.

Are we willing to let go and become a part of something greater? Are ready for a life more grounded in community? It will be hard to let go of the individual freedom that the wider culture so cherishes. But the reward that we are promised is so much greater - the abundant life that we receive as we live into God's purpose for us.

Stability

One of the pillars of Christian monasticism is the vow of stability. In the monastic context, vowed stability means making a commitment to remain in a particular, geographically rooted monastic community until death. The purpose of such stability is to remove any escape route from the process of inward conversion that the monastics have committed themselves to in community. These women and men know that they will live the rest of their lives and die within the context of the vowed community to which they first committed themselves.

As a Quaker, formal, vowed monasticism has never been a live option for me. Even if it were, the fact that I am married and feel that God calls me to an energetic engagement with the surrounding culture would present stumbling blocks to embracing that path. Nevertheless, while I see that my calling in the Lord is distinct from that of my vowed brothers and sisters, I also perceive some similarities.

My natural state is one of flight. I like new ideas and projects, new locales and experiences. I like to start projects, but finishing them is harder. All things being equal, I am likely to seek the sweetness of beginning. I tend to flee the struggle of enduring to the finish.
For someone like me who is a "starter," the great temptation is not to finish. There is always another intriguing possibility on the horizon (or, more likely, dozens!); there is plenty of good work to do that does not involve the painful endurance of years.

But growth takes more than a decision to begin. This is the reason that the early Quaker movement taught that justification (getting "saved," being at peace with God) must go hand in hand with sanctification (being remade in Christ's image, the conversion of all areas of ones life). The decision to start is not enough. There must be an ongoing decision to be faithful, to submit to Christ, to take up the cross and walk with it. Even when it is difficult. Even when it is painful. Even when it is boring.

In my life, "stability" is about remaining where God has placed me and being willing to stay there until my death, if God wills it. In my present situation, it means committing to be faithful in the work that God has given me here in the DC area. As long as it takes, unless and until God releases me for a different kind of service.

I make my vow of stability to Jesus Christ, to remain in him and in his Way, all the days of my life. This is my spiritual vow of stability: not to any particular place or community, but to God's call on my life. And it may amount to the same thing, in the end. If God wills it, I will remain here in Washington, laboring for the Kingdom in this particular place and community until I die. I will not seek to escape my Holy Orders, instead living by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

The Quaker Charism

Within the Roman Catholic tradition, there are a number of monastic orders that maintain a certain level of autonomy and distinctness from the wider Church. Each of these orders has a particular sense of call and a special gift that they lift up for the wider Body. This special purpose, the particular giftedness and mission of the smaller order within the Body, is called a charism. Some orders focus on teaching, others on missionary work, still others on dedicated prayer; whatever their particular call as a community might be, it is this charism that justifies their existence as a semi-autonomous order within the Church.

I have long felt that the Religious Society of Friends is, in effect, a sort of religious order within the wider Christian Church. Believing that this is so, I am led to ask: What is our charism as a community? What is it that justifies the separate existence of the Quaker Church? If we are ultimately merely a subset of the worldwide orthodox Christian Church, what reasons can we offer for existing as a distinct society - an order - within the wider body? To put it another way: What are the special gifts that we bring to the wider Body? What is our particular mission as a people within the universal Church?

I would argue that our most essential calling as a people is to lift up a compelling witness to the fact that Jesus Christ is indeed risen from the dead. In our experience, this is not a figure of speech nor merely a fact that will only become truly relevant at some point in the future, when Jesus returns. We believe and we testify to our experience that Jesus has returned in a very important sense. He is available to us now, as he promised, whenever two or three are gathered together in his name.(1) The most basic mission of the Religious Society of Friends is to proclaim and make visible the fact that Jesus Christ is here, now, teaching and leading us himself.

