Category Archives: Hard-Core Quaker

Authentic Religious Liberty Day, May 24: More Testimony

“I have seen periods of progress followed by reaction. I have seen the hopes and aspirations of Negroes rise during World War II, only to be smashed during the Eisenhower years. I am seeing the victories of the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations destroyed by Richard Nixon.”

Bayard, there have been ups and down since then. But I think it’s been increasingly tough in recent years, and this year is really awful. Maybe it’s better that you’re not here to see it. But I’d sure appreciate your counsel.

“I think the movement contributed to this nation a sense of universal freedom. Precisely because women saw our movement in the sixties, stimulated them to want their rights. The fact that students saw the movement of the sixties created a student movement in this country.”

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Religious Liberty Day: for Friends & Others

If I was the Quaker Pope, Fifth Month (May) 24 would be one of the biggest Quaker holidays/festivals on our [non]liturgical calendar. That’s because it is (or should be), “Religious Liberty Day.”

It was on the 24th of Fifth Month, in 1689, that the Toleration Act, in official jargon, “received the Royal Assent,” and thus became law in England and its dominions.

Why is this important to Quakers?

Because that’s the day when Quakers & Quakerism became legal. It marked the successful conclusion to almost thirty years of suffering, organizing and lobbying.

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Some Quaker FAQs — Part 8

Remember the earlier question about Quakers as a gathered or called people? Robert Barclay presents one of the early expressions of that idea.

Barclay then makes a subtle pun on a hoary Catholic Latin dictum; “extra ecclesiam, nullas salus,” which meant, “outside the [Roman Catholic] church, there is no salvation”:

“Aside from this Church there can be no salvation, because this Church and its denomination comprehend all, regardless of what nation, kindred, tongue or people they may be, who have become obedient to the holy light and testimony of God in their hearts.”

The extent to which Barclay is turning this exclusivist notion on its head quickly becomes clear, in the truly radical passage which follows:

“Although they may be outwardly unknown to and distant from those who profess Christ and Christianity in words and have the benefit of the scriptures, yet they have become sanctified by their obedience and cleansed from the evil of their ways. For this is the universal or catholic spirit….”

In a sense, all Barclay has done is change the first letter of the term “catholic church”, from a capital “C”, designating a specific church (such as the Roman Catholic) to lower case, referring to something generic, something beyond or before specific denominational churches; but in this simple typographical change there is a world of difference.

To get a sense of the magnitude of this shift, simply compare Barclay’s conclusion with more exclusive views of the church.

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Some Quaker FAQs – Part 7

Q. What Did Early Quakers Say About Their New Church?

They said many things. Here are only three of numerous available quotes:

George Fox:

“John did bear witness to the light of Christ; the great heavenly prophet hath enlightened every man who cometh into the world withal; that they may believe in it, become the children of the light, and so have the light.”

William Penn:

“The humble, meek, merciful, just, pious and devout souls are everywhere of one religion; and when death has taken off the mask, they will know one another, though the diverse liveries they wear here make them strangers.”

John Woolman:

“There is a principle which is pure, placed in the human mind, which in different places and ages has different names. It is, however, pure, and proceeds from God. It is deep and inward, confined to no forms of religion nor excluded from any, where the heart stands in perfect sincerity. In whomsoever this takes root and grows, of what nation soever, they become brethren in the best sense of the expression.”

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Tough Interfaith Conversations & “Leaves of Grass”

Interfaith conversation: sounds warm & fuzzy, right?
In reality, though, beyond the Brother/Sisterhood week banquets, it can be pretty tough.
For instance, how would YOU handle these real situations that came up in one such interfaith program?
Rebecca Mays, at the American Academy of Religion, 2015.
–a Muslim young man from a rural island whose hadith lineage would not allow him to enter the sanctuary of a Christian church if a cross stood in the sanctuary (but they were scheduled to visit such a church);
— a young Buddhist scholar from Myanmar (Burma) who argued that the Rohingyah young woman in the group should not call herself by that name as that ethnic group as such has never existed in his country (the Myanmar government has been accused of genocide involving Rohingyah); or
— a Muslim young woman who could not room with our one transgendered participant.

All these and many more such challenges have been faced by Rebecca Mays, a Philadelphia area Friend who has been Director of the Dialogue Institute at Temple University since 2012.
And in the new issue of “Quaker Theology,” she describes how she faced these complex encounters.

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