Contact
with God : A Quaker contribution
Bridget
Walker
Introduction
I
should begin by saying that this talk does not represent any kind of
official Quaker view. It is rather a personal contribution from a
Quaker. Quakers are a very diverse group. We place a high value on
individual experience and joke that two Quakers will have three
opinions. However, we do have a corporate discipline, and find
guidance in our ‘big red book’ : Quaker Faith and Practice, the
Book of Christian Discipline of the Religious Society of Friends
(Quakers) in Britain. This outlines the structures and procedures of
church government and has an anthology of faith and practice over the
centuries. I shall draw on this in what I have to say.
Quakers
elsewhere around the world have different practice – sometimes with
a pastor and programme of worship. I am confining my remarks to what
I know of Quakers in Britain.
We had a meeting of some
Friends from Headington Quaker meeting to reflect on the theme of
this series of Lent talks and I hope I can reflect some of our
thoughts and that Friends here tonight will add to what I have to
say.
First
a couple of personal stories: I was not brought up in a church going
family, so my understanding of contact with God was fairly eclectic.
I spent my summer holidays at my grandmother’s in the country. She
had few books, and no children’s stories apart from a bound volume
of copies of The Children’s Friend dating from 1865.
In
this there was a story about a boy who hated his boarding school and
prayed to God not to be sent back. And he died. I can still remember
my sense of outrage. It was clear to me – if not to God – that
this was not the answer the boy wanted to his prayer. God was not on
the same wavelength, distant, not understanding, and, as in the way
of adults, had different priorities. So my prayers became more and
more extended and detailed to make quite sure that there was no room
for error, until in the end I gave them up for lack of response.
The other childhood memory probably came at a later stage
when God had fallen off my childhood radar. This was of Leigh Hunt’s
poem about Abou ben Adhem. My mother used to recite it to me. Those
of you who know the poem will remember that ben Adhem woke from a
dream to find an angel in his room writing in a book of gold the
names of those who love the Lord. His name was not among them so he
asks that he be recorded as one who loves his fellow men. The angels
writes it down and comes again the next night and shows the names
whom love of God has blessed and lo ben Adhem’s name led all the
rest. Love of fellow men – and women. I was content to aim for
that and leave God out of it.
So it was from other people to
whom God was important that I learned – Quaker workcamps in Eastern
Europe in the 60s, and then working for Christian Aid when I
travelled in the desert regions of West Africa in the aftermath of
the drought of the early seventies. Many project partners were
Muslims, for whom faith was central and the practice of prayer and
fasting an unselfconscious routine. I met Spanish little sisters of
Jesus living the religious life on the edge of the desert. In the
ecumenical family it was the time of liberation theology, black
theology and feminist theology. Quakers have always been rather
suspicious of theology and God talk, believing that our lives must
speak. These lives spoke to me.
In
introducing the first of this series of Lent talks two weeks ago,
Hugh Whybrew looked at the concept, image and mystery that we call
god. I would like to take some of the things that he said and reflect
in light of personal and Quaker experience
1. Not a
person but personal
God is not a person, but God is also
not an abstract life force. God is personal. For early Quakers the
direct experience of God, the leadings of the Spirit was key. Quakers
emerged at a time of enormous change/ferment. People were debating
how society should be governed and questioning the established order
of church and state. They were looking at authority in both the
political and the religious sphere. There was discussion of the role
of bishops in the established church, and the role of women. Margaret
Fell, a founder of Quakerism, wrote a pamphlet on Women’s Speaking
Justified, Proved and Allowed by the Scriptures and women have always
played a key role in work and ministry.
Quakers in the
seventeenth century studied the Bible and regarded themselves as the
direct inheritors if the early church. A key word was light which
they associated with the risen Christ in their hearts.
Friends
weren’t alone in saying that our experience of god is personal,
direct and can be unmediated. However, it is probably fair to say
that they carried this to the logical extreme - stripping out what
seemed to come between them and God . So out went outward religious
ceremonies, and the words and music of the liturgy, out went tests of
belief and the creeds. What mattered was not assent to doctrines but
personal experience and a faith to live by. Revelation was
continuing. Out went the paid clergy (hireling priests) . Everyone,
men and women, girls and boys, had a ministry. Out went the times and
seasons of the church year, out went the sacraments – the whole of
life was sacramental and holy. What was left?
