Faith and Practice Revision Committee
The Faith and Practice Revision Committee consists of at least
three persons nominated by the Nominating Committee and appointed
by the Yearly Meeting. These persons are appointed only when proposed
revisions have been presented in writing to the Yearly Meeting.
The same provisions regarding rotation of members and term limits
apply as for other standing committees. When no revisions are before
the Committee and the Committee has completed all its responsibilities,
the Yearly Meeting releases these persons from their appointment
to this Committee.
The Committee receives proposed changes and circulates proposed
revisions to all the Monthly and Quarterly Meetings in Baltimore
Yearly Meeting with sufficient time that Monthly Meetings may prepare
comments for a Quarterly Meeting session before Yearly Meeting.
The Committee may help prepare proposed changes to ensure clarity
and consistency with other sections of Faith and Practice. It is
responsible for ensuring that changes approved by the Yearly Meeting
are incorporated into Faith and Practice. Printing and distribution
of Faith and Practice or of its revised sections should be coordinated
with the Publications Committee.
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Manual of Procedure, July 2004, p22
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Advance Report - 2010
This has been another great year as we worked together writing, reading, rewriting, and coming up with a final draft for several sections of the Faith & Practice. We have met ten times during the year. Because we needed to cancel both the Second Month and Third Month meetings, we added in an extra meeting in June so that we could finish writing in time to get the new draft to the printer and delivered to Frostburg State University in time for Annual Session.
Who would have thought at the beginning of our year in Ninth Month that we would have a momentous occasion: two of our members become engaged! Wonderful things happen when you worship, share, write, and be open to the spirit together. We truly listen to what each is saying. We begin each meeting with a half-hour of worship, which helps us all.
Progress of the Revision of our Faith and Practice
As stated in our current Faith & Practice (1988), “This manual of Faith and Practice of Baltimore Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends is composed of statements of faith and of advice on organization and practice considered relevant for this present time. It is issued in the expectation, however, that another generation of seekers on the road toward Truth will make changes.”
In 2002, the Yearly Meeting approved the revival of the Faith & Practice Revision Committee to reconsider the structure and content of our current document. Since that time, the Committee has published its work in progress periodically in the hope that each Meeting and each Friend will help with that reconsideration. That hope has met with a gratifying response. At the time of this publication, we have received comments from 14 Meetings and several individuals, as well as some worship groups. We are encouraged by the response of Friends: some Meetings have reviewed our drafts in committee, while others have established “Friendly Eights” to reflect on the “Queries, Advices and Voices” before going to their Monthly Meetings for approval. Whatever the approach, the thoughtful consideration of this material is received with much thanks. We particularly appreciate responses from Meetings because they are seasoned through discussion with others and give us a better sense of the range of reactions among Friends.
Although we have attended to many of your responses, we have not yet integrated all comments received by the date of this publication. We consider all suggestions carefully. For those who find their suggestions have not been followed, it may be because others had a different view and our consideration of all the comments received led us elsewhere. For example, many Friends found the open-ended format of the new queries helpful in exploring issues, while others missed the “yes” or “no” queries. Because many meetings are in the midst of reviewing Voices, Advices, and Queries, we have kept this section the same as last year’s version to avoid the complexity and potential confusion of reviewing comments on different drafts.
We anticipate completing our work on the following schedule:
- By the time of Annual Meeting in 2011, we expect to have a complete draft of Faith and Practice. The 2011 edition will incorporate our deliberations on all comments received by February 1, 2011.
- We will integrate all comments received on the 2011 draft by February 1, 2012. The edition of 2012 will be, in essence, the version we submit for review at our Annual Meeting in 2013.
- We will seek approval for the new Faith and Practice in 2013.
Members of your Faith and Practice Revision Committee are available to meet with individual Meetings to discuss the history of this effort, to present our progress, and to encourage further discussion.
Please consider establishing a process to review this draft within your meeting. Send your suggestions, revisions, comments, and corrections to:
Faith and Practice Revision Committee
305 Friends Way
Harper’s Ferry
West Virginia 25425
fnp@bym-rsf.org or snbach@earthlink.net
Visioning Report - 2010
NEW:
The Faith and Practice Revision committee consists of at least six persons and not more than ten, nominated by the
Nominating Committee and appointed by the Yearly Meeting. These persons are appointed when the Interim or
Yearly Meeting minute the need for revision. Because the Committee needs to know one another well enough to
work together throughout the rewriting, the members of the Committee shall continue on the Committee until the
committee’s work is done, or they resign. When no revisions are before the Committee and the Committee has
completed all its responsibilities, the Yearly Meeting releases these persons from their appointment to this
Committee.
