Category Archives: Quaker Theology

Carolina Quaker Witch Hunt: Here Comes The “Auditing Committee”

“All meetings will be ministered [by the “Auditing Committee”]to in order to obtain change so that they might comply with the will of NCYM as to theological, financial and membership issues. There will be ongoing dialogue between the meeting and the Auditing Committee during this process. If any meeting which is out of compliance wishes to commit to change and come back into compliance, they will be asked to sign a statement of such by the pastor, clerk and all members of Ministry and Counsel and be on probation for one year with consequences. “

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D-Day for Carolina Quakers–Dodging Some Bullets — But NOT All

The theme was announced by none other than Wayne Lamb, pastor of Chatham NC Friends and self-proclaimed scourge of liberal Carolina Quakers. “It’s June 6,” he boomed to the Representative meeting of North Carolina Yearly Meeting-FUM (NCYM), crowded into Pine Hill Meeting in Ararat NC. Then, for emphasis: “June 6, 1944,” he repeated, then added: … Continue reading D-Day for Carolina Quakers–Dodging Some Bullets — But NOT All

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Carolina Quakers: Saturday Showdown at Pine Hill?

What does “Integrity” mean in relation to North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends?

Does it mean taking seriously the four times that Faith & Practice says that it is NOT a CREED and thinking for oneself? Or is it picking out a few phrases from it and trying to make them the “absolute authority” for an organized purge of officers, committees, and meetings–something that same Faith & Practice does NOT authorize anywhere??

Is it attacking meetings which have honest issues about the fairness of their treatment in the yearly meeting, and reflect that in the partial payment of askings?

Or is there integrity in making widespread public threats about withholding ALL askings as of April 15, 2015 unless there was a purge by that date of disfavored meetings — and then abandoning the threat when the deadline passes and it doesn’t work?

Is it shown in getting creeds from other Quaker branches, purchasing most study resources and programs from Baptists, ignoring practically every Quaker in history and almost all the yearly meeting programs (except, of course, Quaker Lake) — and then demanding that other meetings be forbidden from freely associating with other kinds of Quakers, on their own time, and with their own funds?

And is there integrity in pursuing heresy inside this yearly meeting while making detailed plans to secede and form a separate body, one which will abandon just about every Quaker distinctive there is?

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Re-Re-Re-Inventing The Wheel: 170 Years of “Convergent” Quakerism

As Robin Mohr, the younger Friend who coined the “Convergent” label put it, the idea appeals to “Friends from the politically liberal end of the evangelical branch, the Christian end of the unprogrammed branch, and the more outgoing end of the Conservative branch.”

But what has happened repeatedly is that the “politically (and theologically) liberal end of the evangelical branch” gets lopped off, and those involved either hunker down, or join an exodus.

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