Spiritual Journeys

Moving Forward

2007-05-23T17:07:00.001-04:00

To any Friends who still check this blog or who have stumbled upon it:

It's been about 8 months since I've posted anything at all on this blog. Since the time I started this blog and posted on it frequently I have gone through a lot and am in a very different place. I am still unsure about where I stand with the Quaker blog-o-sphere at this point, having had to distance myself from it as it (the Quaker blog-o-sphere) and my life exploded.

That said, I've decided to officially lay this blog down. I will certainly leave it up and check on it periodically, but I will not post on it any further. The good news is that I have started a new blog. I am not clear at this point about what I will post, how frequently I will post, or how much of other Quaker blogs I will read. I am clear that if I am to begin blogging again, I need a fresh start.

The new blog: That God

So, Friends, follow my blogging if you feel so led.

Love and Light,
Claire

Strength in Weakness

2006-06-20T23:05:00.000-04:00

Note: I wrote this post in late June, but for some reason or another did not publish it. In reviewing my blog as it is today (basically unchanged since May) I came upon it. It is time it is published. So on this 14th of September I post my previously unpublished post from June 20th, 2006:

Sometimes I feel as though I need to be profound here on this blog, particularly after such a long blog-absence. But I will be honest with you, Friends, that I really don't have a profound, simple message to post today. Today I found myself writing in my journal about strength. In true strength there is the ability to be weak, I wrote. What exactly does this mean?

Weakness, such as feeling hurt, upset, angry, or lacking enough will-power to do something difficult, or being afraid of something, is unavoidable in life. Thus, it is not just ok to have weakness, but it is a requirement of life. Ignoring or denying, resisting or fighting something so inevitable is unhealthy. I'm not saying that all weaknesses are healthy - things such as addiction or tendency to abuse are certainly NOT acceptable - but that we must acknowledge them before we can do anything about them. We must embrace our weaknesses and love ourselves through them, with them, as they are every bit a part of us as the skin on our bodies. In embracing our weaknesses we learn to love ourselves, we learn to love others, we learn compassion. It is grace. It takes true strength to allow ourselves to be imperfect, to love wholly, both the good and not-so-good in ourselves.

Perhaps this has been stated before. Perhaps it doesn't make as much sense to you reading this as it does to me as I write. I just felt a small nudge to share.

Love and Light,
Claire

Oh right, I have a blog

2006-05-02T17:48:00.000-04:00

Hello, dear blogging Friends,

It's been quite awhile since I've really been blogging - with what, only one post since February? This has been an unplanned, unintentional blog hiatus for me. It's likely to continue for a little while, too. I can't predict these things. I can't predict a lot of things.

A number of unpredictable, major events have occurred in my life in the last month and a half. (To think I was having a difficult semester before!) I'm not quite ready to blog about them (assuming I ever will - we'll see how I'm led) and apologize in advance for being vague, as all my energy right now is going toward staying calm, taking care of myself, and fighting through the rest of this academic semester. I have a lot to process and deal with, and am simultaneously trying to finish four difficult classes.

In the meantime, though, I want to send a message of love and hope out into the blog-o-sphere. Unimaginably difficult things can happen, and then one or two more could happen shortly thereafter, and it is still possible to get through without completely losing sight of the Light in the process. In fact, in some ways the Light is so much more strong in me right now, holding me up when begin to stumble over the fallen branches in my path.

So here I am, still going, still loving.

Love and Light,
Claire

Free to be Lost

2006-03-22T00:00:00.000-05:00

In the last month or two I've been dry in terms of posts. A few times I've thought about posting, perhaps with a fleeting idea of a potential post, but each time I've ended up either staring at the blank "create" screen thinking too hard about what to write, or just not even trying.

The thing is, I don't write posts for the sake of posting. I write posts because I have a message to give, or some form of ministry to share. More than once I've written an entire post, planning to publish it, but haven't felt that final, vital nudge to post - so I haven't posted. I don't even know where this post is going, but I'm going to follow it through.

I've been having a very rough semester. My classes have been more demanding than before, draining me of energy and free time. I even gave up my Saturdays to try and get things done - something I used to have a personal "policy" against. This usually leaves me feeling spiritually dry, out of touch. In the past I have felt very frustrated when spiritually unfocused, as if it's something that shouldn't happen and is bad. Isn't that natural, though? Of course being spiritually unfocused is bad - why do we strive to be in touch with God if not being in touch isn't bad?!

But you and I know that God never leaves us alone. I've known that, in my mind, for quite some time now, but what's kept me frustrated when feeling out of touch is my heart. I didn't feel God when out of touch because that's precisely what made me feel unfocused - not feeling like I felt God.

These last weeks of being spiritually unfocused, however, have been different. Something deep gave me the freedom to be unfocused. It is ok, Friend, to be lost sometimes. It is part of the spiritual process, even. So this time around, while unfocused and feeling lost, I haven't felt frustrated or guilty. Part of me is experiencing a period of patient, loving waiting. I am still connected.

A message in meeting a couple weeks ago spoke to this part of my experience. The part that struck me most was something to the effect of, "When we fall, there is God." Even when we stumble and fall down, when we are lost, unfocused, left behind, there too, is God. I feel lost, but know in my heart that I am still growing with God. I feel God even now.

This is the message I have to give after over a month of blog-silence. Even in writing we must be patient and listen, sometimes for great lengths. I thank you, Friends, for your patience with me. Things are a little rough on my end, these days.

Love and Light, as always,
Claire

All the World Together

2006-02-12T18:55:00.000-05:00

We can each listen deep, we can each strive to follow God on the deepest level we believe we are able, and sometimes even deeper. We can each have deeply transformative experiences, find our own testimonies to the world and then resign ourselves, content to think, "I am working so, so hard, doing all these good works and listening to God; I am a good person, and this is more than enough," leaving the matter at that.

But it is not enough to follow God just in our personal journeys. We are missing the deepest, most difficult calling if we stop there. We are called to suffer together. Together we must help each other build the Divine Community, and together we must enter into it. All our judgements of each other, of ourselves, big or small, all our blame, accusations, hatred, violence, toward friends and strangers alike, all of it tears at our foundation, shaking us further apart, further from God.

We cannot ignore it. We cannot remove ourselves from the crimes of our fellow humans. We are all responsible. We must all suffer together, leaving no one behind. No one in the world. This is what it means to truly love, and to truly live in the Power of the Spirit.

So look to your neighbors, friends and foes, and declare "You, too, are coming with me," for none of us will make it there alone.

Love and Light,
Claire

Saving the World by Coming Alive

2006-02-06T16:43:00.000-05:00

What is my ministry to the world?

Everyone ministers to the world in some form or another, whether implicitly or explicitly. A somewhat well-known quotation comes to mind. It's perhaps cliche, but don't get hung up on that:

"Don't ask yourself what the world needs; ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive." - Harold Whitman

All of our activism - protests, donating to charity, writing to government officials, re-building neighborhoods; all of it - is a way of tending to the world. I need to point out that such activisim is not the only way of tending to the world. Activism means nothing if it is done out of guilt or pity. True actions are sprung from the deepest call, and bring us only joy even through the hardships encountered. We act out of love and only love. When we "come alive" we are tending to the world. If such activism does not make us come alive, then we must re-examine what it is to which we are truly called, where the Spirit is leading us rather than guilt or some other outside obligation. No one should feel guilty if they are not called to drop everything and join the Peace Corps or go to a protest (or ten) or be active in a committee for some form of activism or another.

We all have different gifts, Friends, and we are meant to use them in different ways.

This is ministry to myself as much as anyone else. As a full time college student, it is easy for me to begin overthinking and feeling guilty, afraid that I am not properly tending to the world. I have a passion for chemistry - chemistry in its purist form has very little to do with peace and justice or politics. What good is it if I can prove that putting these two chemicals together under certain conditions produces some other chemical, right? Surely that can't be important in the real world. I even catch myself feeling guilty about wanting to do chemistry. If I'm not out in the field working with people who have so many hardships or rebuilding houses in broken down communities and am instead studying something about which I can be happy and excited, then I am selfish and not properly tending to the world, right?

Then, though, I remind myself that chemistry makes me come alive. Chemistry feels like a calling, one of the main directions in my life. And it's far from useless in the so-called real world. Then I remember that the research project I worked on this summer contributed to finding a faster way to diagnose a horrible autoimmune disease (Anti-Neutrophil Cytoplasmic Autoantibodies - ANCA). I remember that I'm applying to work this summer in a lab doing research about one of the biochemical causes of Type 2 Diabetes - and working toward making a better medication. There are people who are not necessarily being bombed who need help in our own back yard, and I have already worked - and am looking to continue working - to help them using the very thing that makes me come alive: chemistry. The most important message here, though, is that I first recognize and do what makes me come alive, where I am truly led, and after the fact I come up with reasoning about how it tends to the world. Truly living in the Spirit means listening first, and reasoning second.

While I cannot say that my ministry to the world is solely chemistry, I can say that part of how I minister to the world through chemistry. To take this even a step further, I minister to the world when I experience and share any form of joy (chemistry brings me joy, which I do share). I minister to the world when I am upset (ministry is not always fun). I minister to the world by being me, not who I think I should be, and by acting as I am called without feeling guilty about not saving the world in the most obvious way.

By listening to our inward callings and by being truly ourselves, we each do our part in saving the world.

Love and Light,
Claire

Words of Wisdom from Yoda

2006-02-01T00:14:00.000-05:00

There are days when I catch myself taking myself too seriously. I start thinking too hard and overanalyzing, and many things I start trying to do just aren't good enough. It's sort of like trying so hard you can't. A quote from Yoda comes to mind, though: "No! Try not. Do or do not. There is no try." Perhaps I should quit trying to be grounded or focused, trying to listen; maybe all I need to do is let go, and just do.

Some of the times I am least centered are the times I'm trying my hardest to be.

Love and Light,
Claire

True Evangelism Grounded in True Faith

2006-01-16T22:36:00.000-05:00

Evangelism is a word that makes many unprogrammed Friends cringe. I find it a touchy subject within my own heart, but perhaps only because I often do not feel clear about true purpose and meaning behind the mainstream evangelism commonly found in today's society. Evangelism is often defined as the spreading of the Good News of Jesus Christ. I can almost see Friends cringing now.

If the news is Good, why is it then, Friends, that so many of us cringe? Through today's society, many of us have associated evangelism with threats, or guilt trips - "If you don't accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you will suffer unimaginably in Hell for all eternity!". Others may associate it with tricks to lure people into churches where numbers mean more than one's true spirit; such dishonesty and lack of support is damaging, and not at all what most would call "good news". All of these societal factors make me cringe, too.

Recently, though, I find myself coming at the idea of evangelism from an entirely new direction. When we truly follow with our whole lives and our whole selves the leadings of the Spirit, through any hardship, over every mountain, we are then finally spiritually alive. In having such an experience one is grounded in faith and in God, with such an awesome and incredible trust and steadiness. In living in this Center, this Power, one joins in a divine Fellowship (to borrow the terms from Thomas Kelly) with others who have reached down deeply and found such spiritual trust. In a previous post I mentioned John Woolman as an example of such a life. This proposition is one I would not have understood before beginning to experience it myself (I do not claim perfection, only the beginning of serious striving). People encounter such an experience in different ways; there are many who find this experience through Jesus Christ. In having such an experience, no matter how one came upon it, it seems only natural that one would not just outwardly want, but would feel an inwardly deep desire and need to share the true experience of faith in God, with everyone.

This deep need to spread the experience of full faith and trust in God, the Good News, arising from a deep and full trust in the Spirit, this is what I'm beginning to see as a true call to evangelism. Here, spreading the Good News is not about keeping track of how many souls are "saved" or about which church can have the largest congregation, nor is it about threatening people into believing a particular theology out of fear rather than love and trust. For through such a transforming experience, through loving God so deeply to have such faith, we come to love deeply all the world. Evangelism is about having such a deep love for others that it pains us to see them living so blindly without the deep and transforming experience of the Light, of God, or, for those who find such an experience through him, of Jesus Christ. Out of love, we want to spread the Good News, and only out of such profound love and a deep trust in God arises true evangelism.

But what is the content and aim of this yearning Love which is the Divine Love loving its way into and through us to others? It is that they too may make the great discovery, that they also may find God, or, better, be found by Him, that they may know the Eternal breaking in upon them and making their lives moving images of the Eternal Life. ... Wherever any heart has tasted of the heavenly Love, ... there is the shepherd heart yearning over sheep not having a shepherd, not knowing where are the green pastures, not even aware that there are green pastures to find.

(A Testament of Devotion, Thomas Kelly, p. 76)

In such simple and eloquent words, Thomas speaks to the condition of all who live in the Life and Power, the Divine Love. It is not about fire and brimestone raining upon all lost and sinning souls, it is not about who has the correct theology and how many people can we get to believe in it. I find beliefs in this theology or that to be wholly subjective; to me, the Life and Power is not simply a belief, it is an experience, it is real, and it goes much deeper than who is right and who is wrong. I think this is what I was trying to articulate in my previous posting about just what the Important Question is.

In unbounded eagerness we seek for more such fellowship, and wonder at the apparent lethargy of mere "members." In the Fellowship cultural and educational and national and racial differences are leveled. Unlettered men are at ease with the truly humble scholar who lives in the Life, and the scholar listens with joy and openness to the precious experiences of God's dealing with the workingman. We find men with chilly theologies but with glowing hearts. We overleap the boundaries of church membership and find Lutherans and Roman Catholics, Jews and Christians, within the Fellowship. We re-read the poets and the saints, and the Fellowship is enlarged. With urgent hunger we read the Scriptures, with no thought of pious exercise, but in order to find more friends for the soul. We brush past our historical learning in the Scriptures, to seize upon those writers who lived in the Center, in the Life and in the Power. ... And we wonder and grieve at the overwhelmingly heady preoccupation of religious people with problems, problems, unless they have first come into the Fellowship of the Light.

(Thomas Kelly, A Testament of Devotion, p. 55-56).

I quote Thomas Kelly, a soul who by the end of his life was truly living in the Life and Power of which he speaks, because I fumble with words attempting to express an experience that is truly wordless, and Thomas often expresses that which I also find to be true in my heart, in my Center.

It is through this Center, this groundedness in the Inward Guide that we can begin to recreate the Society of Friends and the Christian church and shake the countryside for ten miles around (Holy Obedience, Thomas Kelly). The fellowship .. is founded upon a common Object, who is known by them all to be the very Life within them. This is the Reality which removes Quakerism from pure individualism and from pure subjectivism, as it is so commonly and so mistakenly interpreted (p. 76, A Testament, Thomas Kelly, again).

It is through this Center that we can be called to evangelize, in the true sense of the word, beginning with our own Religious Society of Friends in the form of ministry. Come to think of it, is ministry not a form of evangelizing? True ministry does not come from our minds, but from the depths of our hearts, from the Spirit. By speaking the words of the Spirit from the place of the Life and Power, are we not ultimately calling others to join us this very place? Oh no, we've been evanglizing all along! Perhaps now we see that it's not something to make us cringe, but something with which we find deep love and inspiration, through which we begin to live in this Life and Power as part of the glorious corporate experience of the Divine Fellowship.

Though I began my spiritual journey years ago, I have only just begun to discover what truly living in the Center can mean - and I have begun trembling slightly in writing this post. I have begun to find myself caught in a place where I want to communicate and share the deep groundedness and faith and the seedling of deep Love within me to all those around me, but do not know how to go about doing it without profound (and perhaps damaging) awkwardness. It is a subject not to be thrown around lightly. I myself am just beginning to grow in this Center, and feel a bit scattered as I try to discern what reordering my life with the Spirit located in the Center, at the top of the priority list, entails for me.

I know there are Friends who have discovered this true experience. The Seedlings are there and are planted with deep roots. It is way past time that we share the Love, the Good News, even and especially within our own faith community.

Love and Light,
Claire

Faith Enough to Be Outrageous

2006-01-15T14:10:00.000-05:00

Friends, I have found that I have a concern about the life and energy of our meetings for worship, and the life and energy of all members of our monthly meetings. Many a First Day these last few months I have come away feeling distraught, concerned for the inner understanding of the meeting, concerned for spiritual accountability. A couple months ago I posted a query that arose from this same concern: Do we strive for authenticity in our faithfulness as individual Friends and as a community?

My conception of faithfulness has grown much deeper since I first posted this query, though I do not discredit my then meaning. Then, I was querying about being faithful to the Inner Guide in terms of decision-making in our daily lives, and as meeting communities. Today I re-post the query with more than just decision making in mind; today I query in terms of Holy Obedience.

Thomas Kelly, in his lecture entitled Holy Obedience, (also found in his book, A Testament of Devotion) reflects the concern I have today:

Many of us [Friends] have become as mildly and as conventionally religious as were the church folk of three centuries ago, against whose mildness and mediocrity and passionlessness George Fox and his followers flung themselves with all the passion of a glorious and a new discovery and with all the energy of dedicated lives. In some, says William James, religion exists as a dull habit, in others as an acute fever. Religion as a dull habit is not that for which Christ lived and died.

The earliest Friends had such fiery passion. They did many outrageous things to spread the Quaker message; they would even interrupt sermons of other congregations, hoping to point them toward Truth. A few Friends even felt led to "go naked as a sign" - appearing unclothed in public. I'm not calling for Friends today to interrupt other congregations or practice spiritual nudity, I'm calling for a return to the same fiery passion that led these early Friends to have faith enough to be outrageous, if so called. This fiery passion was from a deep dedication to God, from a deep holy obedience to the stirrings of the Inward Guide. These Friends turned their entire lives over to the great cause of the Spirit. Again to quote Thomas Kelly, Yielding to these persuasions, gladly committing ourselves in body and soul, utterly and completely, to the Light Within, is the beginning of true life (A Testament to Devotion, pg 1). Friends, I must ask, how many of us by this standard are truly living?

John Woolman is another example of an early Friend with such inward dedication. He didn't go preaching in other people's churches, but he was deeply faithful to the Inward Teacher, reorienting his life about God such that he needed not to contradict in his daily life his leadings, his inner conscience, his dedication to the Holy Spirit. His life is a powerful testimony to what true faithfulness brings.

Also in his Holy Obedience lecture, Thomas challenges Friends to re-kindle the embers of faith:

Little groups of such utterly dedicated souls, knowing one another in Divine Fellowship, must take an irrevocable vow to live in this world yet not of this world, Franciscans of the Third Order, and if it be His will, kindle again the embers of faith in the midst of a secular world. Our meetings were meant to be such groups, but now too many of them are dulled and cooled and flooded by the secular. But within our meetings such inner bands of men and women, internally set apart, living by a vow of perpetual obedience to the Inner Voice, in the world yet not of the world, ready to go the second half, obedient as a shadow, sensitive as a shadow, selfless as a shadow—such bands of humble prophets can recreate the Society of Friends and the Christian church and shake the countryside for ten miles around.

Friends, this is no easy challenge, but we were not put on earth to have easy lives. I too am struggling with this, always trying to discern where it is and how the Spirit calls me to be. Reorienting one's life about the Spirit could have heavy implications for some, a change in vocation or location. For others it may be mostly inward, having been faithful enough to end up already where they need to be. Where we each need to be in our lives, and where we need to be as a whole community, is wholly dependent upon our leadings from the Inward Guide, the [Holy] Spirit, God.

I challenge us (myself included), to live with such faithfulness.

Love and Light,
Claire

Blog Changes

2006-01-14T20:30:00.000-05:00

I've recently made a few changes to my blog. The most obvious difference in my blog is the backround (or Template) - it's now all white!

I decided that I needed a change, in part to go along with my ever-changing experiences. Whether or not this change makes a difference to others, it is significant to me and my current blogging experience. It's somewhat difficult to explain why; sometimes I just need a change.

Also new: I added an extensive list (with links) of the Quaker or Quaker-related books I've read, am currently reading, have started reading (but am not currently reading), will soon read (will soon have, or already have but have not yet read), and hope to obtain in order to read (my wishlist). I came up with it mostly from memory, so after returning to my room I may add a few more that I forgot. Since it's such a long list (and will only grow), I may condense it to a post and leave a link to that post, but for now it's on the sidebar.

If anyone has comments or suggestions about the changes (or about my reading list), please, feel free.

Love and Light,
Claire

What Question Leads Me to the True Fires of the Spirit?

2006-01-08T19:20:00.000-05:00

The times I feel most lost are the times when I'm asking the wrong questions.

So many get caught up in the details, the language, this set of beliefs or that - it's an easy trap to fall into. But what are these details but worldly, outward things to be caught up in? What question is being asked that leads to disputes over such things? If we are so concerned about what detail is correct or which words should or should not be used, or even who is right and who is wrong, are we really asking the right question? Instead of being caught up in these outward details, why don't we get caught up in the true Spirit?

How am I called to live?

Living the deeper question transcends the details, including the words I used to feebily communicate a deeper, wordless seeking in my heart.

I find that when I am most grounded, most centered, my life is not at all about the details. In fact details arising from questions as important as "do I consider myself Christian?", or "how do I feel about the war?" become irrelevant when I am closest to the Spirit. My faith experience is not about figuring out or defending these details, the exact answer to these questions. My faith is about listening to the Spirit, discerning and following my deepest leadings as well as I am able at every moment. It is the question behind all, it is the seeking that gives rise to all the answers to any relevent question that needs to be answered.

How am I called to live?

From a William Penn lecture delivered by Thomas Kelley, Holy Obedience:

The life that intends to be wholly obedient, wholly submissive, wholly listening, is astonishing in its completeness. Its joys are ravishing, its peace profound, its humility the deepest, its power world-shaking, its love enveloping, its simplicity that of a trusting child. It is the life and power in which the prophets and apostles lived. It is the life and power of Jesus of Nazareth, who knew that "when thine eye is single thy whole body is full of light" (Luke 11:34). It is the life and power of the apostle Paul, who resolved not to know anything among men save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. It is the life and power of Saint Francis, that little poor man of God who came nearer to reliving the life of Jesus than has any other man on earth. It is the life and power and utter obedience of John Woolman who decided, he says, "to place my whole trust in God," to "act on an innter Principle of Virture, and pursue worldly business no farther than as Truth opened my way therein." It is the life and power of myriads of unknown saints through the ages. It is the life and power of some people now in this room who smile knowingly as I speak. And it is the life and power that can break forth in this tottering Western culture and return the Church to its rightful life as a fellowship of creative, heaven-led souls.

Penn, of course, came from a Christocentric perspective, giving examples from the Christian tradition, but the meaning goes beyond those words. The life that follows the deepest callings of the Spirit has a "simplicity of a trusting child". It is not about who is right and who is wrong, for to concern one's life over such a matter is to live beside the point, lost in the wrong questions.

I mean not to discredit current inward and outward struggles. If a detail strikes me in a way that makes me bristle or uncomfortable, I try to examine what it is that makes me react to it so - often it is my outward self, distracted. I instead try to truly listen to the message behind the detail. Healthy dialogue is important, so long as we don't lose sight of the real Purpose.

When I feel lost, I need to instead ask what question leads me to a deeper Reality, what question leads me to the true fires of the Spirit?

Love and Light,
Claire

Feelings of Disunity and Loss of Spiritual Focus are Part of Faith

2005-12-30T11:29:00.000-05:00

Friends, I have not posted much this month. In October and November of this year I found myself having an intense, more direct spiritual experience. In this experience I found I had more outward ministry to post here. This December I find that the intensity has morphed; my spiritual experiences this month have not been so direct nor so clear as they were in the previous months. Where I felt more united previously I find myself feeling more divided again, outward and inward separated once again.

This is a frustrating experience; however I find that part of my faith requires patience with myself through this. Despite feeling less connected, less one, less focused in times of worship, I can continue to keep the inward ear. I can and do continue to be patient, to listen, to wait for guidance back toward unity.

In disconnected times like these I find there can be important lessons not so easy to see when spiritually grounded. Sometimes it takes periods of lost focus, feelings of disunity, to truly honor those times when I am in more unity with my inward Light, with the Spirit. Sometimes it takes times like these so I can see the Light shown on other aspects of myself that need work. It can be humbling.

I catch myself overthinking again, as I've done in previous ungrounded times. I catch myself trying to test my ideas about God and spirituality by applying them to situations rather than comparing my experience with the spirit underlying the situations.

I need to continue to hold patience with myself, I need to continue learning, and I need not fret my current loss of focus and groundedness. I have faith that my focus, groundedness, and sense of unity will return in due time.

Love and Light,
Claire

Birthday

2005-12-20T10:43:00.000-05:00

I guess I don't have anything profound to say today.

Today is my 19th birthday.

Love and Light,
Claire

A Need to Be More Outwardly Spiritual

2005-12-17T23:53:00.000-05:00

Friends, I have not posted in awhile. In recent weeks the amount of work for my classes has intensified as the semester has come to a close, and I am now in the midst of Finals week (1 term paper and 1 final down, two finals to go).

It is difficult to continue taking time for centeredness during the ups of my workload. It is difficult to accept this, as my faithfulness is not contingent upon the amount of time I have for it. I strive to remain faithful as my spiritual focus goes through this valley, for there must be valleys in order for there to be mountains.

On the bus back from Harvard Square this evening, I realized yet again that while I strive to base my life and actions upon my leadings and through listening [to God], those around me and many with whom I interact on a daily basis would never know. This hugely important part of me remains unrecognized to most around me. Something about that is not right.