The Committee receives proposed changes and develops new text where needed. They circulate proposed revisions
to all the Monthly meetings and worship groups in Baltimore Yearly Meeting.
The above is what the Faith & Practice Revision Committee has been trying to have the Manual of Procedure
Committee change. This corresponds to what we actually do. The current description in the Manual of Procedure
was written a few years after the 1988 version was done and small changes were expected from time to time.
Although some people say we are rewriting, not revising, the dictionary does not differentiate between the two
words. In order to revise, one needs to rewrite and in order to rewrite one needs to revise.
OLD:
The Faith and Practice Revision Committee consists of at least three persons nominated by the Nominating
Committee and appointed by the Yearly Meeting. These persons are appointed only when proposed revisions have
been presented in writing to the Yearly Meeting. The same provisions regarding rotation of members and term limits
apply as for other standing committees. When no revisions are before the Committee and the Committee has
completed all its responsibilities, the Yearly Meeting releases these persons from their appointment to this
Committee.
The Committee receives proposed changes and circulates proposed revisions to all the Monthly and Quarterly
Meetings in Baltimore Yearly Meeting with sufficient time that Monthly Meetings may prepare comments for a
Quarterly Meeting session before Yearly Meeting. The Committee may help prepare proposed changes to ensure
clarity and consistency with other sections of Faith and Practice. Printing and distribution of Faith and Practice or
of its revised sections should be coordinated with the Publications Committee.
1) Looking at your committee description in the BYM Manual of Procedure: What is the most meaningful,enduring or vital part of your committee’s charge? Where is the energy, the Spirit, in it?
The description of the Faith & Practice Revision Committee in the 2009 Manual is quite incorrect. The second sentence is incorrect: “These persons are appointed only when proposed revisions have been presented in writing to the Yearly Meeting.” Appointments have not been based on this criterion, but have been made to consider extensive
revision to the document.
The third sentence is also incorrect: “The same provisions regarding rotation of members and term limits apply as
for other standing committees.” The terms on Faith & Practice Revision are much more lengthy than is normal.
And regarding the fourth sentence, while individuals have resigned, no one has been released: there are a multitude
of revisions that have been before the Committee for several years.
The importance of circulating proposed revisions cannot be understated.
The Publications Committee no longer exists. Faith & Practice Revision has taken on the responsibilities of
publication.
2) How does the Committee seek to accomplish this vital work? What vision does this move us toward?
The Committee meets in worshipful gatherings almost once a month for the last several years. Its task is to consider
whether the current 1988 version of the Faith and Practice adequately reflects our current understanding of our faith
and our practices.
3) What can we do best at this level, rather than at our monthly meetings or through national or international organizations?
This is a concern of the whole Yearly Meeting, and the participation of Monthly Meetings in the process is vital to a
well documented and well understood Faith and Practice. National and International organizations are largely
irrelevant. However we have enjoyed researching the Faith and Practices of other Yearly Meetings as amusing
resources.
4) How does the work of your Committee enrich, influence, or change Baltimore Yearly Meeting as a whole? Where do you see that work taking us as a Yearly Meeting?
The revised Faith and Practice of Baltimore Yearly Meeting should enliven Friends’ interest and understanding of
the depth and quality of our religion. We hope that our work will be relevant and appropriate to inform newcomers
as well as practicing Friends for a great many years to come.
The Committee unites strongly with the statement below.
“Revision of Faith and Practice is a concern of the whole Yearly Meeting, and the participation of Monthly
Meetings in the process is vital to a well-documented and well understood Faith and Practice. The Committee
receives proposed changes and develops new text where needed. It curculates proposed revsions to all the Monthly
Meetings and worship groups in Baltimore Yearly Meeting and carefully considers further revisions and
suggestions.”
Interchange, Fall 2009
Draft Faith & Practice
2009 Available
The 2009 draft version of the Baltimore Yearly Meeting
Faith and Practice, which is under continuing revision, is
now available. For $5 plus $2.38 shipping per copy, this
is the bargain of the year!
