Quaker Community Testimony: II
QUAKER COMMUNITY TESTIMONY: II
261. Interconnections (by Elaine M. Prevallet; 1985)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR—Elaine Prevallet, S.L. is currently director of Knobs Haven, a retreat center for groups or individuals at the Loretto Motherhouse in Nerinx KY. She spent 2 years on staff at Pendle Hill, teaching Spirituality and Scripture. She spent a year in Japan and this country studying Zen. The Sisters of Loretto began in Kentucky in 1812. This pamphlet grew out of talks 1st given at Pendle Hill in 1982.
We can imagine God’s presence as a fount of living water springing up within us, so a stream of love-energy may bless every place we walk, every room we enter, every person we meet, every flower and every flower we see, and allow everything we encounter to “flower from within, of self-blessing.”
When we relate to ourselves as the sacred vessels we are, then we begin to know that all that is in the universe is held together in the one Life of God, woven together like one beautifully intricately-pattern fabric, or like notes in an immense and marvelous symphony of praise & thanksgiving to the infinite God. Elaine Prevallet
The Blessed Community—In Numbers 16 Korah, who ministered to the people, wanted to enter the sanctuary itself, and so challenged Moses and Aaron. In the judgment, the earth opened up and swallowed Korah and his family. A Hasidic tale said: “He did not know that the power he had felt came upon him because Aaron stood in his place and he in his.” For the most part we are unaware of this deeper interconnectedness in life. [Occasionally life shows us that just being oneself, in one’s own place, is what matters].
[The body works such that] if one part fails to do its work all the other parts are hindered. Paul uses the body images to describe the Church. A quite hidden influence is being exercised, sometimes by a person or persons in some distant place. The web of interconnection depends upon fidelity, upon each one of us being faithful to what is given to us no matter what it is. There is so much more than we can see on the surface. There is the kind of wisdom when one engages in intercessory prayer; no one can say how it works.
The East accepts such wisdom more readily. Richard Wilhelm said about his China experience: “There was a great drought. [The Chinese fetched the rainmaker from another province]. A dried up old man appeared; he went to a quiet little house, & locked himself up for 3 days. When a snowstorm came Wilhelm asked what he had done for 3 days. The man answered: ‘The whole country isn’t in Tao & I also am not in the natural order of things because I am in a disordered country. I had to wait 3 days until I was back in Tao & then the rain came.”
Even with our scientific, rational mindset, we know the value of someone whose presence simply allows us to be. Their merely being seems to take some the blockage out of the air, to uncomplicate us. We affect the formation of each others’ personalities in every encounter. Our energy is received and will serve either to enhance the other’s capacity for love, or to cripple it. Intuitions such as these suggest that the exchanges of energy are at least as important as the visible connections that are part of our relationship with the world.
We can imagine energy radiating into the universe; we do communicate some kind of energy. The kind of energy we share depends upon how close we are in touch with the sacred gift of life, how aware we are that we are the temple of God’s Spirit, how deeply we contact that Life-Giving Source within us. It is as if God’s Spirit meets & greets the Spirit in one another. Thomas Kelly called it “The Blessed Community” & wrote: “As there is a mysterious manying of God, so there is a one-ing of souls who find their way to Him who is their home.”
In a beautiful passage from the OT, the prophet Ezekiel describes the new temple at Jerusalem, from which flows streams of living water. Jesus promised: Whoever believes in me . . . out of their belly shall flow river of living water” (John 7:38). [The belly image probably comes from rabbinic writing, where Jerusalem] was the center, the navel of the universe. That God is present with us as the source of the unity of all life is an intuition so fundamental that it appears, even in similar ways, in many religious traditions. We can imagine God’s presence as a fount of living water springing up within us, so a stream of love-energy may bless every place we walk, every room we enter, every person we meet, every flower and every flower we see, and allow everything we encounter to “flower from within, of self-blessing.”
II. On Wounding and Transforming—[In the OT when] the people have not been faithful to their relationship with God, the earth mourns, languishes, lies polluted. Humans’ relationships with God, with each other, and with the land are inextricably bound together and affect each other; when humans are not keeping covenant with each other, they do not know God. Wounding and being wounded are inevitable in our human situation. We are wounded both in ways we know and in ways we don’t know. And we wound; automatically, unwittingly, inevitably. Often not because we want to, but just because we are unable not to.
Participation in our society inevitably means wounding. We live in a world in which wounding and being wounded, wittingly or unwittingly, are war and woof of the fabric of our lives. We have perhaps finally begun to be conscious of the various levels and kinds of wounding, only because survival depends on it. Hazel Henderson asks: Is there ever any profit that is not registered as a debit somewhere? The connection may not be immediate, it may take generations to surface, but surface it will.
Even though competition is a fact of life, winning is only a temporary illusion. The deeper law of the universe, which we have ignored, is the law of exchange, of share and concern. We must become aware of how intricately our destinies are interwoven. Our relationship to the universe is largely formed by how we imagine it to be. [If we imagine any part of creation as only there for our convenience and use] that is how we will relate to it. Maybe I can be deliberate in trying to recognize and be grateful for the exchange when something gives itself to me for my benefit. [If I wound anything] I can pray for forgiveness.
Our society has lost that sense of gratitude for exchange. As technology advanced, so did the sense of power and conquest; after which came a distancing from nature, and consequent loss of the sense of organic relatedness. We could develop some private rituals that would help us remember to acknowledge that we are not simply taking something, but that something is being given to us. We can cultivate gratitude and reverence for all that is. The sign of the risen Christ, retaining his wounded body, suggests that nothing in creation escapes the wounding, but resurrection is the enduring covenantal sign of God’s relations to us. Wounding may be inevitable, and may seem to predominate, but transformation is in process, and life will prevail.
III. Nibbled and Nibbling—There is a fundamental intuition that everything is either food or the eater of food; [everything is nibbled & nibbling]. Just as we cannot live & grow on the physical level unless we are fed, so we do not grow psychically or spiritually unless we are fed. We usually learn our faults through hurting others, & only in that way do we become more sensitive & loving. Collectively we have learned at the expense of countless others who are unknown to us, but who have paid the price of their lives for our heightened awareness.
On the physical level as well, we & all the other elements of the universe are in a patterned & purposeful process of exchange so intricate that we can’t begin to unravel all its connections. It is an all-encompassing cosmic reciprocity. & we, conscious beings that we are, have the opportunity to enter into the process knowingly & willingly. We participate gladly & trustingly in the venture with God who is now at work making all things new.
IV. A Dominion of Love—[God’s promise to Noah, is symbolized by the [rain]bow God placed in the heavens, a promise that] God has set down the weapon of punishment & placed it in the clouds & will never again destroy the earth by flood. [Besides the food God has given us], if we recognize the air we breathe as food for our bodies, then the plant’s life becomes at least as important as is killing a plant to eat it. Our senses depend upon all that is around them to feed them, & our mental well-being is intimately connected with what surrounds us.
How does God exercise dominion and what does that tell us about our dominion over the earth? We have mistakenly identified dominion as involving control and submission [and power over]. God’s dominion is surely a dominion and emphatically not control by power. What was Jesus’ way of dominion? Many NT passages indicate that Jesus’ way was one of com-panion, com-passion, com-munion [being with us]. God exercises dominion by allowing growth from within, causing free, autonomous being, evoking self-blessing.
Paul speaks of all creation as having been made subject to futility or frustration. Our experience of frustration and futility can give us a strong sense of what it would be like to be subject to vanity, to be in vain. There are multitudes of examples like raped mountains. Surely creation does groan with the pain, and waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God. We have a responsibility to the whole of creation to reveal and share the freedom we have been loved into [by Christ]. We need to balance our present sense of power with another, more respectful and collaborative sense of our responsibility to care for all forms of being.
A new reconciled creation may not be so farfetched. Given what research [has revealed] we may yet find our way to a new relationship of communication with the so-called “lower forms of life. We are responsible for a very delicate, providential caring for all that is, a gentle letting-be, the same way that God lets us and all of creation be. The image of dominion as control must give way to the image of dominion as love.
V. The Enemy Within—The image presented in Isaiah 11:6-9 [of unlikely pairs of animals, predator & prey lying down together], is not just an idyllic vision of the world to come. It is the task that lies before us here & now. The pairs are intended finally to dwell together in peace. [We divide the world into hostile & friendly camps]. Within ourselves we have our “virtues” & our “vices.” All our virtues have their shadow-opposites: our gentleness often masks our violence, our love easily turns into manipulation or possession, our humility hides our pride. The gospels, too, are full of opposites to be reconciled. In the gospel & our lives, Christ is the reconciler who accepts the rejected & despised person, & points to the unrecognized value of that which has been cast out.
What we reject & despise in others is what most needs to be owned & reconciled in ourselves. Most often, we come to self-knowledge only by first seeing it in someone who is offensive to us. That is their gift to us. [If we refuse to do the necessary] inner work, we continue to project our negativities outward, thereby condemning ourselves to live in a world peopled with threats & fears, with shadows that never emerge into clear light. [In reference to blacks], it is clear that white Americans must learn that violence & ignorance reside, in reality, within ourselves. And Americans function as [evil & enemy] for the Russians as the Russian do for Americans.
The more fully we know the range of possibilities within ourselves, the more will we know ourselves one with all others, and the more compassionate we can be and less judgmental. When we come to terms with the violence, the “beasts of prey” within ourselves, we learn that one’s inner wolf must be in friendly, knowledgeable relationship with one’s inner lamb. The wolf will not stop being a wolf, but it is able to share some of its wolf-wisdom with the lamb, and they, and the world, are able to exist in peaceful unity.
VI. Metanoia—Today some people have begun to talk about a radical change in the way we have our world put together. Matter, which seems to us to be “substantial,” is now known to be a mass of energy. We now know that an experiment is changed by being viewed. We have to admit that there is more going on in life than meets the eye, and we would have to develop an attentiveness and sensitivity not only of mind but also of heart to the cues that come from beneath the surface. What is required is a deep letting-go of our ego’s attempt to control the world, which the gospel expresses as “losing oneself in order to find oneself.”
We desperately need such a change at this time in history. We have alienated ourselves from our world; we have polluted it, we threaten to destroy it. Our survival of the present crisis is a question of whether we are psychologically and spiritually fit to live on planet earth; whether we can learn quickly enough how to live in harmony rather than competition. What is needed is a real metanoia, a total conversion of mind and heart.
When we relate to ourselves as sacred vessels we are, then we begin to know that all that is in the universe is held together in God one Life, woven together like one beautifully intricately-pattern fabric, or like notes in an immense & marvelous symphony of praise & thanksgiving to the infinite God. It is the God who lives within us who joins us with fellow human beings in a “Blessed Community,” where one seeks to bring wolves and lambs together to be reconciled and loved. In this network each seeks to enter the inner Sanctuary where our small life is touched and held in the great Life of God. When we see these networks forming, we recognize the sign of the wounded and risen Body of Christ, and we know that God is working to transform wounds into wholeness of life.
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About the Author—Jaap Diedrick Snoek was born & raised in the Netherlands, spending an important part of childhood under German occupation. He & family emigrated to the US in 1950. He received a doctorate in social psychology from the Univ. of Michigan. He taught psychology at Smith College for 10 years. This pamphlet grew out of a paper written during a sabbatical term at Pendle Hill, reflecting encounter group experiences.
We expect a [God sighting] of which we know nothing but the place, and the place is called community… There is no single God’s word that can be clearly known and advocated. The words are clarified for us in our human situation of being turned to one another. Martin Buber
Hunger for Community—Everywhere I go I meet people who suffer from a sense of loneliness, of the insufficiency of their relationships. Young people express it in thoroughgoing disengagement from society. Psychology today produces knowledge that threatens to become a tool in the control of men instead of enhancing man’s dignity and freedom. People need each other. We wish to know and be known to others in our fullness. The direction of movement is towards [intentional communities] and increased [and deeper] sharing of our lives.