I was speaking to a friend a few weeks ago and I found myself saying something like, "Actually, spirituality is a really important part of who I am". She replied that she never would have guessed that about me from what she knew about me.

I strive so for authenticity, and what, Friends, does this imply about my authenticity? It is not as if I go around being fake or covering up my actions or intentions, but how is it that this major part of my life goes so unrecognized? I strive to be faithful, as well as I strive to be authentic in my faithfulness. I strive to live an authentic life, as well.

I see that I have a lot to work on.

Love and Light,
Claire

Statement from My Home Meeting

2005-12-08T22:26:00.000-05:00

I first heard about the CPT hostage situation from the email listserv from my home meeting, Durham Friends Meeting (NCYM(C)). Through Martin's Quaker Blog Watch, I found that they put a letter in the local news paper. I feel the need to post that link here to show my own support of the statement, being a member of that meeting.

People of peace

I can't imagine holding the knowledge that there were a very real possibility today or tomorrow would be the last day of my life.

I continue to hold love for all involved, captives, captors, and all their families, for that is all I can do.

Love and Light,
Claire

Tom Fox and Living in the Power

2005-12-06T23:28:00.000-05:00

I don't really have much to say today, but I feel the need to post something regarding Tom Fox.

His actions and faithfulness strike a deep chord within me. It is this kind of faithfulness to which we are all called, though we are all led in different directions.

It seems that part of Tom's message is that we are not to plead with the captors, not to be angry with them, but to love them.

From a recent article in the Washington Post: Don't pay ransom for his return, he wrote in an October 2004 e-mail, and reject the use of violence in trying to win his freedom. Don't "vilify" the abductors, he said, but instead "try to understand the motives of their actions."

Peace is not possible without such unconditional love, without such Grace. Uncontrolled anger and hate lead to objectification, one no longer sees the other as human and can then find it easier to kill the other. When one sees another as truly human, I believe it's nearly impossible to do them such harm.

Peace is not about whether one is pro-war or anti-war, it's more about being faithful. It's about living in the Power that takes away the occassion for all war. By being deeply faithful and following his leading to be a CPT in Iraq, Tom has been putting this into practice; he has been living in that Power.

We are all called to live in that Power.

Love and Light,
Claire

Faithfulness Through a Drop in Spiritual Intensity

2005-11-27T16:25:00.000-05:00

Though I have had recently a very intense experience with the Spirit, I am finding that in recent days the intensity of my experience has dropped significantly. Intuitively, it seems it would be difficult to understand this drop in intensity; am I less spiritually focused? Am I being less faithful? These are tough questions. However, I find I am learning how I can be faithful even when my experience is less intense.

Some days, the Spirit has me by the hand (or rather, by the heart) and is guiding me as I try to follow as faithfully as I can. Other days it is more like the Spirit is piggybacking on me; with me, close, but not in the forefront, providing nudgings or pointing every now and then, letting me go more on my own (but not alone!). This, too, requires much faith, as it is easy to feel afraid that I have lost touch or focus, when really the Spirit is right here with me providing guidance, even if not right infront of me. This reminds me of another example Lloyd Lee Wilson gave:

My favorite example of this comes from a gathering of ministers in Ohio that I atended about a decade ago. In the course of the various discussions, some farmers in the group began to describe their practice of settling into the silence each morning, to be guided about what they should do and where they should go that day. Sometimes they felt no more than an affirmation of the tasks human reason would have recommended, but sometimes they received unexpected direction. (emphasis mine)

Living faithfully according to where one is lead every moment of the day does not necessarily mean that one feels a distinct leading on each and every option and decision that comes up. Sometimes human reason (though secondary) is quite appropriate and good. What is important is that one is attentive and open to the leadings that do arise.

I am learning to be in constant conversation with God, checking in inwardly frequently. I find that my experience of this conversation is not quite that of an exchange of words. In fact, a few weeks ago I was speaking with a friend about my experience of worship as listening, and she said something along the lines of how listening is really a difficult thing to do, that she tends to talk a lot more [to God]. I then realized that I really don't do a lot of "talking to God". I don't really ask much, and my experience of prayer is that of a listening and an attentiveness. Perhaps, though, a little bit of talking may not be such a bad idea. We shall see, we shall see.

Love and Light,
Claire

A Shared Experience

2005-11-21T16:47:00.000-05:00

In a keynote address to Southern Appalachian Yearly Meeting Association (SAYMA) in 2003 (which happens to be entitled Wrestling with Our Faith Tradition and is probably included in the recently published book with that title, but is in fact a piece of writing on its own), Lloyd Lee Wilson speaks of apophatic spirituality. He describes apophatic spirituality as the spirituality of subtraction, where one finds God by subtracting from one's life everything that is not God.

I first heard of this kind of spirituality a few months ago, and I remember thinking that it was an odd way of going about things that must be overwhelming, and clearly, was not right for me. Now, in reading the words Lloyd spoke, I realize it is exactly what I have come to do this last month and a half or so.

In a previous post of mine, I spoke of letting go; by "letting go", I do not necessarily mean that, for instance, by letting go of my belief in God that I no longer believe. I mean that I must pull the rug out from underneath this belief and discover my true experience - minus the padding of reason. I was speaking of removing reason from any primary source of my faith, and though I did not consciously articulate it, I removed reason in this way because I found that though reason is important, it is not God, so it is thus secondary. In Lloyd's address I found these words which speak to my condition:

Our primary path to understanding is a direct, unfiltered and unmediated relationship with the risen Christ who is here with each of us and with all of us in community. Of course, we do value Scriptures and the accumlated wisdom of our yearly meetings and the rational thought process that help us understand the consequences of our actions - it is simply that all these are of secondary value in the Quaker tradition.

It is the experienced reality of the inward encounter with the Divine that is the foundation stone and bulding block for everything else.

It was at this point that I could not read any further without a pencil for underlining things, it struck me so. Earlier today I was speaking to a good friend of mine about it and discovered that I was speaking with more animation than I usually speak; I realized that this was more exciting to me than I initially acknowledged.

When I spoke of my experience before (in a previous post), I knew, I knew I was not the only one to have gone through something like that, but had reached a point where I needed to take a break from reading some of the Quaker books I'm not yet through with, as I continued to get tripped up on words telling me how such an experience should be, or will be, or how all these people experienced it; I needed to have my own, authentic experience without such words to twist me around.

In the last week, though I feel as though my experience has been less intense and less the forefront of my consciousness, I have found myself able to find my own experience in the writings of others - something I had not entirely expected. Reading the words of Lloyd Lee Wilson in this address from two years ago has stricken me, as I feel like a large centrality of my experience has been articulated, and I continue to find more and more places where this experience is articulated. I find myself unconcerned with the language used - whether one speaks of Christ risen, or doesn't mention Christ or God at all is of no importance to me. It is instead the deeper, transcendent meaning that I hear when I read these parallel experiences.

I mentioned that my experience has felt less intense this week, which initially seems like a cause for concern to me; "Did I completely lose touch, just like that? Is my experience over and forgotten already?". It was quickly apparent to me that it was indeed, not at all over or gone. More words from Lloyd speak to me:

[The dialogue] may wax and wane, but seasoned Friends over the centuries have reported that God's presence is an ongoing personal conversation, not the intermittent and infrequent reception of a general broadcast. It is as if whenever we stop to listen, we discover that God is already speaking with us. (emphasis mine)

Yes. Yes, I feel this deeply. I tested my experience this past week, and this is the best articulation of what I found.

In another recent post I spoke of nudgings, and of how I've begun to listen for God in all aspects of my life; My life is about being attentive and faithful to where I am called. My life is happening all the time. Then I read yet another line from Lloyd's address which rang true:

As Carole Treadway of the School of the Spirit reports, an apt description of a Conservative Friend is one who seeks to live every moment under the immediate guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Though I am, indeed, a member of a Conservative monthly meeting, it is not this label with which I am concerned. The part of this that strikes me is the description of a Friend who seeks to live every moment under the immediate guidance of the Holy Spirit. Every moment.

It is a joy to discover and lift up these words, this shared experience. Through shared experiences, both similar to, and different from our own, we grow in the Light.

Love and Light,
Claire

A United Religious Society of Friends

2005-11-16T12:39:00.000-05:00

I can't help but begin to bring together many posts (or at least pieces of them) I've seen in the last few days. They may use very different words and different examples, but I feel a strong sense that they all speak of the same thing. (If any of the Friends I quote or summarize below feel that I interpreted incorrectly or wish not to be included in such a post, please let me know and I will modify this post to accommodate.) Though I lift up certain pieces of a number of posts, I do highly recommend reading each one in their entirety.

Shortly before or after I made my last post, Amanda also posted in response to a question a commenter had asked in a previous post of hers about what the non-negotiable central tenets common to all Quakers are (if there are any). In her post, Amanda quoted Friend James Healton who said that (among other things), there is a powerful unity and purpose underlying all the elements that go together to make the basic contours of Quaker theology and practice.

Amanda says also, We believe that not only is God here, but that there is that of God in each person, which makes them Holy, and Precious and Sacred, which can lead them into the fullness of expression of Divine Love. If we believe that God is in others, we can do them no harm. If we believe that God is in ourselves, we must discipline ourselves to be faithful to his Inward leading and teaching. (Emphasis mine)

In a comment to this post, Lorcan said, I would add to thy excellent start, that to be a Quaker is to be constantly learning to empty thyself and invite God to fill thee.

In a different blog, AJ Schwanz spoke of being wary of doing things out of fear rather than love. Many times choices in ministry are made out of fear rather than a God-placed compassion, she said. Also a line from her post which was also lifted up in the comments to it: Just because it’s a good thing doesn’t mean that I’m called to do it. We must listen for God.

Over on the Quaker Renewal Forum there's a post entitled A Foundation of Listening and Hearing - very much appropriate here. In it there's a paragraph which very much speaks to me and part of what I'm trying to tie together here:

For us as individuals and meetings, we find the solid ground when we become people th[at] are a listening people. Not only that, we are willing to put into practice what we hear. Since this little comparison by Jesus follows on the heels of the Sermon on the Mount, I find that a solid ground life is built when we listen to the words of Jesus as found in that Sermon and are willing to put them into practice. In other words, we listen to God's heart and God's dream and put into practice what we hear. We live out Kingdom values. We live out the values of God's dream. We live out the presence of Christ in our life. (emphasis mine again)

In my last post I spoke of being asked the question, "What is the essence of Quakerism?" Instead of going into an extended explanation about how everyone practices differently depending on the branch, or how it depends on who you are, I gave the brief disclaimer that, well, though everyone would describe it differently, in my experience the essence of Quakerism is about being attentive and faithful to where one is lead or called in life. (Goodness, I just quoted myself.)

What is the foundation upon which we build our spiritual homes? What is the "essence of Quakerism" [if there is one]? What are the "non-negotiable central tenets common to all Quakers" [if there are any]? Personally, I feel that there is an "essence" of Quakerism, or something like a "central tenet", or in the words of James Healton as quoted above, a powerful unity and purpose underlying all the elements that go together to make the basic contours of Quaker theology and practice. If we don't, then what exactly holds all of us together as a Religious Society of Friends? How do we live our lives as individuals and communities of Friends?

I have a growing sense that we all know what this powerful unity and purpose is, though we all use different words, practice it differently, and tend to get caught up in different sets of details. This may seem a little redundant, but I feel the need to lift these pieces up once again:

If we believe that God is in ourselves, we must discipline ourselves to be faithful to his Inward leading and teaching. (Amanda)

to be a Quaker is to be constantly learning to empty thyself and invite God to fill thee. (Lorcan's comment on Amanda's post)

Many times choices in ministry are made out of fear rather than a God-placed compassion. (AJ Schwanz) We must be careful to listen for God.

We live out the presence of Christ in our life. (Quaker Renewal Forum)

in my experience the essence of Quakerism is about being attentive and faithful to where one is lead or called in life. (there I go quoting myself again)

These voices I've quoted and summarized have spoken of what I sense to be the heart of Quakerism. These speakers are of multiple "branches" of Quakerism and use different language and have different ways of practicing or worshipping, but all are part of the whole Religious Society of Friends. In speaking with other Friends, in experiencing the most recent Central Committee meeting of Friends General Conference (FGC) (Central Committee is "the governing body of FGC"), in reading these blogs, and in my own heart I sense a growing movement to build bridges among these "branches", that we might come together as a single tree of Friends with deep and mutual roots.

A post by Robin a few weeks ago also spoke to this movement in a post entitled Quaker History as a Uniting Force. Here, Robin spoke of a movement that seems to be arising in [at least] a few branches of Quakerism, that we all need to learn more about each other, respect each other (or if we're like Aretha Frankin (as Robin put it), R-E-S-P-E-C-T each other). Robin said, No more secretly believing that *we* are the only true heirs of Quakerism, just because we practice more silence than they do or because we proclaim Christ as king more loudly than they do.

We will have to travel and meet each other more.

- and indeed, if we are faithful, we will.

Love and Light,
Claire

Authentic Faithfulness

2005-11-13T14:06:00.000-05:00

A couple months ago I asked Friends how they describe Quakerism to non-Friends who ask about it ("What's Quakerism?"). I described how my description of Quakerism began to feel like a "textbook" explanation - here are the apparent main current branches, here's some history, here's a typical meeting for worship and what it's founded on.. ect. I'm finding that the way I describe Quakerism is a bit of an indication to myself about where I am in my spirituality.

Today as I was waiting for the bus back to Wellesley from Cambridge after Meeting for Worship, I was chatting with a friend on her way back from a Catholic service - she asked me about Quakerism. After describing an unprogrammed Meeting for Worship and a little bit about the branches, I was asked basically, "What is the essence of Quakerism?" Instead of going into an extended explanation about how everyone practices differently depending on the branch, or how it depends on who you are, I gave the brief disclaimer that, well, though everyone would describe it differently, in my experience the essence of Quakerism is about being attentive and faithful to where one is lead or called in life.

As I contemplated this on the bus, I realized very clearly that I am in a place where my life is about this essence of Quakerism that I described; my life right now is about being attentive and faithful to where I am called. My life is about being attentive and faithful not just for an hour on Sunday mornings, not just at gatherings, meetings for business, or committee meetings, but as much of every minute of every day that I can possibly be. I did not reach this point because it seems unreasonable to be grounded just for an hour once a week, but because I feel it at my core, because I am reaching a place were I'm open to the slightest nudgings about small actions here or there in my life; should I go upstairs and speak with a friend about something important right now or should I wait? Do I need to step outside and listen right now or am I ok? Do I need to make a phone call to a Friend today? Do I want to apply to be an RA? A chemistry tutor? Do I need to post on this blog about this concern or that experience? These are all things that it seems most people - and I used to - decide by using reason or some other surface indication. I find I am now more sensitive to small nudgings one way or another, or sometimes even stronger feelings, about these seemingly "unspiritual" decisions. As I've mentioned before, though, I don't believe in the divide between secular and spiritual.

My life is about being attentive and faithful to where I am called. My life is happening all the time.

I left Meeting for Worship this morning feeling distraught. I felt a deep sense of concern about the attentiveness of other Friends to this inward leading, to the still, small voice we all talk about so much. Are people Friends because they are called to be, or because they like the idea of it and it seems to make sense? Who am I to judge? This is a question I've had to ask myself, as well. Even so, I couldn't help but feeling upset and unclear about this question for many in the Religious Society of Friends.

Do we strive for authenticity in our faithfulness as individual Friends and as a community? Do we do things as individuals and as whole communities of Friends because we are led to from a deeper, inward place, or are we doing things because they are the "Quakerly" thing to do? How do we hold each other accountable without coming from a place of judgement, but from a place of sincere concern and discernment - a place of faithfulness?

Love and Light,
Claire

The Challenge of Letting Go

2005-11-10T13:39:00.000-05:00

In my last post I spoke of being in tune with the spirit and discarding excess "spiritual junk". Part of this process, I'm finding, is learning to let go of absolutely everything, including all prior held beliefs about the Divine. This thought almost feels like a punch in the stomach, but I'm finding more and more each day that this is the beginning of a life-long experience of living Truth.

Reasoning and intellectual interpretation are no longer adequate enough reasons for me to put faith in a belief. Even beliefs that seem to be based in experience such as my thought that of course I believe in God - look at all this love around me, everywhere, and these amazing experiences! What else, but God, could allow us to have these experiences? Ultimately, reason is what backs that up. I cannot believe until I feel it at my very core - reason tossed aside, initially unimportant.

I must listen, I must experience. (Sounds familiar, doesn't it?)

Throwing reason out the window along with every belief I seem to have come to through it (which would be more beliefs than one might think!) is an incredible challenge which needs constant attention. I must even catch myself and stop from trying to feel one thing or another because it seems like I should. My interpretation of what I "should" do or "should" feel goes back to reason or interpretation. The only things I really should do are the ones that call me from a place where reason does not apply. I even had to loosen my grip on my belief in God, I had to let it go. This is truly starting anew, from scratch.

I must add here that by "letting go", I do not necessarily mean that, for instance, by letting go of my belief in God that I no longer believe. I mean that I must pull the rug out from underneath this belief and discover my true experience - minus the padding of reason.

I find myself questioning my life as it is right now. I go to a very good college, I have many luxuries; in looking at myself from this deeper place, my life is cluttered. So I should drop everything, sell all my possessions and go live in a shack in the woods, right? No, no. Here's that "should" of mine. I do not feel the call to drop everything. I cannot discredit the passion I feel for what I'm pursuing, the call to the direction in which I'm currently headed. I cannot decide that I "should" feel called to do one thing because it seems like the "spiritual" thing to do. I must listen and wait. I must call faith up from the deepest place, with no reason at all to do so other than a feeling that I must - and questioning, even that, so that I may discard any reason involved. I am very much a scientific thinker, which makes this process much more challenging for me, but also much more powerful.

There is a shift occurring within me. My inward and outward experiences are beginning to converge, my spiritual and intellectual experiences are moving toward a greater overlap. I am beginning to stop living a divided life, as Parker Palmer would call it.

I am struggling through, I am tackling doubts faithfully (as I can), I'm paying even more attention to that still, small voice within me. I am suddenly much more inwardly sensitive to my emotions; I feel my emotions with my spirit, with my core. The surface of my outward experience is sinking down, down to this deep and challenging place.

I find myself glad to be in a physical environment that challenges me further in all of this. It keeps me from being too comfortable. It helps me grow even more, stronger.

Love and Light,
Claire

In tune with the Spirit

2005-11-05T23:15:00.000-05:00

In the last couple of weeks I have stripped away a lot of what I guess I could call "spiritual junk". I have come to a place where my concept of God is not tangible; I have no image or metaphor, no logic or reasoning - all of my attempts to define God tangibly only distracted me from the true Spirit, so I've stripped all my tangible ideas away. I cannot describe it right now, only experience - but my experience with God right now feels much stronger than it's been in the past. I feel in tune, always with an inner ear, attentive to nudgings.

I have been open to nudgings to stop what I'm doing to go and listen for awhile, or perhaps you could call it worship (in the same sense as Meeting for Worship). Several times this week I have taken a break from homework - or whatever I was doing - to just go sit by the lake or step outside for a bit, having the understanding that that's what I needed to do right then and whatever I was doing could wait.

As I go through my daily activities I sense an inward focus, an inward open listening. Fitting this renewed and intense spiritual experience into my life - into my academic life as a full time student - is challenging. Having a continuing spiritual experience is a challenge to reconcile with many, many others around me who are not necessarily having any sort of spiritual experience, or are having a very different spiritual experienc than I. It's a challenge to have any sort of spiritual experience and not know how to express that to those around me.

As I sense this inward focus and listening, I also sense and inward struggle. I'm lovingly wrestling with God, I am inwardly tender. I am being attentive to where I am right now, rather than trying to form or push myself toward some goal. This is where I need to be right now, and right now that's ok. No need to distract myself by trying to figure out where I will ultimately be led, only where I am led right now.

This is my current experience, as best as I can describe it, though words often fail for me when trying to describe these things.

Love and Light,
Claire

Being Broken Open

2005-11-01T19:40:00.000-05:00

My heart is broken open by love. As I struggle to keep sight of my center and ground in my daily life, trying to be gentle with myself as I encounter bumps or road blocks in my path, I often think of those in whom I have found great support. I have recently found myself without words to describe the deep passion and love of so many people and Friends I've encountered so far in my life. I encountered a number of these Friends at Central Committee this past weekend, finding myself supported by them, but also, equally if not more importantly, some of them found support in me. These passionate and deeply loving Friends break my heart; they break it open. This passion and love for the world, for God, for their work and the work of everyone, this is the Spirit manifested. This is my experience of God.

After a couple months of what felt a little like spiritual limbo as I made the transition to college, I feel now that my spirituality has returned full force and intensified. I'm still learning how and struggling to find its balance in my daily life, to discover how to remain spiritually grounded and focused as I interact with others, as I go to class, lab, or study groups, or do homework. I suspect that this is an on-going dilemma for many others, as well.

I must carry on and be tender with where I am, being careful to nurture myself in the place that I am, and I must always remember the passion and love that breaks my heart open.

Love and Light,
Claire

FGC Central Committee

2005-10-31T02:02:00.000-05:00

Affirmed. I come away from FGC Central Committee feeling most strongly affirmed. Coming together in the Spirit with Friends from every FGC-affiliated yearly meeting, fellowship, and directly affiliated meetings as the "governing body of Friends General Conference" was a very important experience for me (though technically I was not a member of Central Committee this time around but am now for a different reason than the one for which I was present this year.. but let's not get into technicalities right now). Being present among many of the Friends who have been doing so much positive work both within the Religious Society of Friends and without and experiencing some of the passion of these Friends was inspiring and incredible to be around.

It's difficult to describe my experience, which makes it difficult to write about. Having recently joined the Publications and Distribution Committee of FGC - which does work with publications and with Quaker Books of FGC and such; it's a Program committee - this was my first opportunity to meet other committee members in person and begin to get a better feel for the work of the committee. With plenty of [shameless] promoting of Whispers of Faith during Central Committee, those Friends who did not already know me began to recognize my name and who I was - something I have not necessarily experienced among Friends, but it was very affirming for me. Feeling connected to and active among the wider body of FGC Friends is incredibly grounding for me, as is seeing Friends with whom I share a deeper connection. Quaker Process, too, was certainly central to my experience these last few days - even after four days of intense Quaker Process among mostly adult Friends (rather than among high school Friends, as most of my previous experiences have been), I do still love it. I love it even more, even. I walked away from Central Committee - or rather, rode in a car, a plane, a bus, a subway, and another bus away from Central Committee - feeling connected, valued, affirmed, and loved on a level deeper than one might usually find out in the "real" world. Though that love does continue even after I take of my name tag and dive back into the "real" world.

I hugged my way into the room where the Plenaries occurred on Thursday night after arriving late, and then hugged my way back out this morning as I left a little early. It was in hugging my way out that the feeling of affirmation and love really hit home for me, and that feeling stuck with me rather strongly during my entire trek back to campus, and lasted almost overwhelmingly until I finally hankered down and did my German homework - and homework is usually quite distracting from the Spirit.

I learned a number of things this weekend, one of which stands out quite distinctly and importantly for me. Central Committee this year approved the formation of a new Program Committee: the Youth Ministries Committee. Being already on Publications and Distribution, I am unable to join this new and exciting committee for the time being, but that aside, I had to reconcile with myself where I stood with Youth Ministries, as it has been a passion of mine in the past couple years. I was soon clear that I needed to learn to put faith into a committee for an issue about which I am passionate, to let go and trust that this committee is just as passionate if not more passionate about Youth Ministries as I am, and that my gifts are needed elsewhere at this time. Feeling that youth ministries is such a deeply important issue makes letting go of my need to be on the Youth Ministries Committee a bit more of an issue, but right now I see it as a situation where I love it so much I have to let it go; this is not where I am led right now. Instead, I currently remain on the Publications and Distribution Committee as one of the youngest members, doing the work of Youth Ministries by creating a more intergenerational environment within this particular committee, setting an example, and working faithfully where my gifts are needed, regardless of my age. I do hope to be as involved as is possible, appropriate, needed, and feasible with Youth Ministries projects as they develop.

I was deeply touched by the passionate presentation of the work of the Ad Hoc Youth Ministries Discernment Committee by the clerk of this committee, Robin Greenler - this was the committee created last year to discern issues and concerns surrounding youth ministries among Friends. She spoke clearly and with much energy of the concerns and experiences of young(er) Friends, and of the work of the Committee; so much that I have experienced/have been experiencing was articulated passionately by Robin during this report, and it touched me deeply. I have so much faith in the formation of this committee, as complicated as forming a new FGC Program committee as such is looking right now, and I'm so thrilled.

Feeling more grounded in the Spirit, more grounded in a wider Quaker community, and excited about the work in which I am now involved, and with the affirming love of incredible and dedicated Friends, I can continue in my collegiate life holding all of this in my heart.

I'm not sure if I managed to capture the way I feel right now and where that feeling came from with this post, and I certainly did not describe all that happened at Central Committee this year, but I needed to articulate something here. More later on this, perhaps.

Love and Light,
Claire

"What we need is here."