Some of the suggested changes previously sent in by individuals and Meetings
have been incorporated and others will appear in the next version. Everyone
is encouraged to read, ponder, consider, and reread this draft, for how the
material pertains to you and how it pertains to your Monthly Meeting or the Yearly Meeting as a whole. The Faith & Practice Revision Committee wants input from small groups as well as the Meeting as a whole. The more suggestions and corrections we have now, the easier it will be to approve the final draft. That
will come in three to five years from now, we hope!
To order your copy of this 2009 draft Faith & Practice
of Baltimore Yearly Meeting, send your name, mailing
address, email and/or phone number to Baltimore Yearly
Meeting, 17100 Quaker Lane, Sandy Spring, MD 20860
with a check for $7.38 made out to Baltimore Yearly
Meeting. You will be glad you did! If you want to pick
up a copy at the Yearly Meeting office, that will be fine.
Copies will be available at Interim Meeting at Goose
Creek Meeting on October 17. For any questions, contact
Sheila Bach at snbach@earthlink.net.
Advance Report - 2009
This has been another year of almost monthly committee meetings at the Friends Wilderness Center, a place where we can be in nature and work at the revision of the Baltimore Yearly Meeting Faith and Practice. As we continue working together, we learn to listen more deeply to each other. There are times when the process moves fairly quickly and there are times when we really have to search hard to find the right words.
There are individuals and meetings who have sent us suggestions for changes. We have gone through many of them, but that takes a great deal of time. By the time we are finished we will have gone through all suggestions and comments. Keep them coming!
When we finished our draft of the Queries, Advices, and Voices (QAV), we realized that we may upset some meetings by having sixteen rather than twelve sets of QAVs. However, we felt each set was important. If your meeting uses one set of QAV each month, you will now go for sixteen months before repeating.
There is now a glossary of Quaker terms, a very brief history of Friends, advices for clerks, a source of the quotations used, a brief history of the Baltimore Yearly Meeting Faith & Practice, and acknowledgments.
Much more will be added in the coming years. There will be a section on the testimonies, the monthly meeting, growth and change, the wider Quaker community, and more advices for traveling among Friends, worship sharing, clearness committees, support committees, marriages, memorial meetings, estates and bequests, and on healing in meetings.
In trying to find the best possible way to put this new draft into the hands of everyone within the Yearly Meeting, we found that the least expensive method was to have it printed in a book through an on-line publishing company. Each meeting and school will be given a copy. We will have copies for sale both at the Bookstore at Annual Session this year and on order throughout the year.
It is our expectation that every member and ongoing attender will purchase a copy of this draft, read it, discuss it in small groups, in the meeting as a whole, and in committees. As you read through this book, the Faith and Practice Revision Committee would like to know what you like and what you do not like. For those parts you do not like, please do not say “I don’t like ….”. Please tell us why you do not like it and how something could be better expressed. It also would help if you do not consider this an individual response, but a group response. There never will be anything written that everyone agrees is great! What is best for the Yearly Meeting as a whole is our objective.
Sheila Bach (Langley Hill), Clerk
Interchange - Fall 2008
Each monthly meeting and school should now have the proposed Advices, Queries, 2008. This was available at Annual Session or was mailed to each monthly meeting clerk listed in the 2007 Yearbook. It is also available on-line at http://www/bym-rsf.org.
Advance Report - 2008
The Faith & Practice Revision Committee has met almost monthly during this past year. During this time we have focused on finishing the draft Advices, Queries, and Voices. We are excited about the packets that will be available for each meeting at annual session in August.
We are asking that each meeting make copies of its packet and sees that each member receives a copy. Individual Friends are asked to read and reflect on what we present to you. At the same time, we strongly urge each meeting to gather in small groups, or as a whole for small meetings, to reflect and discuss the Advices, Queries, and Voices.
Changes, suggestions, and appreciations should be to be sent to the committee. We expect this to be a one to two year process.
At the end of that time, we will begin looking at the changes and suggestions that we have received and make revisions. Friends should remember that this is a group process for discernment on whether these new Advices, Queries, and Voices are what is right for Baltimore Yearly Meeting as a whole.
This is a wonderful committee on which to serve. Because we have been fairly constant in membership most of the time, we have built a deep trust and understanding of each and are not hesitant to make our feelings known. There is a deep respect for each member and the gifts each brings to the committee.
