Intervisitation Resources and Links

Resources

Intervisitation

Travelling In The Ministry And Intervisitation, Britain Yearly Meeting, Faith and Practice, 13.21.
"Intervisitation: Travel Under Religious Concern - Quaker Heritage and Present Need," by Van Ernst, Friends World Committee for Consultation, circa 1982.
"FGC Letters of Travel," Friends General Conference Traveling Ministries Program, http://fgcquaker.org/traveling/letterofintroduction.html
"Visitation among Friends," FGConnections, Summer 2004, http://www.fgcquaker.org/connect/summer04/index.html
"Traveling in the Ministry," Jonathan Vogel-Borne, Paper written for Friends Meeting at Cambridge, 1987. http://www.fgcquaker.org/library/ministry/travelingintheministry.html
"Report of a Visitation Preparation Weekend," NYYM Ministry and Counsel, http://www.fgcquaker.org/library/fosteringmeetings/0501.html
On Living With A Concern For Gospel Ministry, Brian Drayton, Chapter 24, on intervisition, Quaker Press of FGC, 2005.
Walk Worthy Of Your Calling: Quakers And The Traveling Ministry, Margery Post Abbott and Peggy Senger Parsons, eds. Friends United Press. 2004.
"Traveling in the Ministry as a Spiritual Companion" by Jean-Marie Barch, FGConnections, Fall 2002, http://www.fgcquaker.org/connect/fall02/3.html.

Quotations on Intervisitation

"Intervisitation has been crucial in preserving Friends' identity as a religious community, and the simple wish to be among other Friends, to learn their experience of God, to share one's own experience, and to strengthen in that way the bonds of love among us is motive enough for Friends to travel to other meetings." Friends' Tradition of Travel, Gordon Browne
"I believe that much could be accomplished by carefully planned intervisitation. There are highly gifted persons in a few meetings, who ought to circulate much more than is now the case. Their absence occasionally from their own meeting would throw the sense of responsibility on other members of it, which would have a wholesome effect, and they would bring fresh life and inspiration where they visited." Rufus M. Jones, 1941
"Visitors are especially valuable to isolated Friends and small worship groups and meetings. Visitation lets them know that what they do is important because faithful worship has ultimate, cosmic significance. It also reminds isolated Friends that they are part of a larger religious tradition and community. Visits help small groups shape and strengthen their sense of identity, and can encourage and strengthen their intentionality." Martha Paxson Grundy, "Christ Teaching Us," in Walk Worthy of Your Calling, p. 134.
"As one person put it, 'My home felt blessed for several days after your group had been here.' Perhaps holding an opportunity in a home is the Quaker equivalent to taking the sacrament into the home and offering the elements of Holy Communion there. If this be true, then the Quaker sacrament is nothing more nor less than one person offering the whole self to God in the presence of another person." William Taber, "Opportunities," in Walk Worthy of Your Calling, p. 118.
"The spiritual life of the Society of Friends has long been nourished by visitation outside one's own Meeting. Such visitation may be thought of by the visitor as 'casual,' or as 'concerned.' A casual visit should have some motive of concern-concern with the deepest values of friendship, of fellowship, and the life of the Spirit. Whether or not motivated by special mission, the visits of those who come in love and fellowship are likely to enrich those involved, and indeed the life of the Society." Faith and Practice, New England Yearly Meeting, p. 264.

Clearness Committees

Hoffman, Jan, Clearness Committees and Their Use in Personal Discernment, http://www.fgcquaker.org/library/fosteringmeetings/0208.html
Guidelines for Embracing the Ministry of Friends, BYM, at
http://www.bym-rsf.org/quakers/pubs/Guidelines/Released%20Friends%20Guidelines.shtml or for an Acrobat version, http://www.bym-rsf.org/quakers/pubs/Guidelines/Guidelines_for_Embracing_Ministry_Friends.pdf
Responding to Calls to Ministry
Excerpts of a publication by Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting
http://www.fgcquaker.org/library/fosteringmeetings/0209.html
Clearness Committees, Committees of Care, and Committees of Oversight
From Organization and Procedure of Canadian Yearly Meeting, 1990
http://www.fgcquaker.org/library/fosteringmeetings/0207.html

Background Information on FUM concern

"Information Packet on Friends United Meeting's Policy of Discrimination and Baltimore Yearly Meeting's Response with Pertinent Historical Events and Issues," July 1, 2004. This is not available on the web. Copes may be in the libraries of BYM meetings. It may also available from the BYM office. 301-774-7663, bym@bym-rsf.org .
BYM's webpage on the FUM Policy Concern - http://www.bym-rsf.org/quakers/FUMPolicy.shtml
For the intervisitation committee mission statement, see Interim Meeting Minute I2005-3, 4/2005.
For BYM's 2004 epistle on the concern, see
http://www.bym-rsf.org/quakers/pubs/FUM%20Policy%20Epistle.shtml
BYM Ad Hoc Committee on Gender and Sexual Diversity Concerns
http://www.bym-rsf.org/quakers/committees/gender-concerns.shtml
You will also get some of the history by looking at the minutes from interim meetings and annual sessions. The event that precipitated the concern occurred in 2002, so you should find relevant excerpts from the 2002 annual sessions on. http://www.bym-rsf.org/quakers/pubs/minutes/minutes.shtml

If you would like to join in this program either as a visitor or a host, please contact the Ad Hoc Intervisitation Committee at intervisitation@bym-rsf.org.

We welcome any comments.