2005-10-26T20:31:00.000-04:00

I just went to see Parker J. Palmer speak. I was fortunate enough that he came here to Wellesley College, to the very building next to my dorm to speak. I was captivated, and made tender by his words. "We need to learn how to wear our hearts on our sleeves," he said, in a society so focused on what's outward and ignorant of what's within. We need to think with our minds in our hearts. The soul is like a wild animal; resilient and tough, but very shy. We need communities that support and encourage our souls. He spoke of a moment where one stops living a divided life - with the divide between our inward souls and the outward way of life - and starts living in ways that reflect what is within. He called this the "Rosa Parks Moment", as it is what she did when she sat at the front of that bus for the first time. She started living her life from within, honoring her selfhood and worth, her humanness, rather than setting it aside for the racist societal standards by which she was surrounded. Parker spoke of when the police came on the bus to take her off to jail she said "You may do that" as a free human being. No physical jail could overcome the freedom she gained from the prison of that divide.

His words struck a deep chord within me as memories of past experiences and current struggles flipped through my mind, wordlessly relating themselves to these things of which Parker spoke. In a sense, I've been having a long and drawn out "Rosa Parks Moment" as I struggle to draw closer to living outwardly that which I find within.

I feel that I'm drawing nearer to something profound within me, some profound potential. I'm beginning to climb that mountain. Or perhaps it is that I've been climbing it all along, but just discovered something new about how to climb. The world around me is beginning to feel differently.

...

On that note, I'm leaving town (and the internet) until Sunday. Tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon I will be leaving for FGC Central Committee in Maryland as an invited member. The only way my excitement is concealed right now is through an odd sense of disbelief or denial about how exciting it really is for me. I'm one of those nuts who loves Quaker Process.

Love and Light,
Claire

Just Who Is This "Claire" Person, Anyway?

2005-10-26T00:28:00.000-04:00

An interesting result of having a blog for spiritual thoughts, feelings, and writings is that I only hint at other things occuring in my life and other contexts of where I am. I'm a firm believer that there is no divide between secular and spiritual - if there were, where then, would I suggest that the spirit was not? However, this does not automatically lead to describing everything going on in my life in a spiritual blog such as this.

Today, partly inspired by some memes over on Amanda's blog, I felt like filling in a few more bits of the "rest" of my life. Needless to say, a lot of this post is not necessarly going to be spiritually inspiring or anything, but will perhaps give a little more insight about my life as it is and has been recently, and perhaps how rapidly it's changing these days. I'd like to point out also that it is by no means comprehensive - not all aspects of my life are covered here, of course. (There's a lot more to it, but this is a start.) So, here goes. Feel free to comment or ask questions or just entirely ignore it, as you see fit.

1 Year Ago:

I was nearing the end of my first trimester of senior year in high school (we had three trimesters rather than two semesters my senior year). I was attending the NC School of Science and Mathematics, a public boarding school 5 minutes from my house and from Durham Friends Meeting (my home meeting), a school with intense academics and a schedule that resembled college more than high school. Being at that school was tough, frustrating, fantastic, and allowed for more opportunities and growth - academically and spiritually - than I ever would've hoped to experience in the two short years I was there.

I believe, actually, that I was about to enter one of those weeks that I look back on with the thought, "If I can get through weeks like that, I can get through anything." It was less than a week before my Early Decision application to Wellesley was due, finals were going to begin in a couple days - including organic chemistry, asian history, and AP calculus with adv. topics; quite a load! This was also around the time where I learned that my SAT score had improved by 140 points, and that I had done very well in a prestigious, national science competition; this was the point where I finally gained some confidence about the possibility getting into college, and started feeling really good about where I was going, academically. However, doing well in this science competition meant that in the next week, on top of finals and my Wellesley application, I had to work with my research partner to prepare a 12 minute presentation on the research project we'd done, and be ready to answer judge's questions - a trip to the regional competition in Georgia was scheduled for right after our finals.

Spiritually, especially with all of this craziness going on, I was quite distracted and unfocused. I had a Pendle Hill clerking workshop to look forward to attending that was a few weeks away - I was to be one of the FGC Gathering high school program clerks in 2005, but other than regular attendance at meeting, spirituality was not in the forefront of my mind. Even so, it'd been a year and a half since I'd stopped attending First Day School (and had been attending the full hour, instead). Earlier in October I'd attended my fourth and final Young Quakes, a national, FGC-sponsored, young Friends gathering, and I yearned to retain the centeredness I usually found at such gatherings once back at home. Usually, though, the glow would wear off, and with it would go my spiritual focus.

I had not yet read a single Quaker book - a thought I now can no longer understand. I have traveled so tremendously far in my spiritually journey since then - and I'd been traveling right along before, too. Many turning points were on my horizon a year ago. Perhaps I'll post on those, soon. I keep encountering more!

1 Month Ago:

It was nearing the end of September, and goodness, it feels like yesterday! (Is it really almost November? This is ridiculous!) I'd been here at Wellesley for a month, and was frustrated by a lack of stress - it sounds odd, I know. (No worries, things have picked up a bit and continue to, slowly.) I had quickly learned that at this point in my life, I don't function very well without a certain amount of stress. A month into college, while taking organic chemistry, I still wanted (and want) to do research, I still loved (and love) chemistry and it's application to biology (biochemistry, really). I had discovered the possibility of being a chemistry tutor in the department, and am still planning on looking into that possibility. I had already started doing some computational chemistry research with one of the chemistry professors (though I'd rather be doing "wet" chemistry, or lab work, rather than just computer modeling). Exploring Boston had proved to be a wonderful experience, and an exciting new level of independence.

Spiritually, as evidenced from some of my earlier September posts, I was still searching for grounding. It wasn't an ungroundedness like I had a year ago; I'm certainly in a different place now than I was then. I just wasn't focused as I felt I wanted to be and needed to be. However, I was beginning to get closer to that groundedness.

1 Week Ago:

I was still chugging along here, academically speaking. A couple tests, a paper, an almost-all-nighter. The sun was out, after over a week of gross rain.

Spiritually, well, see what I posted a week ago and in the last week.. My journey continues.

1 Day Ago:

Monday afternoons and evenings I usually meet with two different groups for organic chemistry, and usually also have to set up for my Tuesday afternoon cell bio lab. I suffered from a bout of complete distraction. For an unreasonable amount of time I was entirely unable to focus on setting up for my bio lab, which I knew wouldn't take that long to do once I actually did it. There are times when I need to bite the bullet and just do something, and there are times when I can't fight the distraction. Don't worry, this isn't a huge issue. I'm not talking about having ADD (which I don't), but about finding the balance between distraction and focus, as everyone needs to do. Last night, the balance was just inconvenient. Yesterday I also got some laundry done, and it was fabulous.

12 Hours Ago:

I was in my cell bio lab, listening to the instructor go slowly through the procedure that I'd read the night before and had made notes about in my lab notebook. Well, actually, I wasn't really listening to the instructor; I was spacing out, thinking about other things in my life. The redundancy of listening to the instructor go over the procedure and theory again was just too much (too boring, unhelpful), as it usually is.

That, my Friends, is all for now.

Love and Light,
Claire

A Walk to Simply BE

2005-10-23T22:32:00.000-04:00

Today I walked. I walked a lot. For two and a half hours, I wandered around the Charles River, through the crowds and with the crowds as everyone looked on at the Head of the Charles Regatta in the River. I observed jackets and sweatshirts and hats of individuals and entire groups as they walked around, finding people from all sorts of places around the country (and a couple other parts of the world). Listening to some upbeat music with headphones as I walked, I just was.

I didn't overthink anything, I didn't contemplate spiritual matters, I didn't stress about my classes, I didn't think too much about friends or family. I was just walking, letting brief thoughts of the moment pass into and out of my mind, wondering if I'd encounter anyone I knew, but not really expecting to.

I was just being. And it was okay to just be.

I spend so much time thinking about who I am and how I am, thinking about where I am spiritually and academically, and where I'd like to be. It's important to take a break sometimes! I felt more centered with myself today. This is a slow process, but it's ok, I don't have to know everything right now.

Love and Light,
Claire

Toward the Mountain

2005-10-20T21:44:00.000-04:00

I find it interesting where I am now, spiritually. I feel almost as though I've just begun my journey, though I've been traveling for quite awhile now. Perhaps it is more like I feel that I just encountered a new mountain to climb; I can see it in the distance and am working my way toward it. There was some initial excitement about having discovered this new direction, this new focus for my journey, but it's beginning to settle in a little.

I'm working on being careful to not get too caught up in the branches in my way or the beasts I may encounter, but to keep a firm eye on the mountain ahead. It'll always be there, even when I trip and fall..

It's tough and it's tiring when you go it alone
I learned about wiring, I learned about stone
The building is done but the work's never through
And I won't give up, no how, it reminds me of who I am and where I am now
I remember myself, that's the work that I do
On a spring night when the snow is melting
You'll see two sets of footprints walking
Look at all the stars, and turn around,
and walk home,
Slowly walk home.

[From "This is not the House that Pain Built", by Dar Williams]

Love and Light,
Claire

Two Days Later..

2005-10-19T00:53:00.000-04:00

[Oh goodness, it's 1am again. But this time, I'm about to go to bed (and believe it or not, 1am is an earlyish bedtime for me these days). For any who were concerned, I did get very little sleep Sunday night, but I finished drafting my paper, my tests went went well, and I slept a lot last night.]

I've been tender with myself these last two days [see my last post for better context]. When I think about my idea of God, I often challenge it and put it into all sorts of situations to test it - this goes with all the overthinking and rationalizing. After all, I'm not one to just have blind faith, right? I refuse to believe something "just because". However, in these last two days, I've been more patient, more gentle; my recent experience of God is not yet ready to be compared and rationalized into a compromise. I'm beginning to realize that it is not blind faith even if I don't do this thinking; my evidence is my experience of God. Experience is not "just because".

I also have a tendency to want to know everything now. My overthinking is not only testing my idea of God, but is also my way of determining explanations for things. I experience God, but I must be able to apply what this means to every possible situation right now.. right? But it is not so. I can take my time and keep listening. I don't need every explanation figured out immediately, it's ok. So every time I find myself venturing into thought processes that I usually do, I stop and remember that I need time. I need to listen, rather than trying to reason everything out on my own. I do not need to do thought experiments to test my experience of God right now, nor do I need to know everything right in this moment.

I still foster a small fear that this renewed focus will fade.

one day at a time, one day at a time
I will hold on to this love, one day at a time

Baby steps. No need to fear the long term; if I can pay attention to the short term, the long term will follow accordingly.

I've been taking care to focus on my recent spiritual experiences while walking from one place to another, or just sitting. Not just thinking, but focusing and feeling. I've been taking a little more time for myself, not doing homework or other important things from time to time. I've begun re-reading If God is Love, and though I read it a couple months ago shortly after FGC Gathering, I feel as though I'm reading it for the first time again. I'm reading it anew, refreshed, with new eyes from a new perspective. I'm in a different place now than I was before, and it's changed how I experience a lot of things.

This has been another turning point (of which I've had many in the last year). I feel that I may be in the midst of what could be called a spiritual transformation. I feel like I've taken a new turn in my spiritual journey, and am continuing with care and tenderness that I have not allowed myself previously. I'm learning how to trust even more, and not feel unreasonable or irrational.

[As a scientific thinker, I'm very wary of having unreasonable, irrational, out-of-line-with-what-we-know-to-be-true beliefs. This leads to my tendency to test any new spiritual idea or belief I encounter within myself in ways which I am now learning may be too rushed, or just down right inappropriate. This can sometimes be a frustrating roadblock with faith, eventhough I'm convinced that science and religion are not opposed to each other, and instead actually go along with one another.]

I find it fascinating (and a little sad) that no one around me (physically) really has any idea what I'm going through spiritually right now. My behavior has not changed radically or suddenly, and I don't often speak of my spirituality, especially not in casual conversation. I don't need the answer to this problem right now, though. In time, an answer will come. (Last year my response was to create this blog, which has been nothing but a positive experience so far.)

Do forgive me if this entry seems a little disorganized and unclear. I'm still fleshing all of this out. I just felt the need to write about the impact that my experience Sunday night (/Monday morning) has had on me so far. My spiritual focus is returning in a new and awesome way.

Love and Light,
Claire

Called into the Depths

2005-10-17T01:03:00.000-04:00

Your faith was strong but you needed proof, you saw her bathing on the roof, her beauty in the moonlight overthrew you
She tied you to a kitchen chair, she broke your throne, she cut your hair, and from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah
...
Hallelujah

There was a time you let me know what's really going on below, but now you never show it to me, do you?
Remember when I moved in you; the holy dark was moving too, and every breath we drew was Hallelujah

Hallelujah

It is past 1am. I have two tests in the morning, and a draft of a paper to finish writing, yet in this moment the stress of that is backround fuzz. I may not sleep much tonight, but it'll be ok; this, right here, right now, is more important.

I feel moved, struck, pulled into the Light. For many months I have felt a little lost and unfocused, spiritually. My faith not shaken, but turned down, backround. From time to time I'd read a moving blog post or a book, or I'd catch some peace in meeting for worship and think to myself, I need to remember this as I go through my classes, my week, my semester, my life, but moments later, the feeling would be gone and I was again distracted by the pulls of daily things.

Something within me has begun to finally converge. I've caught myself thinking too much, rationalizing too much. I have this idea of God, but what does that mean in this context? Does that rationally make sense? Does that fit with my scientific experiences, my social experiences, my bad experiences, my good? Overanalyze, overanalyze, overanalyze; think, think, think; rationalize, rationalize.. this is not how I experience God! While all this thinking has been going on, a muffled feeling has been desperately calling out for my attention; my need for groundedness coming from within. I can think consciously all I want about how ungrounded I am, but hearing it from deeper down pulls me into it and forces me to pay attention. Like right now. I've hit "pause" on the surface details of life for this short time in the middle of the night. My spirit is moving, and I must pay attention.

Slowly, I am being shown on a deeper level that there are greater things outside my bubble of daily academic life. It's so easy to become wrapped up in getting to class, going to this club meeting, that soccer practice, this study group, getting that homework done, study for these tests, to the point where spiritual matters fall secondary and become distant. I begin to think about spirituality until my thoughts turn me in a circle. But this is not how I am to be. I need to begin to learn how to feel more about God, to listen more, rather than rationalize, to just be.

Living on the surface makes love harder to recognize. It makes God harder to recognize. I feel distant, ungrounded, and like something's missing. I keep gazing down below and conjecturing about what I could find down there if I only had time, but where is the surface without the depths? What supports the top, but the bottom? Foundations should be priority, and who am I without love, without God, but the unsupported top of an unstable structure? I must search below this surface, I must dive into the richness, into the Truth.

Here I am, the depths have caught up with me. This inopportune hour of the night has taken ahold of me and forced me to pay attention, to listen. I am listening now. I am really listening, even if I don't fully understand where this will lead. This opening may well pass, unnoticed on this too-familiar surface of my life, but I will be more careful to leave an ear in my heart, always, and to keep moments like these fresh and deep.

I have been worked on, today. I have been made tender. I have been reminded of love, if even only vaguely. It moves in me, and I am called to move with it.

Oh so much Love, and a world of Light, my dear Friends,
Claire

Attending Unfamiliar Monthly Meetings - First Impressions

2005-10-16T15:30:00.000-04:00

It's amazing how easy it is to let two weeks pass before writing again.

Before coming to Wellesley, I had not attended any monthly meeting other than my home meeting, Durham Friends Meeting. I've certainly gone to meeting for worship at larger gatherings, which allowed me to be comfortable with worshipping with unfamiliar Friends, but never a new monthly meeting. I have since attended Wellesley Friends Meeting three times (it's right near campus), Northampton Friends Meeting, and now, as of this morning, Cambridge Friends Meeting.

I was visiting a f/Friend with another f/Friend in Northampton (at Smith College) last weekend during my Fall Break, so naturally, we went to meeting in Northampton on Sunday. I found Northampton Friends Meeting quite a lovely, comfortable place, and would love to go back again sometime, whenever I'm next in that area.

Wellesley Friends Meeting is easiest to get to, but I find myself having trouble relating. I'm not quite sure what it is. Perhaps it's because the last two times I had to rush out right after we broke for fellowship so I wouldn't be late for a club soccer game and have thus not yet had the chance to meet people, but I think it may be something else. I think it may be a lack of people my own age. There are other college-age Friends here at Wellesley that I need to get in touch with more, but I don't think there's any way to "fix" this particular problem. I still plan to attend Wellesley Friends more to give it more of a chance. I've begun to reach a point in my Quaker spirituality where I need meeting for worship, so if I were to decide not to go to Wellesley Friends Meeting, this would be quite a problem.

This morning, I attended Cambridge Friends Meeting for the first time, and it was fantastic for me. I felt very comfortable, and was excited to discover a couple familiar faces - the wonderful result of having attended multiple national gatherings over the last few years, and also to meet three fellow bloggers in person, finally - Jeffrey Hipp, Amanda (Of the Best Stuff, but Plain), and Rob (Consider the Lillies), *waves*. I also spoke to a few Friends I'd never met before, which was also wonderful. I quickly felt a much greater connection to Cambridge Friends than I have with Wellesley Friends, and hope to go back rather often - eventhough it takes a 40 minute bus ride (which costs $2 each way) followed by another 10-15 minute walk to get there, and then the bus takes about an hour on the way back (there are other stops after Harvard Square). (It's really not that bad, though - definitely worth the commute!)

I recognize that it takes more than a couple times attending to get a decent sense of a meeting, but these are my first impressions. Since all I have right now are first impressions, I'll just have to do some more attending. I'm so glad to have found a couple Quaker communities up here; it's incredibly comforting and important to me. I also hope to get a little involved with NEYM YAFs - many opportunities there.

Well, that's it for now - it's getting late and I have a couple tests tomorrow, a paper to write, and.. well, I'm sure I've made my point.

Love and Light,
Claire

Philosophical Reason, God, and Faith

2005-10-04T11:47:00.000-04:00

In my philosophy class - intro to metaphysics and epistemology - we've been examining arguments for, and some against, the existence of God. This may initially sound like a spiritually challenging course; all these careful rationalizations or valid arguments for a particular concept of God, or against, or the argument that it's rational to believe in God or that it's rational to either believe or not believe.. It's quite possibly very overwhelming.

However, through all of this, I have been quietly testing my faith, prodding it a little, if you will, to see if things have been shaken up or disturbed. What if my belief isn't based on reason alone; is that completely irrational? While I don't want to be unreasonable about believing in God or some sort of "divine" being or thing; quite the contrary, I feel that it is actually unreasonable to try and even use reason to "prove" or "disprove" the existence of such a being as God. My faith has not been so shaken because it's based on experience. Reason, in my mind, becomes secondary.

This, though, feels a little unnerving; am I tossing reason out the window in favor of experience? What if I experience something completely a function of my pschological state of mind, such as a hallucination? Instead of rejecting the validity of my experiences based on the possibility of hallucination, I can actually provide a little reason - this reason being 'secondary' to my experiences - to explain. A hallucination completely out of line with my other experiences of reality I feel is an unreasonable thing to believe as real; however, if I were to hallucinate something line with my other experiences of reality, how would I know that my supposed experiences of reality were not hallucinations in and of themselves? It is irrational to continue thinking in such a way, because one could argue one's self out of reality into a place where nothing matters. Instead, I think of my experiences and I find faith. Not blind faith; blind faith would be to believe something unreasonably, without careful weighing, but faith that I cannot know everything, and that my experiences are real to me is enough evidence as I'll ever need.

I experience love. Love is real to me. I put my faith in love.

Love and Light,
Claire

What's Quakerism?

2005-09-26T23:02:00.000-04:00

What a question! I find that over the years, as I've been asked so many times by so many people, my explanation has evolved and expanded. However, though, it's become a somewhat of a "textbook" explanation; it's so difficult to capture the spirit of Quakerism and form it into words.

In the last year or so, in an attempt to be thorough, I've tried to talk about basic testimonies or ideas or concepts that are present throughout Quakerism, such as direct "communication" or experiences of God (or the Spirit or whatever you call it), while explaining the diversity of Friends - liberal, unprogrammed through evangelical. This is quite a task; I've found myself calling it my "Quaker spiel". Sometimes it's difficult to know where to start.

I bring this up now because I just had a 30 minute conversation with an exchange student from Austria where I tried to describe Quakerism. I found this to be more of a challenge than usual; usually, people asking have at least heard of Quakerism or learned a little bit about it in their high school history courses, but this student from Austria had never heard of Quakers or Quakerism.

I tried to explain that it was founded in Christianity, I tried to explain a little bit about the testimonies, but first had to explain what the word "testimony" meant, which was a task in itself! (I believe I said they were like concepts or things to be followed - sort of; I feel that my description of them was inadequate, but the best I could do to continue.) I described a typical unprogrammed Meeting for Worship and a little bit about leadings. I was asked about Quaker weddings and membership, I was asked about whether there were rules (such as abstinence). I tried to touch on the diversity of Quakerism - that some attended Quaker churches or Friends churches.

I was asked about where the word "Quaker" came from - and spoke about George Fox and about early Friends being persecuted for being faithful Quakers, I spoke about trembling or shaking when feeling led and about how a Friend was called a "Quaker" in court once and somehow that became incorporated into the name or rather, an alternative name. I spoke about why Quaker Oats took the Quaker name, even though they have absolutely nothing to do with Quakerism.

It was very difficult to describe Quakerism in such a manner; somehow I felt that I couldn't just give my usual spiel because that spiel was given with the assumption that someone had at least heard of Quakerism and had at least a basic idea of what Quakerism is. Also, I was challenged to define words along the way that I wouldn't normally have to define (such as testimony).

I don't feel like I manage to necessarly capture the depth and spirit of Quakerism, but I'm not sure how to go about doing that without being confusing or assuming.

How do other Friends describe Quakerism? How might you respond to the question "What is Quakerism?"

I find that giving a complete answer is quite the challenge.

Love and Light
Claire

Walking with God

2005-09-18T22:08:00.000-04:00

I planned to go to meeting this morning. I missed it last week - it had been the first time in at least a year that I had chosen to sleep in over going to meeting. I've been feeling the effects of needing meeting all week.

Instead, I woke up at 9:50 - it was unlikely that I would be able to get there on time by 10 (which would require me to get up, get dressed, say hello to people in the common room, and walk for 15-20 minutes). According to one of my roommates (I have two), my alarm did, indeed, go off at 8:30, but I just didn't seem to notice in my slumbers. This would be because I went to bed at 4:30 the previous night - I wasn't surprised that I didn't wake up to my alarm.

My point here is that I did not make it to meeting this morning. Instead, I decided to walk around the lake, Lake Waban, which lies on the edge of campus right behind my dorm. I needed time for some quite, worshipful contemplation and an attempt at grounding. As I walked I let my thoughts drift a little to process recent events while taking in the beauty of the path and the lake.

When I got about half way around the lake and my thoughts drifted to a particular distressing situation I'm in regarding family, I immediately got a distinct feeling of the Spirit or God walking with me and within me. I continued thinking about that, and listening to that feeling of walking with God as I continued around the lake. I felt comforted, I was by myself, but not alone.

As I went around the lake I walked slowly, pausing occasionally to enjoy the scene. I thought of sitting with God, eating dinner with God, doing my homework with God, and doing essentially everything "with God". This God that I speak of felt (and feels) more like a comforting entity, there always, through everything. Not comparable to human emotions or thoughts, but "aware" of them and tender, supporting, like something firm, steady, and trustworthy on which to lean when I feel weak or unsure.

My thoughts continued to wander in and out of focus as I continued walking, and I haven't been overly contemplative of my experience, but it was significant to me, and I shall keep it with me as I continue from here. Even as I've felt miserable during a lot of my afternoon, I have also felt comforted. Even as I've been harsh with myself, I've found a few gentle reminders to be tender with myself. Emotionally, I've had a rough day.

As I sit here, typing this [with God] in utter exhaustion, I feel ok. Do, please, excuse run-on sentences, redundancies, and minor grammar errors; I'm a bit (thoroughly) tired (exhuasted) and will be heading to bed soon.

Love and Light,
Claire

Note: Need for Groundedness

2005-09-12T19:19:00.000-04:00

I'm alive and I still love it here.

I'm feeling so incredibly uncentered and ungrounded. I feel cluttered, but I can't figure out why - I have so much space in my schedule right now. I just went out to sit by the lake in a spot near my dorm that seems rather private; I thought maybe I could just sit and gather my thoughts and really relax for a little while. Once I sat down I was acutely aware of a couple giant clouds of mosquitoes hovering in the air around and above me. I knew this would happen, and when I left to go to that spot I had decided to ignore them and deal with it. Mosquitoes weren't going to stop me from taking my break. But then I also heard voices nearby - someone must have been a little ways away either in a boat or further down the coast of the lake. I didn't particularly want people to know I was there - I thought this was a private space. Anywho, the point here is that I couldn't relax. When I lay back I felt tense-ness; a tense-ness from far more than just mosquitoes and the possibility of people near by. I think it goes back to feeling cluttered.

I know the Spirit is with me, I just need to figure out how to get back in touch. I feel the effects of my need for groundedness.

Time will help. I just needed to get this out there.

Love and Light,
Claire

Notes for a bit

2005-09-05T14:08:00.000-04:00

Orientation has been so busy that I haven't really had the focus or energy to post much, so until things settle down, I'll be posting notes here and there, like this one.

The last four days have been successively more beautiful; I simply can't believe it. Walking around the Wellesley campus in utter awe for the nature and architecture surrounding me is incredibly uplifting - throw in the most gorgeous cool, breezy, sunny weather, and I could lie in the grass all day!