Howard Brinton writes: “[For] the suburban commuter who has his business in the city, one’s community is really the wide world, full of people with whom he has no intimate contact. As a result he is an unnatural human being, because one’s body & mind have been created & conditioned to function in small local communities. One tries through frantic, ceaseless activity to fill the vacuum created by the absence of the kind of life one was created to lead.” Brinton argues that “to strengthen Meeting so as to make it in reality an ideal community, is really more productive than some of the more common ways of seeking community involvement and action.
Experiencing Pendle Hill helped to make me more aware of the obstacles that ordinary life puts in the way [of relationships], such as the isolation of one-family houses. Martin Buber writes: “In no case does membership in a group involve an existential relation between one member & another.” We need to understand more about our propensities for failure in human relationships in order to make any proposed living arrangements work.
From Acquaintance to Mutuality—I have come to find it useful to think of a common dimension that characterizes relationships: the degree of involvement that 2 persons have with each other. 1st, there is a stage which 2 people are aware of each other’s existence as acquaintances. It appears we feel comfortable, or at least safer, with persons who promise by background & appearance to reinforce our beliefs, & uphold our values.
2nd, is the stage entering into a role relationship of surface-contact. Over time, a surface contact relationship accumulates a history of more or less gratifying outcomes, producing feelings of satisfaction with the relationship & liking the other person. Because interaction in surface-contact relation is mainly of this role-bound variety, it often carries remarkably little information about the person enacting the role. “Slips” in performance reveals true selves to others, & give them greater confidence that they are beginning to know us as persons. [The drive for] efficiency, predictability, & smooth transactions, has led to ever greater intolerance for humanness in the performance of our daily duties. To be caught up for the major part of one’s day-to-day existence in relationships at this level is a source of feelings of disease, alienation, and eventually a kind of spiritual death.
We occasionally attain another, more satisfying level of relationship that may sustain us through many a period of sterility. Sharing some knowledge about each other as persons leads to the level of mutuality which includes an underlying attitude of affection. If we have said “Thou” to another once, the memory of mutuality endures and tends to transform a relationship in the directions I have here tried to describe. Shared knowledge of another is decidedly different from the knowledge about him.
They do not have to reveal themselves to each other in words; they can also act so as to express clearly and unambiguously their conception of you-and-me-at-this-moment. [When you and another are faced with a less-than-ideal situation, you may find yourself acting in concert with the other to improve the situation, sometimes without planning it before hand]. Shared knowledge is usually a source of affection between people. The memory of such moments of mutual understanding endures as a positive feeling that transcends mere liking or satisfaction. People sharing mutuality often show a lot of resourcefulness in caring for each other and interact with regard for the effect of their behavior upon the other person and upon the relationship.
Man wishes to be confirmed in his being by man, & wishes to have a presence in the other's being… He watches for YES which allows him to be & which can come only from one human person to another. Martin Buber
Difficulties in Developing Mutuality—Relationships that develop at the level of acquaintance or surface-contacts are far more likely to remain at that level or to be abandoned altogether than they are to be deepened. Time and opportunity are 2 important prerequisites for forming relationships of any sort. Who we meet, when we meet them, and how much leisure we have are all socially structured. We must take time, invent opportunities, pursue freedom to be ourselves and act as if nothing could be more important than persons.
When one in a relationship conceives a desire to deepen the relationship, one says or does something not required by one’s role or situation; it is an invitation. [The risk of invitations being rejected is minimized] by making it into something more like a way to avoid hurting the inviters feelings; dissembling is also used. These are ways of dealing with an unacknowledged fear of rejection. [Honesty & directness is best in invitations, including admitting a fear of rejection].
[Even with someone whom we feel dislike and hostility], when we can speak directly and confront the other specifically with the actions or words that aroused our discomfort, we clear the path for a deeper approach. [A defensive approach would be to show righteous anger [at the 1st sign of a mistake]; it reduces the possibility of counterattack. [Also], it is possible to make people feel pretty terrible by forgiving them, [and leaves them unable to be angry back]. For some, fears of being engulfed or totally absorbed in another person’s existence raise doubts about how much closeness can be tolerated; fear needs to be replaced by trust.
Educating for Community—John MacMurray argued that we could learn to bring our feelings into greater correspondence with the reality of our present situation. The intensive small group experience is the new “school” for re-educating people’s capacity to experience themselves and each other more fully. I have come to look upon “the group” as a contrived community in which participants try to create conditions under which each can grow into greater awareness of one’s self and greater freedom and spontaneity in one’s relations with others.
One of the basic elements of a skillfully conducted experiential learning group is that participants are confronted with dilemmas that cannot be adequately resolved by relying on old habits. [There must be openness]. If our awareness is limited, if our messages are censored, and our image of reality distorted, both individual and group efforts at relationships will be impaired. Groups need to establish trust, so that I can risk being vulnerable to potential rejection, and instead meet with others’ willingness to let me be and an honest response.
[It is necessary] to inhibit natural impulses to control other people’s expression of their awareness, & to respond with what I am feeling or thinking rather than with what the other person wants to hear. John O. Stevens writes: “Trust & love are my feeling responses towards another person; these responses can’t be manufactured … Honesty, however, is ... something I can choose or not choose… Trust is my response to a person I know I can believe.” True honesty pertains to what I am experiencing here & now in what is going on between us.
Enhancing Community Experiences—How will sharing my inner life with a group of strangers [over] 1 or 2 weeks of encounter help me to live a more fulfilling life with friends, family, and coworkers? At their best, our meetings are indeed communities of precisely the kind we need so deeply, and laboring with each other, and extending a ministry of love are precisely the sort of exercises needed to enhance community life. [Sharing uninterrupted, undiscussed answers to the question], “To what groups or persons have you belonged in your life? [can lead to a better understanding of one’s feelings of belonging or not belonging]. Why do I hesitate to share of myself, to cultivate my memberships today?
A Religious Perspective—At its best, the intensive small group creates for itself a community in which each person stands in authentic relation to all others, aware not only of who one is but also of interdependence on others. Martin Buber writes: “Man wishes to be confirmed in his being by man, & wishes to have a presence in the being of the other… He watches for a YES which allows him to be & which can come only from one human person to another.” Perhaps it is only an inter-personal experience like an encounter group that permits us to re-discover how true it is that we must be “priests to one another.” What we customarily take to be our “self” is largely a residue of past experiences and relationships. We do not discover who we are except by continually recreating our Self in response to the present. My experience gives me faith that I can act so as to free you to be who-you-are, and that you can do the same for me. Martin Buber said: “One who know how our generation has lost true freedom, must practice directness and not depart from it until scoffers are struck with fear, and hear in one’s voice the voice of their own suppressed longing.”
APPENDIX: Evaluating Intensive Group Methods—The intensive small group experience is the latest fashion in psychology. Educators view them as textless, subjectless, teacherless courses; others view them as conspiracy, revolution, new [humanist] faith, on par with unlicensed psychological quackery. Study findings support the general conclusion that the encounter group experience is not without its dangers, nor is it as potent an instrument for personal change as it is usually depicted.
In the growth-centers [that use these groups], claims are overstated, leaders cannot be easily evaluated, and the contract between leaders and clients provide for little or no accountability. Leaders should be able to present credentials, attesting to their competence in the dynamics of human behavior, training experiences, and reputation as competent facilitators. The contract should be explicit. Any manipulation, exploitation, or attacking without challenge should be discussed. If one does not feel comfortable in a group and does not get clarification from discussing [their discomfort], chances are one is better of leaving that particular group. In the absence of at least the beginnings of trust and group cohesion, little educational benefit can be expected.
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461. Spiritual Gifts, the Beloved Community, and Covenant (by Emily Provance; 2020)
About the Author—Emily Provance is a member of 15th Street Meeting and thinks of NYC as home, though she now travels in the ministry full time with the support of her meeting and Good News Associates. She understands the Religious Society to be a covenant community and has spent time with Friends from Kenya, Belize, Britain, Ireland, Tanzania, Palestine, Mexico, Peru, and the US. Her travel minute is [well-traveled].
[Introduction]—In 2002, I stage-managed a play called Archipelago, about the Russian gulag. I loved this play, loved the challenge of managing it, & especially loved a slower part of the play, a monologue by "Nina." "Nadya" was dying & asked Nina to tell her about angels. Nina said, "[They look] like the sun when it comes through crystal. They sparkle, dance & play ... Their wings are like rainbows, bright & colorful ... They'll clap their hands & show their great wings ... They'll carry you & put you at God's feet. You will live with him forever & be happy." This passage speaks to a longing within me, to homecoming, rejoicing, & being close to God.
[Finding and Becoming a Quaker]—I became a Quaker on 10/10/10. I celebrate my anniversary annually, because I looked for [these people] for 17 years. My childhood faith tradition taught that God spoke to 1 man at a time. It was that man's job to tell what God said; it never seemed right. Surely God [would find a method not dependent on one man interpreting a message right for many different people]; it didn't seem the smart way to do it. I didn't agree with many religious traditions' exclusiveness. The 1-pathway business seemed absurd.
I started looking for a faith tradition when I was 10 years old. I knew the whole time that I was looking for something that said "God talks to everybody, & nobody knows the one and only Truth." It took me [a long time] before I found the Quakers, who aren't present enough in theological circles for me to have learned of them. My 1st meeting was totally silent, and I wasn't able to learn anything. In the 2nd one, a man said a bunch of stuff, and "There is that of God in everyone." That was it; I knew I was home.
My longing wasn't just to know that God talks to everybody. If that was all I needed, I wouldn't need to find a people. I needed more than God talking to me & I didn't know it, but God did & interceded. God talks to all, but God tells different people different things. God gives me a piece, you a piece, & another a piece, & expects us to learn how to play well together— covenant's beginning. Covenant is giving our selves to God & God, in turn, giving us to a group of people, a covenant community. For some of these, this means God's will as written in commandments, but in Quakerism, it means God's will as constantly revealed. On 10/10/10, my people accepted me & I accepted them, from my local meeting through each succeeding level to include the whole Society.
In Archipelago, angels "look like the sun when it comes through a crystal"; light through a prism. The Light within us shines through us differently, [all colors of the spectrum]. Unless they all come together you never see the complete spectrum. In reality, [we argue about who is what part of the spectrum, and do we really need all of the spectrum]. If God asks us to build the Kingdom of God, then God has probably given us the great wings attributed to angels in the play. What are the "great wings" God has given us to show others in service? Perhaps we show our "great wings," our God-given gifts as: organizers, prayers, workers, carers, innovators, provocateurs, healers, those with a huge capacity to love.
[Great Wings= Spiritual Gifts]—Jan Wood names 24 gifts using biblical language. Here are a few favorites with a brief definition: Mercy, ability & desire to alleviate suffering; giving, desire to pour out resources; exorcism, liberating from systemic oppression; helps, ability to provide assistance to those in a leadership role; apostleship, ability & authority to care for & lead groups; naming, i.e. naming a gift we see manifest in a person. [Author alludes to a scene from Madeleine L'Engle's Wind in the Door], where Meg has to pick out the real Mr. Jenkins from 2 fallen angels masquerading as Mr. Jenkins. One Jenkins was extremely kind, another is strict & rude. The 3rd wasn't very warm & fuzzy; this is the real Mr. Jenkins. Meg doesn't like Mr. Jenkins. It's Meg's job to see Mr. Jenkins, really see him. She sees him & Names him, with a capital N, & the fallen angels fly away. How have you experienced being Named? We can also be Named when someone sees our condition or when someone recognizes our pains or when someone expresses love for us [in particular]. To be known in this way, I think, is essential to our well-being. God made us and consecrated us and crafted our great wings.
[God's regard for us is different]. In my experience, there is a sort of loneliness that can be addressed only by another breathing human being in the flesh. In the group God gives us to, it is our responsibility to see one another, Name one another, & drive away loneliness. I also find parts of [being in] covenant terrible, like when I'm expected to come over for dinner and I'm more in the mood to sit at home, or when others hurt me with their mistakes and I'm expected to forgive. Or when I did something wrong 6 months ago and someone is still ticked off about it. I really don't like regularly putting up with someone doing little things that get under my skin.