Flowing out of this experience of Christ's literal presence in the midst of the community, Friends have developed certain beliefs and practices that make us unique, distinct from the rest of the Christian Church. Because of our faith that the Holy Spirit will lead us in our life together as a community, we seek to submit ourselves to its guidance in all things. Rather than attempting to interpret the Bible like a legal code, we seek to allow the very Spirit that inspired the Scriptures to inspire us as well, so that we can understand the true meaning of the holy texts. We wait on Christ, trusting him to open the Scriptures to us, just as he did for the early Church.(2)

This direct reliance on the Holy Spirit for direction not only gives Friends a distinctive relationship with the Bible, it also changes how we understand human authority. For much of the Christian Church, a human system of government is set up as the ultimate authority for the community. Whether it is a hierarchy of bishops and priests, bodies of elected representatives, or simple voting at the congregational level, most of the Church operates essentially under human control.

Truth be told, much of the time Quaker churches and institutions make their decisions with same degree of functional atheism as within the wider Church. However, at the core of our tradition is a practice of inward listening and trust in the living presence of Christ to guide us as a community. Out of our testimony that Christ is literally here, the functional Head of his Church today, we have developed a method of decision-making that involves group discernment of God's will. Rather than relying on human hierarchies or political-style voting, our charism expresses itself in a practice of voteless decision-making, where all the members come together and are (more often that one would guess) brought into clarity and unity by the present Spirit of Christ.

The discernment of God's will by the entire membership of the Church, waiting to be brought into unity by the Holy Spirit, is one of the most profound characteristics of the Religious Society of Friends that justifies its autonomous existence within the wider Church. We believe that this is a practice that the entire Church should adopt, and the best way we can witness to this super-human way of being guided directly by God is to continue to practice it as a distinct community.

Out of this process of waiting together as a community for the guidance of Christ's risen presence and power, a number of other distinctive beliefs and practices have emerged. Once again, we believe that these beliefs and practices are fundamentally faithful to the Truth of the gospel, and we feel that we are justified in remaining a distinct community within the wider Church so that we might continue to witness to the truth that has been revealed to us.

One part of our particular mission as Friends is to witness to the primacy of the spiritual reality of the gospel over the formal ritualism that so often threatens to choke out the Seed of Christ. Because we believe that the inward baptism of the Holy Spirit is so important, we feel led to refrain from participating in the outward ritual of water baptism. Similarly, because we feel that communion with Christ is fundamentally a spiritual reality, we refrain from conducting the ritual of the Lord's Supper within our community. Instead, we receive communion with Christ through a form of sacramental silence and prophecy.

Most Christian bodies believe that water baptism and the Lord's Supper are essential for salvation, and we know that many will be worried for the state of our souls. Yet it is precisely for this reason that it is so important that we maintain our witness in this regard. While we do not believe these traditional Christian rituals are wrong per se, it is our fervent belief that Jesus Christ desires lives of holiness and love, not religious ritual. We pray that, through our abstention from these forms (and, admittedly, adoption of different forms) we might help to reveal the truth that God is truly sovereign and that we cannot control God through ritual.

There are a number of other distinctive beliefs and practices that form part of the Quaker charism: Acknowledgment of the spiritual equality and ministry of women and men; denying participation in war and preparation for war; care for the Creation; refusal to swear oaths, and a general intensity in our call to be truthful at all times. All of these beliefs and practices are rooted in our experience with the risen Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah. In our desire to be faithful to him, we feel called to remain a distinct society - an autonomous order within the wider Church - until such a time as our faith and practice is fully integrated into the entire Body.

For Friends: What is your response to this? Does this resonate with your sense of our charism, our mission as a community? For Friends and others: How does this relate to you and your faith community? How do we maintain a distinct witness in a culture that is both intensely sub-divided and yet skeptical of commitment to any one path? How do we affirm our distinctive call as a community while staying engaged with the wider Body of Christ?