Classes don't begin until tomorrow, but already my spirit feels nourished by the environment. Right now I'm inside in the library, but this room holds at least three large paintings of accomplished women on every wall; I'm not even doing work right now, but I feel empowered by these images.

When I first began feeling serious about applying here, I didn't quite understand why. I knew I felt a snag here; Wellesley caught my attention more than any other place I was looking, but I just couldn't put my finger on why. So far, though, I can't imagine being anywhere else right now. I know there will be difficult times, the weather will be bad, too, but for now, I'm treasuring how I feel. If I can just hold on to this wonder and feeling of nourishment, my experience here will continue to be beyond words.

Even without a lot of focus or grounding, I feel the Spirit running deeply within me.

Love and Light,
Claire

A Note from the Other Side

2005-09-02T23:22:00.000-04:00

I made it, and so far I LOVE it here.

The first three days were a little shakey in some respects; I felt very much like an intimidated-little-first-year being herded around like a sheep. It's a bit unnerving for me to feel so completely uprooted from who and what I knew myself to be. Suddenly I wasn't acting quite like myself - or the self that I'm so used to, at least - challenging questions came to mind. Is this the real me? If so, am I okay with that? What does it mean?

I've calmed down since then, though. Yesterday we had a "get to know your community" event within our residence halls, and a lot of it involved sharing parts of our own stories. It helped me remember who I am and where I've come from. (Oh yeah, we're individuals, not a homogenous group of first-years..)

[I'm sitting in the common room of my residence hall and just paused in writing this for at least and hour because someone walked in (who I didn't know) and started talking to me, and we had a lengthy conversation because we're both super-excited about organic chemistry (people like me who are super excited about orgo are often hard to find), and she also took it as a first-year (as I will be doing :) ). Then had a conversation with my first-year mentor and another first-year about Quakerism and Quakerism compared to the United Church of Christ (UCC)...]

There's another young Friend in my dorm a floor above me, and she went to World Gathering. I was so startled when I discovered this. We were walking in a group to some orientation event and she turned to someone as part of some conversation and said "well, I'm a Quaker.." and I immediately in my startled moment turned and said "NO WAY! I'm Quaker!" She's from CA, part of Pacific Yearly Meeting. This coming Sunday, this young Friend, my first-year mentor (who's UCC), and I are going to check out Wellesley Friends Meeting, which is 0.8 of a mile from my dorm room. It's so good to not be a single token Quaker around.

The campus here at Wellesley is absolutely fantastically beautiful, and my dorm is right near the lake. It's even more wonderful than I originally envisioned, and the fact that I find nature so grounding is only making it that much more amazing.

It's been busy so I haven't been online very much, but I suspect this will all change around once things settle down. Classes begin on Tuesday.

I could continue talking about all of this here, but I'm running out of energy and adjectives/adverbs. I just thought I'd give an update about how things are going.

Love and Light,
Claire

Pre-Move-In Note

2005-08-28T18:53:00.000-04:00

I move in to Wellesley for the first time tomorrow, and I feel frighteningly uncentered, unfocused, and ungrounded. I suppose that's to be expected when one is suddenly a two day, 17 hour, traffic-jam-y car-ride away from home, and about to move into an unfamiliar place with a couple thousand unfamiliar faces.

No matter how nervous and ungrounded I feel, whether I'm conscious of it or not - often I'm unnaturally calm about all of this (though it has brought out a grumpy, snappy side of me that I don't particularly enjoy or approve of), there is still Light and Spirit within me. It is this that I need to remember whenever I feel hopelessly overwhelmed - though, I'm aware that this is true even if I'm not conscious of it all the time.

Instead of going on about the range of emotions naturally flowing through me right now, I'll stop here. I move in tomorrow, and I have faith that it will be great - whether I realize it immediately or if it takes me a whole semester.

A great thank you to any and all who are keeping me in their thoughts. It means a lot to me.

Love and Light,
Claire

It's ok if you don't know everything

2005-08-22T15:40:00.000-04:00

In five days I leave for Wellesley. I'm in the process of packing up my current life again - as I have so often in the last couple years going to boarding school or living on my own for a summer - and also going through the corners of my closets and bookshelves, throwing out or giving away my past life - old pieces of paper, toys, clothing; sentimental items such as old concert tickets or programs, my old band t-shirt which I know I'll never wear again, and so on.

As I continue to freak out and calm down (and freak out again and calm down again and then freak out again.. etc.), I keep reminding myself that regardless of the scariness and awkwardness the first week of being at Wellesley will exude, it will be ok and I'll get through it.

I've learned over and over again that at the beginning of an experience, no one expects you to know everything - so I've stopped expecting myself to know everything. It's part of my experience of faith.

Take, for example, my experience beginning to work in a research lab this summer. On the day I walked in for the first time, I hadn't met anyone in person yet and knew only vaguely what I would be doing. I knew it had something to do with gene expression and that I was working in the Division of Nephrology and Hypertension, so kidneys would be involved. Other than that, I knew incredibly little about gene expression, kidneys, autoimmune diseases, or even about what I was about to begin to do! Not only that, but I'd been focused on doing chemistry rather than biology for the past couple years - I didn't have a solid backround in what I was getting into.

But instead of freaking out about how little I knew, I walked in with confidence and faith that I would learn what I needed to know in good time, and that someone was about to explain to me just what I'd be doing. After a week of feeling like I was in a foreign country where everyone spoke a different language - the language of nephrology, immunology, and molecular biology - I began to pick up the language, and researched words and concepts I was entirely unfamiliar with and couldn't pick up from context. I learned more than I needed to know for what I was doing, expanded my horizons more than I ever expected to, and I was more than ok - this was incredible!

I've learned to let go of my need to know every detail of everything before stepping into something new. This same mindset applies in the Quaker world to things like joining a new committee, walking into an unfamiliar meeting, or going to a gathering or conference for the first time. This also applies to leaving for college for the first time. It is the experience of life.

I may or may not post once more in the next two weeks, but I have faith that in two weeks from today, after a week of orientation, the day before my first day of classes, I will be ok. I will be embarking on an incredible four-year adventure, and I don't need to know everything before I first set foot on the path.

Love and Light,
Claire

The 'young Friend' Identity [perhaps]

2005-08-15T22:10:00.000-04:00

"As a young Friend.." I began to write. I stopped right there. What do I mean by that opening phrase? It seems as if I'm about to speak from the perspective of a young Friend, but just what is a "young Friend"? In many contexts among Friends, young Friends are usually the teenagers. What about children? They're young, and they're Friends, too, are they not? I sense that the term 'young Friend' may have a little more to it than just young-ness. When I speak "as a young Friend", I am claiming 'young Friend' as my identity within the Religious Society of Friends. But what identifies me as a young Friend other than just my age? Is it my spiritual yearning and seeking? My amount of experience with or level of understanding of Quaker Faith and Practice? Is it really just my age?

Age is, indeed, the most defining feature of young Friends. In my experience, it is very important to connect with one's peers on a deeper level, so it naturally makes sense that strong communities of young Friends form, seperate from intergenerational ones. Age can be a vital part of one's own identification, and can be important to a young Friend's spiritual journey. A great many young Friends are in the process (or about to be in the process) of a great transition - from high school to the beyond, from First Day School to the full meeting for worship, and also the transition away from familiar high school gatherings or programs. This is a very important and distinctive time of life, and not a very easy one. While young Friends may need extra support and some gentle eldering, it's not to say that young Friends are not also capable and ready to listen inwardly and follow leadings; young Friends, too, can have great ministry to give.

As a young Friend myself, I seek connections not only with my peers, but also with older Friends. I want to engage in meaningful relationships with those who have more experience than I; I want to share my own experiences so far; I want to have experiences together with Friends of a variety of ages. Each and every Friend, young and old, has something amazing to offer (whether they're aware of it or not), and I want to share in that as much as possible. I speak also of the great transitions young Friends are making each year and the support needed; I speak of this as I am right in the middle of preparing to transition to college and to a new monthly meeting - the relationships I do have with adult Friends are very important to me. In such a particular time of transition, young Friends are in a very different place in their lives than adult Friends. However, I sense that there are many more similarities between young Friends and older Friends than most Friends consciously realize.

Perhaps young Friends have less experience than many adult Friends, but this is also the case with newer Friends; some young Friends even have more experience than some newer Friends. Many young Friends have experience on committees and meetings for worship with attention to business, as well as clerking these and other bodies. Like adult Friends, young Friends are spiritual seekers. My own spiritual seeking has involved reading many books, as well as conversations with other Friends - young as well as old - and is based on my own experience of the Spirit and the Light. I know I am not the only young Friend who has sought in any manner, whether using books or not (check out Whispers of Faith for some personal experiences of young Friends), and I am most certainly not the only Friend (young or old) who seeks! Also, as young Friends need support and guidance in their time of great transition, so do many adult Friends in times of transition, such as getting a new job, moving, having a child, marriage, divorce, and so on. To any older Friends who are at all skeptical of the level of experience and spiritual seeking young Friends are capable of having (and indeed are having!) or who have not realized the depth of young Friends' experiences, I highly suggest exploring this topic further by getting to know some young Friends yourselves!

While I cannot fully define what the young Friend identity is here and now once and for all, I have done my best to speak to it, and hope this opens the topic for further reflection and comment.. A young Friend is just as much of a Friend as older Friends, and thus just as much a part of Friendly communities. If you have not already, go on, introduce yourself to one and get to know them. There is growing to do for everyone.

Love and Light,
Claire

[Note: This particular post may undergo great editing in the future and may perhaps be shared in other places. Any editorial comments are welcome - it's very rough, and certainly not my best writing (it perhaps could be organized a little better and could use more here, less there, etc.), though I'm passionate about the subject.]

Poking the Coals of my Blog

2005-08-12T01:08:00.000-04:00

It's been most of a week since I posted, and when I did post, it was only about blog tweaks - not very deep or meaningful.

I've attempted to post a couple times this week, but found myself writing mainly about how stressed I've been - not at all what I want to post about here. So, since my blog isn't really 'on fire' right now, I thought I'd give its hot coals a poke - this post - to keep things alive. As soon as I receive a good log to put on the fire to bring it back up - a post from a deeper place - I'll be sure to do that.

A couple nuggets have slipped in to my thought processes through all this stress, though. The other day a phrase from a (in some places classic) Quaker song came to me: walk in the Light, wherever you may be. I found myself picturing myself from an inward place walking in the Light, walking with a constant, conscious ear to the Nudgings of the Spirit (something I attempt to do all the time). I found myself wondering, what will I be called to do next? A question I know not the answer to, but it will come when it comes. I do try to keep a constant ear out for Nudgings and leadings, even if I'm doing something seemingly spirit-less (I mentioned something like this in a post, Where's the Spirit in This?). I strive to always walk in the Light.

I'm also trying to slow down just a little bit, eventhough time is short before I leave for college (and there's SO much to do before then!). My inability to focus enough to post something meaningful is a clear sign (to me) that I'm not slowing down enough to listen. There are times when I'm just not feeling called to post, but there are times when I'm not stopping to listen, and this is one of those times when I'm just not stopping for long enough to hear. Despite the fact that I feel like I don't have time to slow down, I'm taking it a little easier for the next couple days as I make the brief transition back home. No matter how insane my life is, I need to squeeze out some slow-down time to re-evaluate my circumstances and take time to listen more closely to guidance of the Spirit. This squeezing of time, in and of itself, can be a frustrating thing - squeezing time for calming down often causes me more stress, and thus prevents me from calming down.. a balance is to be found, and I'm working toward finding it.

That's all for now, Friends, as it's incredibly late and I have a dire need to get more sleep.

Love and Light,
Claire

Blog Tweaks

2005-08-07T23:07:00.000-04:00

Friends, if you look, you'll notice a couple of changes to the sidebar on the right.

I added a "Featured" section, with which I'm not quite sure what I'll do in the future, but for now has links to my two publications - Whispers of Faith, of which I am one of the editors, and The Importance of Friendship between Adults and Young Friends, an essay I wrote which was in the most recent FGC Connections newsletter.

I also got rid of the "Previous Posts" section, as it had links to posts that you could easily scroll down to find, and it was taking up space. (If you want to find a post that's less recent than the ones on the immediate page, search in the Archives section.)

There is now a link to each post of my series of postings about my experiences at FGC Gathering this year, all organized and easy to find.

Let me know if you like or dislike any of these changes, or have further suggestions. (I'm slowly improving my HTML skills.) Hopefully I'll have a more meaningful post up soon.

Love and Light,
Claire

Whispers of Faith: Young Friends share their experiences of Quakerism

2005-08-05T23:23:00.000-04:00

I am overdue for a blog announcement of this book, Whispers of Faith: Young Friends share their experiences of Quakerism, of which I am one of the five young Friend editors.

The book is composed of essays, stories, poetry, and art from young Friends of all Quaker colors (liberal unprogrammed all the way to evangelical), from all over the world (though mostly from North America and UK). If you click on the link for the book above you can find out more information about it, and also a link to Lucy Duncan's Book Musings where she speaks about the book and a little about the process in Oregon (she was there, of course). It was a pretty amazing experience being a part of that process.

In fact, as part of the process, we (the editorial board) flew out to Oregon at the end of a QUIP (Quakers United in Publications) conference back in April. It was there that we did most of the discerning about which submissions would go in, what the title would be, what all the chapters would be, who would write which preface/introduction or editorial note, what we still needed, new deadlines, and all sorts of other logistical things.

Actually, this experience was a rather significant turning point in my Quakerism. I came up with the idea of starting a blog solely for my thoughts, feelings, and leadings regarding Quakerism and spirituality. I wrote the essay, The Importance of Friendship between Young Friends and Adults, which was recently in FGConnections, and also appears in this book in a more developed form (it was edited again). Martin (who I'd just met in person in Oregon) found my blog within a couple days (he's good at these things) and wanted to feature the very rough draft of this essay (which I'd posted on my new blog) on Quaker Ranter, where it quickly made its debut in the wider realm of Friends (at this point it was in its baby form and has since undergone many edits before being officially published anywhere). Through Quaker Ranter, other blogging Friends found my blog, and I in turn discovered other blogging Friends. Connections have been made and they're incredible to have.

Also after this meeting in Oregon, I realized that I could, indeed, be active and involved in the life of my local meeting - before I'd hung on peripherally without making much effort, mainly because that's how it'd always been. I can't remember any specific thing that was said or event while in Oregon that caused me to come to this realization, but it the experience certainly sparked something deep within me. So, with one month left of high school and three months of summer, I began making myself a bit less peripheral. I spoke with Karen Stewart, and active Friend when it comes to youth ministries on a national level, who was very excited about my participation with QUIP, and also very excited about me getting more involved with DFM (Durham Friends Meeting).

My main focus of 'active' involvement with DFM pertains to youth ministries and First Day School. I stopped attending First Day School in January of my Junior year of high school, a year and a half ago; I had realized that it did not feel right for me, and began attending the full hour of Worship. Almost a year later, I began discovering a lot of things on my own through Quaker books, things that I now feel should be shared and communicated (or perhaps 'taught', but I'm not sure if I like that word in this context) in First Day School.

After attending a Pendle Hill clerking workshop led by Arthur Larrabee (excellent workshop!) in November (2004) with my fellow then-future co-clerks of 2005 FGC Gathering HS Program, I had discovered the world of Quaker books. I began reading books such as The Amazing Fact of Quaker Worship (George Gorman) and Encounter with Silence (John Punshon) that spoke of experiences of Meeting for Worship and inward listening. I read books such as The Quakers in America (Thomas Hamm) that discussed Quaker history and began to help me find similarities between liberal, unprogrammed Friends, conservative Friends, and more christ-centered or evangelical Friends. I read books of vocation, such as Let Your Life Speak (Parker Palmer). There were so many thoughts, ideas, experiences, and leadings in these books that I had never realized existed before!

Already in Durham Friends Meeting, even before I woke up and dove in, there were efforts to improve and change First Day School. Currently, I'm working on sharing my experiences with First Day School and my experiences with Quaker books; there are some wonderful ideas floating around regarding all of it, and I'm very excited about all of it. Though I no longer attend First Day School and will be going off to college VERY soon, I want to help improve things for those coming after me.

I continue reading books today. In fact, a couple months ago I posted a request for Quaker book recommendations, which is an excellent resource, even if I'm currently overwhelmed with books and pamphlets in my possession.

Another door that opened before me with this experience in Oregon for Whispers of Faith is the one of Quaker journalism and writing. I had a strong realization that I can, indeed, write and be published in the Quaker world, and that this is an excellent way of reaching out to other Friends and communicating. I feel now like I have one foot in the door of Quaker journalism, something which I hope to pursue and continue. It's a little odd to me, though, and perhaps counter-intuitive, as I am so passionately into science that in the past, writing and being published (other than scientific journal articles) was not even near my radar, and here I am, ready to dive in!

Woo, now that I've rambled at length about the cascade of insights and realizations that came from my experience working on this book, I shall bring this post to a close. The book is really amazing (I say from a rather biased standpoint), and I highly recommend it. I have yet to see a real, in-person copy of it (aside from pdfs of final drafts and such), and will get to when I go home at some point tomorrow. I'm quite excited!

Love and Light,
Claire

Space for Comments

2005-08-01T00:20:00.000-04:00

Friends, these last few weeks I've been posting about some really heavy, intense, and emotional experiences. I haven't really seen many comments about any of it (though there were a couple here and there - not discrediting those, I promise).

I would like to offer this space (this post) as a place for any thoughts or feelings that may have come up while reading any of my recent posts. It could be something that seemed too insignificant to say at the time, or something gigantic you didn't feel like saying just yet, or anything in between. I just feel that I've been posting rather rapidly, considering the topics, and sometimes that leaves no clear space to comment.

If you don't feel the need to comment, that's ok too. I just wanted to offer this space.

Love and Light,
Claire

Epistle from FGC Gathering High School Program

2005-07-31T14:55:00.000-04:00

I was just going to add this to the bottom of the relevant Gathering post (from my series), but felt that it could stand for itself, even without the details prior to it. It's such an important document. So, I'm posting it here, as well as adding it to the bottom of the relevant Gathering post. Hold it in your hearts, dear Friends.

Epistle from the High School Program
July 7, 2005

It was brought to the attention of the High Schol Program duing the course of the Wednesday night Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business that members of the community have used alcohol and marijuana during the course of the gathering. The clerks introduced a chance for worship, stating that they themselves were struggling with the issue. From this worship, a wide array of emotions arose, including anger, confusion, and grief. Many felt sadness and pain knowing that trust could be lost not only between members of the comunity, but also between the program and the larger gathering. However it was clear that the community felt that those involved are surrounded by love and acceptance. Many members shared stories of substance abuse and addiction in their lives. It was affirmed by many that drugs and alcohol are simply not needed in such a warm and loving environment, yet it was understood that isolation and pain can be channeled through these substances.

The community struggled to determine how to move forward following the period of worship, and wrestled to develop the appropriate consequences for thses circumstances. One defining sentiment was that it is absolutely not an option to remove any members from the community, and that such actions would only tear us more deeply. To prevent any similar situation from occuring in years to come, many felt that each year the community should reexamine the emotional gravity of the drug guideline experienced during the night through a written statement or discussion at orientation each year. We will also make an effort to ensure that this experience will become part of the oral history of theHigh School gathering.

The entire program as a whole recognizes the break in trust that this event could create with the greater gathering, yet we hope that through our emotions, and the love we have expressed for each other, it is understood that this event will reverberate throughout our program for years to come. Througout the evening as well as early morning, the importance and strength of our community guided the spiritual leadings that allowed for such forgiveness and compassion for all of our members. Healing the tear in the community created by these actions will only develop through love and understanding.

We offer our experience to the wider gathering as testament of our strength and with a hope that trust can be maintained.

Friends, hold this epistle in your hearts, as it was an intense experience to go through. Reading this epistle myself, I hope that our experience is never forgotten and left behind as an echo of things past. This is something, as it says in the Epistle, that will "reverberate throughout our program for years to come"; I hope it doesn't fade too much, as reverberations tend to do.

Love and Light,
Claire

"Where is the Spirit in this?" - a rough draft

2005-07-28T23:40:00.000-04:00

The other day as I was pulling samples of RNA (in tiny tubes) out of a very cold freezer (-80 degrees C) - a rather repetative task involving opening the freezer, pulling out a number of specific boxes, looking at list of tube locations, pulling out appropriate tubes from appropriate locations in appropriate boxes, returning the boxes, pulling out another set of boxes, ect. until 50-100 tubes have been collected (depending on what's needed) - I thought to myself rather seriously, "Where is the Spirit in this?" At first glance, it was a pretty secular activity. However, I believe that the spiritual and the secular are not seperate, that we need to integrate our supposedly seperate concepts of what is secular and what is spiritual. In my experience of the Spirit (or the Light or God or whatever one calls it/him/her), there is no place or situation where it is not present, where there is no Light. Thus, while I was performing a seemingly lifeless and repetative task, I came to the thought that despite outward appearences, the Spirit must be present in some manner.

There are many times in our supposedly secular lives when the presence of the Spirit is quite obvious when one stops to think about it for a moment. When one is outside with nature, or among loved ones, or perhaps even reading a good novel over a cup of tea on a rainy afternoon, it is often not difficult to recognize the Light in the experience. The challenge with which I presented myself was to find the Spirit in this not-so-obviously-spiritual situation.

A day or two later, as I was doing yet another tedious, repetative, lengthy task with 98 tubes that I had previously pulled from the above-mentioned freezer - this time I was transfering 8 microliters of solution from each tube to a well-plate - I again pondered the same question, "Where could the Spirit possibly be in this experience?" In examining this question, I took a giant step backwards to look at a slightly larger picture. Perhaps the Spirit was present through why I was doing such a tedious task. Repetative and boring as my task was, it was science. Science research is one of my passions - a quick inventory of my backpack would reveal a few Quaker books, often a few science magazines, and currently also a chemistry textbook and spiral notebook for chemistry notes - and this is between school years! These books and magazines I carry around because I am passionate about these subjects, and dedicated to learning and pursuing them. The root of why I was doing this repetative task was this passion for scientific research, and a dedication to science with all of its many postive and negative aspects. There is Spirit in passion and dedication.

As I recognized the Spirit mentally, I began to recognize its presence in my "secular" activity on a deeper level. With that realization I became a more grounded in my daily activities - this experience is applicable to so many other situations.

I am learning how to experience the Spirit in the situations of my every day life that don't seem so obviously spiritual. My conscious and emotional experience of the Spirit is becoming more and more continuous and thorough as I recognize Light pervading my life in all of its seemingly spiritually trivial events. I'm learning how to ask, "Where is the Spirit in this?" without sarcasm or pessimism, but honestly and openly, even for the most menial of activities.

I have a feeling I will have more to express on this topic soon; this is just what's been on my mind very recently. It is an ever-developing train of focus.

Love and Light,
Claire

Lurkers!

2005-07-25T23:01:00.000-04:00

Out of curiousity, I'm wondering how many people actually read this blog of mine! If you've read my blog at all - whether I'm aware that you have or not, give a wave hello as a comment to this post. It doesn't matter if you know me at all or have a blog of your own or any of that. I'm just curious.

(You don't absolutely have to, but it would be nice. :) )

Love and Light,
Claire

Gathering follow-up.

2005-07-24T21:52:00.000-04:00

Before I move on to other things, I need to post about the day or two following my return from Gathering. That's what this post is.

Note: I've made three edits to previous posts of my Gathering series. I added a photo of the Nominating Committee, a copy of the letter sent out to all High School Program participants, parents, and sponsors, and two images from the Eyes Wide Open exhibit.

When I went to bed Saturday night after returning from Gathering, I had in my mind two needs to balance: Meeting for Worship in the morning, and Sleep. I decided that my first priority was my physical health, which in this case meant I needed to put sleep first. I went to bed between 8 and 9 pm Saturday night (VERY early for me) with the decision that if I woke up of my own accord (no alarm or parental wake-up call) in time to make it to Meeting, I would go.

Sunday morning I woke up and was ready to get out of bed at 9:50am. Meeting here begins at 10am. Luckily for me, my Mom's house (where I returned to after Gathering before going back to my apt.) is about a 3 minute drive from the meetinghouse. The moment I looked at my watch I knew I was going to Meeting, and was very glad for this. In my Post-Gathering Self Check-in post, I had posed a number of questions to which I needed to begin searching for answers, such as, how do I return to my monthly meeting and sit in worship without that intensely deep sense of community and love that all of us young Friends experienced together this past week?

As I settled in to worship, I began reflecting upon my experiences from Gathering. My heart began to pound once again. I felt similarly to how I'd felt during the final HS Meeting for Worship - not necessarily in the community sense, but in the sense that I felt very strongly. I began to question whether or not I had a leading to speak, but with extra patience, as my experience in the final HS Meeting for Worship had felt a little off. This particular Meeting for Worship felt quite gathered - moreso than any other I remember experiencing here, and Friends began to speak messages. Some centered around the recent London bombings - I don't remember so clearly the details of these messages, but I remember hearing concerns about hatred and division, and other things that seemed to fit in with that, generally (details are very foggy for me now; it's been two weeks). With each message given, my heart raced faster for a few moments and I searched more deeply to see if I had a message. Gathering was very clearly and strongly in my heart.