In the summer of 2016, my dear friend Kelly had a heart attack at YM while in her 40's. [Because of the long-standing covenant community of YM, all sorts of people, with all sorts of "great wings," spiritual gifts, including a paramedic, pastoral care, & prayers, were sought out, & brought together to support Kelly & her family in dealing with this crisis. My particular "wings" were having a relationship with Kelly and Kelly's 2 small children, and because I am the person who steps in and maintains a sense of normalcy and continuity in times of emergency. Each of us made right use of their gifts in this crisis. We had Named each other long before that day.
[Full-time Traveling Ministry]—At January 2019's end, I gave up maintaining a permanent home. In the next 4 months, Backpack & I visited about 45 groups of Friends in 4 countries. It's not only individuals who carry particular gifts; whole meetings carry glorious gifts. Meeting attributes & interests include: loyalty; prayer; hospitality & cooking; extraordinary humor; decolonizing Christian culture; love of neighborhood community; extreme efficiency; beautiful gardening; proficient dealing with mental health issues; praise & helping one another; community development & work & change. It's harder to Name our gifts as communities than to Name our gifts as individuals. We often don't have anything to compare ourselves to. We may think what's natural, easy & joyful for us must surely be the same for everyone—but that's not the case. Whether we are coming together with a wider group of Friends for business or socially, neither of these relationships is a real expression of covenant. How do we build the kingdom of God on Earth in the larger sense, with the entire Society of Friends?
If we are a covenant people, then we need to know ourselves as that & build genuine relationships together. How do you & your meeting react to a meeting-for-business crisis & its resolution? In times of crisis, the human brain releases endorphins, which increases our tolerance for pain. Endorphins stick around for a couple days before ebbing away; we are left feeling we have bonded. A crisis-endorphins-relief cycle is dramatic & addictive. Within the infrequent meetings of our larger, spread-out groups, we might even, unconsciously, begin to seek threats in an effort to experience that feeling again. This isn't healthy, & it isn't of God.
Crisis bonding [involves 3 chemicals, [2 neurotransmitters & 1 hormone], The transmitters in the brain] are endorphins & dopamine; [the hormone] for group social bonds is oxytocin. Endorphins are triggered by trauma, exercise, laughter, music, & chocolate, & cause us to feel friendly & helpful. Dopamine is triggered by exercise or music, [& promotes bonding]. Release of oxytocin can be influenced by laughter, exercise, music, & hugs, & can create calmness & closeness. If we really hope to be bonded together as a community, we need to spend more time together, with less time spent on crisis, business, & more exercise, laughter, music, hugs, & chocolate.
Neither crisis bonding, nor bonding based on feeling good together, is actually our ultimate goal; it's not what God asks of us. Building the kingdom of God that God is calling us toward is moving toward a world where God's love for all God's children reigns supreme and each living things is perceived as having infinite value. How do we get from crisis bonding to [good feeling together], to the kingdom of God on Earth?
[Community Stewardship of Spiritual Gifts]—There are 6 steps to community stewardship of spiritual gifts: Naming; Claiming; Consecrating; Developing; Exercising; & Receiving the Fruits. When I think about Claiming, I think about David & Jeremiah. David was presented as a little shepherd boy, & Goliath was a big scary giant. But David had a track record of chasing after lions & bears while watching his flock. He acknowledged God as the source of his protection, but also knew [his own track record], that he was ready & prepared. It was only the people around him who doubted him.
Compare this to Jeremiah, who was also very young when he was called to serve God; his reaction was: No, No, No, heck no, God what are you thinking? [Actually he said, " Alas, sovereign, Lord, I do know how to speak, I am so young]." Jeremiah's reaction was less "Here I am, Lord!" and more "I'm hiding under the table now, Lord." How do we claim our gifts like David, like Jeremiah, or a little of both? In naming, claiming, and consecrating, once a gift is recognized, and accepted, we hold it in prayer and turn it over to God. We have reason to fear that our covenant people will actually prevent us from doing those things. To receive powerful ministry is demanding; we can transform or cover our ears. What will it cost to be transformed? Who are we going to be asked to be? How will we recognize ourselves? Covenant [community] means expecting our care-ers to care, pray-ers to pray, speakers to speak, prophets to prophesy, healers to heal, leaders to lead, holding them and ourselves accountable when they don't. Where are we trying to shut down God's Light?
I often think about the difference between Jesus and Paul. Jesus of Nazareth told us, "Love one another," 3 words. The apostle Paul took about 34,000 words to try to explain what "love one another" means. Jesus was inspiring people to start a movement and Paul was organizing a church from a covenant people. Organizing leads to institutions, which are essential to support groups of human being doing particular things. Without the institutions, we have to start from scratch every time we're led to do something. Our institution's rules, processes, hand-book, committees are not the will of God. They are how we do things.
We have created rules that suit [the dominant demographic(s)]. It's normal to do this. The question comes when we ask whether we are willing to notice the ways in which we have done this and then change so we can serve others. How do we engage with our behavioral norms with an understanding of how behavioral norms are not uniform across racial, age and economic groups? I made learning the complicated systems in local meeting, YM's, Friends General Conference, Friends United Meeting, Friends World Committee for Consultation my full time job, because I felt led by God to do so.
When someone is led to new work on behalf of the body, it takes often weeks, months, or years to get pieces in place, [because all the committees involved meet at different times and intervals that end up stretching out the process. When institutional delay extinguishes one spark, that's sad. When it puts out sparks routinely, that's a spiritual crisis. This happens more often to younger members, active parents, full-time workers, those without transportation or technology, and inexperienced members. [This part of the process is] stopping Christ's mouth, [and is certainly not] building the kingdom of God. The institution supports us, makes it possible for the community to do God's will; it's not God's will. Carrying out God's will is ministry.
[Call to Ministry]—Any one of us could be called to ministry at any time, if we're open to the possibility. What are our expectations that we or someone in our communities might be led to travel, teach or engage in radical witness? We can't possibly see the world's condition & think God's work is done. William serves his church in Kenya in a quiet, unassuming way. [He brings] schoolbooks & fabric to put in 2 windows to block the strongest gales. He sweeps out the church, straightens long school desks, erases the board, replenishes the chalk, finds the erasers, sharpens the pencils, does needed repair. During a school of 2 teachers & many children, he stands by, still & silent; he interacts with a child when necessary. He gathers the children at the end of school for a Bible story. At an English school, 11-year-old Lexie, a trained peer counselor guides other children through finding just solutions to conflicts, by having them explore their feelings & what needs to happen to "make it right."
I rode on a bus to North Carolina that had to pull over on a hot Tuesday afternoon. We have to get off the bus and wait for help a long time. After a couple hours, at 4:30, Marcy pulls over and unloads a back seat full of granola bars, chips and water bottles. The mechanic comes but is unable to fix the bus right away. Marcy returns with 24 pepperoni pizzas. I take Marci aside and ask her who she is and why she did this. She replied: "I believe that when people don't get enough kindness, what they are left with is fear, which becomes hate. So when I get the chance, I put kindness in the world. These are stories of ministry & of building the kingdom of God on Earth.
Each minister needs support & guidance from a group. As I travel in ministry, I get questions about ministry. I find talking about ministry is part of ministry. An old sacred practice is re-emerging & we don't always know how to respond, how both old & new traditions will work in the 21st century. Most questions I hear are about how my meeting handles my ministry, about travel minute, communication, financial support, clearness & support committees, recorded ministry. If your meeting is trying to supporting ministry, whatever the your support's status, please reach out to other meetings who are also trying to support ministry. We have lessons to learn from one another. Whatever you are focusing on, reach out to a meeting having a reputation for that specialty.
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461. Spiritual Gifts, the Beloved Community, and Covenant (by Emily Provance; 2020)
About the Author—Emily Provance is a member of 15th Street Meeting and thinks of NYC as home, though she now travels in the ministry full time with the support of her meeting and Good News Associates. She understands the Religious Society to be a covenant community and has spent time with Friends from Kenya, Belize, Britain, Ireland, Tanzania, Palestine, Mexico, Peru, and the US. Her travel minute is [well-traveled].
[Introduction]—In 2002, I stage-managed a play called Archipelago, about the Russian gulag. I loved this play, loved the challenge of managing it, & especially loved a slower part of the play, a monologue by "Nina." "Nadya" was dying & asked Nina to tell her about angels. Nina said, "[They look] like the sun when it comes through crystal. They sparkle, dance & play ... Their wings are like rainbows, bright & colorful ... They'll clap their hands & show their great wings ... They'll carry you & put you at God's feet. You will live with him forever & be happy." This passage speaks to a longing within me, to homecoming, rejoicing, & being close to God.
[Finding and Becoming a Quaker]—I became a Quaker on 10/10/10. I celebrate my anniversary annually, because I looked for [these people] for 17 years. My childhood faith tradition taught that God spoke to 1 man at a time. It was that man's job to tell what God said; it never seemed right. Surely God [would find a method not dependent on one man interpreting a message right for many different people]; it didn't seem the smart way to do it. I didn't agree with many religious traditions' exclusiveness. The 1-pathway business seemed absurd.
I started looking for a faith tradition when I was 10 years old. I knew the whole time that I was looking for something that said "God talks to everybody, & nobody knows the one and only Truth." It took me [a long time] before I found the Quakers, who aren't present enough in theological circles for me to have learned of them. My 1st meeting was totally silent, and I wasn't able to learn anything. In the 2nd one, a man said a bunch of stuff, and "There is that of God in everyone." That was it; I knew I was home.
My longing wasn't just to know that God talks to everybody. If that was all I needed, I wouldn't need to find a people. I needed more than God talking to me & I didn't know it, but God did & interceded. God talks to all, but God tells different people different things. God gives me a piece, you a piece, & another a piece, & expects us to learn how to play well together— covenant's beginning. Covenant is giving our selves to God & God, in turn, giving us to a group of people, a covenant community. For some of these, this means God's will as written in commandments, but in Quakerism, it means God's will as constantly revealed. On 10/10/10, my people accepted me & I accepted them, from my local meeting through each succeeding level to include the whole Society.
In Archipelago, angels "look like the sun when it comes through a crystal"; light through a prism. The Light within us shines through us differently, [all colors of the spectrum]. Unless they all come together you never see the complete spectrum. In reality, [we argue about who is what part of the spectrum, and do we really need all of the spectrum]. If God asks us to build the Kingdom of God, then God has probably given us the great wings attributed to angels in the play. What are the "great wings" God has given us to show others in service? Perhaps we show our "great wings," our God-given gifts as: organizers, prayers, workers, carers, innovators, provocateurs, healers, those with a huge capacity to love.
[Great Wings= Spiritual Gifts]—Jan Wood names 24 gifts using biblical language. Here are a few favorites with a brief definition: Mercy, ability & desire to alleviate suffering; giving, desire to pour out resources; exorcism, liberating from systemic oppression; helps, ability to provide assistance to those in a leadership role; apostleship, ability & authority to care for & lead groups; naming, i.e. naming a gift we see manifest in a person. [Author alludes to a scene from Madeleine L'Engle's Wind in the Door], where Meg has to pick out the real Mr. Jenkins from 2 fallen angels masquerading as Mr. Jenkins. One Jenkins was extremely kind, another is strict & rude. The 3rd wasn't very warm & fuzzy; this is the real Mr. Jenkins. Meg doesn't like Mr. Jenkins. It's Meg's job to see Mr. Jenkins, really see him. She sees him & Names him, with a capital N, & the fallen angels fly away. How have you experienced being Named? We can also be Named when someone sees our condition or when someone recognizes our pains or when someone expresses love for us [in particular]. To be known in this way, I think, is essential to our well-being. God made us and consecrated us and crafted our great wings.
[God's regard for us is different]. In my experience, there is a sort of loneliness that can be addressed only by another breathing human being in the flesh. In the group God gives us to, it is our responsibility to see one another, Name one another, & drive away loneliness. I also find parts of [being in] covenant terrible, like when I'm expected to come over for dinner and I'm more in the mood to sit at home, or when others hurt me with their mistakes and I'm expected to forgive. Or when I did something wrong 6 months ago and someone is still ticked off about it. I really don't like regularly putting up with someone doing little things that get under my skin.