Advance Report - 2007
This is a joyful committee on which to work. In the past year we have met ten times and are proceeding slowly, deliberately, using good Quaker process in adding new voices, advices, and queries for the revised Faith & Practice. As we work together each month, we understand each other a bit better. We are able to present something one has written and give it up to the committee.
I like this except for the word....
Don’t we have this voice or something very much like it somewhere else?
This is a query which asks for a yes or no answer. Let’s rewrite it with a “how” or “in what way ...?
Last year we had six booklets, each with a different set of Voices, Advices, and Queries. Every one of the two hundred sets was taken. This was very encouraging. However, there has been very little feedback on these. Several meetings did ask for more booklets to use. Instead of making more booklets, which is time consuming and costly, we referred people to the web site where they can be downloaded.
This year we have two pamphlets. The green one contains the six small booklets we had available last year. The yellow one contains the seven new queries, advices, and voices on which we worked this past year.
As you read the queries, advices, and voices, please take time to consider each, either by yourself as you wait for a doctor’s appointment, sitting on a train or bus, lying in bed before slumber overcomes you, or with others in your meeting as part of a first day school program, a second hour, a Friendly Eights group. It does not matter how or where or with whom, but please make sure you read them. We hope each of you will grow in your spirituality and service to God, your meeting, and yourself.
Your feedback will be very valuable to us. We will be going over each and every comment as way opens. If you do not hear from us about your feedback, do not think we have or will not considered it. Quaker process takes time!
As you read through the booklets or what you download from the web site, please keep in mind that what you are reading is for everyone. If something does not speak to your condition, ask yourself whether it might speak to others. If it is the way it is worded, then give us some different wording. We are all different, thank goodness, and what speaks to one may not speak to another.
Is your meeting using the new queries, advices, and voices? If not, what is keeping you from doing so?
Sheila Bach, clerk
Interchange, Fall 2005
We ask that each Monthly Meeting, either as a whole or in small groups, read and discuss all the Advices and Queries as we distribute them. We need this feedback so that our final product will reflect the needs of the whole Yearly Meeting, not just an individual or a small contingent.
Worship: Advices
The heart of the Religious Society of Friends is the Meeting for Worship. In that Worship we are called to offer ourselves, body, mind and soul, for the doing of God’s will.
Worship is the adoring response of the heart and mind to the influences of the Spirit of God. It stands neither in forms nor in the formal disuse of forms. God is a spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. (John 4:24, RSV) We treasure silence as a path towards inspiration and guidance which leads to communion with God.
In our Meetings for Worship, we are called to the spirit of prayerful obedience to God, with a willingness to give as well as to receive. In speech or in silence, each person contributes to the Meeting. Worshipping God together, we can strengthen one another, and our bodies and minds can be refreshed in the life of the Spirit. Our daily lives are linked with the Meeting, the Meeting for Worship with our daily lives. “Let meeting for worship nourish your whole life.” (Britain Yearly Meeting, Quaker Faith and Practice, 1.02.10)
Friends are encouraged to give adequate time for study, meditation and prayer, and other ways of preparing for worship. Come regularly to meeting for worship even when you are angry, depressed, tired or spiritually cold. In the silence ask for and accept the prayerful support of others joined with you in worship.
During the Meeting for Worship, Friends may be led by the Holy Spirit to testify, to share an insight, to pray, to praise. When we speak, we should do so clearly and simply, using as many words as necessary and as few as possible. When another speaks, listen with an open spirit, holding the speaker in love. Rest with the message, recognizing that even if it is not God’s word for you, it may be so for others.
Queries–For the Individual:
- How do I prepare my heart and mind for worship?
- What do I do to prepare myself to receive the power of God’s presence and love?
- How does worship deepen my relationship with God and how is this inspiration carried over into my daily life?
- How do I discern the source of my leading?
- How do I know when to speak?
For the Meeting:
- Do all other activities of our Meeting find their inspiration in worship and in what way do these activities, in turn, help to uphold the worshipping group?
- How does the Meeting assure that there is time after Friends have spoken for the ministry to be absorbed by those for whom it was intended?
Sheila Bach, Clerk
Advance Report - 2005
This has been a wonderful year for the Committee. For the first two years there were just three of us and we felt more Friends should have the opportunity to have the joy in the work of revising our Faith and Practice. At our last annual session, five names were added to the Committee. What a joy it has been to have them with us.
The richness of eight Friends sitting around a table searching for the right words, the right expressions, the history, and the writings of those before us has been incredible. There is a depth of appreciation for each member's gifts to the committee. We listen and we learn from one another.