Finally, one Friend rose and began a message - in the instant he began to speak I knew, knew, I needed to speak, and I had an idea about what, but no particular words planned. Usually when I'm commenting about something in a group, especially a large one, I have something rather clearly planned out. I was very aware that a planned out message in my mind was probably not a true, spirit-led message. This message of mine took little thought. When I rose to speak I was shaking (quaking), and words about the high school community at Gathering poured from me. I spoke of how we encountered a major issue, possibly a very divisive issue, and rather than becoming divided, we bonded over it and became a more close community. This felt like a true message, and I sat down, very aware that this was the first time I ever felt strongly led to speak in any Meeting for Worship of a monthly meeting.

After I sat down again, there were a few more minutes of Worship, and then it was closed. I looked at my watch and realized that it was 11:05 - I had spoken right at the end of the meeting; it had gone by so quickly! The intensity of this particular Meeting for Worship was a wonderful welcome home, and made me feel much less alone. Many Friends came to me during fellowship and thanked me for my message, some mentioning how powerful it was. This was certainly a new experience for me.

Gathering has affected me deeply - it has affected me increasingly so every year. It will remain with me for a long time as I hold these experiences close to my heart and remember them with all the joy and pain and love that was there, and is here, always.

Love and Light,
Claire

<- Final Gathering Post

Note:

2005-07-21T23:52:00.000-04:00

For those just finding my blog or reading it for the first time in two or three weeks, if you're interested in reading about my Gathering experiences in detail, I urge you to start at the beginning. Since it's taken me more than 10 posts, the first post is not listed under the 'Previous Posts' list in the sidebar of my blog, so you can click below to go to the first post of the series.

Link to Post # 1: Preface; FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend

Thank you, Friends

Love and Light,
Claire

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - FRIDAY, Nominating Committee and the last night

2005-07-21T19:40:00.000-04:00

Nominating Committee was such an incredible experience. I spoke a little bit before of our meeting on Thursday night, and about how I felt slight unease about the group. Here it will become evident what became of that.

Around 4:30 on Friday afternoon, right after support groups, we the Nominating Comittee gathered and traveled together to the room in which we were meeting in a nearby building. We were rather informal to begin, as we were making sure everyone could put a face to all of the nominees (we had done this a little the evening before, too). Once we had done our best with that and everyone had taken necessary bathroom trips, we finally really settled down to begin.

Before we began the process, though, we addressed the concern that we may either miss, or need to take a break for, the final HS program Meeting for Worship - which is always an incredibly moving experience, and lends a sense of closure even before we stay up all night. After not too long, it was clear we needed to take a break to attend, but would travel back to the HS dorm together as a small community of a committee - the group had a strong sense about remaining together. [Also, at some point we broke for dinner (pizza) and ate outside, but I can't remember where we were when this happened. I just thought I'd mention it.]

Finally we began to settle in to the process - and what a beautiful process it was! As a clerk, I made sure to re-emphasize that this was first and foremost a spirit-led process, and that the qualities we'd listed were important, but secondary to our leadings as a committee. I also articulated that eventhough it may seem like a solomn task, it was indeed a joyous process.

The process was one of lifting names out of open worship from the one list to another, with a strong sense that at ANY time, at any part of the process until we were walking out of the door with a list in hand, one could lift a name not previously lifted if one was led. No one was "ruled out" or "cut" at any point. Those in the committee shared about those names lifted as they were led. The group seemed to come together rather well, and things were going quite smoothly and well when we broke to go to the final HS Meeting for Worship. We arrived together and sat in various places around the room and settled into worship.

The entire time during worship, my heart was pounding. Pounding from the intensity of emotion and spirit I had felt all week, pounding for the love and joy, the pain and exhaustion, and all the amazing people around me. I remembered that my heart pounded in this manner during the final HS Meeting for Worship the previous Gathering in 2004, and how the moment I knew for sure for the first time that I had message to speak, the Meeting was closed. This time, I again felt the need to question whether I had a leading or not, as my heart was pounding so much. There were so many things to say, but I tried to feel whether I had a leading to say anything, and if so, what? During the meeting there were many messages about how incredible the community had been, and how some felt deeply changed by the experiences of the week. Somewhere in there, I too rose and spoke a message. Right after I sat down, my heart calmed, but I felt that I had not waited patiently enough, that perhaps I had spoken prematurely. It's not that what I said was wrong or inappropriate, it's that it felt like I thought about it too much once I stood. 'T was a lesson for me about leadings to give messages in meeting.

After the Meeting closed, there were a great many hugs given and received. Nominating Committee soon gathered together again outside to move back to the other building to continue the process. There seemed to be a sense of energy and joy about the group. Someone suggested that we run back to the building - and we all (or almost all of us) did! It was invigorating and exciting how we did this!

Once we got back to the room, we noticed that below the windows of this room outside there was a group of Friends singing! This seemed only to add to the joy we all felt. As we remained centered and focused, we seemed giddy and happy. This was, indeed, a joyous process!! My heart was warmed and the room was filled with the loving joy we all felt. When we got toward the final lifting process, as a clerk I suggested we center down a little more and remain a little more calm, as this more final stretch of the process had the potential to be more intense; however, I made sure to remind Friends of the importance of the joy in the process, and that though we may be more calm, the joy was still appropriate and a good thing.

Every step of the way there was genuine care not just for the community, but also the nominee being considered. Would both the community and the person have positive experiences were they to be clerk or not clerk? Leadings clearly concerned both, and it gave me joy-chills to hear.

Throughout the process, as a community, the committee tended to have a strong sense among it - I rarely had trouble discerning the sense, as it was usually obvious to all. (Whenever I articulated what seemed to be the obvious sense, often every single person's hands went up in agreement.) Though I was not waiting upon my own leadings but discerning the leadings of the group, by the end I didn't really feel incredibly detached (I think in some cases the clerks can feel a sense of detachment from the group they're clerking due to their different role in whatever process is taking place). There were points when a very familiar name would come up and my heart would beat a little harder, but I remained focused, as a clerk, on the sense of the committee.

In the end when we were clear we had our final list, I felt a strong sense of the Spirit among the group. The joy was still there and it was so amazing. It didn't matter that it was 2am or we all probably should've been exhausted. We had just experienced a united, joyous, spirit-led process of discerning the clerks for next year, and that gave me a sense of vigor and energy.

As a group, we had willingly given up many of the last events of the week for the HS program - on the last night after the final HS Meeting for Worship, there's the HS Program dance (with AYF invited, too, if the community feels led to give the invitation the Sunday night MfWwCfB before), and then this year we went on late enough that we missed most of the talent show, too. I think we all agreed that it was amazingly worth it, no question. It was an incredible experience.

Though it was 2am, we managed to get most of everyone (minus the few who were sleeping - the last night in the HS program is one where almost no one sleeps at all) in the lounge to make the announcement. As we were walking down the hall toward the lounge to make the announcement as a committee, we took a group picture, shown here on the right [photo credited to Peter Lyrene].

As we walked into the lounge together, and I felt a sense of nervousness. It's not that I didn't have faith in the list, but I think more that I remembered a little how I felt when the clerks were announced last year, and I also was not sure how the community would respond. Madeline (co-clerk) gave a sentence to open ("So now we're going to announce..." something like that), and then I read the names as clearly as I could. The room remained silent. Erik (co-HS program clerk, but not involved in the Nom. Comm.) suggested to everyone that the community hold the names in the light for a few moments. [We on the Nominating Committee dispersed ourselves around the room so that we weren't standing uncomfortably off to the side.]

Honestly, though I still had so much joy from the process, I felt a little awkward returning to the group. There were so many nominees and I couldn't remember all of them, and many were friends of mine whom I wanted to hug, but who I didn't want to upset if they were sad about not being named, and I didn't want to show preference to those who were named - I had countless little concerns that eventually faded as the night wore on. I did end up giving (and receiving) a great many hugs.

Throughout the night, my energy level faded quickly to the point where it was taking a considerable amount of effort to remain half-conscious. I was afraid that if I slept, I would awake very late and would not get the chance to say goodbye to many people who were dear to me - this is what made me do my best to remain conscious. I mustered up some energy around dawn to go watch the sunrise, and was met by a couple really good fFriends of mine who were in AYF this year - it was really good to see them on this last morning.

Eventually, around 7ish, I dragged myself to breakfast. However, I found that I only had enough energy to eat half of what I put on my plate, and that when I put my head down on the table I dozed for 10-15 minutes at a time. I even got up and switched tables at some point, but after dozing at the table two or three times, I knew I had to leave. When I got back to the dorm I wanted to sleep in a place where I could easily be awakened by people. In my half-awake state, I lay down right outside my dorm room on the floor and quickly dozed off. At some point I stood up and gave someone a hug, but then went right back to sleep. This dozing and occasional waking went on for about two hours (also at some point, someone gave me my pillow). Finally I stood up and found that another dear AYF fFriend of mine was nearby, so I got up and went over to give another hug. From that point on, I wandered around the dorm and gave many hugs. Around 11 I went to lunch - the last meal of Gathering, and found that many more people than I expected were still around, and that was very nice. There were some more hugs and last goodbyes (and at some point I checked out of my room), and finally, I got in the car and left with a friend.

I slept most of the way back. Got home, posted my post-Gathering check-in, and then went to sleep really early.

With that, Friends, my Gathering experience was physically over. While this is the last post officially in my Gathering series, I have one more post about my experience at my home Meeting for Worship the day after Gathering (which I actually made it to!), a sort of post-Gathering follow up post.

Thank you again, Friends, for bearing with me through this process of pouring out my experience into words. It's been exhausting and wonderful.

Love and Light,
Claire

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - FRIDAY, Eyes Wide Open

2005-07-19T21:25:00.000-04:00

Ahh, and finally, Friends, we have come to Friday, the final full day of Gathering - and a full day it was!

After workshop I actually had until 3:30 to do what I wanted! After spending over an hour at lunch, talking to many fFriends (I tended to eat at one table with the Friends there, then move on to a different table to converse with other Friends, then get up and find more.. etc.), I went with a friend off to see the Eyes Wide Open exhibit that was set up on campus for Gathering (and anyone else, too, really) (see http://www.afsc.org/eyes/default.htm).

Eyes Wide Open is an exhibit of thousands of soldiers' boots, equal to the number of US casualties from the Iraq War, and then also civilian shoes, representing thousands of Iraqi civilian casualties. Many families have sent letters and articles and other things from or regarding their family member who was killed - these are displayed along with the boots representing that soldier. Every pair of boots has a tag including the name, home state, and age of the soldier they represent, and the boots are arranged by state.

I went to see this exhibit very aware of my exhaustion (and that I should have probably been taking a nap instead), but also very aware that this would be my only opportunity to see it.

As I walked into the very large room where the exhibit was set up and saw the thousands of boots lined up, I tried to let it sink in. Mentally, I felt numb. "Every single one of these boots represents a unique, loving individual, who had a loving family, and who was lost prematurely in prolonged actions of hate and misunderstanding," I thought to myself, in an effort to convey to myself the gravity of what I was looking at. I continued thinking like this as I walked by the civilian shoes and pictures of Iraqi people - both civilian and military. My body began to wear down, but mentally, my natural defense mechanism of non-reaction seemed to be prevailing, which did not feel right to me. This was a week of opening and deep feeling! I was not happy with this numbness.

At some point I thought of my step-brother. He has a wife doing a residency in OB/GYN and a 5 year old son. My step-brother went to Iraq a year ago (edit: he's in the Marine Reserves), and on the morning of New Year's Day this year, was wounded and lost his right arm, just below the elbow. I tend to view it more as if we got to keep the rest of him, rather than a loss of his arm. I tried to imagine what it would be like if one of these boots represented my step-brother. I couldn't.

I sat down in the middle of the exhibit and leaned against a square column (part of the structure of the building) and just sat in silent worship (with attention to the exhibit and what it meant). While my mind was failing at evoking a reaction mentally, I began to feel some physiological effects of strong emotion. I could feel my grief and despair through my body and in my bones, rather than a mentally. Had I stayed long enough, I'd be surprised if I didn't begin shaking a little, yet my mind was still elsewhere. My mind so often feels desensitized, but my emotions clearly were (and are) not. It was a strange and uncomfortable detachment of my mind and emotions. I don't quite know how to explain it.

After a time, I left. For a portion of the walk back to the dorm I was walking with fFriends, but we didn't really talk about the exhibit. I was exhausted (as per usual for this year's Gathering), but it was time to head off to support groups.

[Both images credited to Peter Lyrene.]

Friends, I'm going to break up Friday's post into two posts. I am tired right now, and don't quite feel up to writing about the rest of Friday tonight. Also, I feel that this experience at the exhibit and my experience with Nominating Committee each need seperate posts, eventhough I hate to drag this out longer than it already has. Those of you who have read all of this up until now and continue to stick with it, I thank you greatly, Friends.

More soon..

Love and Light,
Claire

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - THURSDAY

2005-07-17T23:11:00.000-04:00

After sleeping for 3 1/2 hours Wednesday night/Thursday morning, I arose around 8:00am and stumbled off to breakfast. [Even after such a Meeting for Business, we young Friends are still required to go to workshops.]

I made it to my workshop on time, and managed to stay conscious and somewhat focused during opening worship. In fact, it was during the opening worship of my workshop that I began to realize just how emotionally raw I was feeling. How I was feeling was almost comparable to an open wound, though I don't quite know how to complete the analogy.

Every morning during workshop we would have a 'check-in', allowing participants to speak briefly about how they were feeling. I used this opportunity to explain that the night before the HS program's Meeting for Business had been very emotionally and spiritually intense and had lasted until 4am, and that I had also been in emotionally and spiritually intense meetings immediately prior to this Meeting for Business. I think I just asked for understanding that I may be a little out of it. Amazingly, I actually participated a little during workshop that morning and didn't doze off - a testament to my strength that day.

After workshop, very aware of my rawness, I sought out f/Friends during lunch (which is actually something I did during every meal anyway, but I was in particular need of hugs, as were many others, I suspect). Shortly after arriving at the cafeteria, I heard about what had happened in London. I was rather upset by that, and my rawness was perhaps not the best state to be in for such news. I was having trouble enough dealing with and processing the night before, but then to hear of such a destructive and hateful act, right after having such a deep, powerful, painful bonding experience - I took a deep breath and tried to take it in keep myself under control for lunch.

It also happened to be pouring rain during lunch - our carefully rescheduled out trip was canceled. On Monday when we were attempting to resolve the scheduling conflict, it was clear that the trip should NOT be canceled, and that a great many participants would be upset by this. Today, though, there was more relief than upset feelings. No one had slept much, and few had energy to swim and have fun at a park. Regardless of the energy I put into the planning that went into the rescheduling, I, too, was very relieved to not go on the out trip.

At 1:30 I went to the HS sponsored Meeting for Worship (open to any and all of the Gathering). I'd already been planning to attend this Meeting for Worship anway, but during lunch I realized that I really needed to. I needed it as a comfort and a release. I did indeed arrive feeling as raw as before. It wasn't long before I began to release a little from the night before and the morning. It sounds odd when I say it, but even with my rawness, I felt a little emotionally constipated. I needed to begin to process and to release, but it did not come easily.

As I sat among nuturing fFriends, holding hands, hugging (we shifted around a little throughout the worship, as necessary), I reflected and replayed some of the events of the night, and thought some of the London bombings, and I finally let some tears flow; it felt a little relieving. My heart was pounding with the emotional and spiritual intensity of it, and by the end I was shaking - a decent portion of worship for me was also spent trying to determine whether I had a leading to speak, but in the end, it seems that I did not (and that's ok). There were a great many hugs afterwards, including a large group hug or two. Many in the room were from the high school program or from AYF (Adult Young Friends) and had been there the night before, or heard about it and understood a little of what the HS program went through, which was a comfort to me as I went through this release - though, this is not to say that the presence of adult Friends was not unwelcome or appreciated; this was not solely a HS MfW! While still a little raw, I felt much better after that Meeting for Worship. (I'm not sure if I just articulated myself about what I was going through as clearly here as I did about the other days, so if it really doesn't make sense, I can attempt to clarify. Sometimes articulating strong emotions is a most difficult task.)

Shortly after this HS sponsored Meeting for Worship, I returned to the dorm and we had our HS program group picture (this traditionally occurs during the out trip). Then there were support groups, as usual. During support group we had to discern which member of the group would participate on the Nominating Committee. --

[The process for discerning next year's clerks this year was as follows: Nominations for clerk would be spoken during a worshipful period during support groups on Wednesday. Nurture Committee reps would ask those who were nominated from their support group whether they accepted their nominations before the Thursday Nurture Committee meeting. A member from each support group - discerned on Thursday - would serve on Nominating Committee - the committee actually doing the discernment. Any two of the current clerks would clerk this committee. Nominating Committee would then begin meeting on Thursday and continue on Friday until the clerks for next years FGC Gathering HS program had been clearly discerned.]

-- It was clear that everyone had very low energy. In fact, during the group picture I would lean my head on a fFriend infront of me while they were setting up and close my eyes. Luckily, I was arm-in-arm with those next to me, which helped me remain standing. (Looking at this picture, now that I have a copy of it, I do look like a zombie.) The fact that everyone had low energy, coupled with the known tendency for Nominating Committee to take many hours and be really intense and exhausting led to no one in my group really feeling like it was something they wanted to or should do. During support groups that day, I was lying down on the floor, my head on someone's stomach, with my eyes closed. Given my exhaustion, I should have been out like a light. Somehow, though, I was still conscious and functioning - I even managed to moderate (/facilitate/guide/clerk) the discernment process of my support group! Once again, my strength surpassed what I felt was possible, and I pushed through without a nap - planned or otherwise.

During Nurture Committee (immediately following support groups), we gathered names of those who were nominated and accepted their nominations into a list. There may have been minor concerns here or there, but again, everyone was exhausted.

After Nurture Committee, we clerks met together briefly to figure out which two of us would clerk the Nominating Committee. Up until this day, all week (and even prior to Gathering) I had felt pretty strongly led to participate on this committee - having heard how intense and amazing it had been in past years was inspiring, but now I was feeling exhausted and like I had my fill of intensity. Though I had begun to doubt my need to be on the committee, I recognized that the other clerks were also exhausted. I don't think any of them had had any sort of strong, prior leading to participate in this particular process, except Susanna, who had decided to be on the committee, but not as a clerk. So I overcame my exhaustion and decided to do it. Madeline also found interested in doing this, so together we were to co-clerk the Nominating Committee. Once I'd agreed to do it, I mustered up a little excitement - despite my doubts about my energy, I was happy to do this. My energy level, while it was very clear that I was exhausted, did not seem to affect my ability to serve the community in ways I was needed, and I also managed to remain present to the community. I was still able to spend time with my fFriends between meetings and at meals.

At 7:30, Nominating Committee began to meet. We did not know how long this first meeting would last, but we knew we wouldn't be finished that night. After 3 1/2 hours, we had listed qualties we felt were important for a clerk, come up with a loose process by which to do this discerning, and had begun to look at the names on the list, while not narrowing down or beginning the discernment. I was sure to emphasize that though the qualities we had listed were very important and not to be ignored, this was a spirit led process, first and foremost. There was a clear sense that the committee also felt this way. So around 11pm, we communally felt ready to stop for the
night and planned to continue the next day after support groups.

At this point I was a little uneasy about the committee. The dynamics were such that great division and perhaps resentment was a possibility within the community of the committee (and I do believe every committee is a small community). Though there had been some strong feelings during our first meeting and perhaps a few rough edges here and there, things had gone alright so far. I felt that this process had to be done in a unified and joyous manner, and I had to have faith that this committee would come together on Friday and go smoothly and sincerely. I didn't let it stress me out.

After the committee meeting ended, I wandered around the dorm and enjoyed a little free-time with my fFriends, played Apples to Apples a little, gave and received many hugs, and then crashed in my bed for the night.

Coming soon: Friday - among other things, the Eyes Wide Open exhibit and Nominating Committee. One day left, and still a lot of intensity to go.

Love and Light,
Claire

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Brief Note:

2005-07-16T00:55:00.000-04:00

Going to let this sit until Sunday or Monday.. and I'm also out of town until then.

Feedback is appreciated, if anyone feels so led - but no hurry.

Sunday evening or Monday I'll continue posting about Gathering and the events of the day following Meeting for Business.

Love and Light,
Claire

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - WEDNESDAY, Meeting for Worship with Concern for Business

2005-07-14T23:35:00.000-04:00

Note: Friends, it is important to read the entry immediately prior to this one before reading this one. This one and that one were posted simultaneously. Please heed this request.

The Wednesday night FGC Gathering High school Program Meeting for Worship with Concern for Business began as it usually does. After a period of open worship for centering, visitors were introduced, and announcements were made. I think there were some smaller agenda items to attend to, but then the first major issue was introduced.

I didn't mention that this particular issue was an agenda item earlier, but it was certainly important. When we reached this point (not very far into the meeting), the clerks opened the floor to thoughts, concerns, and leadings on the topic of our openness to LGBTQ Friends, and the accepting nature of our community as the high school program. Considering the events of the week - such as the Witness to Marriage Equality - we felt it was an issue that needed to be included in the Meeting for Business to allow thoughts, feelings, concerns, and emotions to be expressed. Part of the reason we (clerks) decided to address this issue first was that we were aware that it was something the community had the potential to bond and grow together over considerably. We felt that not only was this issue important - we had planned it as an agenda item before we even knew of the drug issue - but also that the state of the community would be important when the drug issue did, indeed, arise later in the meeting.

Pertaining to the LGBTQ agenda item, many Friends became emotional. Many times, feelings of overwhelming love and acceptance in the high school community over the years was expressed. Some told of how they only began to open up to themselves and/or others about the issue while in the high school program at Gathering, and of how it changed their lives. Some even mentioned how accepting the community was of those who were different in ways other than being LGBTQ, as well. There were some comparisons to other less accepting environments, and an emphasis about just how important it was that this community was so open and loving. It was quite moving, and the community did bond over it as the topic remained open for over an hour. In the end, we came up with a minute about the openness and accepting nature of our community. I was so grateful to have been there for that process, and also grateful that I was able to remain grounded and focused enough that I was not distracted by the issue I knew to be coming up, nor by my own exhuastion.

By the time we closed the topic and were ready to move on, it was almost midnight. Since the building we were in closed at midnight, that meant it was time for us to return to the dorm, take a break for pizza (which arrives at midnight Sunday and Wednesday, regardless of whether we finished our meeting yet or not), and then meet together again in the large lounge of our dorm. By this point, all the visitors our Meeting had had, had left, as it was getting quite late. I knew that we still had a huge issue or two to come, and was as emotionally prepared as possible - I was spiritually grounded.

After moving everything, re-setting up, eating some pizza, and a number of hugs, it was time to settle in again. I was almost in disbelief at how late that it was and how we hadn't even touched the drug concern yet. I held on to faith that it would come up in good time, and that we would all perhaps at least get a little sleep that night.

The next issue we came to had to do with intervisitation hours and curfew. Currently, no intervisitation (that is, no one was allowed to hang out in a dorm room other than those who roomed there) was to occur after midnight, and we were all supposed to be in our rooms in bed by 2am. These were guidelines we had revisited on Sunday; we had changed the intervisitation guideline for a trial period - prior to Sunday, intervisitation would last until 2, and we decided to try having it end at 12 until Wednesday Meeting for Business. Despite the fact that we had visited the guideline as a community on Sunday, there had been a great number of infractions of this guideline every night that week. The counselors were beginning to feel like 'cops', which is not what they came to do - the community was supposed to hold itself accountable for its own guidelines. Again, I believe the heart of this problem rested in a lack of understanding of Quaker process, and a lack of understanding the every single guideline was alterable by us as community. None of the guidelines were there just because they 'had to be'. While we were supposedly re-addressing whether we were content with the shift in intervisitation time, we instead were raising concerns about the infractions.

Friends began to speak of trust and respect in our community.

At this point, the clerks at the table (Erik and Tamsin co-presiding, Madeline recording, and Tara supporting) found that the next agenda item, the drug concern, needed to be introduced before this one was closed - they were both concerns along similar lines. It was then about 2:00am. I was conscious, grounded, and feeling solid as a rock in my centeredness. I couldn't be shaken even if I tried to be (which I did - I'll explain in a moment). I was fully present, and feeling like a pillar of strength as I held the entire community in the Light. This state of being did not take conscious, purposeful effort, but was what I naturally fell into that night, despite my incredible exhaustion.

Erik read the preface we had previously written, and opened the concern to the community with no suggestion of what direction to go with it. We had to have a considerable amount of faith that the community would eventually come to a place where it needed to be with the issue - there was no way to resolve this but through the Spirit. I remained solid as emotion began to pour from the community. Many expressed anger and hurt - the individuals who were involved with the alcohol and drugs were present anonymously in the room, and the community was aware of this. There was love, yes, there was a lot of love, but love was angry, too. These actions had hurt the community deeply, trust was violated deeply. Trust was violated deeply. There were so many personal stories of struggles with drugs, either personally or with a family member of dear friend - Gathering was supposed to be a place free of that, safe, trusted. Everyone hurt. So many were crying. A friend of mine near me needed considerable calming down, and at points had to leave the room or get water. I remember sitting there, right next to the desk, holding hands tightly with someone, at one point hugging someone strongly, solidly, groundedly.

I need to emphasize that love and forgiveness were strongly expressed, right along with the concerns about trust and respect, and the anger and pain. The entire community, together, felt all of this.