In the summer of 2016, my dear friend Kelly had a heart attack at YM while in her 40's. [Because of the long-standing covenant community of YM, all sorts of people, with all sorts of "great wings," spiritual gifts, including a paramedic, pastoral care, & prayers, were sought out, & brought together to support Kelly & her family in dealing with this crisis. My particular "wings" were having a relationship with Kelly and Kelly's 2 small children, and because I am the person who steps in and maintains a sense of normalcy and continuity in times of emergency. Each of us made right use of their gifts in this crisis. We had Named each other long before that day.
[Full-time Traveling Ministry]—At January 2019's end, I gave up maintaining a permanent home. In the next 4 months, Backpack & I visited about 45 groups of Friends in 4 countries. It's not only individuals who carry particular gifts; whole meetings carry glorious gifts. Meeting attributes & interests include: loyalty; prayer; hospitality & cooking; extraordinary humor; decolonizing Christian culture; love of neighborhood community; extreme efficiency; beautiful gardening; proficient dealing with mental health issues; praise & helping one another; community development & work & change. It's harder to Name our gifts as communities than to Name our gifts as individuals. We often don't have anything to compare ourselves to. We may think what's natural, easy & joyful for us must surely be the same for everyone—but that's not the case. Whether we are coming together with a wider group of Friends for business or socially, neither of these relationships is a real expression of covenant. How do we build the kingdom of God on Earth in the larger sense, with the entire Society of Friends?
If we are a covenant people, then we need to know ourselves as that & build genuine relationships together. How do you & your meeting react to a meeting-for-business crisis & its resolution? In times of crisis, the human brain releases endorphins, which increases our tolerance for pain. Endorphins stick around for a couple days before ebbing away; we are left feeling we have bonded. A crisis-endorphins-relief cycle is dramatic & addictive. Within the infrequent meetings of our larger, spread-out groups, we might even, unconsciously, begin to seek threats in an effort to experience that feeling again. This isn't healthy, & it isn't of God.
Crisis bonding [involves 3 chemicals, [2 neurotransmitters & 1 hormone], The transmitters in the brain] are endorphins & dopamine; [the hormone] for group social bonds is oxytocin. Endorphins are triggered by trauma, exercise, laughter, music, & chocolate, & cause us to feel friendly & helpful. Dopamine is triggered by exercise or music, [& promotes bonding]. Release of oxytocin can be influenced by laughter, exercise, music, & hugs, & can create calmness & closeness. If we really hope to be bonded together as a community, we need to spend more time together, with less time spent on crisis, business, & more exercise, laughter, music, hugs, & chocolate.
Neither crisis bonding, nor bonding based on feeling good together, is actually our ultimate goal; it's not what God asks of us. Building the kingdom of God that God is calling us toward is moving toward a world where God's love for all God's children reigns supreme and each living things is perceived as having infinite value. How do we get from crisis bonding to [good feeling together], to the kingdom of God on Earth?
[Community Stewardship of Spiritual Gifts]—There are 6 steps to community stewardship of spiritual gifts: Naming; Claiming; Consecrating; Developing; Exercising; & Receiving the Fruits. When I think about Claiming, I think about David & Jeremiah. David was presented as a little shepherd boy, & Goliath was a big scary giant. But David had a track record of chasing after lions & bears while watching his flock. He acknowledged God as the source of his protection, but also knew [his own track record], that he was ready & prepared. It was only the people around him who doubted him.
Compare this to Jeremiah, who was also very young when he was called to serve God; his reaction was: No, No, No, heck no, God what are you thinking? [Actually he said, " Alas, sovereign, Lord, I do know how to speak, I am so young]." Jeremiah's reaction was less "Here I am, Lord!" and more "I'm hiding under the table now, Lord." How do we claim our gifts like David, like Jeremiah, or a little of both? In naming, claiming, and consecrating, once a gift is recognized, and accepted, we hold it in prayer and turn it over to God. We have reason to fear that our covenant people will actually prevent us from doing those things. To receive powerful ministry is demanding; we can transform or cover our ears. What will it cost to be transformed? Who are we going to be asked to be? How will we recognize ourselves? Covenant [community] means expecting our care-ers to care, pray-ers to pray, speakers to speak, prophets to prophesy, healers to heal, leaders to lead, holding them and ourselves accountable when they don't. Where are we trying to shut down God's Light?
I often think about the difference between Jesus and Paul. Jesus of Nazareth told us, "Love one another," 3 words. The apostle Paul took about 34,000 words to try to explain what "love one another" means. Jesus was inspiring people to start a movement and Paul was organizing a church from a covenant people. Organizing leads to institutions, which are essential to support groups of human being doing particular things. Without the institutions, we have to start from scratch every time we're led to do something. Our institution's rules, processes, hand-book, committees are not the will of God. They are how we do things.
We have created rules that suit [the dominant demographic(s)]. It's normal to do this. The question comes when we ask whether we are willing to notice the ways in which we have done this and then change so we can serve others. How do we engage with our behavioral norms with an understanding of how behavioral norms are not uniform across racial, age and economic groups? I made learning the complicated systems in local meeting, YM's, Friends General Conference, Friends United Meeting, Friends World Committee for Consultation my full time job, because I felt led by God to do so.
When someone is led to new work on behalf of the body, it takes often weeks, months, or years to get pieces in place, [because all the committees involved meet at different times and intervals that end up stretching out the process. When institutional delay extinguishes one spark, that's sad. When it puts out sparks routinely, that's a spiritual crisis. This happens more often to younger members, active parents, full-time workers, those without transportation or technology, and inexperienced members. [This part of the process is] stopping Christ's mouth, [and is certainly not] building the kingdom of God. The institution supports us, makes it possible for the community to do God's will; it's not God's will. Carrying out God's will is ministry.
[Call to Ministry]—Any one of us could be called to ministry at any time, if we're open to the possibility. What are our expectations that we or someone in our communities might be led to travel, teach or engage in radical witness? We can't possibly see the world's condition & think God's work is done. William serves his church in Kenya in a quiet, unassuming way. [He brings] schoolbooks & fabric to put in 2 windows to block the strongest gales. He sweeps out the church, straightens long school desks, erases the board, replenishes the chalk, finds the erasers, sharpens the pencils, does needed repair. During a school of 2 teachers & many children, he stands by, still & silent; he interacts with a child when necessary. He gathers the children at the end of school for a Bible story. At an English school, 11-year-old Lexie, a trained peer counselor guides other children through finding just solutions to conflicts, by having them explore their feelings & what needs to happen to "make it right."
I rode on a bus to North Carolina that had to pull over on a hot Tuesday afternoon. We have to get off the bus and wait for help a long time. After a couple hours, at 4:30, Marcy pulls over and unloads a back seat full of granola bars, chips and water bottles. The mechanic comes but is unable to fix the bus right away. Marcy returns with 24 pepperoni pizzas. I take Marci aside and ask her who she is and why she did this. She replied: "I believe that when people don't get enough kindness, what they are left with is fear, which becomes hate. So when I get the chance, I put kindness in the world. These are stories of ministry & of building the kingdom of God on Earth.
Each minister needs support & guidance from a group. As I travel in ministry, I get questions about ministry. I find talking about ministry is part of ministry. An old sacred practice is re-emerging & we don't always know how to respond, how both old & new traditions will work in the 21st century. Most questions I hear are about how my meeting handles my ministry, about travel minute, communication, financial support, clearness & support committees, recorded ministry. If your meeting is trying to supporting ministry, whatever the your support's status, please reach out to other meetings who are also trying to support ministry. We have lessons to learn from one another. Whatever you are focusing on, reach out to a meeting having a reputation for that specialty.
A couple of times, I was able to pass on information about a Quaker school. Either the person who benefited or the person who provided more of the information requested was a Friend I had never met. When someone came to me with a negative story of how they were treated years ago in a Quaker meeting, I apologized. Because the people who hurt her—they were my people, and I'm responsible for them. This is also covenant. We're all standing in the parking lot with 3 Jenkinses, 3 ways of relating as a group, trying to find the genuine one, that's present, not simple, often unpleasant, and absolutely real.
Some of us came into Quakerism without any understanding of covenant. A conversation about covenant people and the reality of that experience is not a conversation we've had with new members. [Which of the imposter "covenants" have we settled for? The "warm fuzzy" meeting or the "rules, processes, handbooks, and committees" meeting. Or are we the one that's fully present, genuine, and real, even if not always enjoyable? How are we ready to Name, Claim, Consecrate, Develop, and Exercise our gifts as a covenant people? And finally, how will we receive the fruits and pray for all of creation to receive those fruits?
One night in 2002, at my favorite "angel" part of Archipelago, I heard choral music. I 1st thought it was coming from another theater. I asked several people if they heard it; they did not. Nobody heard it but me. Angels. That's what I know it was. It was God saying, "I'm here. Pay attention. I'm speaking." "[Angels look] like the sun when it comes through crystal. They sparkle, dance & play ... Their wings are like rainbows, bright & colorful ... They'll clap their hands & show their great wings ... They'll carry you & put you at God's feet. You will live with him forever & be happy." God is here. We are at God's feet. What are we going to do next?
Queries—What is your understanding of covenant community? What gifts do you bring to the community? What gifts are found among members of your meeting? How are gifts recognized/ Named, nurtured & grown into? How can we build covenant across communities and the whole Society? How might a community block or deny a member's spiritual gifts? How do we hold our selves accountable to our covenant relationship? What do we need to change to better support people's leadings & ministry & allow true faithfulness to the Spirit's movement? How do you envision the kingdom of God on Earth, among us? Which pieces of the vision & reality do you carry? What pieces do you see in others?
Some of us came into Quakerism without any understanding of covenant. A conversation about covenant people and the reality of that experience is not a conversation we've had with new members. [Which of the imposter "covenants" have we settled for? The "warm fuzzy" meeting or the "rules, processes, handbooks, and committees" meeting. Or are we the one that's fully present, genuine, and real, even if not always enjoyable? How are we ready to Name, Claim, Consecrate, Develop, and Exercise our gifts as a covenant people? And finally, how will we receive the fruits and pray for all of creation to receive those fruits?
One night in 2002, at my favorite "angel" part of Archipelago, I heard choral music. I 1st thought it was coming from another theater. I asked several people if they heard it; they did not. Nobody heard it but me. Angels. That's what I know it was. It was God saying, "I'm here. Pay attention. I'm speaking." "[Angels look] like the sun when it comes through crystal. They sparkle, dance & play ... Their wings are like rainbows, bright & colorful ... They'll clap their hands & show their great wings ... They'll carry you & put you at God's feet. You will live with him forever & be happy." God is here. We are at God's feet. What are we going to do next?
Queries—What is your understanding of covenant community? What gifts do you bring to the community? What gifts are found among members of your meeting? How are gifts recognized/ Named, nurtured & grown into? How can we build covenant across communities and the whole Society? How might a community block or deny a member's spiritual gifts? How do we hold our selves accountable to our covenant relationship? What do we need to change to better support people's leadings & ministry & allow true faithfulness to the Spirit's movement? How do you envision the kingdom of God on Earth, among us? Which pieces of the vision & reality do you carry? What pieces do you see in others?
10. Community and Worship (by Douglas V. Steere; 1940)
About the Author: Douglas Steere was Professor of Philosophy at Haverford, author of: Prayer & Worship; On Beginning from Within; On Listening to one Another; Dimensions of Prayer. His concern for the inner life is fused with a concern for action; with his wife, Dorothy, he has gone on numerous missions to Africa, Europe, & Asia for the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). The 1st draft of this essay was prepared before his departure for Central Europe on behalf of the AFSC. Revision were made without being able to consult with him.
Introduction—The pitiful words of a would-be assassin, "I belong to nothing ... only to myself, & I suffer," express the pain in the hearts of a vast number of modern men & women. A religious community could have dispossessed them of themselves, & freed them to belong to life. Where can these isolated people come into contact with the releasing Agent & the health-giving atmosphere of a community that frees them to belong somewhere and belong to life? When the currents of secular life have weakened natural bonds & world events threaten to dissolve them further, something more elemental [than a "Sunday morning social club"] becomes imperative if we are to be strong enough [to resist our] time's demonic forces. Where then, can seeking men & women find a community & be part of the informal natural life of a close religious fellowship?