Harvey Gillman,
in A Light is Shining , an introduction to Quakers, describes the
foundation of the Religious Society of Friends like this: there is a
creative, loving power in all people and in the world around. Many
call it God, though it is beyond all names. Everyone can become aware
of it directly, by listening to its promptings in their hearts …it
is not in the institution of the church, nor through the sacred texts
that God is most keenly felt, but in the human heart. Obviously if
you have difficulties with the institution and the scriptures this is
attractive and helpful. But it is also, I think, very demanding.
There is no hiding place from the direct relationship with God
wherever God is to be found.
At last year’s annual
gathering of Quakers I went to a meeting of the Committee on
Christian and Interfaith Relations. A Baptist minister who had been
invited was asked for his impressions. Well, he said, I have been to
Quaker meetings, of course I have, and 20 or 30 people in silent
worship in a room, it’s fine, it’s lovely. But five hundred,
gathered together, I wondered when the silence was going to begin,
and then I wondered when it would end ….it’s scary. Robert
Barclay , the Quaker theologian described his experience thus: When I
came into the silent assemblies of God’s people, I felt a secret
power among them, which touched my heart; and as I gave way unto it I
found the evil weakening in me and the good raised up….he began to
hunger more and more after the increase of this power and life and so
he says ‘I became knit and united unto them. This describes a close
relationship both with other Quakers but also with this creative
living force.
2.
Relationship
Relationship was the second area mentioned by
our speaker last week. The creator, he said, is not separate from
creation. All things are in God and God is in all things. There is no
part of ourselves where God is not present. He suggested that this
God relationship is one of friendship and reminded us that Jesus had
called his disciples his friends. This fits rather neatly for us –
Quakers were originally called Friends in the truth and we remain
officially the Religious Society of Friends. Quakers have taken
wholeheartedy to the concept of God in all and all in God. There is
no compartmentalisation into the public and the private domain. All
our relationships, personal and social, economic and political are in
God. How does this belief translate into action?
At this point
I turn to our red book, Quaker Faith and Practice. In the section
entitled Living Faithfully Today we have simplicity and equality,
moderation and abstinence, honesty and integrity. We are exhorted to
be careful not to defraud the public revenue. Fraud is out, but some
Friends feel called to the honest withholding of tax judged to be
used for war purposes with the concomitant sanctions – and bailiffs
- that this brings down on their heads, just as Friends in the past
refused to pay tithes. There is a section on oaths and affirmation –
we should avoid two standards of truth - payment of just debts,
sources and use of income, gambling and speculation. Conflict and how
to deal with it.
A quick word here about conflict. a Somali
friend once said to me ‘We Somalis know a lot about waging war and
that means we also know a lot about making peace.’ When I was
working at Friends House I sometimes felt that the reverse might be
said of Quakers at times. Of course there will be strongly held views
and differences. I can think of a particular occasion. It was a
committee meeting. Quaker business is conducted in the context of
worship, decisions should be reached by a process of discernment.
There is no voting, and the record of decisions reached is written at
the time by the clerk.. I remember an extremely heated discussion,
about what, I no longer recall, but at one point the clerk asked for
a moment of silence and then said ‘May I remind Friends that we are
not here to agree or disagree on this issue –we are hear to discern
the will of God.’ That took the discussion on to a different plane
and we did find a way forward .
Back to the red book – there
is a chapter on close personal relationships. Then there is the
matter of our responsibility as citizens, social justice, poverty and
housing, slavery, torture, discrimination and disadvantage, racism,
disability, education (there is ongoing debate about Quaker schools
in the private sector) world and economic affairs, and the unity of
creation and, of course, peace in all its fullness. Like the News of
the World we could claim that all of human life is there – and that
all is in God.