I saw and felt others around me crying, releasing, feeling the pain. I felt the pain, and tried to allow myself to cry, but only a few times did tears come, and they didn't last long when they did. I was so steady and grounded - I'm not trying to imply that this groundedness was a bad thing; the community needed the support, and I did all that I could. (I just wished a little that I could have such a release as others were having.) Through the week, and especially at this point in time, I discovered more about how deeply rooted my strength is. I found more strength than I ever knew possible, and kept going, supporting, being.

It was difficult to find a clear sense of the community about what needed to happen. At some point the clerks directed attention to the issue of what to do about it. There was mention of the minute from last year, and how clearly ineffective it had been. We did not want this happening again. If I remember correctly, we wrote a minute about this year's experiences - and a committee met again in the next couple days to make sure the minute included some of the feelings and emotions from the Meeting for Business; it had been mentioned that perhaps the minute from last year was too formal-sounding. Also, when the minute from this year is read next year, we discerned that a Friend or two who was present this year rise and explain what happened and how it felt to be part of it, just to re-emphasize the gravity of it all to next year's community. When we had finally reached clarity, we had some closing worship for the Meeting, and finally finished. It was 4:00am.

Many Friends took some time to process a little before going to bed. I was still too grounded and centered to become emotional enough to release. I gave (and received) a great many hugs, talked a little bit to a few people, and finally, after nearly 12 hours of emotionally and spiritually intense meetings with barely more than one short break, I went to bed (and almost immediately to sleep) around 4:30am.

[For a little more clarification about the logistics of the response to drug issue, it turns out there is a wider Gathering policy about such an incident. Erik, Tara, Tamsin, and Hilary ended up meeting with a few other Gathering clerks about the issue on Friday evening - Madeline and I were clerking a Nominating Committee (which Susanna was part of not as a clerk) when this meeting happened, and thus were not present at that meeting, so my version of the details is perhaps incomplete, and perhaps flawed. From what I understood from what one of the clerks who was at this meeting told me, those involved in the drugs or alcohol (some came forward after the Meeting for Business, and some names had been given when the incident(s) was(were) originally reported earlier in the week) were to meet with a counselor about it, and a letter explaining what had happened (and including the minute written about it) was to be sent to all parents of participants. There may be a little more to it than that, but when I was told about this, I was just a little exhausted as it was the middle of the night on Friday.]

After laboring many hours to write this post and the one right before it, I am now about to go to bed rather late. This was exhausting to write, but so dearly important to express.

Friends, I thank you deeply for reading through all of this - it was even more intense being there. There is more to come - next I will share about my experiences the day after such a meeting, and then the most amazing experience clerking the Nominating Committee. The intensity has not quite ended yet.

Love and Light,
Claire

EDIT: I received the letter sent to all High School program participants, parents, and sponsors, and feel it's appropriate to copy it here at the end of this post. Here it is.

21 July 2005

TO: All Participants in the 2005 FGC High School Program
cc: all counselors, parents and sponsors of High School participants

FROM: Bruce Birchard, General Secretary
David Miller, Clerk, Long Range Conference Planning Committee

RE: Alcohol and Illegal Drugs in the High School Program

Dear Friends,

On Friday, July 8, at the end of the 2005 Gathering of Friends, we were informed that alcohol and marijuana had been used by some members of the High School community. We met Friday evening with the High School Coordinators, two of the High School counselors, and four of the High School clerks to discuss this.

This is a serious violation of both the law and the commitments that High School participants made to us and to one another in joining the High School community at the Gathering. All participatns received a letter welcoming them to the program which stated, in part:

In order to gain the most from you Gathering, it is important to prepare for the experience. Please take time to read through the guidelines and expectations (included as a separate sheet) and discuss them with your parent/guardian and/or FGC sponsor. By attending Gathering as part of the High School Program you implicitly agree to abide by these guidelines. The guidelines have been developed and approved by the High School Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business, and they represent our collective wisdom on how to construct a safe, supportive, and fun community ....

The "Guidelines of the High School Program of FGC" include the following point:

9. No illegal drugs or alcoholic beverages.
Reason: Apart from the obvious legal implications, use of mind-altering drugs undermines the purpose of the community. It can lead to disruptive behavior and reduced ability to participate in the program.

These are not simply guidelines for the High School Program. In fact, ALL Gathering participants (including High School participants) are sent a copy of the "Gathering Expectations" which speaks of forming "a community of Friends living in the discipline of the Spirit" and specifically states:

Alcohol, fireworks and sparklers are not permitted. Use or possession of illegal drugs in prohibited ...

Several members of the High School community ignored these commitments, bringing (or purchasing) alcohol and/or marijuana and using it during the week of the Gathering. In doing so, they undermined the spirit of the community and put the entire High School Program at risk.

We undrsand that these matters were discussed extensively, and with deep feelings and concerns, during the business meeting of the High School community on Wednesday night. We have been informed by the High School clerks and staff that the strong negative response of the High SChoolers was taken seriously by those known to have violated their commitments. An epistle was written and read to the 2005 Gathering Committee on Friday. We will forward a copy of that epistle to all of you when it becomes available.

Yet we also understand that this has happened in other years, and we are concerned that it could happen again. Hence this letter to all participants, parents and sponsors.

We wish to make it perfectly clear that, in the future, use or possession of alcohol or illegal drugs by any participant in the High School Program will result in the violator being separated from the program. As with violations of community expectations by any Gathering attender, any action to be taken will be discerned by the appropriate officials within the FGC/Gathering structure.

In preparing for the 2006 Gathering of Friends, we will take extra steps to communicate clearlyt with each participant abou t the seriousness of the commitmens which each individual undertakes in joining the High School community. Steps under consideration include a special statement to be signed by all participants in which each individual agrees to abide by the guidelines, special discussion in the orientation of High School counselors and staff, and special discussion in the orientation of High Schoolers and their parents or sponsors on the first evening.

We appreciate your attention to this concern and encourage you to discuss this with each other. We would welcome your comments or questions, which may be sent to our Conference Coordinator, Liz Perch: lizp@fgcquaker.org. All comments and questions will b eshared with the High School Coordinators, Kri Anderson and Cari Burke, unless you specifically ask that they be held in confidence.

Having said all this, we want to voice our tremendous appreciation for the extremely dedicated, caring and exhuasting work of the High School coordinators and counselors, and for the very serious commitment by most of the High School participants to making their week-long community so very loving, caring and centered in the Spirit. This is truly an awesome community of wonderful young Friends, and we do not want it to be endangered by the actions of a few.

Edit again: Here is the Epistle from the High School Program:

Epistle from the High School Program
July 7, 2005

It was brought to the attention of the High Schol Program duing the course of the Wednesday night Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business that members of the community have used alcohol and marijuana during the course of the gathering. The clerks introduced a chance for worship, stating that they themselves were struggling with the issue. From this worship, a wide array of emotions arose, including anger, confusion, and grief. Many felt sadness and pain knowing that trust could be lost not only between members of the comunity, but also between the program and the larger gathering. However it was clear that the community felt that those involved are surrounded by love and acceptance. Many members shared stories of substance abuse and addiction in their lives. It was affirmed by many that drugs and alcohol are simply not needed in such a warm and loving environment, yet it was understood that isolation and pain can be channeled through these substances.

The community struggled to determine how to move forward following the period of worship, and wrestled to develop the appropriate consequences for thses circumstances. One defining sentiment was that it is absolutely not an option to remove any members from the community, and that such actions would only tear us more deeply. To prevent any similar situation from occuring in years to come, many felt that each year the community should reexamine the emotional gravity of the drug guideline experienced during the night through a written statement or discussion at orientation each year. We will also make an effort to ensure that this experience will become part of the oral history of theHigh School gathering.

The entire program as a whole recognizes the break in trust that this event could create with the greater gathering, yet we hope that through our emotions, and the love we have expressed for each other, it is understood that this event will reverberate througout our program for years to come. Througout the evening as well as early morning, the importance and strength of our community guided the spiritual leadings that allowed for such forgiveness and compassion for all of our members. Healing the tear in the community created by these actions will only develop through love and understanding.

We offer our experience to the wider gathering as testament of our strength and with a hope that trust can be maintained.

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - WEDNESDAY, late afternoon, evening

2005-07-14T21:20:00.000-04:00

Note: This is a very long post, but incredibly important. I suggest leaving a decent amount of time to read it, or deliberately read it in parts. The full story is very important.

..picking up where I left off from the last post..

In Nurture Committee on Wednesday afternoon, Kri brought to us a major concern. The staff (counselors) had had a very lengthy meeting about it that morning, and they ended up clear that this needed to be brought to the community - via Nurture Committee - for discernment. A participant had brought to their attention that there were some in the high school community who had done alcohol and marijuana during Gathering this year.

Let me open this issue with a description of what happened last year. Last year, a participant had unlocked his room on the first day to find the smell of marijuana. It was not actually clear if this was from another participant (as the participant whose room it was was in a single for the week and had just arrived), or someone not involved with Gathering, previously there. Just in case, though, the community addressed it as if it were a single, unknown member of the high school community. [Last year I was a member of Nurture Committee, but not a clerk of any sort.] Kri (co-coordinator last year, too) brought the issue to Nurture Committee. We, the Nurture Committee, met on Monday for a very emotional two hours, trying to discern how to address this issue. Eventually, it was clear what needed to happen: during Wednesday night's Meeting for Business, the clerks would set aside a 40 minute period of time for the concern. During this time, there was open worship for Friends to express their feelings, concerns, and leadings on the issue - a period of time was set because action did not necessarily need to be discerned by the community, and the Meeting for Business did not necessarily need to go way into the night. If more time was needed, it would have been granted.

This 40 minute period involved an outpouring of emotion. Friends were hurt and upset. It is VERY important to emphasize what hurt the most here: our trust and respect had been violated. The guidelines we have in place are ours. We discerned them in Meetings for Business, and we have the ability to change every single one of them as a community. A violation of a guideline was more than just a guideline violation - it was a strike to the trust on which the community holds its foundation! Such trust is vital to how deeply we connect and bond together during the week, and how we function! Naturally there was a lot of emotion involved when this issue came to being, even if there was question about whether it was actually a member of the community - in fact, the fact that we didn't know was irrelevant. Some Friends shared very personal and stories of how drugs had negatively affected their lives. Also, though, the beauty of this was that while Friends were very upset, there was an outpouring of love to whoever this individual may have been. "Whoever did this, we love you." Friends offered to be named specifically as people to talk to if anyone needed to talk about a drug problem. The community, while upset, was able to express love and an openness to help anyone who may have been the involved.

We did not want this to happen again. We wrote a minute about what had happened, to be read at this year's Gathering during the first Meeting for Business. (If I had that minute right now, I would post it. I'll try and track it down -someone out there has it.)

Indeed, this year that minute was read at the beginning of Sunday night's Meeting for Worship with Concern for Business. Unfortunately, it clearly did not have the impact we hoped it would. In fact, on Wednesday, many Friends on Nurture Committee (who had not been at Gathering the previous year) didn't really remember it, or they remembered that something about it was read, but didn't remember much else about it. As soon as I realized this, I described what had happened last year in detail. I was sure to be clear that while it was important to know what happened, I was not presenting it as the way to resolve the issue this year.

This year was a little different. This year, we were sure that members of our community had been involved. This, coupled with a large number of guideline infractions surrounding curfew and quiet hours within the dorm every night so far, reinforced in me the idea that this year's community did not have a full understanding of Quaker process and the trust and respect involved in this community, especially pertaining to the FGC Gathering High School program. In fact, some of the main concerns brought to Nurture Committee earlier in the week had to do with a multitude of minor guideline infractions. In an attempt to address this, we asked that the topic of Quaker process and Meeting for Business be brought up for discussion and questioning/answering during support groups. I made a point to be clear about this in my support group, and I think those in my group who did not understand before, had a much better understanding afterwards (this is speculation on my part). I have a strong belief that the root of almost all of our concerns during Gathering this year were due to this lack of understanding about the basis of our community on Quaker process/Meeting for Worship with Concern for business, and the incredible trust and respect we need to (and usually do) hold for each other and expect from each other.

We clerks had attempted to pre-emptively address this possible issue during orientation on Saturday, the day we all arrived. We stood as clerks infront of all the participants and parents and sponsors and spoke about Quaker process, our Meetings for Business, and what it means for a meeting to be Spirit led, and how incredibly important all of it is for our community each year. (We also explained and defended why our Meetings met when they did, and lasted as long as they did sometimes - but why we had to explain that is a topic for another day.)

So, on Wednesday of Gathering this year, Nurture Committee had just been handed a great issue. After explaining the events of last year, the meeting was open to leadings and concerns. This year, it was not so clear what to do. A number of concerns came up, including the whopper - What should be done? What about consequences? Do we decide that? How would we make such a decision? It was clear almost immediately that this issue needed to be brought to Meeting for Business that night. What we ended up circling around for most of the meeting was how the issue needed to be framed when it was brought up. Did we need to direct Friends thoughts or concerns to consequences? Did we need to emphasize the gravity, or was that a given? Other important things were brought up. Finally, 10 minutes until dinner ended at 7, Nurture Committee was clear enough about what needed to happen to conclude. The issue needed to be brought to Meeting for Business, and prefaced with some of the concerns that had been brought up (greater detail about which concerns exactly I cannot remember at this moment in time). Nurture Committee then broke and went off to catch dinner.

Susanna and I (co-clerks of Nurture Committee) went quickly off to dinner to grab food and return to the dorm - we still had to meet with the other clerks. I was exhausted, a little upset - but mostly very grounded and solid, as it seems I would remain for most of this process - and very aware of how much I'd done that day (and that week), and what was still to come.

While the Nurture Committee went an hour and a half late, the other clerks had met as we had previously planned to around 6 to finish discussing everything else - earlier we hadn't been aware of the drug/alcohol issue, and they weren't yet, either. While Susanna and I were still in Nurture Committee, the other clerks had finished discussing everything else and were taking a break until we got out of our meeting. Me, Susanna, Erik, Tara, Madeline, Tamsin, and Hilary met together, with Kri present for clarifications when needed, from 7 until Meeting for Worship with Concern Business began, 20 minutes late at 9:20pm.

This meeting of ours began with the other clerks updating Susanna and me about what they had previously discussed, and finishing up some discussions about other smaller issues. We then presented the concern to the other clerks (who had previously been unaware of it), and began discussing it (again). We talked about what we felt needed to happen, what we felt about the issue of consequences, how we thought it might need to be prefaced or framed when presented to the community - we touched on a number of the same issues Nurture Committee had raised. We also were aware that we couldn't impose our own feelings about the issue on the community. Finally, we had to admit that we really didn't know what to do, ourselves. To introduce the issue, we made sure it was prefaced well - I think it included emphasis on how this was a violation of trust and respect and such - we wrote the preface that Erik (co-presiding clerk of Meeting for Business with Tamsin) read to the community when the issue was later introduced to everyone (again, I can't remember the specific details - I apologize for that).

Finally we were ready for the Meeting for Business to begin (somewhere in there we clerks had switched buildings, rearranged the furniture in the room where our meeting took place, and posted the agenda on the wall). Around 9:20pm, we clerks were beginning to settle and center after a long conversation while the entire high school community and any visitors to our Meeting for Business silently filed in and found seats. With an idea of what was to come in the next few hours, I somehow found a deep grounding, a solid focus, that would remain with me through the night.

Friends reading this, please stop for a moment, take a breather, and if you need to, just sit with this for a moment. I am ending this post here (while posting the next one simultaneously, so as you read this, it's already there, ready to be read). This post alone is already incredibly long, incredibly intense, and describes a lot to take in (imagine having been there!). I will now dive into that night's Meeting for business in the next post.

[I've been working on this post for a few hours now, taking frequent breaks when necessary. I won't go to bed tonight until I have the next one written, and both of these posted. If you're reading this, I accomplished that goal.]

Love and Light,
Claire

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - WEDNESDAY, during the day

2005-07-14T19:12:00.000-04:00

Wooo.. Wednesday. Time to take a deep breath and dive back in for a bit..

After workshop I headed to the cafeteria to get lunch. Wednesday there was the option of 'simple meal' for lunch. Simple meal each year consists of beans and rice; money saved from having such a simple meal is donated for those with more need. (I actually put down the pamphlet I was handed and lost track of it somewhere, so I can't remember any more details about it than this - if anyone wants to clarify, feel free.) At 12:15, those of us on the small committee formed at the intergenerational dialogue from the day before were supposed to meet in a specific part of the cafeteria. Since there were people other than those of us attending Gathering on campus who used the cafeteria, the cafeteria staff had tried to rope off a section of the cafeteria for those eating simple meal, seperate from those having the regular lunch. (Those eating simple meal didn't swipe their meal cards, whereas everyone else did - it was a logistical thing.) This greatly complicated our meeting location, and it took us until 12:40 to actually sit down together in one place.

I had to leave this meeting early, too, since we had a HS clerk meeting at 1:15 back at the dorms - the second HS Meeting for Worship with Concern for Business at Gathering happens on Wednesday night, and we needed to start getting the agenda and such together. Knowing we would meet together again after support groups and Nurture Committee, we broke at 2:00. This left me with an hour and a half to do whatever I wanted or needed to do.

Instead of taking a break or sleeping (like I really needed to), I went promptly to a performance that Peterson Toscano (http://a_musing.blogspot.com) was performing for us in the high school dorm, Queer 101. I stayed for most of the performance - it was highly entertaining and fun to watch, but then left a little early to get a couple things done.

I then trekked off accross campus to Squires where FGC Bookstore was set up, as well as the Gathering message boards. I returned to the bookstore and made a few more purchases (as if I didn't already have a decent stack of books from my Sunday trip), and then posted a message on the message board. When I initially left for Squires, I had the intention leaving time to see the Eyes Wide Open (http://www.afsc.org/eyes/default.htm) exhibit set up during Gathering. I had heard it was intense, and that I should go with someone and leave plenty of time for the experience. Since I was already squeezing things in to my free hour and a half, I decided against going, and instead took my time at the bookstore.

[I just had a brief interlude in writing this post - a 25 minute (or so) battle with my power cord - talk about jiggling a lot and a little bit of one-handed typing! Very soon, I will get a new laptop. This one has been on its last leg for way longer than any computer in this condition would be expected to last. I'm grateful I managed to position the power cord in a manner that it would work without me using one of my hands to hold it! Ok - back to the post now - sorry!]

At 3:30 support groups met, and then it was time for Nurture Committee. We began around 4:45 (late, as usual), and went through our usual process of hearing concerns and figuring out what to do with them - there weren't any major ones at this point (at least, none major enough that I can remember them after what happened next). When we finished our usual business, Kri, who had been waiting patiently for us to get to this point, had a very heavy issue to bring to us.

I feel the need to end this post here and continue in a seperate post. The next period of time I'm about to describe needs an entry to itself, not distracted by less-intense events that occurred prior, as described above.

Next entry VERY SOON. Bear with me, as this is rather exhausting to write.

Love and Light,
Claire

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - TUESDAY

2005-07-13T19:41:00.000-04:00

In the morning I awoke, met f/Friends at breakfast, and went patiently to my workshop. I was very patient that morning – I didn’t even really need to think about being patient; I just was. I think this speaks a little to how grounded I was during the week.

After workshop I briefly stood in front of the cafeteria to redirect any HS Friends to the dorm – everyone was supposed to go directly to the dorm right after workshops ("do not pass go, do not collect $200"). (I was asked by Cari to stand as a reminder for a few minutes, which is why I, myself, didn’t go so directly.)

At some point while I was standing there, someone mentioned to me what had happened with the buses – we were able to get them switched to Thursday. A wave of relief and happiness passed over me. All of that work and energy had come to something so positive – and it wasn’t that it wouldn’t have worked out alright if we couldn’t changed the buses, but it just felt so awesome that plan A became a reality. Because of all of our hard work, the community now did not have to be split during out trip, and everyone could go to the Witness and the out trip – this seemingly unsolvable problem (well, it felt unsolvable earlier in our discussion of what to do on Monday) had been resolved. Again, this is another example of faith - we put our faith into the situation, and things turned out very well. (And I don't mean to imply that if the buses hadn't come through that they wouldn't have turned out well - that could've been in good faith, too.)

Since we’d already requested boxed lunches from the cafeteria for Tuesday (due to the trip), we had to eat those lunches instead of going to the cafeteria. So we all hung out in a grassy area in front of the high school dorm relaxing, eating our boxed lunches, and just having fun together as a community. It seemed we had some bonding time together even without being on the out trip and that was really nice. (Come to think of it, I think those two hours were really among the few hours I spent actually relaxing during the entire Gathering.) I remember being incredibly exhausted and wanting to nap, but I never got around to it. By the time I was in the right place and position for nap in the grass, it was about time to go. I had already abandoned the idea of napping, anyway.

When it became near 2pm, those of us who wanted to go to the Witness began to gather together – we had decided to all go together. A huge crowd gathered – I think a majority of the 150 high school Friends had gathered to attend the Witness. Together, we walked across the campus to the location of the Witness. As we were walking, I ended up toward the front of the group and turned around to look again at just how many of us there were – I felt like I was on a march! There were so many of us! I was glowing with joy; we clerks were able to let this beautiful occurrence a be a real possibility! To have been involved in that process and to have served the community in such a deep way was so incredible! And there was more…

As we began crowding through a gate in a fence on the outside of the small field where the Witness was taking place, those Friends already there spontaneously applauded our arrival – I think there was a general awareness of how hard it was to get this to happen, but also, our presence as young Friends was so important to the Witness. My heart did fill with Joy – as did the hearts of many. What a fantastic experience that entire process was.

The speakers and performers were very nice, and often moving to listen to. There was a point where a woman from the local community had stopped on her way to work and stood up on the stage and spoke of how she felt so much warmth and acceptance there, unlike anything she’d experienced in her local community. I watched as a number of people stood up to give her hugs after she walked off stage. It was beautiful.

Sitting here trying to remember what I did right after the Witness until dinner, I’m drawing a huge blank. I just thought I'd articulate that - I'm impressed by how many details I'm already managing to remember, so I'll let this blank go. Moving on, then..

After dinner, support groups happened, followed by Nurture Committee. Nurture Committee began at the same time as a Youth Ministries interest group (it was something along the lines of an interest group, at least) that I really wanted to attend. [I could speak at length about Youth Ministries as it is one of the things about which I am passionate in the Quaker realm, but I don’t feel that here in this series is the place to speak about it at length.] As soon as Nurture Committee finished (and though I wanted it to end as soon as possible, I did not let this urge get in the way of my clerking – the meeting went as long as it needed to), I walked quickly to go to the Youth Ministries thing. However, I found that I had walked quickly to the building where I thought it was, right past the building I actually needed to be in. Then, once I learned what building I needed to be in, I spent a great deal of time looking around the wrong end of the building, getting incredibly frustrated. I was about to give up, when I realized that I hadn’t looked in the very other end of the building – it was there that I found the group (oh the things that patience can do..). I was so relieved to have found it, and was able to get involved a little more afterwards on a small subcommittee type thing.

Immediately after the Youth Ministries meeting was the HS sponsored all-Gathering dance. I enjoyed myself sitting on the side with f/Friends, watching crazy Friends, young and old, dance (I'm not one to dance, myself). It was a nice way to end the day – and it was a reminder that it was probably a good thing we hadn’t had out trip earlier, otherwise few in the high school program would have had the energy to dance as they did!

Anyways, I realize that the end of Tuesday was perhaps not as moving or interesting to anyone other than myself and those present, but I felt the need to talk about it anyway – just to be thorough.

Of all the days that week, I believe Tuesday was the most relaxing. Little did I know what Wednesday would bring…

Coming soon: Wednesday – this is where the intensity really picks up. In fact, the next post may bleed into Thursday a little; aside from what I would call a longish nap, there was little distinction between the two days for me.

Love and Light,
Claire

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - MONDAY

2005-07-12T21:51:00.000-04:00

Monday morning I awoke to my alarm at 7:30 and got up (without hitting snooze, as it was across the room and I was on the top bunk). I stumbled to the shower, and managed to make it to breakfast to meet up with some friends by 8 am - a full hour before workshops began. To many people, this is basic morning routine. To me, it was fascinating. My normal morning habits involved hitting the snooze button 4 or 5 times for an hour to an hour and half before actually getting up (and I set my alarm with this in mind), then pulling clothes on, grabbing necessary stuff, and being out the door about 10 minutes after first dragging myself from the blankets. Every year at Gathering for the four years in a row I've attended, my morning habits are dramatically different. I realized this year that it's because I am much more excited for the day coming than in any other circumstance, enough that I get out of bed earlier and more quickly than usual. Anywho, even though that's not as exciting and intense as my other experiences, I just felt it was an interesting thing to note.

Workshop went smoothly and I found that I was, indeed, quite comfortable sharing among the group of adult Friends there (and also an AYFer who I knew previously also turned out to be in the workshop). I probably won't speak a whole lot about my workshop in this series of posts, though it was a very good experience. I'll mention things that really stood out to me here and there, with perhaps some sort of summary toward the end of the week, but for now I'm going to focus more on events other than workshop.

As I was eating lunch, another HS clerk found me and told me that we HS clerks had a meeting with Kri (one of the two main co-coordinators of the HS program) at 1:30 - something had come up. It turned out that there was a major scheduling conflict with the high school program's out trip (a big trip that occurs every gathering for an entire Tuesday afternoon where the entire high school community goes to a nearby park and hangs out and swims and such) directly conflicted with Tuesday's Witness for Marriage Equality.