TYPES OF COMMUNITY: Therapeutic Groups—Psychotherapists today are seeking to meet this need by setting up institutions with gymnastic, relaxation, & handicraft teachers, spiritual directors & those suffering from nervous tensions. Long overdue readjustments of patterns of living can be made. But one has been given no adequate philosophy to take with one, & one's deepest hunger has been neither recognized or fed.
Gerald Heard has been sensitive to this need for centers of close community life. His community would be built around a master or masters who have themselves found the way to inner health and who have developed inner maturity. There is released through them an unmistakable and almost irresistible spiritual power, [a sort of guru]. They would be the modern and progressive form of the Franciscan Third or lay order. Heard's proposals seem too much like Hinduism and Zen Buddhism for most critical readers, yet his proposals point the way to the necessary, spiritually integrated community.
The Monastic Community/ The Third Order of the Franciscans—In the Benedictines, manual labor, intellectual studies, and devotional exercises supply the needs of body, mind, and spirit, and result in a fertile organic community. It helped hold together 1,000 years of western civilization. It's exclusion of the family and its rigid medievalism limit the scope of its usefulness.
In 1220 Francis of Assisi preached up & down Italy. Many with the responsibilities of family & livelihood longed to respond to God's love. The 3rd Order Francis set up in response was a lay society of men & women living a normal life in the world, & yet resolved to live a life especially near to God, in fervent response to God's love. The seeker made strenuous effort to make restitution for any wrongs consciously committed. They ate less & spent so little time & money on themselves, that they had a surplus to pour into the Lord's work to the sick, prisoners, the poor, & peacemaking. They refused to bear arms, take oaths, or submit [legal disputes to court]. They confessed more often, & met monthly to among other things help each other on the matter of grave personal faults. They were important leaven in church life, until they became a stiffly organized church fraternity.
The Ashram Movement—E. Stanley Jones writes: "The ashram in India springs from the ancient forest schools, where a guru, or teacher, would go aside with his chelas, or disciples, & together search for God through philosophical thought & spiritual exercises"; there is no standard type of ashram. "Its central characteristic would be simplicity of life & an intense spiritual quest." Jones with others experimented with a Christian ashram in India, combining the Indian spirit, with the development of men of Kristagraha, Christ-force. The fellowship includes the renunciation of secret criticism & complete frankness with one another. One day a week is given to silence. Life in the ashram is a corporate discipline; [each member's growth in Kristagraha is the goal].
THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS—The early Christian community knew what it was "to be all with one accord in one place," to experience the Spirit's visitation together. To respond to the good news meant joining a local Christian fellowship that touched every side of their lives. When there is genuine concern for one another and they meet together for worship they are truly open as a corporate group for the Spirit's deepest working.
The Society of Friends is designed to be exactly such a fellowship. The lay character of its ministry enables small units to survive without being forced to gather large numbers & resources for a minister. Few Friends meetings today can claim to offer this ideal type of fellowship. Friends & the Christian Church as a whole would be stamped Not Dangerous by rival national, racial, and class religions that have sprung up in our day.
Out of college & university centers, out of ranks of professional people, & out of ranks of those who work with their hands, "there is a people waiting to be gathered." Is there a place with you for us to be renewed & transformed by this inward power that a few of you have found? Are you just another formal, respectable, non-intrusive religious group? The answer must be honestly given in concrete terms by each local meeting. Even including our service organizations & our study centers, the Society of Friends must still live or die by its local meetings' character or quality. Are our local meetings "intimate fellowships" of those who are about the Christian Revolution"? The cultivation of this fellowship will be greatly assisted by the following 3 steps.
The Ministry Hospitality/ The Ministry of Visiting—The revival of Christian hospitality in which food is eaten together is essential. A return to simplicity would help bring about the revival of this precious sacrament. Members of the meeting should visit one another in the spirit of that fellowship which they have felt in the meeting for worship. It should not be restricted to any official body in the meeting. [These absolutely essential and continual] visits help to draw the meeting for worship into a basic fellowship that can yield to the Spirit, and in time of need can draw on the bank of God's healing power for members in difficulties.
The Ministry of Small Fellowship Groups—Out of hospitality and visiting there may grow a desire in several members to gather in one another's homes, perhaps for a meal and for a quiet evening of conversation. Teresa of Avila wrote of having 5 of her friends "meet together, for the purpose of undeceiving each other, for conferring on the means of reforming ourselves, and of Giving God the greatest pleasure." The several little fellowships my wife and I have been a part of have been of inestimable value. [Difficult decisions were often brought there]. These occasions have also been gay, joyous times together. [In a time when bearing testimony against war can be even more isolating], groups like these can be not an elective, but a necessity. Sometimes these groups spend days at a time together, and return to their ordinary lives with a sense of gratitude.
In several Scandinavian countries, where meetings weren't yet or just started, I have seen small fellowship groups meeting every other week. These groups have been the source & the indispensable auxiliary of meetings for worship. In these groups, larger surfaces of our lives are opened to each other. Meetings for worship in Quaker workcamps where the group had been at manual labor together seem to take on a fresh reality, with fellowship already partly built through common work. It may take on practical applications for the meeting or for social service projects. [For those in crisis] wouldn't it mean much to have little fellowship cells into which these people could be invited? Lay groups within the church in many different centuries speaks for their essential function. The Society of Friends offers a peculiarly hospitable provision for the return of this movement today.
WORSHIP AS THE SOURCE & CULMINATION OF THIS RELIGIOUS COMMUNITY—In corporate silence people gather weekly to work & let God work. The work includes stilling the body & stilling surface distractions of the mind, readying one's self to be open to the Inward Guide. Distractions of the mind can best be treated by not trying to resist them, by acknowledging their presence & sinking to a depth beneath them.
[Offering Prayers] In the confessional of silent prayer I may unlock the secret chamber of hidden thoughts. Donn Byrnes' words "There were great battles fought in great fields, but there was never a harder one than that between myself & myself in that little [meeting] room." The facing of hidden fears in the silent confessional, the dying to fear, letting God have God's way, is part of our work there. Upon deeper scrutiny, what we thought we longed for most of all may prove to be something very different. A young woman had come to workcamp bent on transforming that underprivileged community into a cell of the new social order she was alive to spread. She later confessed that neither she nor most she knew had the discipline to live in that order, let alone spread it.
Someone has called intercessory prayer "unselfishness in prayer." There we can hold up the needs of others and the longings we have for them as in no other way. Isaac Penington wrote: "[In intercessory prayer], Are they blinded and hardened so that they can neither see nor feel as to this particular [fault]? Retire, sit awhile, and travail for them. Feel how life will rise in any of you and how mercy will reach toward them and how living words from the tender sense may be reached forth to their hearts deeply by the hand of the Lord for their good." Or we may work with the grain of God by holding up the sufferings of the world, letting God identify us with them and increase our responsibility for them. We become God's conscripts for the work of the alleviation of suffering. Finally there is a time of silent fellowship with God when we confess nothing, desire nothing, intercede for nothing, but simply enjoy God in thankfulness. Thomas Story wrote: "My concern was much rather to know whether they were a people gathered under a sense of the enjoyment of God."
Let God Work—It is good to work. It is still better that our work should lead up to letting God work. It is good to pray. It is still better to be prayed into. Dick Sheppard, an English Christian peace apostle felt an illness coming on and was terrified because he was solidly booked with important appointments. He had a dream where God wrung God's hands at the prospect of Dick being ill. He awoke in the morning smiling at himself and his indispensability complex. John Woolman speaks of being brought low in the silence. That is letting God work, which results in "24 hours in which to do the 1 thing needful, instead of 10 or 12 hours in which to do a dozen ... There will be time to place ourselves at the disposal of anyone in real need ... no time to be devising schemes for our own amusement ... There will be time to pray long and passionately for the coming of the Kingdom, no time to question its present security or its ultimate triumph" (Natalie Victor).
This is not passivism. Things that must be done are laid upon worshiping individuals and worshiping groups. Work done under such a concern is no longer an outside philanthropy; it becomes an intimate relationship. We may let God work when we listen to vocal ministry, to one who has allowed what had to be said to be hammered out in the molten center which is the gathered life of the worshiping group. [Or we may be brought to that molten center to have a message laid upon us to speak be hammered out]. The community that has no such common experience to gather it into an inward fellowship as a children of a single loving Father, has not experienced the deepest fellowship of all. It is here in meeting for worship, that all of the preparative experiences of religious community mentioned earlier culminate. There might well be such joy, even a holy exuberance, if we each had daily contacts with Jesus Christ. Meeting for worship is soil that has been plowed and harrowed and disked by common experiences. It has been made open for the planting of the seed.
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149. Experiments in community: Ephrata; Amish; Doukhobors; Shakers; Bruderhof; Monteverde (by Norman J. Whitney; 1966)
[About the Author]—Norman J. Whitney (1891-1967) studied English Literature, & was for 38 years a professor at Syracuse University (NY); he founded Syracuse Peace Council. In 1957, he went to work for American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) as a representative for New York & New England. He established State Civil Service (NY) as an alternative to military service in the US (1941). He was a signatory of "From the Force to Speak the Truth," a study of the international conflict situation. This pamphlet contains essays describing intentional communities and defining the causes of their success.
Introduction (by Howard H. Brinton)—A community is called “intentional” when it adopts a way of life, a culture, different from that of the surrounding society. It creates a “utopia” based on a specific philosophy. The community maintains itself by commercial and other relations with the world, while insisting on its own way of life; it is in the world but not of it. The Amana community in Iowa and the Oneidas in New York began as communistic societies inspired by a powerful religious impulse. Capitalism entered, though never completely. On the other hand, the Amish, the Hutterites, and the Doukhobors have persisted for nearly 400 years.
Though greatly separated from the world, Quakers were individually so successful in business & politics that the world pushed through the walls & hedges created by Quaker schools. Not content with being isolated from the public, they were busily engaged in efforts to prevent wars, abolish slavery, reform prisons and other pioneering social efforts. [Under these conditions, maintaining different customs was increasingly difficult].
On this continent there have been about 200 attempts to create the “beloved society” in intentional communities. They ranged from complete Christian communism to a slightly modified, competitive communism. There were 12 definable [attributes] of successful cooperation:
1. Loyalty to an able, selfless leader or leaders. 8. Balance of intimacy and separateness.
2. Religious exercises carried out by whole group. 9. Separateness from the world to allow for working
3. Moderately strict cooperative discipline. out unique ideals, & a vital concern for the world.
4. Adequate, diverse economic resources, simplicity 10. Optimum size 50 to 100 people;
5. New member, child education on group practices. 11. Participation of children.
6. Loyalty to social theory without obsession. 12. Face to face relationships creating single
7. Group loyalty over family loyalty. living organism.
Highly successful tribal communities probably had these same attributes; they preserved the primitive life-style, perhaps too well. With little or no community life, men cannot adjust to changes fast enough. 19th century agricultural communities had far less mechanical help, and far more spiritual help; they were not fragmented as they are now. Education is concerned with the tool-using, rational part of the mind, and not the feeling and action-oriented part of the mind. The 19th century Quaker boarding schools aimed to resemble an enlarged Quaker family with emphasis on religious worship, the cultivation of the intellect, and the practice of physical work. Pendle Hill is a modern attempt along the same line, applied to adult education.
The 6 community experiments in the following sections are all religiously-oriented communities: [Ephrata; Amish; Doukhobors; Shakers; Bruderhof; Monteverde]. The first 5 were transplanted from Europe; the last is a contemporary American Quaker settlement in Costa Rica.
Ephrata—The record of Ephrathites of 18th century Pennsylvania (Lancaster County) is the record of John Conrad Beissel’s efforts to resolve the riddle of [needing individual recognition & needing to identify with others]. Among 3 types of spiritual reformers in 17th century Germany were the Inspired, who broke with denominations & organized independent sects, endeavoring to live daily in God's presence. Beissel sought to join a Germantown monastic group, but they were breaking up. He turned to Dunkers, another spiritual reform group & became leader of a new congregation, which divided after 7 years over celibacy & Sabbath observance issues.