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1. Matthew 18: 20
2. Luke 24:32

Missional Quaker Faith: Letting Our Lives Preach

Our encounter with Jesus changes everything. When Jesus approached Simon, Andrew, James and John while they were working as fishermen by the sea, his call to them was so compelling that they immediately left behind everything that they had known - family, profession, security - and followed Jesus.(1) When we experience Jesus' presence and hear his gentle but firm invitation to come and follow him, we are challenged to radically change our lives - both in the outward details as well as in our inward motivations.

In our life together as a community of disciples, we come together to follow Jesus and to practice deep listening to how the Spirit is guiding us in this present day. As we listen for God's guidance in stillness and song, in rest and in work, we are drawn deeper together as a human fellowship that is rooted in love and obedience to the Spirit. It is in this context of love and trust that we are able to lean on one another as we walk together in the Way of Truth.

Ultimately, though, this loving community is only a small haven within a wider culture that is dedicated to the pursuit and protection of money, power and self-interest. It is in this wider world that most of us live the greater part of our existence, and it is to our hurting world that Jesus is extending his healing hand. Jesus knows the pain of this world better than any of us, and he knows what it is like to be excluded from polite society for loving those who are viewed as too sinful to have a part in mainstream society. He hung out with tax collectors, lepers and prostitutes, as well as with zealots, pharisees and desert mystics.

Jesus embodied God's love to those who the culture of the time had deemed unlovable. He was scandalous in sharing his presence with those who were not even allowed to enter the Temple - the center of social, religious and economic life in his time and place. Jesus summed up his generation's judgment of him like this: "Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners."(2) Today, we might well say of him, "a friend of Muslims and atheists." Jesus shows mercy to those who are open to receiving it; and if those our society regards as "successful" are not ready to hear the Good News, he will share it with those whom the wider culture has cast out.(3)

We are called to embody the reckless, socially unacceptable love that Jesus shows us. We are called to love not only to those who appear to be doing well in the current social order, but also those who have been rejected by mainstream society. We are called to show Christ's love to the poor, the uneducated, the physically and mentally disabled. We are called to love those whom our culture excludes. We are called to demonstrate our love in acts as tangible as washing feet and breaking bread.

If we truly wish to follow Jesus, our daily habits, patterns of consumption, and social relationships must change. As we struggle to embody the Gospel in our daily lives, we are challenged to open ourselves to people that we never would have associated with before. We are forced to get out of our comfort zones. Embracing the radical hospitality of Jesus means being confronted by our own routines of exclusion and self-centeredness.

We should be horrified that the modern-day Church tends to exclude the very people that Jesus commands us to embrace. How often have our churches treated the poor as a problem to be fixed, rather than as brothers and sisters to be embraced, loved? How many of us have treated our gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered brothers and sisters like the Pharisees treated lepers? How many people have we sent screaming into atheism and New Age religions through our legalism and scorn for those who do not fit into our boxes? How many of us, still within the Church, live in fear of being excluded if our fellow Christians were to learn who we really are?

Rather than relating to our Christian communities as fortresses to be walled off and defended against ungodly intrusion, I believe that Christ is calling us to use our communities as a base from which to reach out to the wider world. The mission of the Church is the same as that of Jesus Christ: to save the world, not to condemn it.(4) While we as followers of Jesus must be clear about our commitment to be obedient to Jesus as we know him in Scripture and in his present Spirit among us, our purpose is to call others to wholeness.

To live into Christ's mission of redemption, we will need to make substantial changes to our own lives, giving Jesus our house, job and bank account, not just our heart. Many of us who belong to privileged classes in our culture may be called to change our lifestyles, work, and living arrangements in order to do justice and live at peace with all people. Jesus' love is not about charity; it is not about sharing with those "less fortunate than us." On the contrary, when Christ is in us we see that we are just as deeply in need of God's mercy and transformation as anyone else, regardless of where we fall in the world's social hierarchy. The Spirit of Christ leads us into a life of self-emptying and service to others, in imitation of our Lord.(5)