We have had feedback from two people who gave valuable suggestions. We desire more feedback from what we have written. While we are continuing forward with our writing of the Advices and the Queries, we are at the same time going back and revisiting what we have written to take into account the suggestions given to us.
Early on we made the decision to put advices and queries together. By writing the Advices first, we are better able to focus on the Queries that follow. Eventually we will add writings from Friends throughout history to follow each set of Advices and Queries to give more richness to the whole. Queries by themselves are valuable. Advices preceding the Queries make for a richer process. Quotations following give historical meaning to the Queries and Advices.
We ask that each Monthly Meeting, either as a whole or in small groups, read and discuss all the Advices and Queries as we distribute them. We need this feedback so that our final product will reflect the needs of the whole Yearly Meeting, not just an individual or a small contingent.
At Yearly Meeting session we will have draft copies of all we have done up to that point. We will also be sending our draft copies to the clerks of each Monthly Meeting, Preparative Meeting, and Worship Group with a cover letter asking for your feedback.
Here is the first of the Advices and Queries that deals with worship as we rewrote it after receiving suggestions.
WORSHIP
Advices:
The heart of the Religious Society of Friends is the Meeting for Worship. In that Worship we are called to offer ourselves, body, mind and soul, for the doing of God's will.
Worship is the adoring response of the heart and mind to the influences of the Spirit of God. It stands neither in forms nor in the formal disuse of forms. God is a spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. (John 4:24, RSV) We treasure silence as a path towards inspiration and guidance which leads to communion with God.
In our Meetings for Worship, we are called to the spirit of prayerful obedience to God, with a willingness to give as well as to receive. In speech or in silence, each person contributes to the Meeting. Worshipping God together, we can strengthen one another, and our bodies and minds can be refreshed in the life of the Spirit. Our daily lives are linked with the Meeting, the Meeting for Worship with our daily lives. "Let meeting for worship nourish your whole life." (Britain Yearly Meeting, Quaker Faith and Practice, 1.02.10)
Friends are encouraged to give adequate time for study, meditation and prayer, and other ways of preparing for worship. Come regularly to meeting for worship even when you are angry, depressed, tired or spiritually cold. In the silence ask for and accept the prayerful support of others joined with you in worship.
During the Meeting for Worship, Friends may be led by the Holy Spirit to testify, to share an insight, to pray, to praise. When we speak, we should do so clearly and simply, using as many words as necessary and as few as possible. When another speaks, listen with an open spirit, holding the speaker in love. Rest with the message, recognizing that even if it is not God's word for you, it may be so for others.
Queries:
For the Individual:
How do I prepare my heart and mind for worship?
What do I do to prepare myself to receive the power of God's presence and love?
How does worship deepen my relationship with God and how is this inspiration carried over into my daily life?
How do I discern the source of my leading?
How do I know when to speak?
For the Meeting:
Do all other activities of our Meeting find their inspiration in worship and in what way do these activities, in turn, help to uphold the worshipping group?
How does the Meeting assure that there is time after Friends have spoken for the ministry to be absorbed by those for whom it was intended?
Interchange, Spring 2005
Queries on Meeting for Worship
The Faith and Practice Revision Committee has been working for
over two years to revise our current Faith and Practice of Baltimore
Yearly Meeting. We are working on the Queries first and have
finished the first four. Beginning with this issue of the Interchange,
we will have one each issue.
The advices and queries are to be used together. You will notice
that we have limited the number of queries for each of the advices.
We felt that the advices should declare the intent of the topic
rather than having as many queries as we have in the current edition
of the Faith and Practice.
We ask that you read them as individuals. More important is that
you have some discussion within your monthly meeting, either as
a whole or in small groups. The corporate consensus is most valuable.
When you are discussing each query, please remember that while each
individual needs to respond according to how each is led, the queries
are written for everyone, not just one individual.
Please send any suggestions to Sheila Bach, 7535 Mission Road,
Harpers Ferry, WV 25425, 304.728.4820 or snbach@earthlink.net.
Meeting for Worship
Advices
The heart of the life of the Religious Society of Friends is the
Meeting for Worship. It calls for us to offer ourselves, body, mind,
and soul for the doing of God's will.