It's important to note here, for those who are not already aware, that in the last year, Virginia passed an incredibly homophobic law. FGC Gathering planners, out of care, concern, and consideration for FLGBTQC (Friends for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Queer/Questioning Concerns), originally seriously considered relocating the Gathering to a different state, but this proved to be too complicated to do with such late notice. So out of support for FLGBTQC, and as a sort of protest to the state laws in place, this Witness, which would involve speakers and performers, was planned and open to the entire Gathering community. (If anyone has better details about this, feel free to add them in a comment if you think it's important enough.)

When Kri told us that it was a scheduling issue, I don't think the gravity of the issue initially hit home for me; then we began talking about it. Kri brought this issue to us as clerks of the HS community because it was an issue pertaining to the entire community. We began brainstorming how to resolve this schedule conflict. What if we allowed those who wanted to go to the Witness to go together as a group? What if we shifted the out trip until later in the day and compromised time? Could we move the out trip to another day? We were as thorough as possible, and by the end of our meeting had a couple decent options; however, we found that we needed to bring the issue to the rest of the community to discern overall interest in attending the Witness.

Before going to our support groups (arriving late, as we had spent over 2 hours discussing the issue), we as clerks had tried to write a paragraph outlining the issue and what needed to be discussed in support groups. Then in Nurture Committee, Susannah (my co) and I would ask that everyone report the overall sense of interest from their support groups. When my own support group heard this paragraph we clerks had written, I immediately realized that we'd left out some somewhat important details. I felt an 'oh no!' moment, a moment of elevated stress. In my recent experiences with faith though, I realized that I needed to have faith in the situation and hold it in the Light. There was nothing I could do about the left out details, and after a few moments, I realized that it would probably be ok anyway. Faith allowed me to release the momentary stress to the Light.

The process ended up going incredibly smoothly, and without much trouble, we soon had a sense of the community about the issue. There was great interest in attending the Witness, and an acknowledgement of its importance, but also a strong feeling about the importance of the out trip. The out trip, in the past, had been a time where the high school community bonded a little more, being exclusively together away from the rest of Gathering. It was clear that Friends did not want the HS community divided during out trip, but also that both the out trip and the Witness were very important.

Fortunately, one of the options we came up with involved moving the out trip to Thursday, three and a half hours later than originally scheduled (3:30pm instead of 12:00pm), and a shift of support groups and Nurture Committee to the evening (as the Witness was scheduled to begin around 2, and support groups were originally supposed to begin at 3:30 with Nurture Committee meeting directly afterwards). This would allow any and all to attend the Witness without breaking up the community for the out trip. When discussing our plan with Cari (the other co-coordinator working with Kri), we found that the final detail of this plan would be the key factor in whether it would work or not: the buses. There was a fee to cancel the bus service, and each bus was expensive to re-rent on a different day - it was financially too much for the high school program if it ended up that way, so it depended upon whether or not the bus company would be willing to work with us and not charge too much. We communicated with Liz Perch about it and found that the Gathering really supported us in working so hard to allow young Friends to go to the Witness, and thought it very important that we have the opportunity, so it was possible we would have help there. Unfortunately, it was late evening on the 4th of July when we finally had the scheduling issue somewhat figured out, so it was the wrong day and too late to call the bus company. We would have to wait until the morning for the final verdict. Again, we would have to release the issue with faith that whatever happened, everything would work out alright in one way or another.

Just in case, though, we found among our options a plan B. This was less favorable and involved having the out trip at the same time, but an hour shorter, and instead of having support groups and Nurture Committee meet during the out trip, they would meet later in the evening after returning (so eventhough the trip would be an hour shorter, everyone there would actually have more free time, and no one would miss these important meetings because of the Witness). In this case, those who wanted to attend the Witness would stay behind and attend it together - the split was not favorable, but was our only remaining option if we couldn't move the buses to a different day.

So, with the possibility of plan A or plan B, we wrote a detailed letter to the high school community, to be read at midnight check in (where everyone checks in with their support group counselor). We outlined the issue with the buses, we outlined both plans and what needed to happen for each to occur, we outlined the importance of the Witness, and then reiterated in bullet points at the end what everyone needed to do. With the letter finally finished - 8 or 9 hours after we originally began meeting together about the issue early that afternoon, I released the issue to faith, and went outside with Cari to try and see fireworks.

As we were sitting watching fireworks, I felt more relaxed than I had for most of the day. We both found it fitting that we were watching fireworks after such an ordeal - it was like a celebration of the conclusion we'd come to for the evening, even if it was temporary. Putting that much time and energy into an issue in service of the community, while exhausting, to me felt wonderful, even before we knew the outcome. Somewhere in the exhaustion, I felt a deep sense of joy in being able to be a part of this issue and being able to help come to a resolution.

I went to bed exhausted, but content, with great anticipation for the outcome of the morning.

With that, Monday was over - you'll have to wait for my Tuesday post to find out how it worked out! (Those who know already, no spoilers, please!)

[I meant to have this posted last night, but very shortly before finishing, my power cord failed me in a major way, and I am now on my way to accepting that my laptop may have breathed its last breath last night (I'm getting a new one soon, anyway.) I hope to have Tuesday posted this evening - I have other things I want to post, so I'm trying to speed this process up.]

Tuesday coming soon...

Love and Light,
Claire

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FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - SUNDAY (First Day)

2005-07-11T22:02:00.000-04:00

The first day of Gathering is often slightly disappointing, only because I find myself comparing it to the end of the previous Gathering. At the beginning of any FGC Gathering, the high school program is not as united and centered and one as it is by the end of the week. So when thinking of how the previous Gathering ended in a state of immense loving unity and oneness, the first day of a not-yet gathered Gathering does not seem nearly as exciting. However, I began to find the hints of oneness in this day, getting a taste of things to come later in the week. A deeper faith began to grow within me.

Sunday morning I found myself at an outdoor all-Gathering meeting for worship. I felt a bit unfocused, which worried me a little, but I didn’t dwell on it. I was happy to be among so many Friends. About half an hour after meeting for worship, the first workshop session was to occur.

I walked into my workshop, Ways to Love your Enemies (led by John Helding), to find that I was the only young Friend there. I wasn’t necessarily surprised, but it seemed to have more of an impact on me than I originally thought it would. My first reaction was sort of an “Oh no, should I switch workshops after this? Maybe I should..” Then, though, I thought about one of the issues I’m passionate about among Quakers, an issue I wrote an essay about (which will appear in the coming FGConnections and a book soon to come out) – The Importance of Friendship among Young Friends and Adults. On the other hand, I didn’t want that to be the only reason I stayed in the workshop. I needed to know that I would be comfortable sharing among this group. As the morning continued, the group of Friends in the workshop seemed to come together, and I began to feel more comfortable. By the end of the session on that morning, I felt clear that I would stay in this workshop for the week. When John (the leader) asked me, “See you in the morning?” as I was about to leave, I was able to honestly and confidently answer “Yes.” In this clarity, I believe I began to find the first bit of a great growing faith within me.

In the afternoon I visited FGC bookstore (which was set up on campus for Gathering) and got a heap of books and pamphlets (I’ll talk about which ones later), and then we meet with our support groups. I began to get to know the other 9 people in my support group (as I knew none of them from previous gatherings), and we discerned which one of us would go on to be a member of Nurture Committee (I didn’t count since I was a Nurture Committee clerk). In this process, I found that members of this support group of mine were very centered and thoughtful, even if they themselves were not necessarily aware of it. I was very excited about this.

The first Nurture Committee met directly after support groups. This was the first time I clerked a group as large as 17, and though I was co-clerking with Susannah (and thus not alone), and had served on Nurture Committee the year before, I was still a little bit unsure of myself. This in mind, I didn’t over-prepare; I just went in keeping in mind the basics of clerking, and let it go naturally. The young Friends on this committee seemed to also be very centered and committed, which was most incredible. I found yet more faith (look – more faith! It’s growing..), and my excitement became even more grounded.

Eventually, I met with my fellow HS program clerks to prepare for the first Meeting for Worship with Concern for Business, which was to happen that night. Having never been in the clerking position before, I was more excited about this particular Meeting for Business than previous ones. After we met as clerks, I spent the hour before it was to begin running around campus with the alternate HS clerk, Hilary, (who is fully involved in clerk meetings and such during the week, while not having an official clerking role) posting messages, finding a person or two, and then setting up the room for the meeting.

Despite quite an agenda, the first Meeting for Business went very smoothly; it was wonderful. I found great faith (and it grows..) in the high school community for the week – there were so many people who seemed centered on the issues and who were participating. It was really wonderful.

It looks like this series of posts I’m writing about my experiences may be a day by day type of thing. However, I hope to have future posts a little less play-by-play as this one seems to be. The intensity picked up on Monday, I promise. This may be a lot of reading, but I do hope Friends find it worth the time. I have so much to express! If anything, this will be a good record of the 2005 Gathering for me to look back upon in the weeks and months (and possibly years) to come.

Monday coming soon..

Love and Light,

Claire

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Preface; FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend

2005-07-10T15:39:00.000-04:00

As I sat in the car on the way to FGC Gathering, watching the landscape change and keeping an eye out for groups of cows, I was in a state of utter disbelief that I was on my way to Gathering. Gathering! That one week of the year that I spend the rest of the year looking forward to, and here I was on my way to it! Not only that, but I was to be one of the 6 clerks who guide the high school community through the week. It was a disbelief in the sense that I was calmly sitting there looking forward to arriving while not dying with anticipation. I knew I would be busy, and I knew that the past three Gatherings were incredible, each one better for me than the last, but I had little notion of what this Gathering would bring. This year, as one of the clerks of the high school program, a week that would be easily considered intense by high school participants was to be even more so for me, if that sort of thing can even be compared.

[As part of this preface to my posts about my experience in the FGC Gathering High School Program, I need for Friends reading my posts to understand the basics of how the High School Program at FGC Gathering works. All of the guidelines of the program are ours, determined through hours of our own Meetings for Worship with Concern for Business. The counselors are there for guidance, not enforcement. During the week we all meet together for an hour a day in support groups of about ten or so high school participants and one counselor (these are analogous to groups often called family groups in other programs). Each support group sends one member to the Nurture Committee. Any concerns during the week, serious or small, are brought to Nurture Committee (which meets right after support groups each day), where discernment about how to address them takes place.

There are six HS program clerks (and one alternate) each year; these clerks are young Friends from the program, not adults. There are two co-presiding clerks, a recording clerk, and a support clerk of the Meeting for Business, and also two co-clerks of the Nurture Committee. Together, though, all of these clerks are clerks of the high school gathering during the entire week, a responsibility not limited to when meetings are occurring.]

I'm not sure how these posts of my experience will end up being, but I have faith that I will post in a manner that will convey what needs to be conveyed.

More coming soon…

Love and Light,
Claire

Next Gathering Post ->

Post-Gathering Self Check-in

2005-07-09T17:44:00.000-04:00

I feel Overwhelmed. The withdrawal is hitting full force right now.

This was by far the most emotionally and spiritually intense week of my entire life, and I have absolutely no idea how to process that and debrief myself. Checking my email just now and opening my roommate information from Wellesley were two things I should have perhaps waited to do. (I forgot to check the mail for the water bill before leaving for Gathering and thus it is late, I have a clearness committee for full membership possibly on Tuesday, and it looks like I'll be living in a triple this coming year, and I have no idea how I feel about that.)

Earlier today, when saying my goodbyes, I did not really give myself the release of crying. I was far too exhausted and wanted to leave on a joyous note, and now I'm just beginning to let it flow. I wish I knew a way to express the emotions and the spirit I've felt all week. I've grown and learned so much.

I'm considering outlining my experiences in detail in a multiple part series of posts. Highlights of intensity from the week, soon to be posted in more detail:
-A scheduling conflict involving deep emotions and a big change
-A joyous and moving Witness
-Two Meetings for Worship with Concern for Business, each of VERY different nature, but both incredible and amazing in their own way; there is SO much love..
-Clerking: firstly (with 5 other co's and the alternate), the Highschool gathering; secondly (with one co), the HS nurture committee; thirdly (with a different co), the nominating committee for the discernment of next year's HS clerks; fourthly, informally, my support group.
-Eyes Wide Open
-A squeeze of Youth Ministries
-Workshop: Ways to Love Your Enemies
-A growing, deepening sense of strength and faith, and energy to keep going through the intensity and little sleep emerging through me from the depths of the community

As I sit here and try to begin to process the events and emotions of the week, I begin to feel so very alone again. I thought about this at points during the week - there I was among so many beautiful, dedicated, spiritual, centered, and wonderfully amazing young Friends, who are so passionate about the very things I am; how do I return to living in my secular life among secularly thinking people? How do I keep my fire going when there is no one around for miles who can begin to understand? How do I return to my monthly meeting and sit in worship without that intensely deep sense of community and love that all of us young Friends experienced together this past week? As I ask these questions, I know that there are things I can do; I just need to express my joyous grief.

Words cannot do justice to this experience, but I will do my best. I need to express this in a very deep way.

I feel the need to begin the process of writing, in detail, about my experiences. Another post is coming very soon.

Love and Light,
Claire

Gathering Soon, and a Passage

2005-06-27T21:46:00.000-04:00

First and foremost, FGC Gathering begins Saturday, and I will most certainly be there! (I have an intense feeling of excited anticipation!) I'd love to meet other bloggers in person, if any are going. I know some of you out there are. I have no plan or idea about how to find people, but I thought I'd just bring it up anyway. (I'll be deeply involved with the high school program, making me less available than others, but as a Friend mentioned to me a little while ago, I do have to eat!)

Moving on, I've been reading A Certain Kind of Perfection by Marge Post Abbott. It's an "anthology of evangelical and liberal Quaker writers" spanning the last three centuries with a number of passages from well known, and some lesser known Friends. A particular part of a passage written by Adam Curle really stood out to me, especially pertaining to my situation with my step-mother, though it applies in all sorts of situations:

The absolute necessity for attentive listening was borne in on me very early in my experience of peace making. I became aware that what my friends and I were trying to say was often not heard, especially at the start of a meeting or if the situation were particularly tense. A question or observation would, it is true, be answered, but not responded to in any meaningful way. It was as though our words were filtered through a compound of anger, fear, resentment and perconception that radically changed their meaning. It was to this new meaning that the people we were talking with responded, often angrily and usually irrelevantly. Because of the general circumstances, what we said was often perceived as having a threatening or insulting meaning, or a perfectly straightforward question would be taken as criticism. ... We, in fact, were not being listened to, but if we had responded with irritation, it would mean that we, too, had not been listening. We assumed without question that the way to overcome these difficulties of communication was to say very little, certainly not to argue, re-explian, or contradict, but to be inwardly still and as receptive as possible. This would usually enable the storm of emotion, so natural in men under great pressure, to blow itself out.

[This can be found on page 150.]

The entire passage spoke of attentive listening, a concept important not only in our daily lives, but also spiritually. Goodness, I speak as if our daily lives are seperate from our spiritual lives - I believe they are one and the same, if only we can come to terms with that.

When my Native American friends visited me they would always fall silent, Quaker-like, and listen. How else, they asked, could they discover my condition and so speak to it, as they always did most effectively. [Found on page 151.]

There is so much truth in this, and it grounds me to read it.

Finding the Ground..

2005-06-19T23:33:00.000-04:00

Finally, three weeks after a great physical transition - movement from one place to another, from one environment to an entirely different one - I am finally finding some grounding. With patience and the realization of how the Spirit has been moving in my life without my initial conscious awareness, I am beginning to find grounding that I was reaching for (and perhaps approaching) before my summer uprooting.

Through great conflict, I am finding great support and a growing strength. I am finding a greater power of Spirit and Light within myself than I originally consciously realized; I am finding love, even in dark places.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not iritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 1 Corinthians 13.4-7

For on reason or another, I felt the need to post that; love is so important in my life, and in everyone's. I hope to continue remembering that, even at my most exhausted and low moments.

I'm finding that my posts here often seem to be ministry to myself, something I did not expect to occur. In posting it, I make this available to any whom it may help or inspire. Perhaps one day my posts will be more well thought out and edited, more sorted and less blurted, but for now, this is what I feel I need to do here with this space.

Love and Light.

Brief Note

2005-06-06T18:51:00.000-04:00

It looks as though I won't be nearly as active as I was a couple weeks ago for a little while. My computer has decided to reject the internet, and I've become incredibly busy at a new, full time job which will last through the summer.

I'll check back (probably) daily, but may not be doing much commenting or posting.

: /

Peace

Simplicity - an unfocused thought blurt

2005-06-01T22:22:00.000-04:00

Through the chaos of my last couple weeks, the testimonies of simplicity and integrity have been coming up in my thought process quite a bit. Since I haven't felt like I've had time to really sit with these thoughts yet, what I have to say may not be as clear, focused, or articulate as I would hope, but I figure that writing it out may help me thresh through some of it a little better.

Simplicity. My thoughts on simplicity have been far from thorough, but different from typical interpretations of 'simple' that I usually hear or think about. I recently moved out of my dorm room at school and found that I had a great excess of stuff. I threw out what was trashable, gave away some of it, and brought the rest home - still an excess of necessary stuff. I decided that the next time I moved out (which turned out to be today, four days later), I would not bring nearly as much stuff as I brought home, in part as a dedication to simplicity. Excess stuff leads to mess, clutter, and often distracting complication to one's life - distracting from the Spirit. I did manage to bring a lot less stuff, but still probably more than I need. (I find, all too often, that I keep thinking to myself "well, I might need that one day; you never know!" The hard part about saying "no" to things like that is that I might actually be right - often it's not a completely misplaced or irrational thought. It still leaves me with excess stuff.) I think part of simplicity - and I admit that this is not an entirely original idea - is to not have so much stuff!

Another, perhaps more original (perhaps not), thought that has come to me is simplicity in terms of the least complicated. Some Friends find that being plain is how they feel called to live out the simplicity testimony, but I feel that this, for me at least, would complicate my life in distracting ways. I would become too focused on finding ways to fit in or explain my ways to people rather than being focused on the Spirit. While I realize that a certain amount of adversity is necessary when on a spiritual journey (spiritual development isn't always just a walk in the park, though a walk in the park might be quite helpful), such adversity should not necessarily distract. Perhaps for some, dealing with complications that occur because of personal callings to certain levels of simplicity may be more focusing - to always answer questions of "why?" or deal with social responses may cause one to constantly re-examine what it is one is doing and may help spiritual development. In my own experience so far, I'm finding myself beginning to be called to simplicity in other ways, such as reducing the amount of stuff in my life. I need to find a time to listen with this in mind - as I mentioned above, I'm not yet in a place where I feel like I can articulate in a clear and focused manner.

More later on simplicity after I find more focus time. Also coming, a post about a somewhat specific experience regarding integrity and honesty.

Brief update

2005-05-28T20:55:00.000-04:00

It's been a week, so I thought I'd just slip in a post to show that I do still exist.

This last week was littered with final exams and year-end events.

Today was my high school graduation; doubly emotional coming from a boarding school. I haven't slept in a day, and I just had the most amazingly wonderful night with some wonderful people (some of whom I won't be seeing for a long time). I'm in a state of complete disbelief that it's actually over, feeling torn away, lonely, and in need of many more hugs from those I won't see so much anymore.

I was almost inspired to write a post earlier this week, but I haven't had the energy, nor the focus, to write anything meaningful here. I haven't been consciously focused on spirituality this week, which, while it's frustrating sometimes, is ok from time to time. Despite this lack of conscious focus on spirituality, I have felt in the last couple days as though my class, the class of 2005, has been held in the light, in a sense, by the school and the school community these last couple days. It's just how everything felt to me; it's not a Quaker school or anything.

I know this may seem petty compared to many other things, but please hold me in the light as I transition from an environment where I've had such an amazing, wonderful, and supportive friends around in-person almost whenever I need or want to be with them, to living on my own and paying for my own rent for 2 1/2 months, with most of my friends only available to me through the internet and occasionally the phone. Thank you, Friends. I will try to have a more focused post up soon after I recuperate from this trainwreck of emotions.

College and Quakerism: a dilemma

2005-05-22T00:35:00.000-04:00

In one week I graduate high school. Next year I will attend Wellesley College, up in MA. A year ago, if I knew that would be true now, I would have been incredibly overjoyed. A year ago I decided that I wanted to go to Wellesley (and was incredibly excited about it). After visiting a few colleges, I decided to apply to Wellesley early decision (which is binding); of all the colleges I'd seriously looked in to, it snagged me. It was more of a gut feeling; perhaps even a leading. In December I joyfully discovered that I had been accepted. Until a few weeks ago, I had no qualms about this; no doubts whatsoever.

A few weeks ago my involvement in Quakerism jumped up a significant amount. I also was reminded of Earlham and heard a great deal about it from a second-year there (who I met a few weeks ago and who is also an awesome person). I began to question my decision.

Though not everyone at Earlham is Quaker (far from it), it's a community with rules/guidelines based on Quaker principles. There are entire courses regarding Quakerism (such as Quaker Spirituality), which I would love to take. There are wonderful people there involved in the wider Quaker community such as Paul Lacey. It has a decent chemistry department (I'm currently planning to major in chemistry). The more I think about it, the more it seems like the perfect place for me to learn about finding a balance between my passion for chemistry and my devotion to my Quaker faith, in addition to furthering my experiences with both. Alas, I am currently bound (somewhat literally) to my entrance at Wellesley this fall.

Wellesley doesn't have a prominent on-campus Quaker community (though I plan to seek out any other Quakers and get everyone together as soon as possible; previous such organizers graduated a couple years ago, and from what I've heard, no one's picked up the ball). I'm having enough trouble being the only active Quaker at my school as it is; it would be nice not to be so isolated in college.

Through this thought process, it's hard to remember my original excitement about Wellesley. It's up north, near a big city (BOSTON!) but not in one, has awesome sciences, is a small (2300 students) liberal arts college, no greek life, I loved the campus, met a Quaker chemistry professor there when I visited, and had an inexplicable gut feeling about it. Wellesley Friends Meeting is also not too far down the road.

I know that there's no way out of going to Wellesley this fall (unless my family suddenly goes broke in the next two months, which is incredibly unlikely, knock on wood); I know that I will give Wellesley the best chance that I can. Perhaps this inexplicable gut feeling was a true leading (though I'm not sure I properly tested it as such); perhaps part of my calling is to get Friends on campus organized (as I mentioned above). In fact, I bet once I get there I'll feel a ton better about it. If not, then I'll continue to think about transferring. I already feel a little better about it after writing this out and weighing things in a slightly more balanced manner.

Knowing this, I still feel frustrated and confused about this sudden doubt.

I was unsure about the relevance of this post for this blog of mine, but I feel compelled to post it here. If anyone has any comments or suggestions or thoughts (or feelings) about this, please feel free to comment or offer support.

Cared for by the Spirit

2005-05-18T10:51:00.000-04:00

The other day while I was on my way to class, I was thinking about how I might respond if someone came up and asked me the question, "Have you been saved?".

This situation has actually never happened to me (at least not that I can recall), but I often consider what I would do in such a situation. This thought process is often a checkpoint for me; it allows me to consider questions such as: am I am actually considerate of the beliefs of others? Am I comfortable with my own spirituality in relation to that of others? Do I look beyond the words to the meaning and intent of the question posed? (Do I feel as though I would become defensive or offended in such a situation?)

Over time I find that my response has changed (as I have often considered this situation). The first time I considered it, I believe I didn't really know how I would respond - probably very apprehensively and uncomfortably I would say 'no' and then brace myself for a lecture I didn't want to hear; I was not clear about my own spirituality. There was a point in the last year where I would have felt offended and not respected; I was getting caught on words and not intentions - by feeling offended, I was not being considerate enough to interpret the meaning of such a question and was instead ignoring the care behind it. As a few months passed, this kind of reaction no longer felt right.

So the other day as I was again considering the situation, the following response came to me: "Do not concern yourself with me, I am under the care of the Spirit." This struck me quite significantly, as this message was as much for me as it would have been a response to another. I am often concerned about my own spirituality in an intellectual manner. I keep forgetting to be patient and to allow myself to be cared for by the Spirit. I must remember to say to myself, "Do not concern yourself so much, Friend, you are being cared for by the Spirit."

Relating to friends (lower case 'f')

2005-05-15T23:37:00.000-04:00

Note: The below is slighty tweaked from what I wrote in a post on my normal, not specifically spiritual online journal/blog, but I felt it appropriate to articulate here as it still pertains to my experiences with Quakerism.

Does it make sense to feel generally lonely shortly after going out and hugging a bunch of different friends and hanging out?

There are so many people I hug on a regular basis and love so much, who love me so much back; I offer all of my support and love to my friends, but I feel like there's something very important missing. We all hug all the time and hang out and talk about surface things, but we rarely go deeper, into more personal issues. I want to connect on a deeper level. I want to really get to know my friends, not just hug them every day.

I feel like some of the things in my life that are most important to me and who I am are either not important at all to anyone else, or I'm afraid talking about them will make someone else uncomfortable - and it never really comes up anyway.