A good outward measuring stick for communities that seek to live out Christ's mission in the world is the Twelve Marks of the New Monasticism. These marks, including, "relocation to the abandoned places of Empire," and, "sharing economic resources with fellow community members and the needy among us," present a challenge to the prevailing culture in North America. In a society that consistently encourages us to enlarge ourselves, improve ourselves, promote ourselves, we are being called by Jesus to surrender ourselves, to die to self. As we meditate on the life, teachings, death and resurrection of our Lord, and as we listen to how his Spirit is guiding us today, it is clear that our lives must be radically changed in things as practical as where we live, who we buy our groceries from, and who we have over for dinner.

We will discover who we are in Christ when we commit to changing our lives in order to share the Gospel with all people - especially those on society's margins. The kind of sharing that we are called to goes far beyond putting a Jesus fish on our bumper or even delivering a sermon. When we are in Christ, we are called to let our very lives preach. It is through the way that we live, and the love that we show for others, that the world will come to know Jesus.

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1. See Mark 1
2. Luke 7:34
3. Luke 14:15-23
4. See John 3:17
5. See Philippians 2:5-11
Resources for Further Study:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_monasticism
http://www.newmonasticism.org/12marks.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movement_for_a_New_Society

Can Quakerism Survive the Airplane?

One of the greatest challenges for this generation of Quakerism will be figuring out how to adapt our traditional practices to a society in which human mobility and information technology have reached a level never seen before. For the first three hundred years or so, the Religious Society of Friends could count on a certain level of geographical stability on the part of its membership. Most people lived and died in the same time zone. When Friends did move, we often did so as a community, re-establishing our social context wherever we migrated to – be it Rhode Island, the Carolinas, Ohio, Kansas or Oregon.

Our present generation lacks the stability - dedication to place and community - that was normative for the first three centuries of our history. All of our structures – Monthly, Quarterly and Yearly Meetings; Ministry, Eldership and Oversight; and the seemingly endless committee structures that have blossomed over the years – all of them were developed in the context of geographically stable, covenantal community.

How might Friends today adapt to the radical itinerancy of our (post) modern context? How do we maintain the spirit of our tradition while re-examining the old forms that often seem poorly adapted to our new situation? How are we being called to re-evaluate our lifestyles to discern when our lives ought to conform themselves to tradition, rather than insisting that tradition conform itself to the exigencies of mainstream 21st-century society?

Are we being called to question our radical mobility? What are the social consequences of our detachment from place? What are the ecological consequences of our dependence on fossil-fueled transportation, particularly air travel? What are the spiritual ramifications of our choice to participate in the wider culture’s nonchalance about place, community and rootedness?

The New Quaker Monasticism and Liturgy

This Ash Wednesday, a few friends and I got together to observe the beginning of Lent. We shared a meal, and then we read the lectionary scripture for the day and settled into waiting worship. After worship had broken, we walked together over to St. Mark’s Episcopal church to attend their service. For me, the Episcopal service was at once foreign and familiar.

Several years ago, while in seminary at Earlham School of Religion, I lived as part of a new monastic community called Renaissance House. We lived together in a big, dilapidated mansion in the once-prosperous Starr District of Richmond, Indiana. We hosted public dinners three times a week where all were invited, and which were frequented by the mentally ill, the very poor, college professors, entrepreneurs, drug addicts, seminary and college students, and neighborhood kids. We lived off the land, dumpster diving for food and foraging for wasted wood and fallen trees to heat the house. We prayed together as a community four times a day.

As we explored what it meant to be a worshipping community, we visited a nearby Roman Catholic monastic community, the Sisters of St. Francis, in Oldenburg, Indiana. One of the surprising things we learned was that we at Renaissance House did a lot more corporate prayer than the “real” monastics did. We gathered for worship before breakfast (Matins), at noon (Sext), before dinner (Vespers) and in the late evening before bed (Compline). We prayed liturgy out of the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer, we sang, and we read the Scriptures aloud.

