2004-01-06 - 12:17 p.m.
I think I'm in love....
With my Quaker Meeting. After months of not going to Meeting, I finally went on Sunday. We gathered around the fireplace and had silent worship. I forget how much I need that space of quiet reflection. In the message sharing there were a lot of messages about generosity of spirit. Someone talked about how he was trying to find meaning in a quote from King Lear that said something along the lines of need has no reason. He realized that he was being spiritually stringy by determining how much another person needs. This led to messages about how we Quakers are often spiritually stringy on how other people practice their religion. More specifically, several struggled with how to deal with our opinions about "nondemoninational" Bible churches and their jumbotron screens and internet cafes. Our own judgement was making us stringy about other people's truth. I love practicing a religion that challenges me.
To heap more love onto my Meeting, mr. Activision and I were reading our newsletter and saw that the young people of the Yearly Meeting (the Quaker version of a diocese) we are affiliated with wrote a letter to a Quaker youth camp. This youth camp is affiliate with another conference of Friends. One that has different views than ours about sexual and gender diversity. This is their policy:
The response of FUM describe a policy approved in 1988 for volunteers in Quaker Volunteer Witness and in 1991 extended to staff. This requires that volunteers and staff may only have sexual relations within marriage between one man and one woman. FUM stated that it does select leaders for spiritual gifts but the are not chosen without regard to wither they are in a same-gender relationship.
Our Yearly Meeting responded as follows:
Dear YouthQuake Planning Committee
Many of the youth of the B Yearly Meeting have been led to abstain from participation in YouthQuake. In current YouthQuaker practice, gay and lesbian youth are allowed to attend, but as they mature, they are denied the opportunity to return to YouthQuake in a leadership role. We feel that all members of the greater Quaker community should be adequately represented and welvomed to fully participate in this opportunity for spiritual growth. We realize that this issues is at the forefront of Friends' minds and have caused division and intolerance. We hope that this issue will be held in the Light, as it is important to youth within the Religious Society of Friends. We aspire to maintain open dialogue on the subject and create a YouthQuake where all Friends may "affirm and seek a firsthand experience with the living Christ which is available to everyone."
I heart my place of worship big time. I realize it's MORAL to promote acceptance. It's a VALUE to affirm the humanity of everyone. And it is the most CHRISTIAN thing I cna think of to challange prejudice.