Beissel and his followers established in 1732 what was probably the first and only Protestant monastery, called The Spiritual Order of the Solitary, better known as the Ephrata Cloister; it was dissolved in 1934. It consisted of a brotherhood and sisterhood to begin with and later included “householders” or married couples. Within the buildings, the doorways were low, to teach humility, and most beds were narrow boards with wooden blocks for pillows. The diet was simple and nearly meat-free with mostly water “and good bread always.”
Everything was ordered to inculcate Christian virtues of humility, chastity, temperance, fortitude, charity. The Sisters tended the kitchen & gardens; the Brotherhood did heavier farm work. They started a tannery, grist, saw, fulling [cloth-making], flaxseed, & paper mills. Here was produced 1st German book in the Colonies. They revived medieval art of text illumination, which they called Frakurschriften. They had a unique method of singing, the secret of which is now lost. They ran schools for their own and for the surrounding community.
The [community’s] aim was personal union of the soul with God; all else was subsidiary to His purpose. There were stated hours for meditation, song and prayer throughout the day, including a midnight meeting. Cloister missionaries ventured by foot as far as Rhode Island. A Revolutionary War soldier who received treatment from them said, “I had no idea of pure and practical Christianity. . . I knew it in theory before; I saw it in practice then. Blessed are they who see; more blessed they who show forth.”
Amish—The Amish arose out of the same spiritual ferment that produced Anabaptist, Quakers, and Mennonites. They take their name from Jacob Amman, a Swiss Mennonite, under whose conservative leadership they became a group in the late 17th century. They renounced infant baptism, denied that the church was the mediator of divine grace, declared that religion was an individual matter; they were severely persecuted.
William Penn offered them shelter in the new world where they continued to “despise the world, fear God & keep his commandments”; they first came to America in 1727. Their total membership is about 57,000 [1966; 270,000 in 2015). Maintaining this old-time culture has been accomplished by rigid discipline, the maintenance of a strict agriculture economy and a rural social pattern. Amishmen are excellent farmers, their tools are limited to those that can be operated by man and animal power, and without electricity. The distinctive dress and language of the “plain people” is a constant reminder and aid to discipline, a visible symbol of separateness.
All Amish speak Pennsylvania “Dutch,” a High German dialect of the Middle Rhine region. “Dutch” is used at home, English at school and for “outside” interaction, and High German for all religious purposes, preaching, hymn singing, Bible reading. All travel is by horse and buggy. The family rig is an enclosed buggy; the courting buggy is single-seated and wide open. Amish dating is called “running around” and begins at 16 or later, at Sunday evening “singings,” husking bees, or apple schnitzens.
“House-Amish” meet in the homes of members; “church-Amish” have meeting houses. Generally they have a bishop, 2 or 3 assisting preachers, and a deacon; leaders are chosen by lot for life. Major decisions must have the “voice” of the members; meetings last 4 hours. Preparing for “preaching” involves many hours and the whole family, and preparing the meal for afterwards involves a dozen women from the community. The Amish are not anarchist but law-abiding taxpayers up to the point at which the State would interfere with their religious faith and practice; they refuse oaths, flag salutes, military service, and federal aid. The Amishman Papa Yoder said, “We know who we are, Mister, Don’t interfere. . . Poor people you have plenty, and worried people and afraid. Here we are not afraid. . . We know what is right. We do not destroy, we build only . . . And wars we don’t arrange.”
Doukhobors—I have long been interested in groups that search for solutions to the problem [of balancing] liberty & authority in terms of a community. My visit to the Doukhobors, or Spirit Wrestlers of Western Canada began with lunch in a Doukhobor home. The meal was vegetarian with home-baked bread and straw tea.
Part of the Declaration of faith is: “The Spiritual Community of Christ, having submitted themselves to the Law and Authority of God, thereby become liberated from the guardianship and power established by men. . . Under the banner of Toil and Peaceful life, everything demanded of us which is not contradictory to the Law of God, we will accept and execute through conscientious guidance. That evening we attended a sobranya. The men and women sat separately and facing each other. There was no liturgy; mainly choral singing in Russian. Their own “psalms” often recounted the traditions and sufferings of Doukhobor history.
Joseph James Neave, felt an inward call to assist a minority group in Russia being persecuted for a non-conformist faith & practice. With cooperation of Arch Street Meeting, 8,000 Doukhobors arrived in Canada in 1899; Queen Victoria granted them exemption from military duty. Under able leadership of Peter Vasilivitch Verigin they developed a communal life & prospered. Under poor leadership of Peter’s son they lost land. Krestova was the small, principal settlement of the tragic Sons of Freedom, who took direct, sometimes violent action to protest the state’s encroachments on a people to whom private land-ownership is a sin. In 1962, 100 men were arrested & imprisoned. Hundreds of women took to the road & wound up camped in a Vancouver park.
A young Doukhobor said: We and Quakers must get together for the good of the world. Quakers has been saved [from similar anarchy] by acceptance of the authority of the “sense of the meeting.” The Doukhobors, with a long memory of martyrdom, serfdom, and Tsarist tyranny, have tried to transplant an age-old peasant culture into a modern industrialized society. A deep sense of mission, long frustrated, coupled with a strong sense of injury, long endured, is the perfect formula for desperate deeds. The Sons of Freedom become the image of all of us and their very name a tragic symbol of our collective despair.
Shakers—Their spiritual descent can be quickly traced from the Camisards, a persecuted Protestant group in France. They escaped to England; a Quaker couple named Wardley joined them & proclaimed the 2nd coming of Christ as imminent. Ann Lee joined the Wardley group, where she endured physical & spiritual struggle & the Manchester jail. It was made known to her that she was the word of God & the 2nd coming. She became known as Mother Ann, & attracted troubled men & women by the spiritual peace in Mother Ann’s radiant face. They called themselves “The Millenial Church: The United Society of Believers in Christ’s 2nd Appearing."
2 Years before the American Revolution, Mother Ann and 8 of her followers set sail from Liverpool. After defying a hostile captain, and a miraculous survival of a storm, Mother Ann’s party landed in New York on August 6, 1774. There were several years of struggle with poverty and the hardships of frontier life near Albany, New York; their slogan was “Hands to work and hearts to God.” Augmented by frontier revivalism, with its emphasis on the 2nd Coming, the movement grew around the dynamic presence of Mother Ann who “appeared to possess a degree of dignified beauty and heavenly love which they had never before discovered among mortals.” She died in 1784, worn out by toil and persecution, but not until after she had seen her vision realized.
“Gospel Order” was based on: Virgin Purity, Christian Communism, Confession of Sins, & Separation from the World. Additions to Society were from conversions, & later adoption. Widowed parents “gave” children to a Shaker “family.” Christian Communism took care of selfish material ambition & assured Separation from World. At peak in the mid-19th century, there were 58 “families” in 18 Societies, scattered from Maine to Kentucky.
The list of Shaker inventions is long. Besides their furniture, they invented clothespins, brimstone matches, & a washing machine. Their business with world was carried on by trustees under strict discipline. The quality of goods & their integrity made the Shaker name synonymous with excellence & fair dealing. Other experimenters acknowledged their indebtedness, notably Humphrey Noyes of Oneida & Bronson Alcott of Fruitlands. Shakers & Quakers shared the testimonies of non-violence, opposition to slavery & plain dress to separate them from the world. Charles Dickens disparaged them. Others found in their practices a sincere & dignified act of worship.
Bruderhof—The 1st Bruderhof was founded in Germany by Eberhard Arnold, who felt need of restoring sense of community in a society shattered by WWI. Nazism drove Society of Brothers into England. WWII saw them labeled “enemy aliens.” They were rejected by the State Department and the Shakers in the US; they ended up in Paraguay. Interested groups in this country started Woodcrest at Rifton in the Hudson Valley in 1954.
What is the attractive power that draws devout & thoughtful men and women together into this way of life? This is an age in which disintegration has overtaken integration. In such a time sensitive souls will feel a heavy weight of responsibility for a creative contribution to the life of Man. Artur Mettler writes: “The demand of the prophetic spirit is distinguished by its call for a people. [The demand of God’s people] to take up the battle with the world in new and changing forms was a tremendous demand. Later generations were not equal to its greatness. The visible people of God became one religious group among others and the salt lost its savor.”
What is it that holds these communities together? At the center of communal life there is acceptance of what appears to be a hard core of Christian doctrine. Economically, the organization is pure communism. [Socially], complete candor in all relationships is the rule. As all share in a common faith & a common ownership, so all share in work, frequently heavy, of the total “family.” The Bruderhof has its own school for the first 8 grades. After that children are able to choose their own level of education & whether or not to join Society. The Woodcrest Brothers say: “When the world faces a [horrible] future ... we all must make greater efforts to spread witness of a life where love & brotherhood . . . become the center of our lives: the basis for a way of life.” I should like to think of the [“one body”] as a Fellowship of the Friends & Followers of Truth. Each of us may find their right service & make a reasonable sacrifice for the coming of that Peaceable Kingdom for which we all long.
Monteverde—It wasn't by accident that Monteverde, an ideal community, was planted in Costa Rica, a world of exotic foliage, bright birds, & green mountains. [The government here] does not have political prisoners or strong military, & has “more schools than soldiers.” After leaving airport, the last leg of the journey was by an upgraded ox-cart trail, now a quagmire punctuated by a few boulders. We negotiated the 45% grades & 60° hairpin turns in an Austin Jeep with the aid of shovel, winch, walking & the skill & strength of our driver.
At length, in the distance, green fields appeared on the mountainside. [When we arrived I asked my new friends]: What has thee found here that justifies the effort of that incredible journey? Monteverde is 3,000 acres of rain forest overlooking Nicoya Bay from an elevation of 4,000-5,000 feet on the Pacific slope of the Continental Divide. It is a small agricultural community whose principal industry is dairying and cheese-making. In 1950, a half-dozen families left their Alabama Meeting to seek a different social climate on this Costa Rican mountainside. They started out in tents. They built new houses, a sawmill, a woodworking shop, the hydro–electric plant, telephone lines, a cheese factory, and roads. We rejoiced to see the friendly relationship between Tico, the local people, and Quakers, based on mutual trust.
My guide and host answered my question with: “Freedom. Freedom from the pressures of an urbanized society; from defense taxes; from the whole military industrial complex. New challenges and the adventure of the untried.” These people advance no social theory; ask no revolution; they are a revolution. During graduation, there was a special Meeting for Dedication held at sunrise on First Day. In the Meeting I waited in the confident expectation that silent worship invites. A little later someone behind me spoke words of prayer in a voice vibrant with feeling. [Surrounded by people of all ages], I found my self relaxed in the “womb of sensations which in themselves can mysteriously nourish.” I had found the secret of Monteverde: a community whose center is a meeting for Worship; a Meeting whose life is a community at work.
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149. Experiments in community: Ephrata; Amish; Doukhobors; Shakers; Bruderhof; Monteverde (by Norman J. Whitney; 1966)
[About the Author]—Norman J. Whitney (1891-1967) studied English Literature, & was for 38 years a professor at Syracuse University (NY); he founded Syracuse Peace Council. In 1957, he went to work for American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) as a representative for New York & New England. He established State Civil Service (NY) as an alternative to military service in the US (1941). He was a signatory of "From the Force to Speak the Truth," a study of the international conflict situation. This pamphlet contains essays describing intentional communities and defining the causes of their success.
Introduction (by Howard H. Brinton)—A community is called “intentional” when it adopts a way of life, a culture, different from that of the surrounding society. It creates a “utopia” based on a specific philosophy. The community maintains itself by commercial and other relations with the world, while insisting on its own way of life; it is in the world but not of it. The Amana community in Iowa and the Oneidas in New York began as communistic societies inspired by a powerful religious impulse. Capitalism entered, though never completely. On the other hand, the Amish, the Hutterites, and the Doukhobors have persisted for nearly 400 years.
Though greatly separated from the world, Quakers were individually so successful in business & politics that the world pushed through the walls & hedges created by Quaker schools. Not content with being isolated from the public, they were busily engaged in efforts to prevent wars, abolish slavery, reform prisons and other pioneering social efforts. [Under these conditions, maintaining different customs was increasingly difficult].