Because I had come to Christianity in the Quaker tradition, this form of worship was new and somewhat strange for me. I did not know quite what to make of spoken liturgy, especially because the Friends tradition that I was being steeped in put a high value on extemporaneous, “Spirit-led” prayer and vocal ministry. To have our prayers “scripted” seemed questionable. Despite my reservations about the details of our worship, I felt very committed to the worshipping community at Renaissance House. I believed in our way of life as a Christian brotherhood. I believed that our ministry to the neighborhood and wider community was meaningful; that we were truly “being the Church” in that time and place.

My experience at St. Mark’s this Wednesday surprised me. First of all, it became clear to me that Renaissance House was an Episcopal-inspired new monastic community. Having the chance to participate in a more formal Episcopalian service, I saw how almost all of our practice at Renaissance House was based in that tradition. Second of all, and far more shocking to me, I realized that I missed the liturgy. I missed the corporate recitation of the Psalms. I missed the congregational call and response. I missed the corporate confession of past failure, and repentance from sin. I missed the discomfort of being asked to say things that I would not normally say.

Recognizing that spoken liturgy has meaning for me, I feel the need to reflect on how this relates to my distinctively Quaker interpretation of my faith. I know that the early Friends rejected precisely the form of worship that I am now finding compelling. And I feel like I understand why they did. When the Quaker movement was emerging in the middle of the 17th century, the Church of England (now known as Episcopalian in the United States) was an oppressive force that demanded submission to an array of priestly codes, and which made the Gospel something that had to be mediated through educated, humanly authorized clergy. I affirm the early Friends’ rejection of human-based authority and the idolatry of Scripture and ritual.

But the early Friends did not merely leave the “apostate” Church of England and take up a revised liturgy on their own. They did away with the liturgy, with pre-arranged congregational singing, Scripture-reading and prepared sermons. They insisted that for worship to be conducted “in Spirit and in Truth,” there could be no pre-arrangement. True worship was when God was waited upon and women and men preached out of a sense of immediate leading by the Holy Spirit. The liturgy was a dead letter imposed by the human mind, but the Spirit gave life.

I think that this may have been the right answer for the early Friends. This first generation of Quakers had been filled to the brim with ceremony, liturgy, singing and Scripture. From their earliest childhood, the tradition of the Church was inculcated in them. The liturgy was practically in their DNA! The early Friends already knew the Scriptures, the creeds and the hymns of the Church by heart before they broke away from the deadening ritual and hierarchy that fallen humans had employed to take the Gospel captive. The early Friends rejected the abuses of Scripture, music and liturgy – but they retained full knowledge and use of them as they gathered to wait on the Lord.

More recent generations of Friends have not been as fortunate. We have been raised without as rich a sense of the tradition of the Church: without a corporate knowledge of our hymns; and without a regular corporate confession of our faith, our recognition of sin, and repentance. Many of us have lost even a basic awareness of the Scriptures.

Given our present context and condition, I wonder whether some form of liturgy might not be a good thing for Friends. What is the balance between us waiting on Christ to lead us in every step and us taking initiative to respond to Christ’s call?  What would be a Quaker way of doing liturgy?

Shane Claiborne comes to Wichita

The Church in Wichita was honored to receive Shane Claiborne, a fellow laborer from Philadelphia, who is a prominent voice in the New Monastic movement and an inspiration for many people – especially young Evangelical Christians – who are tired of “business as usual” in the Church and who long for a more radical call to discipleship in the Way of Jesus. Claiborne came to Wichita as a part of a larger speaking tour, during which he visited several Kansas communities. In Wichita, he spoke at Eastminster Presbyterian Church to a largely Evangelical audience. Claiborne preaches a message of unity within the church and between Protestant denominations, the Roman Catholic Church, and other branches of Christianity. He says that he and those in his community seek a renewal in the Church, not a continuation of the centuries of divisions that created the modern face of the Western church.

