As I’ve already posted, the day after I attended North Pacific Yearly Meeting, I attended North West Yearly Meeting and these experiences got me thinking about all the times I’ve spent with other Quakers and what that has been like for me.
You see, my Quaker life is very disjointed. I am a part of three Quaker groups and though they are side by side in some respects, I have never seen them interconnect. It’s rather odd, but so it is. Relationships in one are completely different from relationships in another and so I live between three worlds. Each one offers me a gift. By themselves, they are not enough, but together, they have helped me grow in ways I could not have foreseen. Through one, I was born and raised into Quakerism, I have been stretched by another, and put to meaningful work by a third. I have come to call these worlds “Mind, Hands, and Heart”.
In one place is the church I attend. It is the mind piece, my “growing edge” and though I love it, I haven’t known them for that long – just shy of a year. We are a very diverse group and usually focus on ministry and life-style. I do like it because those are areas where I’m growing and need that space to learn and try my hand at doing things within the church. We don’t discuss spirituality or the heart much, though, things I love to talk about. The gift in that, is that I am free to explore God in whatever way I want, personal faith is not asked about in the way I’m used to and there is no one there to tell me differently. (Not that I would heed them if I disagreed anyway.)
This may be strange sounding to some of you, I’m still getting used to this style of church myself. The church as a whole is focussed more on the visible outgrowth of faith. It engages my mind. The church is like North Pacific Yearly Meeting in that respect. When I need to talk about spirituality, I just go to my mentors. Still, coming from where I have, a church that doesn’t talk much about our relationship with God can get lonely.
My second Quaker life is with the Quaker Youth Book Project and Quakers United in Publishing. This is my forte’, this is what I love doing in the Quaker world. It combines art, spirituality, writing, creativity, ecumenicalism, and a bit of travel, many of my favorite things rolled into one beautiful project. It has been so much fun and an honor to be a part of. I feel like I have brothers and sisters all over the world in my fellow board members and I cherish them and what we’re creating. I love having something I am passionate about to promote and to discuss with others who are also excited about what we’re doing. However, as much as I am enjoying it, I also need faces nearby, a community around me.
My third and biggest Quaker life is in the Northwest Yearly Meeting, my heart piece. Everything and everyone that brought me to Quakerism are there. I spent the whole evening last night running into one person after another and with several I am acquainted with but don’t know well, I had to ask to be reminded where I knew them. George Fox? Reedwood Church? Silverton Friends Church? Rivers Way? Women’s Theology Conference? (My small group is also NWYM.) Out of context, you know… But I had a ball! I could hear “the song of Quakerism” I first learned to sing sung throughout the evening and I cherished hearing it again after so much time of hearing other music. Some of the people there have known me for many years, others, even since I was a child. I feel grounded and accepted exactly as I am when I am with them. They know my story, who I have been and the journey I have taken to who I am now. In fact, many of them have had a good influence on the person I am and what I’m intrigued with. It feels like coming home for Christmas when I’m around them. And though the evangelicalism can sometimes aggravate me, I’ve known it since I was small in the Nazarene denomination and it can be comfortingly familiar even as I want to protest some finer theological points. It’s not something I would want to be immersed in all the time, I need the space my church gives me, but like being wrapped in a beloved blanket for a while, it feels very safe and warm.
I am sure others share in my experience of having different faith groups so close together that may even be interrelated but still separate. Personally, I would like to see them a little more integrated as it can be tiring to go between three. Still, I wouldn’t give any one of them up, I need each: mind, hands, and heart. It will be interesting to see how they play out in time to come.