Is there a danger that faith gets lost in
action? I remember just prior to the invasion of Iraq some of the
staff at Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre in Birmingham busily
lettering posters and organising transport to London for the big
demonstration. I asked another Friend if she would be going. She said
to me. ‘Well Bridget, I am not an activist, I just pray a lot’.
That, I thought, may well be the hardest part. But action too, can be
testing. It is one thing to march behind a banner, and enjoy the
comradeship of others for the day and go home at the end of it. Why
did we go home that day by the way? It is quite another to take part
in non violent direct action to blockade nuclear bases. Yet should we
be doing anything less?
For if all are in God and there is
that of God in everyone, then every war is a civil war. When I hear
politicians on the radio say that nuclear deterrents have brought 60
years of stability I do wonder what planet they are living on. It is
not just a matter of all the wars that were fought by proxy outside
Europe and North America and the current phraseology around the war
against terror. There is the ongoing violence which results from the
inequalities of the rich and poor, north and south. And it’s not
just a matter of people – how can we honour God when we dishonour
the earth. Peace writ large is about rebuilding a broken world.
In
a recent little booklet called Twelve Quakers and Pacifism one Friend
writes:
As a Society we challenged the immoral and illegal war
in Iraq only in the ways of the ‘bourgeois pacifist’, courteous
demonstrations and polite letters. The Quaker termites of peace
nibbled only imperceptibly at the foundations of power. Our latter-
day respectability, economic prudence and lack of youthful vision
increasingly hold us back.
As a bourgeois pacifist – I try
to keep on nibbling!
(and cheers for our MP Andrew Smith who
has decided to vote against the replacement of Trident, and cheers
for all those nibblers whose correspondence and conversations may
have influenced his decision).
All things in God: God in all
things – a mutuality of relationship if we are attentive and
mindful. Quakers love to talk of the light within and light can bring
knowledge and warmth and security – but it also brings the hidden
out and that can be uncomfortable. 20 years ago the Quaker women’s
group produced a book entitled Bringing the Invisible into the Light.
In it a group of Quaker women described their experience of God and
of their fellow human beings. They challenged Friends to enlarge
their understandings of God and also to face the way in which God may
be mocked in the person of women. I found it really inspiring.
Drawing me closer to Friends at a time when the Anglican church was
struggling with issues over women’s ordination to the priesthood.
But some Friends found it really hurtful. Maybe the light was both
that of revelation and also of interrogation into truths we would
rather keep in the dark.
A male Friend has written of his own
difficult feelings about sexism, guilt, he says, is not a helpful
response. In ourselves as well as others we must seek that of God and
this will lead us in the right path.
A member of the Quaker
women’s group wrote
To me, worship is recognising and
communing with the divine whether it is within myself, in others or
in the world. The pre-condition of worship is my belief in my worth
–ship, my own and that of other people.
3.
The Kingdom within us
This
leads me to the third note I made from the first lent talk. This was
about the Kingdom within us. The speaker talked of the need to meet
god inside because we won’t otherwise find god outside. He quoted
St John Chrysostom: the door of the heart is the door of the kingdom
of god. We journey through the self to reach the point where God and
I meet.
When Headington Friends had our discussion of prayer
we looked at the roots of worship in worth and the need to affirm our
worth as the starting point to respond to God and the worth in
others. For some the personal relationship was strong, one Friend
spoke of what her children call her ‘hello God’ moments. For
others such moments of intimate encounter were rare. In our corporate
worship we still ourselves to wait on god. There is no formal moment
for intercession.. An American Friend said that his meeting had a
time for holding people in the light. We talked of prayer as thinking
lovingly of others.
If God is within us and the inner light is
in everyone then the kingdom of God is also a commonwealth where all
are equal in the sight of God and one another. Early Friends
addressed everyone as thee and thou, and did not use titles. It was
plain George Fox and Margaret Fell. This custom continues, and can
still present problems. I find it quite contradictory when people
trying to sell me something will call me Bridget at the drop of a
hat, but still ask for a title on most official forms. At the weekend
I installed a new printer for my computer but when I tried to
register it I was not allowed to be plain Bridget Walker. I had to be
Mr/Miss/Mrs/or Ms. I wonder why gender and women’s marital status
are important to Canon copiers. You may be interested to know that
there was no slot for Reverend. Perhaps this is an outward and
visible sign of a social order which still tries to put women in
their place – and has moved the formally religious out of the
frame.