Worship is the adoring response of the heart and mind to the influences
of the Spirit of God. It stands neither in forms nor in the formal
disuse of forms; it may be with or without words, but it must be
in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). We recognize the value of silence,
not as an end, but as a means toward the attainment of the end,
which is communication with God, and fellowship with one another.
In all our Meetings for Worship, we gather in spirit of prayerful
obedience to God, with a willingness to give as well as to receive.
In speech or in silence, each person contributes to the Meeting.
Worshiping God together, we strengthen one another, and our bodies
and minds are refreshed in the Life of the Spirit. Our daily lives
are linked with the Meeting for Worship, the Meeting for Worship
with our daily lives.
Friends are encouraged to give adequate time for study, meditation
and prayer, and other ways of preparing for worship, and to arrive
at Meeting promptly with an open and expectant spirit. During the
Meeting for Worship, some people may feel moved to speak, to share
an insight, to pray, to praise. When we feel led to speak, we should
do so, clearly and simply. When another speaks, we should listen
with an open spirit, seeking the thought behind the words and holding
the speaker in love. After a message has been given, Friends should
have time to ponder its meaning and to search themselves before
another speaks.
North Pacific Yearly Meeting Faith & Practice
1993
Queries_For the Individual
How do I prepare my heart and mind for worship? What do I do to
prepare myself to receive the power of God's presence and love?
How does worship deepen my relationship with God and how is this
inspiration carried over into my daily life?
How do I discern the source of my leading? How do I know when to
speak?
Queries_For the Meeting
Do all other activities of our Meeting find their inspiration in
worship and in what way do these activities, in turn, help to uphold
the worshiping group?
How does the Meeting assure that there is time after Friends have
spoken for the ministry to be absorbed by those for whom it was
intended?
Annual Report 2004
With much prayer, worship, work, laughter, discussion, and writing,
the Faith & Practice Revision Committee has finished two more sets
of Advices and Queries this past year. We have not been able to
meet every month as planned because of weather and a few other commitments,
but we have managed to meet eight times.
We are still looking for more Friends to join us in this wonderful
experience in writing Advices & Queries, looking for quotations
and writing of other Friends, reading the Faith and Practice books
from other Yearly Meetings. We need a broader range of thoughts
and experience. We need people from other areas of our Yearly Meeting.
We need you to commit to a long term project, to meet every month
on the first Saturday of the month, and do your homework in between
meetings.
Here are the first four Advices and Queries for all to read, discuss
in small groups, use at your Meeting and, most of all, give us some
feedback on what you think about these four. When you use them,
please do not make your thoughts so personal that you overlook the
wide range of people within our midst and how others might view
the same words.
Meeting for Worship–Advices
The heart of the life of the Religious Society of Friends is the
Meeting for Worship. It calls for us to offer ourselves, body, mind,
and soul for the doing of God’s will.
Worship is the adoring response of the hart and mind to the influences
of the Spirit of God. It stands neither in forms nor in the formal
disuse of forms; it may be with or without words, but it must be
in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). We recognize the value of silence,
not as an end, but as a means toward the attainment of the end,
which is communication with God, and fellowship with one another.
In all our Meetings for Worship, we gather in spirit of prayerful
obedience to God, with a willingness to give as well as to receive,
in speech or in silence, each person contributes to the Meeting.
Worshiping God together, we strengthen one another, and our bodies
and minds are refreshed in the Life of the Spirit. Our daily lives
are linked with the Meeting for Worship, the Meeting for Worship
with our daily lives.
Friends are encouraged to give adequate time for study, meditation
and prayer, and other ways of preparing for worship, and to arrive
at Meeting promptly with an open and expectant spirit. During the
Meeting for Worship, some people may feel moved to speak, to share
an insight, to pray, to praise. When we feel led to speak, we should
do so, clearly and simply. When another speaks, we should listen
with an open spirit, seeking the thought behind the words and holding
the speaker in love. After a message has been given, Friends should
have time to ponder its meaning and to search themselves before
another speaks.
North Pacific Yearly Meeting, Faith and Practice
1993
Queries–For the Individual
How do I prepare my heart and mind for worship? What do I do to
prepare myself to receive the power of God’s presence and love?
How does worship deepen my relationship with God and how is this
inspiration carried over into my daily life?
How do I discern the source of my leading? How do I know when to
speak?
For the Meeting
Do all other activities of our Meeting find their inspiration in
worship and in what way do these activities, in turn, help to uphold
the worshiping group?