A big part of who I am has to do with my spirituality and Quakerism. Eventhough everyone knows I'm Quaker and some ask general questions about Quakerism (or even attend Meeting with me on occassion), I never actually talk about my own experiences. This year has been a year of incredible change for me on my spiritual journey as a Quaker; I've developed and grown so much. But who around here would know? Aside from my occassional comment about going somewhere or doing something or about how I know Quakers all over the country, I've rarely spoken about my own inward experiences. These inward experiences are central to my way of being and central to what thoughts go through my head on a daily basis. Almost a constant basis. I never talk about it because I don't want to intrude on anyone else's religious (or non-religious) comfort zone.

In my struggle to unite my spirituality with everything in my daily life, to unite my spirit with the mundane, I still keep it to myself. I even created a seperate journal to relate spiritual contemplations so that if my friends didn't want to hear about it, they don't have to. Though this seperate journal has caused me to find a small online community of Friends (which is wonderful), it still does not help me relate to my friends here. I almost feel like I'm hiding this huge part of myself from everyone, but I wouldn't quite know how to express it even if I weren't afraid of making people uncomfortable.

It's not that my spirituality is particularly discomforting or off-putting, it's that I'm afraid that any talk at all of spirituality would be off-putting for some, and I don't want to put anyone off. I tend to save my in-person rambles about spirituality for when some philosophical conversation occurs of its own accord and tends toward the direction of spirituality, but that just hasn't happened that often around here. As I continue on and develop, more and more, I need someone to talk to.

I still behave in ways that fit with my spiritual and Quaker beliefs and experiences, and haven't been deliberately going against anything central to my Spirit in order to "fit in" or anything, it's just that I never talk about why, or no one actually notices in the first place.

I don't have any solution to this problem. I just felt the need to articulate it. Perhaps I'll feel better about all of it now, perhaps I will not. I'm still working on finding a balance in many aspects of my life.

Finding the Spirit in the Mundane

2005-05-12T19:51:00.000-04:00

I continue to find that when I look back upon my posts I am reminded of things that came to me on a particular day, but that I let go of too soon. I need to remember the joy and love in everything around me, I need to remember to listen with my heart more than my head. I need to remember that it is ok to have periods of spiritual chaos, or periods of spiritual dry-ness. Forcing things usually makes them worse.

It is so difficult to remember these things in my life here at school (I live at a boarding school); I feel that I am stuck in a rut. A few months ago I placed pieces of paper on the wall by my bed that say the following things: "Peace - To be calm within despite chaos without", "Listen with calm Patience", "Nurture with Care and Grace", and "LOVE passionately". It was my hope that if I was reminded by these words each morning that I may remember them throughout my daily routines. Usually, though, I barely notice them in my groggy morning state as I check my email, throw on some normal clothes, grab my bag, and shuffle off to class. I find it incredibly easy to be distracted during the day from things I hope to keep in my heart at all times. I realize that I do keep things in my heart even if I am not constantly thinking of them, but there are times when I simply forget or get frustrated and don't remember to feel. I've spent too long feeling like the mundane and the spiritual aspects of life are seperate.

I feel so distracted these days! I don't even know by what! Though I know it is ok to be chaotic sometimes, I wish that I were better at feeling and identifying the Spirit in the mundane during these periods of chaos.

Welcome to My New Blog Site!

2005-05-10T00:48:00.000-04:00

I realized today that for the purposes of my spiritual blog, Blogger (blogspot) is much more appropriate than Livejournal. It's more finished-looking, has more (and better) options, and seems to be of much better quality. In having better quality, I may take more time and care with my posts - with Livejournal I tend to edit very little - and this will have a good impact on my writing skills and articulation.

I have added Quaker Ranter, The Good Raised Up, and Of the Best Stuff, but Plain to my 'Other Blogs' list, and I hope that these Friends do not mind (please, let me know immediately if you mind and I will take down the links ASAP).

As you can probably see, I have added all of the posts from my previous blog (with appropriate dates for date of post), http://www.livejournal.com/users/quakerspeak/. Those that did not have titles before now have some sort of title to make the 'Recent Posts' list easier to read. The only thing that did not switch along with my posts are the comments on them, which can still be found at http://www.livejournal.com/users/quakerspeak/.

I may still use the livejournal account for minor livejournal things (such as the Quaker community there), but for the most part, this is now the blog I will use for spiritual and theological contemplations, writings, etc.

Any advice about blogspot or my particular blog is quite welcome.

Peace

The Heart of my Restlessness

2005-05-09T01:23:00.000-04:00

I feel like there's a lot of stuff floating around inside me that needs to get out and I don't know how to let it out. I find it difficult to truly listen and wait. I had no problem sitting still during Meeting today, but my focus is off. I can't even remember what I thought about or felt during Meeting today, and that's quite frustrating. I feel like I'm flailing my arms in the dark, looking for someone to take hold and guide me. I know that flailing my arms is not going to do anything; they say if you are lost to stay where you are until someone finds you. Perhaps that is part of what waiting is about; waiting for the Spirit to guide you.

Alas, there is a restlessness within me, about which I know not what to do. It's times like these when I realize that when I think and try too hard it only makes things worse. It's time to relax my mind a little, wait, and listen more to my heart, to the Spirit. My intellectual side has been going on overdrive trying to purposefully "wait and listen". Listening is about waiting for a feeling. Instead of flailing my arms in the dark, I should pause and let my Light shine bright and guide me.

I am thankful that I created this particular journal. If I had not ventured to write the above, it may have taken much longer to reach the heart of my restlessness.

Need Quaker Book Suggestions!

2005-05-08T16:36:00.000-04:00

As I am delighting in the fact that I found an online resource where a number of older Pendle Hill Pamphlets are available online (http://www.pendlehill.org/pendle_hill_pamphlets.htm), I'm also excited about one more resource for reading material.

I am going to graduate from high school in three weeks, and my mom mentioned to me today that she had no idea what to get me as a graduation present. She noticed my high interest in Quaker reading materials (books, pamphlets, etc.), and offered as my graduation present $200 worth of Quaker books (of my choice)!

Even before this point I had gone through the FGC Bookstore catalogue and circled books that caught my interest right off, but I want to have input from other readers.

What books do you think every Friend should read? What books do you think a young Friend like myself should read? What books blew (blow) you away and took (take) part in your own (or anyone's) spiritual transformation?

Any suggestions?

[If you could give a brief description of the book in addition to title/author, that would be most helpful]

Love Conquers Hate

2005-05-06T21:35:00.000-04:00

Tonight I went to see a production of The Laramie Project put on by my old high school, Durham School of the Arts (DSA) (which has a PHENOMENAL theater program).

Wait, let me back up. I'd known for a few months that DSA was putting on a production of the Laramie Project and had full intentions of attending. A little over a month ago, though, I learned that Fred Phelps was going to be there and hold a protest as people went in to see the production. Now Fred Phelps does not give off a very loving vibe; in fact, it's quite the opposite that he's after. He preaches HATE. He's a Baptist preacher from somewhere in Kansas (I think it's Kansas) and he travels around the country protesting things and preaching hate (and basing it in the Bible), and that God hates some people and puts them in Hell for it.

In talking to others about this upcoming event, I found that many people reacted with anger and a sort of returned hatred. To me, this does not feel right - we're all equal, everyone has Light within. My reaction to Fred Phelps is to love him back and feel pain for the hatred present in his life. What he preaches is so incredibly outrageous that I cannot even begin to take it seriously (if you look at his website, www.godhatesfags.com, you might see what I mean).

So tonight I went to see this production of the Laramie Project, at which Phelps and followers were protesting. I did not really know what to expect of this, but I knew that I did not want to react to him; I wanted to just walk past and not let them get any reaction from me. As I walked down the sidewalk past the anti-gay protesters with my arm around a good friend, I did not feel affected by the Fred Phelps protest - as I mentioned before it was too outrageous for me to take seriously. What did strike me greatly was the counter protest across the street. There were 20 or so anti-gay protesters, and at least 100 counter-protesters packed like sardines between the street and the building across the street. I felt an immense loving vibe from them, one person was holding a large sign that said "God is Love", which warmed my Spirit. There was no violence, just a great amount of love.

In watching the production of the Laramie Project I was reminded of the vigils around the world for Matthew Sheperd and his family and the vast out-pouring of love. Despite all the violence and pain in this world, there is so much LOVE, and it's so easy to become distracted from it. Responding to hate with more hate only provokes the problem, two wrongs don't make a right. As the cliche statement goes, love conquers hate, and it's so true.

I do not know what moves Fred Phelps, but despite his efforts he probably inspires more love in his actions than hate. There is always love, everywhere - you just have to remember it.

Some Passion in Chaos

2005-05-05T21:34:00.000-04:00

Despite my lack of ability to find stillness in my life, I am still able to find my passion. I'm involved in so many different things (Quaker and other) that I feel like I'm constantly losing my mind! The upside to this, however, is that I'm involved in many things that I am passionate about. While I'm running around feeling an all too familiar twinge of insanity, I'm still finding ways to coordinate with other Friends both locally and nationally about my experiences and get things done that I didn't think I could do. After speaking on a panel at a conference with a good portion of Quaker editors, representatives of publishers, and authors, I'm finding that there is so much I want to write!

Every day I feel like I think of something else I need or want to do or read, and at this rate I'll never have another free moment! Somehow I need to discover the peace in all of this chaos - I can't just wait for my life to calm down because by now I've learned that I don't let my life calm down. Every time I think there's a less chaotic period of time coming up, it turns out to be just as chaotic as the time before.

If I believed there was such a thing as 'over ambitious', I'd give myself that label right away! (Perhaps overly ambitious will have to suffice for now.)

I will find peace and calm. I just have to listen and wait - things that are all too quickly forgotten in this fast-paced life I lead.

An Essay Thing

2005-05-04T21:32:00.000-04:00

I find that there are so many things on my on-going To Do list that I have a constant need to be doing something! (So much for finding stillness..) However, every free moment I get (or create) I find myself reading a Quaker related writing of some sort, sending emails about one of the Quaker things I'm involved with, or trying to write something about my Quaker experiences or ideas of things to do.

I started writing an email the other day and it turned into an essay about a need to improve young Friend and adult Friend relationships in local meetings. I've decided to post this essay here, though it may need a little editing if anything serious is to become of it.

[Note: this is a revised version from the one originally posted in my other blog, http://www.livejournal.com/users/quakerspeak/]

On April 23 I flew to Oregon to serve on an editorial board for a book that QUIP is putting together of young Friends' experiences of Quakerism. After arriving in Oregon but before I met with the editorial board for this, I served on a panel with the other young Friends on the editorial board in a QUIP meeting (as we had arrived at the end of a QUIP conference for our meeting) about how media, printed or otherwise, inspired us spiritually. As we related our experiences as young Friends (and growing up as Quakers), a number of issues surfaced rather quickly.

As young Friends move through high school and enter the [young] adult world, there is often a general lack of communication between young Friends and adults in Meetings, as if there's some tension about it. Personally, as a young Friend in Durham Friends Meeting (NCYM(C)), I've found that I know certain adults - ones with whom I have interacted more specifically over the years as I have grown up. Often these are parents of other young Friends in the Meeting or people who have been involved in youth group events. What's missing is the connection to the rest of the adults in Meeting; I've been attending Durham Friends Meeting since I was born (with a period during middle school where I was mostly absent, but for the last few years I've been quite regular in attendance) and I feel like most of the meeting has no idea who I am. In addition to that, I've not known how to communicate my involvement and dedication in various national Quaker communities, such as being chosen as one of six co-clerks of the HS program at FGC Gathering this summer, my participation in Young Quakes, my attendance at a Pendle Hill Clerking workshop last fall, my involvement in this QUIP book, or how I have been reading many Quaker books over the last few months, all of which have been VERY integral in my spiritual development. Even Friends in DFM with whom I do converse sometimes after Meeting do not know of all these things with which I am involved.

Also, when I stopped attending First Day school in January of my junior year in high school (a little over a year ago) and began attending the full hour of Worship, I spoke to two youth leaders about it briefly so they would understand, and then there was no further response. Looking back on this, I feel that the Meeting should be more involved in such a transition for all young Friends - not just those adults directly involved in the youth group/First Day school, but everyone should be more aware and attentive of the young Friends in Meeting and their involvement in Quaker communities outside of Meeting.

One thing that each of us felt is very important yet very lacking is mentorship within Meeting for Worship. There need to be adults who are not necessarily First Day school teachers, youth group leaders, or parents who are willing to have a relationship with a young Friend as someone who has had more experience with Quakerism and can nurture a young Friend's spiritual development. A young Friend who was in Oregon with me related her experiences with a mentor she has at Earlham (she is a second-year there, currently), and how she sees him about once a week; often she even receives books to read from him.

As the only active young Friend at my school (I'm sort of the 'token' Quaker around), I usually do not have anyone to talk to about my spiritual findings and leadings. As I have continued to develop spiritually, I find more and more I need other Friends to talk to who are familiar with my struggles.

These are issues not only within Durham Friends Meeting, but in Meetings across the country. I recognize that there are efforts to improve youth programs everywhere, but it never hurts to start locally.

As a graduating senior this year, and as an involved Friend, I would like to improve my relationship with the Meeting as a whole and make way for better relationships between members and young Friends in the future. This, however, needs to be fully a double-sided effort.

Ambitions!

2005-05-03T21:31:00.000-04:00

I've gained a sense of being overwhelmed with resources as I continue to discover more and more online Quaker resources. In surfing through Martin's QuakerRanter website (www.nonviolence.org/martink), I ran into a site with a few online faith and practice resources (http://worship.quaker.org/qfp/), including a complete online version of my yearly meeting's (NCYM(C)'s) faith and practice which I have been meaning to read! I plan to get a paper copy soon, but I am still excited to find such an online resources!

Dear me, there is so much to read! Books! Online essays! Blogs! Faith and Practices! Things to write, to organize! I believe I am at a turning point in my spirituality and involvement with Quakerism - I was involved before, but now I've found that my intensity just jumped off the charts.

I often read of ambitious young Friends like myself eventually losing steam and energy and fading away - I do not want this to happen to me. I don't plan to go that way.

a couple things..

2005-05-01T21:31:00.000-04:00

I've been thinking about how to interpret the concept of being 'saved' in a way that has meaning to me. This idea came to me - when someone is 'saved from their sins', it is when they begin to trust in their Spirit and start to realize that people do make mistakes; one is being 'saved' from their own intense judgement of their flaws or mistakes in life (otherwise known as 'sins').

In my efforts to approach spirituality from a more spiritual standpoint as opposed to intellectually, I'm having some trouble. I'm a very intellectual thinker, and I'm having so much trouble finding stillness! It's from situations like these that I have learned most strongly that time, patience, and waiting are what I need most. I must remain patient and allow my Spirit to nurture me as I nurture it (because my Spirit and I are one and the same).

All journeys, it seems, have periods of immense chaos and confusion. With time, things begin to clear and make sense.

In Need of Stillness

2005-04-30T21:30:00.000-04:00

These past few days my mood and some of my actions have been much less controlled than usual for me. I've generally been feeling better and in better moods during the day, but then I get random negative streaks - when speaking I feel like things come out of my mouth that I normally wouldn't say (not insulting or demeaning things, just new and more negative ways of griping about things that I normally wouldn't bother to gripe about); I've been talking more and listening less, it seems.

I know that I need stillness. Perhaps this lapse in control is part of a transition from intellectually led daily actions to more spirit led actions. This is not a problem to be solved by intellectual means - I must find stillness.

Joy

2005-04-28T18:49:00.000-04:00

I just read an entry of a friend of mine about joy and being incredibly happy and joyous and ecstatic about life (thanks Cait, if you read this). It made me realize that all week I've been quite intense in my spiritual contemplations and readings that I've almost forgotten to find joy in the spirit! It's not that I haven't been happy or having a good time, just that I've been too intense. I was already beginning to realize that I need to find more stillness, but in this stillness I should remember joy in life.

It also reminds me of a conversation I had with a couple Friends at the clerking workshop at Pendle Hill last November about trying to stay centered while having a "rowdy good time". I think part of having a rowdy good time is the spirit present in the joy - being totally centered all the time is not how we stereotype it! One does not have to remain calm and of moderate energy to be centered - centeredness is not necessarily a state of meditation 24/7, but a focus on the spirit at hand in everything and everyone, that is everything and everyone.

I am sad that I'll miss meeting tomorrow (I'll be sitting on an airplane somewhere between San Diego and NC), but I'm getting much better at finding my spirituality at all times everywhere, these days. I'm working on bridging the gap between what I view as my 'secular' activites and my spiritual life.

Obsessive Quakerism

2005-04-28T03:01:00.000-04:00

I'm feeling quite obsessive about Quakerism right now. Perhaps it's just the word 'obsessive' that gets me, but it's almost making me uncomfortable. However, to be fully focused on spiritual development, one really has to be somewhat obsessive until it entirely natural (where you don't have to think about things as consciously anymore).

Quakerism and my spirituality are in the forefront of my mind and of my thinking right now (and I think 'obsessive' actually describes my thought processes quite well).

I never really thought much about how I was sort of bottling up all my theological and spiritual contemplations; suddenly I feel like I'm pouring it all out on the table and examining it all.. well, except that I've been examining it all. I'm trying to better apply my sprituality to my daily life and interactions without losing sight of myself; I'm trying to figure out where it all fits into my own life without trying to alter my personality or ways of being.

I feel quite naive in this 'obsessive' feeling. I feel like this should all be natural and unconscious - my reactions to the world around me, that is. However, it's tending toward that way; my reactions to things are more and more natural.

I'm learning how to better listen to that still small voice in every situation, not just ones where I'm thinking about it. Sometimes this is quite difficult.

I don't think I just made very much sense. Perhaps it's time to end this entry and move on.

peace

On God

2005-04-28T01:28:00.000-04:00

When it comes to the actual existence of God, I have put a lot of thought into things; I am a logical person and blind faith just doesn’t cut it. I’ve pondered questions like why should I believe in God when others can lead decent lives as atheists? What makes me think there is any sort of God? If I do believe in God, what kind of form is it/he/she? How does it ‘reveal’ itself or ‘interact’ with the world and myself? What would it mean in my life?

I believe God exists because there is love and beauty in the world. Even if beauty is subjective and love is just an innate chemical reaction in our brains, the fact that we can experience these things emotionally means to me that something deeper is involved.

Traditional views of God don’t make any sense to me. Why would such a concept be male, have emotions (such as anger), or be separate from all things? Would God not be an incomprehensively integral part of everything and every action everywhere? How could this concept be any other way? Besides, if this Spirit really is the ‘Father’ of Jesus, ‘the only Son of God,’ then what does that leave for possible intelligent beings on planets far gone from here who would have no possible way of knowing about Jesus?

If God made way for Life, then I believe God in its ubiquitous nature is ensuring that Life is lived fully and gracefully, which is why we have leadings and callings. God is helping us to Live fully. I don’t understand everything about these conclusions I have come to; in fact, they’re not really conclusions, they’re beliefs, concepts, notions, leadings. Such a journey is continuous and on-going.

A Passage that Speaks to Me

2005-04-28T01:26:00.000-04:00

A passage from Emilia Fogelklou Norlind found in A Certain Kind of Perfection (Margery Post Abbott, page 77) that really spoke to me:

In this period she ceased to worry about the opinions and views of other people, and yet she felt a new sharing of life with everyone. She met others from the inside, including her colleagues, who had no notion of what she had experienced.

Was this not to have gained “the life which is life indeed”? Neither church, nor priest, nor Bible had converted her. It was the living spirit of God that had come down into the lifeless being, so that she finally knew what Life is and what Love is, without that knowledge being bound to any outward intermediary. She saw that we all belong indissolubly together in the depths of God. Christ knew this, lived this, found this among publicans and sinners. She stood before and inexhaustible well of new thoughts, feelings and certainties. The richness was too overwhelming for her to be able to draw up more than a few drops at a time. She was boundlessly happy.

I find in these two paragraphs many things that I, myself, feel that I have experienced or want to strive to experience. In this period she ceased to worry about the opinions and views of other people, and yet she felt a new sharing of life with everyone. She met others from the inside, including her colleagues, who had no notion of what she had experienced. I strive to “meet others from the inside”, even when they have ‘no notion of what [I have] experienced’. Being usually the only active young Friend around, I feel uncomfortable talking to others about my spiritual experiences and developments as I fear they would not understand (where one quite familiar with Quakerism might); also, sometimes I fear that I might make someone uncomfortable with all my contemplation.

Neither church, nor priest, nor Bible had converted her. It was the living spirit of God that had come down into the lifeless being, so that she finally knew what Life is and what Love is, without that knowledge being bound to any outward intermediary. “Neither church, nor priest, nor Bible” converted me, but my Inner Spirit. I am learning so much about Life and Love all the time, and am striving to keep myself from binding any of my notions of spirituality to outward intermediaries.

She saw that we all belong indissolubly together in the depths of God. We do. I feel it.

Beginning Ramble

2005-04-28T01:23:00.000-04:00

I really want someone to talk to about spirituality. I have so much in me to express, to articulate, to sort out! Reading Margery’s book (A Certain Kind of Perfection) has opened new doors for me, spiritually; I’m grappling with the concept of Christ. I’ve found that reading selections from these well-known early Quakers and their experiences with “Christ” or “Jesus” or “Christ Jesus” (etc.) has allowed me to relate to people and words that normally would turn me away; “Christ” is a word that, in the past, has made me shudder or cringe or just glaze over, and when reading this book I have not responded in any of those ways. I have so many questions to work out, of which to discover the meaning. Why does Inner Light have to be “Christ”, per se?

I find Jesus to be a role model, someone to strive to be like. He is a prime example of someone who followed leadings and his Inner Light in life and through that has become one of the most influential people in the history of the world. I feel that I can say I strive to follow the example of Christ as I strive to find and listen to that still small voice within me (does this make me Christian? What does it really mean to be ‘Christian’, anyway?). When others refer to that still small voice as the Light of Christ (as George Fox called it), I see it as symbolic; it is Light like Christ’s Light, because it is in all of us, and Christ happens to be a shining example. I see God as something that is everywhere in everything; it doesn’t necessarily have a shape, form, gender, or classification. In fact, I see God as more of a verb than a noun. God is everything we do, love, compassion, kindness, generosity, the balance of pain and suffering, the boundless beauty in everything. That is my experience of God.

When people describe their immense moments of revelation and release and sudden trust in the comfort and love of God, I think I see that as a moment of recognition of Inner Light. I’ve always had trouble with any sort of literal interpretations of Biblical things (such as Jesus actually being the Son of God and that he ‘saved’ us from our ‘sins’), so descriptions of spiritual experiences when someone ‘found Jesus’ are hard for me to interpret sometimes. When someone ‘turns their life over to Jesus’, I see that as when they discover how to trust their Inner Light and leadings from it.

I believe not just that God or Inner Light is in everything, but that God/Inner Light is everything. I don’t just have Inner Light, Inner Light and I are one and the same. So when I have a leading or my Inner Light is guiding me to do something, it’s not some separate entity giving suggestions. It is an integral part of my very being that is calling me to action.

Spiritual Journeys

Moving Forward

Strength in Weakness

Oh right, I have a blog

Free to be Lost

All the World Together

Saving the World by Coming Alive

Words of Wisdom from Yoda

True Evangelism Grounded in True Faith

Faith Enough to Be Outrageous

Blog Changes

More on Asking the Important Question

What Question Leads Me to the True Fires of the Spirit?

Feelings of Disunity and Loss of Spiritual Focus are Part of Faith

Birthday

A Need to Be More Outwardly Spiritual

Statement from My Home Meeting

Tom Fox and Living in the Power

Faithfulness Through a Drop in Spiritual Intensity

A Shared Experience

A United Religious Society of Friends

Authentic Faithfulness

The Challenge of Letting Go

In tune with the Spirit

Being Broken Open

FGC Central Committee

"What we need is here."

Just Who Is This "Claire" Person, Anyway?

A Walk to Simply BE

Toward the Mountain

Two Days Later..

Called into the Depths

Attending Unfamiliar Monthly Meetings - First Impressions

Philosophical Reason, God, and Faith

What's Quakerism?

Walking with God

Note: Need for Groundedness

Notes for a bit

A Note from the Other Side

Pre-Move-In Note

It's ok if you don't know everything

The 'young Friend' Identity [perhaps]

Poking the Coals of my Blog

Blog Tweaks

Whispers of Faith: Young Friends share their experiences of Quakerism

Space for Comments

Epistle from FGC Gathering High School Program

"Where is the Spirit in this?" - a rough draft

Lurkers!

Gathering follow-up.

Note:

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - FRIDAY, Nominating Committee and the last night

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - FRIDAY, Eyes Wide Open

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - THURSDAY

Brief Note:

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - WEDNESDAY, Meeting for Worship with Concern for Business

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - WEDNESDAY, late afternoon, evening

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - WEDNESDAY, during the day

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - TUESDAY

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - MONDAY

FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend - SUNDAY (First Day)

Preface; FGC Gathering 2005: The Experience of a clerking young Friend

Post-Gathering Self Check-in

Gathering Soon, and a Passage

Finding the Ground..

Brief Note

Simplicity - an unfocused thought blurt

Brief update

College and Quakerism: a dilemma

Cared for by the Spirit

Relating to friends (lower case 'f')

Finding the Spirit in the Mundane

Welcome to My New Blog Site!

The Heart of my Restlessness

Need Quaker Book Suggestions!

Love Conquers Hate

Some Passion in Chaos

An Essay Thing

Ambitions!

a couple things..