To acknowledge that of God in all we meet is to try and
be respectful. That has its challenges even with family and like
minded friends. The more diverse company we keep the more we may need
to work at it. In the red book, in the section of Advices and
Queries, we are bidden actively to go out and learn about other
people’s experience of the light, to work gladly with other
religious groups, to enter imaginatively into the life and witness of
other communities of faith and to be open to new light, from whatever
source it may come, while recognising that we must also exercise
discernment.
This has always attracted me as I have spent a
lot of my working life in other people’s countries and communities.
Two years ago in Mozambique I was sharing a room with a Muslim
colleague. The room was very small. She needed physical space to say
her prayers so we had to push the beds together. But there was no way
we could re-arrange the furniture so that she could face in the right
direction. ‘No matter,’ she said, ‘God is everywhere’. As she
prayed I perched on my suitcase and reflected on the pattern of time
and space that are the frame for prayer for many Muslims. We need
space both physically and also psychologically. In our discussion of
prayer among Headington Friends this came up – how do we
find/create the right space in which to be able to pray. We don’t
need a dedicated building: that can be both a resource and a burden,
but we do need to have the psychological space to come together with
hearts and minds prepared.
This brings me to our corporate
worship about which I would like to say a few words. As we have seen,
Quakers share the foundational concepts about the nature of God with
many others from different Christian traditions. What is different is
the practice.
Here is Caroline Stephen, the aunt of Virginia
Woolf, describing in 1890 her first experience of a Quaker meeting
some years earlier: "On one never to be forgotten Sunday morning
I found myself one of a small company of silent worshippers who were
content to sit down together without words, that each might feel
after and draw near to the divine presence unhindered at least if not
helped by any human utterance. Utterance I knew was free, should the
words be given ...". She goes on to talk of a sense that At last
I had found a place where I might, without .the faintest suspicion of
insincerity, join with others in simply seeking God’s presence. To
sit down in silence could at least pledge me to nothing, it might
open to me the very gate of heaven.
I think that to sit down
in silence could at least pledge me to nothing is interesting. In her
book Interfaith Pilgrims, Eleanor Nesbitt suggests that this form of
worship may offer an opportunity for interfaith worship, that can
sometimes founder on familiar formulations of words. This made me
think of a Quaker work study camp I attended in East Germany in 1965.
There were participants from the American Friends Service Committee,
the Friends Service Council (now Quaker Peace and Social Witness) and
the German Youth movement. There was also a member of the ANC who had
reached the GDR through a communist underground railroad. The Quaker
contingent asked if we might start our day with silent reflection. We
were asking this for ourselves, not with any intention of being
exclusive but not expecting the others to join in, as most of the
Germans were vociferous about the dangers of religion as the opiate
of the masses. In fact everyone joined us for our quiet start to the
day and that, together with the hard physical labour of getting in
the rye harvest with a minimum of machinery, brought us together,
while our discussions often tore us apart.
Of course we have
to ask ourselves what’s going on in the silence? We are advised to
go with heart and mind prepared , to gather ourselves and seek the
still centre, then wait attentively and leave the rest to God. And at
the end? Well that is the beginning. We are not breaking contact with
God. As William Penn said in 1682, "True godliness don’t turn men out
of the world but enables them to live better in it and excites their
endeavours to mend it." When worship ends, service begins.
References
-
Quaker Faith and Practice: The Book of
Christian Discipline of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in
Britain
-
Quaker Women’s Group: Bringing the Invisible into
the Light
-
Harvey Gillman: A Light is Shining
-
Eleanor Nesbitt:
Interfaith Pilgrims
-
John Punshon: A Portrait in Grey
-
Helen
Steven: No Extraordinary Power
-
Alex Wildwood: A faith to call our
own
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