Claiborne especially highlighted the obligation of Christians (or “Christ-followers”) to work for social justice. He says that, “one of the signs of the early Church was ending poverty” (see Acts 4:34). Claiborne’s inclusive message stresses the importance of working with those whom we do not fully agree with – theologically or otherwise – so that together we might be about the work of the Kingdom of God. Hospitality to our brothers and sisters is critical to Claiborne’s understanding of the gospel. In particular, Claiborne preaches a Christ-like solidarity with those who are most shunned and despised by our society, such as the homeless, the addict, the physically and mentally infirm, and the poor. It is not enough to give charity, we must be an incarnational community; we are called to live and work among the poor. Flowing naturally from this loving concern for all of God’s children, Claiborne was explicit that the Way of Jesus is the way of nonviolence: War and oppression are incompatible with the Christian life.

I was impressed with Claiborne’s message, especially in that he combined a fidelity to orthodoxy (right belief) with a commitment to orthopraxy (right practice). Claiborne affirms the creeds of Roman and Protestant Christianity, but he insists that mere belief in Christ is not sufficient – we must strive to be like Christ in our lives. Love, mercy and humility are the key ingredients of our walk in the Way of Jesus; if our way of living does not give testimony to our belief in the person of Jesus, our intellectual assent to church doctrine is meaningless. As Claiborne put it: “You can have all the right answers and still be mean.”

One disappointment that I had with Claiborne’s presentation that day was that he did not explicitly direct his hearers to the Inward Teacher, Christ in us. During the question-and-answer session, several individuals stood and asked questions of Claiborne: they wanted to know how they were to live this radical life of discipleship that Claiborne had been talking about. It felt like they were looking for a technique, a set of steps to follow, a rule to walk by. Claiborne did well in that he did not claim to have the answers; he made it clear that he was living out of his own experience and in his own context and that each of us must determine what is right in our own situation. But I wish that he had taken it a step further, directing his audience to seek guidance from the immediate presence of the Holy Spirit in our midst and in our hearts. I wish he had said, “I can’t tell you what the next step is for you – but Jesus Christ can, and he’s ready to lead you if you get still and listen within your heart for his voice.” It is clear to me that Claiborne himself practices this inward listening; it was implicit in everything he said. I just wish he had made it explicit for his audience, many of whom may never have heard of such a concept.

How far am I willing to go?

I had a good conversation recently with a f/Friend. It started out extremely intensely, since I found myself defending the idea that Quakerism needed to be grounded in a sense of Scripture being a checking authority in discerning the will of God. I believe that this is true, but as I argued the point I felt convicted of my own failure to live up to the life that Christ Jesus calls me to with the example of his life and teachings. For all I could say about the need for scriptural authority in the Religious Society of Friends, I cannot escape the fact that my own life does not conform to the life of Christ.

I act out of ego - out of desire and fear - so very often, and it is relatively rare that I act out of agape-love. And there is so much of my life that I hold back from God. I shy away from the cross. I expect that I should be able to be a suffering servant without having to suffer for it! I expect that I should be able to say to my Lord: "Yes, Lord! I hand my life over to you - just as long as I have health insurance and food to eat." I don't want to face the fact that God offers the ministers of God the same health insurance that is offered to the birds of the air and the lilies of the field.

I feel released. I feel clear in abandoning expectation of anything, even necessities. Maybe it serves God's will in my life that I go without healthcare. Maybe God is glorified best in my life when I give up all semblance of control, all wealth, all security. My f/Friend spoke of his experience as the son of two missionaries and remarked on how they lived in great poverty, practically begging from the religious community they served. He related this to the tendency for men and women of God to live like beggars. Consider Francis and the true monastics, Rumi, the Buddha and his monastics. Perhaps the path that God has called me to is that of being a beggar, renouncing all semblance of self-sufficiency.