On this continent there have been about 200 attempts to create the “beloved society” in intentional communities. They ranged from complete Christian communism to a slightly modified, competitive communism. There were 12 definable [attributes] of successful cooperation:
1. Loyalty to an able, selfless leader or leaders. 8. Balance of intimacy and separateness.
2. Religious exercises carried out by whole group. 9. Separateness from the world to allow for working
3. Moderately strict cooperative discipline. out unique ideals, & a vital concern for the world.
4. Adequate, diverse economic resources, simplicity 10. Optimum size 50 to 100 people;
5. New member, child education on group practices. 11. Participation of children.
6. Loyalty to social theory without obsession. 12. Face to face relationships creating single
7. Group loyalty over family loyalty. living organism.
Highly successful tribal communities probably had these same attributes; they preserved the primitive life-style, perhaps too well. With little or no community life, men cannot adjust to changes fast enough. 19th century agricultural communities had far less mechanical help, and far more spiritual help; they were not fragmented as they are now. Education is concerned with the tool-using, rational part of the mind, and not the feeling and action-oriented part of the mind. The 19th century Quaker boarding schools aimed to resemble an enlarged Quaker family with emphasis on religious worship, the cultivation of the intellect, and the practice of physical work. Pendle Hill is a modern attempt along the same line, applied to adult education.
The 6 community experiments in the following sections are all religiously-oriented communities: [Ephrata; Amish; Doukhobors; Shakers; Bruderhof; Monteverde]. The first 5 were transplanted from Europe; the last is a contemporary American Quaker settlement in Costa Rica.
Ephrata—The record of Ephrathites of 18th century Pennsylvania (Lancaster County) is the record of John Conrad Beissel’s efforts to resolve the riddle of [needing individual recognition & needing to identify with others]. Among 3 types of spiritual reformers in 17th century Germany were the Inspired, who broke with denominations & organized independent sects, endeavoring to live daily in God's presence. Beissel sought to join a Germantown monastic group, but they were breaking up. He turned to Dunkers, another spiritual reform group & became leader of a new congregation, which divided after 7 years over celibacy & Sabbath observance issues.
Beissel and his followers established in 1732 what was probably the first and only Protestant monastery, called The Spiritual Order of the Solitary, better known as the Ephrata Cloister; it was dissolved in 1934. It consisted of a brotherhood and sisterhood to begin with and later included “householders” or married couples. Within the buildings, the doorways were low, to teach humility, and most beds were narrow boards with wooden blocks for pillows. The diet was simple and nearly meat-free with mostly water “and good bread always.”
Everything was ordered to inculcate Christian virtues of humility, chastity, temperance, fortitude, charity. The Sisters tended the kitchen & gardens; the Brotherhood did heavier farm work. They started a tannery, grist, saw, fulling [cloth-making], flaxseed, & paper mills. Here was produced 1st German book in the Colonies. They revived medieval art of text illumination, which they called Frakurschriften. They had a unique method of singing, the secret of which is now lost. They ran schools for their own and for the surrounding community.
The [community’s] aim was personal union of the soul with God; all else was subsidiary to His purpose. There were stated hours for meditation, song and prayer throughout the day, including a midnight meeting. Cloister missionaries ventured by foot as far as Rhode Island. A Revolutionary War soldier who received treatment from them said, “I had no idea of pure and practical Christianity. . . I knew it in theory before; I saw it in practice then. Blessed are they who see; more blessed they who show forth.”
Amish—The Amish arose out of the same spiritual ferment that produced Anabaptist, Quakers, and Mennonites. They take their name from Jacob Amman, a Swiss Mennonite, under whose conservative leadership they became a group in the late 17th century. They renounced infant baptism, denied that the church was the mediator of divine grace, declared that religion was an individual matter; they were severely persecuted.
William Penn offered them shelter in the new world where they continued to “despise the world, fear God & keep his commandments”; they first came to America in 1727. Their total membership is about 57,000 [1966; 270,000 in 2015). Maintaining this old-time culture has been accomplished by rigid discipline, the maintenance of a strict agriculture economy and a rural social pattern. Amishmen are excellent farmers, their tools are limited to those that can be operated by man and animal power, and without electricity. The distinctive dress and language of the “plain people” is a constant reminder and aid to discipline, a visible symbol of separateness.
All Amish speak Pennsylvania “Dutch,” a High German dialect of the Middle Rhine region. “Dutch” is used at home, English at school and for “outside” interaction, and High German for all religious purposes, preaching, hymn singing, Bible reading. All travel is by horse and buggy. The family rig is an enclosed buggy; the courting buggy is single-seated and wide open. Amish dating is called “running around” and begins at 16 or later, at Sunday evening “singings,” husking bees, or apple schnitzens.
“House-Amish” meet in the homes of members; “church-Amish” have meeting houses. Generally they have a bishop, 2 or 3 assisting preachers, and a deacon; leaders are chosen by lot for life. Major decisions must have the “voice” of the members; meetings last 4 hours. Preparing for “preaching” involves many hours and the whole family, and preparing the meal for afterwards involves a dozen women from the community. The Amish are not anarchist but law-abiding taxpayers up to the point at which the State would interfere with their religious faith and practice; they refuse oaths, flag salutes, military service, and federal aid. The Amishman Papa Yoder said, “We know who we are, Mister, Don’t interfere. . . Poor people you have plenty, and worried people and afraid. Here we are not afraid. . . We know what is right. We do not destroy, we build only . . . And wars we don’t arrange.”
Doukhobors—I have long been interested in groups that search for solutions to the problem [of balancing] liberty & authority in terms of a community. My visit to the Doukhobors, or Spirit Wrestlers of Western Canada began with lunch in a Doukhobor home. The meal was vegetarian with home-baked bread and straw tea.
Part of the Declaration of faith is: “The Spiritual Community of Christ, having submitted themselves to the Law and Authority of God, thereby become liberated from the guardianship and power established by men. . . Under the banner of Toil and Peaceful life, everything demanded of us which is not contradictory to the Law of God, we will accept and execute through conscientious guidance. That evening we attended a sobranya. The men and women sat separately and facing each other. There was no liturgy; mainly choral singing in Russian. Their own “psalms” often recounted the traditions and sufferings of Doukhobor history.
Joseph James Neave, felt an inward call to assist a minority group in Russia being persecuted for a non-conformist faith & practice. With cooperation of Arch Street Meeting, 8,000 Doukhobors arrived in Canada in 1899; Queen Victoria granted them exemption from military duty. Under able leadership of Peter Vasilivitch Verigin they developed a communal life & prospered. Under poor leadership of Peter’s son they lost land. Krestova was the small, principal settlement of the tragic Sons of Freedom, who took direct, sometimes violent action to protest the state’s encroachments on a people to whom private land-ownership is a sin. In 1962, 100 men were arrested & imprisoned. Hundreds of women took to the road & wound up camped in a Vancouver park.
A young Doukhobor said: We and Quakers must get together for the good of the world. Quakers has been saved [from similar anarchy] by acceptance of the authority of the “sense of the meeting.” The Doukhobors, with a long memory of martyrdom, serfdom, and Tsarist tyranny, have tried to transplant an age-old peasant culture into a modern industrialized society. A deep sense of mission, long frustrated, coupled with a strong sense of injury, long endured, is the perfect formula for desperate deeds. The Sons of Freedom become the image of all of us and their very name a tragic symbol of our collective despair.
Shakers—Their spiritual descent can be quickly traced from the Camisards, a persecuted Protestant group in France. They escaped to England; a Quaker couple named Wardley joined them & proclaimed the 2nd coming of Christ as imminent. Ann Lee joined the Wardley group, where she endured physical & spiritual struggle & the Manchester jail. It was made known to her that she was the word of God & the 2nd coming. She became known as Mother Ann, & attracted troubled men & women by the spiritual peace in Mother Ann’s radiant face. They called themselves “The Millenial Church: The United Society of Believers in Christ’s 2nd Appearing."
2 Years before the American Revolution, Mother Ann and 8 of her followers set sail from Liverpool. After defying a hostile captain, and a miraculous survival of a storm, Mother Ann’s party landed in New York on August 6, 1774. There were several years of struggle with poverty and the hardships of frontier life near Albany, New York; their slogan was “Hands to work and hearts to God.” Augmented by frontier revivalism, with its emphasis on the 2nd Coming, the movement grew around the dynamic presence of Mother Ann who “appeared to possess a degree of dignified beauty and heavenly love which they had never before discovered among mortals.” She died in 1784, worn out by toil and persecution, but not until after she had seen her vision realized.
“Gospel Order” was based on: Virgin Purity, Christian Communism, Confession of Sins, & Separation from the World. Additions to Society were from conversions, & later adoption. Widowed parents “gave” children to a Shaker “family.” Christian Communism took care of selfish material ambition & assured Separation from World. At peak in the mid-19th century, there were 58 “families” in 18 Societies, scattered from Maine to Kentucky.
The list of Shaker inventions is long. Besides their furniture, they invented clothespins, brimstone matches, & a washing machine. Their business with world was carried on by trustees under strict discipline. The quality of goods & their integrity made the Shaker name synonymous with excellence & fair dealing. Other experimenters acknowledged their indebtedness, notably Humphrey Noyes of Oneida & Bronson Alcott of Fruitlands. Shakers & Quakers shared the testimonies of non-violence, opposition to slavery & plain dress to separate them from the world. Charles Dickens disparaged them. Others found in their practices a sincere & dignified act of worship.
Bruderhof—The 1st Bruderhof was founded in Germany by Eberhard Arnold, who felt need of restoring sense of community in a society shattered by WWI. Nazism drove Society of Brothers into England. WWII saw them labeled “enemy aliens.” They were rejected by the State Department and the Shakers in the US; they ended up in Paraguay. Interested groups in this country started Woodcrest at Rifton in the Hudson Valley in 1954.
What is the attractive power that draws devout & thoughtful men and women together into this way of life? This is an age in which disintegration has overtaken integration. In such a time sensitive souls will feel a heavy weight of responsibility for a creative contribution to the life of Man. Artur Mettler writes: “The demand of the prophetic spirit is distinguished by its call for a people. [The demand of God’s people] to take up the battle with the world in new and changing forms was a tremendous demand. Later generations were not equal to its greatness. The visible people of God became one religious group among others and the salt lost its savor.”
What is it that holds these communities together? At the center of communal life there is acceptance of what appears to be a hard core of Christian doctrine. Economically, the organization is pure communism. [Socially], complete candor in all relationships is the rule. As all share in a common faith & a common ownership, so all share in work, frequently heavy, of the total “family.” The Bruderhof has its own school for the first 8 grades. After that children are able to choose their own level of education & whether or not to join Society. The Woodcrest Brothers say: “When the world faces a [horrible] future ... we all must make greater efforts to spread witness of a life where love & brotherhood . . . become the center of our lives: the basis for a way of life.” I should like to think of the [“one body”] as a Fellowship of the Friends & Followers of Truth. Each of us may find their right service & make a reasonable sacrifice for the coming of that Peaceable Kingdom for which we all long.
Monteverde—It wasn't by accident that Monteverde, an ideal community, was planted in Costa Rica, a world of exotic foliage, bright birds, & green mountains. [The government here] does not have political prisoners or strong military, & has “more schools than soldiers.” After leaving airport, the last leg of the journey was by an upgraded ox-cart trail, now a quagmire punctuated by a few boulders. We negotiated the 45% grades & 60° hairpin turns in an Austin Jeep with the aid of shovel, winch, walking & the skill & strength of our driver.
At length, in the distance, green fields appeared on the mountainside. [When we arrived I asked my new friends]: What has thee found here that justifies the effort of that incredible journey? Monteverde is 3,000 acres of rain forest overlooking Nicoya Bay from an elevation of 4,000-5,000 feet on the Pacific slope of the Continental Divide. It is a small agricultural community whose principal industry is dairying and cheese-making. In 1950, a half-dozen families left their Alabama Meeting to seek a different social climate on this Costa Rican mountainside. They started out in tents. They built new houses, a sawmill, a woodworking shop, the hydro–electric plant, telephone lines, a cheese factory, and roads. We rejoiced to see the friendly relationship between Tico, the local people, and Quakers, based on mutual trust.