How does the Meeting assure that there is time after Friends have
spoken for the ministry to be absorbed by those for whom it was
intended?
Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business–Advices
Attendance at meeting for worship with a concern for business is
the responsibility of all friends. Come with open minds, seeking
the spirit, ready to listen to others carefully, always trying to
discern the truth in what they have to offer. Proceed in the peaceable
spirit of the light of Truth, with forbearance and warm affection
for each other. If you cannot attend, uphold the Meeting prayerfully.
We do not seek a majority decision nor even consensus. As we wit
patiently for God’s guidance, our experience is that way will open
and we shall be led into unity. Do not allow the strength of your
convictions to betray you into making statements or allegations
that are unfair or untrue. Think it possible that you may be mistaken.
Queries
Are your Meetings held in the spirit of worship, seeking the guidance
of God?
In what ways do we each take our share of responsibility in the
service of the Meeting?
Fostering Community Within the Meeting
It is well for Meetings to consciously cultivate fellowship and
community. The Meeting is enriched when all members and attenders
participate actively. The working of the Holy Spirit in our lives
is expressed through prophetic ministry, pastoral caring for each
other, and the example provided by lives lived in the Light. As
we worship, work, and laugh together, we forge bonds of trust, understanding
and communication. When need arises to address contentious issues,
they then may be addressed openly and honestly. When resolution
is not immediate, the Meeting should make room for different expressions
of continuing revelation, while persisting in earnest search for
unity. Paradoxically, conflict thus experienced can also build trust
and intimacy. Convictions which might divide or disrupt a Meeting
can, through God’s grace, help to make it creative and strong.
Queries
What helps our Meeting build trust of one another?
How do we get to know one another in community?
How do we make time in our lives for our faith community?
What role does conflict play in the life of our community?
Caring for One Another
We must be concerned about the welfare of every member of the Meeting
community. While Friends need to guard against prying or invasion
of privacy, it is nevertheless essential that Meetings be aware
of the spiritual and material needs of members of the community
and express caring concern in appropriate ways. To this end, we
are to live affectionately as friends, entering with sympathy into
the joys and sorrows of one another’s lives. As we are willing to
offer help, so should we be willing to make our needs known and
to accept help. In bereavement, give yourself time to grieve. When
others mourn, let your love embrace them with the simple things
of life: praying together, talking, planning meals, caring for children,
and otherwise being of comfort. In offering pastoral care, it is
not necessary to find the right words. It is important to be present.
Just as we do not leave pastoral care to a pastor, so we may not
leave this most essential function to a committee, although a committee
may be useful for coordinating an effort.
Queries
What impediments do I find to reaching out to those in distress?
What do I need to do to overcome them?
Do I trust my Meeting enough to make my needs known?
Stewardship–Advices
“To turn all we possess into the channel of universal love becomes
the business of our lives” –this, in the words of John Woolman,
is the meaning of Quaker stewardship.
This applies to all that we have and are, as individuals, as members
of groups, and as inhabitants of the earth. As individuals, we are
obliged to use our time, our various abilities, our strength, our
money, our material possessions, and other resources in a spirit
of love, aware that we hold these gifts in trust, and are responsible
to use them in the Light.
Stewardship of our Resources
Investment of assets and consumption of resources require our careful
stewardship. As friends, we can direct our investments toward socially
desirable ends, avoiding speculation and activities wasteful or
harmful to others. We should seek to participate constructively
and without greed in the economic life of the community and to refrain
from undue accumulation of wealth as well as irresponsible borrowing.
Queries
Do we regard our time, talents, energy, money, material possessions
and other resources as gifts from God, to be held in trust and shared
according to the Light we are given?
How do we express this conviction?
What are we doing as individuals and as a Meeting to use and thereby
perfect our gifts?
How do we encourage others to use theirs?
Stewardship of the Earth
Friends have connected with the earth and all it holds as part
of their spiritual development. From George Fox walking throughout
England searching for his spiritual identity to current times, we
are aware that we are only stewards, not owners of this land. We
need to be constantly aware of how our actions affect the rest of
the world. By not using more than we need and by sharing with others,
we insure that the earth will continue to support everyone.
Queries
How do we exercise our respect for the balance of nature?
How do we avoid misusing the land, air, and sea and to use the
world’s resources with care and consideration for future generations
and with respect for all life?
In what other ways do we carry out our commitment to stewardship?
Sheila Bach, Clerk
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