Am I truly willing to die for my faith? Am I willing to be homeless, without healthcare, literally begging for my daily bread, if that's what God is calling me to? I must cease fretting so much about how I am to do God's will and simply do it. Thy will be done, Lord God - even if it means humiliation and death. And this means not resenting others who are making different choices. If I am truly grounded in God's call for me and truly given over to follow that call, whatever be the consequences, the I have no reason to be upset with anyone. That's not to say that I should let sinful behavior off the hook - but speaking to it should never be about me. My only motivation should be Christ-like care and compassion for my fellow beings.

It is time for me to let go of everything but God, walking in the footsteps of Jesus, seeking no vindication but that of my Parent in Heaven. Come what may, no matter what others think, I pray that I might be faithful to God, walking in the Way of God's son, Jesus Christ.

Yucatán, idleness and Quaker Monasticism

Since my last post, Andrew and I have gone from Mexico City to Xalapa, Ver., to Veracruz, Ver., and are now in Mérida, Yucatán. Ever since leaving Xalapa, the weather has been steamy, and these boys from Kansas are scrambling to adapt to the heat and humidity of the region. We've seen some concerts - Spanish-language hip-hop, Veracruz folk music, Cuban bands, serenades on classic guitar - walked on some beaches, visited some cafés. Muy tranquilo. Today, we are headed out to Chichen Itzá, to see some of the more impressive Mayan ruins that are to be seen here in Mexico. My main concern is to avoid getting too sunburned. I am unsure as to how successful I will be, after this afternoon.

This trip has been very relaxed, mostly just Andrew and me hanging out with Mexico as a background, and it has given me opporunity to do some thinking. I have been reflecting a lot on my own spiritual life and how connected it is to community and place. I am seeing in very concrete ways how much community and place impact my spirituality in the way that I feel spiritually off-balance traveling here in Mexico. Being here, largely disconnected from Friends and all of my familiar patterns of life, it is far more difficult to keep myself oriented towards God. I am more easily distracted, most easily confused. This trip has convinced me that, at least for the time being, travel for pleasure is not an activity that I should be engaged in. To be here in a foreign land without a sense of mission, without work to do, is dangerous idleness. In the future, I hope to be more conscientious about bringing all of my plans before God and listening very carefully before I commit, rather than assuming that I know the answer already. Just because a plan seems good and logical to me does not mean that that is how God wants to use me.

With all of this travel, I have also had the chance to think a bit about the Quaker tradition and how it relates to forming or joining more intentional community. I identify with the convergent tendency, wanting to move forward in radical, unexpected ways, but not at the expense of the important "check" of our tradition as the Quaker branch of Christianity. The place that this seems to become most difficult is in forming or joining intentional or new monastic communities that are composed of various types of Christians. Straight "emergent" makes sense when dealing with a bunch of people from different Christian backgrounds. It seems like in that case, you're just looking for the lowest common denominator, so that everyone can be included. Unfortunately, it seems that in many if not most neo-monastic communities, the lowest common denominator is not, in fact, very congenial to Friends who want to remain in the Friends tradition. "Basic Christianity" almost always seems to include bread and wine communion and water baptism, as well as extensive spoken liturgy. Where waiting worship might come in here, I'm not sure; but there doesn't seem to be much reference to it.

This is only a problem because we Quakers are such a small group, and, on top of that, a group that teeters between a significant minority that does not strongly identify with Christianity and another that does not strongly identify with the Quaker stream, often prefering to "just be Christian" (that is, Protestant). What I am personally hoping for, as a Friend of convergent orientation, is to see explicitly Quaker intentional and neo-monastic communities grow and show what a new Quaker monasticism could look like. The question for me is: will Quakers come to the banquet, or will we need to call in anyone and everyone, accepting the change (dilution?) of our corporate witness as Friends as our makeup becomes much more Protestant in flavor?

Do you feel led to more radical, intentional Quaker community? Let's talk.