My guide and host answered my question with: “Freedom. Freedom from the pressures of an urbanized society; from defense taxes; from the whole military industrial complex. New challenges and the adventure of the untried.” These people advance no social theory; ask no revolution; they are a revolution. During graduation, there was a special Meeting for Dedication held at sunrise on First Day. In the Meeting I waited in the confident expectation that silent worship invites. A little later someone behind me spoke words of prayer in a voice vibrant with feeling. [Surrounded by people of all ages], I found my self relaxed in the “womb of sensations which in themselves can mysteriously nourish.” I had found the secret of Monteverde: a community whose center is a meeting for Worship; a Meeting whose life is a community at work.
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218. ANOTHER WAY TO LIVE: experiencing intentional community (by James S. Best; 1978)
About the Author—Jim Best has spent much of his life in the company of publications, 2 decades in books, another decade in magazines, off and on with newspapers. The Fellowship of Reconciliation took the 2nd largest chunk of his working experience. The 3rd of his 3 loves, living in community, he speaks of here. Jim has been a member of 4 Friends Meetings: Nashville, TN; 15th Street, NYC; Rockland Meeting (NY); and Central Philadelphia MM. At 65, he has no intention of retiring.
May we ... try whether the seeds of war have nourishment in these our possessions. John Woolman
Is there no other way the world may live [than] under the cloud of threatening war? Dwight Eisenhower
If you are not going to be part of the solution, you are part of the problem. Eldridge Cleaver
The world is now too dangerous for anything short of Utopia. John Platt
[Defining Community]—Parker Palmer has made excellent working definitions of community. In this pamphlet I will, in almost all cases, be implying the word "intentional" with community. A true community of faith involves a community of sharing, where Christians held "all things in common." The 19th century saw perhaps the richest flowering in Christendom of a wide variety of communistic societies, A directory of American & Canadian alternative communities & communes lists 320 communities [1978]. Other lists & "guestimates" range all the way from 2,000 to 3,000. Most of them are characterized by: relative physical isolation; effort to be self-sufficient; counter-culture life style, [anti-conventional]; general egalitarian & libertarian philosophy. Another important category, often overlapping the above, is that of the religious communities, which may vary from monastic types to family-oriented communities. Many in both groups use the term New Age or similar label.
Antecedents—Since adolescence I [have had it in mind] to make a personal commitment to a society that would outlast me, a Kingdom of God brought down somehow to the 20th century. I threw myself into plans for Skyview Acres, which in time became a reality for 44 families. I thought I had prepared for living in community, but the reality was different. Skyview Acres was for 24 years a limited sanctuary after 10 hours of work & commuting. It was a rich & warm seedbed for nurturing 4 children. [It was liberal, middle-class America], a staging ground for protest meetings & action, often a place of ease for certain kinds of liberal comrades in the struggle. It was also a place of high taxes, harassed & sometimes angry neighbors. It was a burial ground for dear dreams of what an intentional community might mean, a gradual dimming of the once-bright hope of cooperative endeavor. [3 of our 4 children grew up and moved away].The 4th had a year to run at Skunk Hollow school.
A New Kind of Community—A "realer" community continued to beckon. In Philadelphia, A Quaker Action Group had merged most of its membership and added many more in a Movement for a New Society (MNS), locally called a Life Center in West Philadelphia. The bedrock on which it was founded was the belief that our war-making, profit-prone, consumption-gorged and violence-infected society is on its last legs. There is still time to build a peoples' structure sturdy enough to hold the weight of public peace and order. For 2 suburbanites well past mid-life a certain kind of freedom beckoned. [The good things where we were could be left behind. There was an "unlived" life out there. Why not go in search of it?
The generally youthful members of MNS took certain [West Philadelphia, turn-of-the-20th-century] houses in a 10-block area as they found them, [with original or 1950's decor]. All had spacious airy bedrooms, much "common" space, endless hallways. At the 3-day orientation weekend, I don't remember much of the information thrust at me those 3 days, but the feeling "this really is another way of life" became much clearer. They were here as a necessary discipline to change the world. Their "revolution" consisted of the non-violent, peaceful persuasion, learning to perceive political & economic contradictions, & confronting reality's oppressive nature of."
Moving into a New Society/ Reflections—We bought the house next [to MNS's central Stone House] after spending one day in it. I would say that a hand not our own could be seen in this push into the future. By the time our moving days ended on a scorching Labor Day weekend, we had substituted a new extended family for the old nuclear family. [2 others formed a family with us]. Applicants needed to understand the purpose & commitment of MNS. We would live & eat as simply and as "low on the food chain" as good nutrition would permit; we would share equally in every task, both in work and costs. We would make all decisions by consensus.
Later modifications and refinements set in. Uncleanliness and anger were dealt with in "contracts," agreements worked out by the householders. There were 13 other houses in the community that tended to function almost as a unit, while keeping the identity of each clear. We did many things together: Christmas Day procession and decoration to and at Clark Park; merging many traditions and greeting the sun on a cold rooftop in a Winter Solstice celebration. [There is a long list of] "collectives" that constitute the real core of the movement: food service; feminist; life center; "Seeds for Change"; "Wonderful Older Women"; "Men Against Patriarchy"; etc.
In these collectives the real work for social changes takes place. One of the most ambitious was the Community Associates Printing Collective. For 4 years we printed books, pamphlets, newsletters, posters and other things. Problems with equipment, and adequate training made it necessary to lay it down. We learned a great deal about worker-managed enterprises designed for service rather than profit. Most collectives provide no substantial income to MNS community folk, nor are they expected to do so. In the 1970's, it seemed time to blur the distinctions between activists and supporters and MNS evolved as one way to do that. [As a result of that], a requirement that those who joined MNS communities seek work that would not commit them to more than 3 days a week. The other 4 days were needed for: obligations to the resident community; tasks in the social change collective; group & individual study of the world scene to be changed; socializing and recreation; personal growth.
The 5 time-divisions caught me up in a equation of freedom-cum-commitment that released rather than regimented my time. [Making my place] homey was usually a joy, never a duty. Macro analysis was more challenging than any leisure time college seminar. There were frequent minor celebrations; even the meetings were fun. I made friends in the wider neighborhood & kept my Quaker meeting connections in Center City. I rarely thought about my life's relatively insularity. [Ours wasn't a pie-in-the-sky utopianism]. What the MNS is largely about is how we get from here to there, & living as if the "kingdom of heaven" were already here. It is a challenge worthy of every ounce of thought & devotion. Life in community, in a small society that strives to actualize itself, gives me more chance of self-actualization than I would have if I were buried in the mass society.
Community as Family—Living in community is on balance a great learning experience—one that never ends. I [will] sort out something of what I learned as well as observations and comments for [fellow-travelers]. What is the place of marriage and family life in intentional communities? No marriage that has honestly faced the necessity for change in society and relationships need fear for its life in community. A persistent Life Center (MNS) question is: "Where do you stand on the women's issue?" Good men's groups have emerged, too, going beyond mere knee-jerk responses.
Community as Family—Living in community is on balance a great learning experience—one that never ends. I [will] sort out something of what I learned as well as observations and comments for [fellow-travelers]. What is the place of marriage and family life in intentional communities? No marriage that has honestly faced the necessity for change in society and relationships need fear for its life in community. A persistent Life Center (MNS) question is: "Where do you stand on the women's issue?" Good men's groups have emerged, too, going beyond mere knee-jerk responses.
Sexuality as an expression of affection is a ridiculous bugaboo that gets in the critic's eye when looking at communities spelled "communes," yet it must be dealt with. One wonders how the myth of sexual license in the new communities ever took root. I, even keeping my eyes & ears halfway open, observed no "free love" along the gaudier lines. I would hazard a guess that there is more celibacy [in social change communities and] those in their 20's than in any cross-section group in the same age-range. The family as we know it now has a number of characteristics we must preserve in this new age. In Life Center houses where children are an important part (5 out of 20 houses in 1977), the whole house usually participates in Parent Effectiveness, a system of re-education.
"Social Security" in Community/ Simplification of Life—Income sharing is a way to approach the problem of the "whole community's" protection of individuals from life's hazards. In our particular setup, such questions often came up in the [query:] "What are the hallmarks of a caring community?" No final or really satisfactory answers emerged. Is this an occasion for self-taxation or income sharing as an expression of mutual help, or for reliance on state-financed help? A "core community" group at Life Center began to deal with these thoughts. It grew from the conviction that communities of change are long-term things, & must have an expectancy of continuity built into them.
Wonderful Older Women (WOW) is a bright light in the MNS/Life Center structure these days. They give each other much personal support in stretching and occasionally "downing" experience. Alas, no comparable group exists for men, and I was more than a little frustrated in trying to start one. The transition from our rigid and invalidating family" system to suggesting the "small society" that fosters true growth is strewn with blocks and boulders. But there are paths in between.
Living in a new kind of residential setting has myriad openings for experimenting with the simplification of life. There is a new exuberance in the return to almost forgotten style of inventiveness & adaptation that turns away from reliance on gadgets & wasteful mechanization. We found, early on that much of real value & even beauty can be garnered from the sidewalks of our "throwaway" society. Cars are often shared, & there need be only one of many kinds of appliances & machines for several houses. Communal stockpiling of common medicines & health aids is taken for granted. [there was even a clothing exchange for a while]. It is never for the sake alone of simplifying life, [but is based] on the assumption that America [globally] is much more a part of the problem than of the solution [i.e.] 6% of the world population consuming 30% of world resources; this must end.
Decisions and Privacy/ Shared Leadership—I would concede that, in our decision-making process, we touch a difficult issue. Living in community makes new demands on the forbearance, flexibility, an individuality of all its members. The Friends meeting with its consensus method is only a rough approximation of how people living in close community order their lives. For a house meeting, a small group of adults meet. A facilitator has already prepared a wall or large clipboard chart with the proposed agenda. Items might include: new member; new treasurer; retreat; food storage; Assessment for Child Care; Evaluation. Hard and difficult questions are matters dealt with in these sessions, but with a minimum of hurt to participants. Sound process means keeping necessary tension in group relations to a minimum.
I believe that intentional communities, to be successful, must go beyond the style and expectations of an ordinary Quaker-type business meeting. A weekly meeting of corporate concern cannot postpone a decision without loss and maddening frustration and sometimes death of hopes for living and working together.
The old-style charismatic leader, who embodies his people’s wishes and sometimes their very soul, in benevolent, loving dictatorship, has played out its role and left the stage; the exception are guru-led communities. MNS/Life Center started with Taylor, Lakey, Willoughby, Moyer as "leaders," by virtue of their clear vision, ability to inspire, and sound organizational sense. And now, not needing official "spokesmen" nor people to attract crowds or even to initiative strategy or write papers, the community now distributes this kind of work more widely between the different sexes and ages.
Change or Die/ Community As Witness—Institutionalizing & politicizing of social processes seems to stand in the way of a genuinely "marco-analytic" view of total reality affecting the continuing human presence on earth. Thoreau writes: "I learned this at least by my experiment: if one advances confidently in the direction of one's dreams & endeavors to live life as he has imagined, he will meet with success unexpected in common hours ... Solitude won't be solitude, nor poverty poverty, weakness weakness ... If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now, put the foundation under them." My life in that small part of the West Philadelphia MNS, has been & is an experiment in life; it is a lifeway. I don't put it forward as a final model for anyone else. New beginnings are being made, must be made. The time is now when wrong rises up to confront us." Our lives are all we have to experiment with, and the way is not uncharted.
Communities set forth by MNS & the American Friends Service Committee don't see themselves as utopian models, but rather as a school for a future life of sharing & working together toward a world of peace & justice. God isn't to be sought in the sky, but in everyone engaged in the struggle for what certain prophets used to call God's Kingdom. [With the amount of] caring for each other, it is hard to determine whether a community is "religious" or "secular." My experimental life isn't done. Community is no idle dream for me. I shall never forget the rapt & solid commitment gripping us as we sang together in General Training. It is indeed Another Way to Live.
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