A Radical Kind Of Love

When I observe my Quaker community with eyes of love, I see great potential for societal change.  I see it in the way long-time Friends address expressed disparities in opportunities for leadership by young people.  I see it in the response from young Friends when they see the good intentions of long-time Friends as they falter and struggle to listen.  It's this certain kind of perfection that persists in the Society of Friends and it's this hope and resilience that keeps Friends from leaving our small international community of spiritual peace activists.  And now, it is the humble, yet disturbing realization that American Friends have continued to accept privilege from a white supremacist, dominant culture.  Friends of color have been excluded from leadership since emancipation but resilient in delivering a loving message of imperfection despite now welling anger and sadness at the ignorance of many Friends.

Though it is a powerful temptation to step back and criticize our communities and organizations for their ongoing acceptance of power over others, it is more in alignment with the leadings of the Spirit to point out all of the reasons why we can change.  It is right to open our eyes to the tragic difference between who we can be and who we are right now.  To have this vision of a world transformed, means hearing the prophetic voices of Friends who are describing what this new world of inclusion looks like and how we as Friends look when we are in it.  Together, we must hold hands and leap across the river of disbelief and arrive hand in hand on the other side, where all are welcomed, encouraged, empowered, and acknowledged for their gifts, regardless of how the dominant culture functions. 

When Friends walk by the leadings of Spirit in every step, we are guided through darkness and tribulation with hope and joy.  When we keep in the presence of the Light and refresh ourselves constantly with the breath of this presence, we are with one another beyond the walls of the meetinghouse.  Yet, we are not separate from those around us, who have nothing to do with the Society of Friends and could care less about whether we are humble or honest.  It is out in the world, walking with Black Lives Matter and others that are not Friends' organizations, where we shine with this strength.  When we walk in the Light of God/Spirit, this Light is in each living presence we encounter, but most importantly, it shines on our darkness as well.  For me, it is like being hugged and held by a forgiving, strengthening, and loving force that is coming from within and yet is all around.  I feel safe, and at the same time very awake to the violence and inequality I sense around me, sometimes apparent only in imperceptibly small ways.  It is gratitude I feel when I walk in this way.  

It is the belief in our ability as humans to be in this radically loving place that I hope I share with all Quakers that gives me the strength to stay in this vision of transformation beyond the reality of violence and inequality.  

I suppose what I am saying here, is that if love is the first motion, the motion is to observe the goodness of Friends and our potential to transform our society into one that is inclusive, open, and forgiving.  I prefer to have this hope and support when I must surrender each day to the willing of Spirit.  I trust the guidance of Love and all I have learned about this Way from Friends.  

Learn More:  Fit For Freedom, Not For Friendship (Book) 
                      Women of Color Speak Out (Seattle)

The Gathering

Dr. Nekima Levy Pounds, a civil rights attorney, community organizer, and law professor, spoke to Friends gathered in the wake of yet another killing of a man of color by police in Minneapolis. She spoke to us as the holders of privilege and authority. Here is a poem that rose out of this event. 

VOICES 

Speak to me truly 

this time I tell you 

I will hear my place 

On top is killing 

My place where I am safe 

And you are not

For property returned undone 

Undone of self respect 

We cannot confiscate

Cannot conceal 

Hands are up to silence 

This murmur long and deep 

Hands up, don't shoot 

Hands up for a silent silence 

In a room screaming 

Say you're sorry! 

Give it back! 

It's not yours to take 

Or give 

Or live

All you got is time to listen

Open up your ears to hear

Your eyes to see 

Your whole selfs got to change

You're  a fragile egg shell 

Holding seeds of tiny prisoners 

In your hands

Who, instead of saving, you eat for breakfast next to the pigs and Irish potatoes

Whistling a tune for 

Woe be gone days when me and mine had all there was 

All the power 

All the land

All the rights

All the freedom 

Stolen from the flesh 

Of our own righteousness. 

Away away in Dixieland, there flows a river of blood wide and long, from South to North and West to East out into the desert growing in our hearts. 

And now you know. And love flows in, and through, for you, my children, for you. For you are now and this is when we stop our hands a wringing and set the system free.

The Proof In The Pudding

My husband suggested the other day that I might have attended a spiritual retreat and “drank the Kool-Aide”. My greatest fear has always been that I will be brainwashed and become susceptible to some external, authoritarian structure that suppresses my joyful, creative spirit.  My staunch skepticism has led me to wonderful places, but protected me from flitting off in any direction promising Utopia.

Let's first define "drinking the Kool-Aide".  In my culture, there are two kinds of Kool-Aide (if you even recall what Kool-Aide is), the one mixed with LSD and the one mixed with cyanide poison.  It is the epitome of "a spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down".  The first is a reference to Ken Keasey and the Electric Acid Kool-Aide test. It refers to the openness to altered states of mind produced by taking a mind altering drug.  At times, people were given the drug when they didn't know it was in the Kool-Aide.  A community of people who had experienced a whole new part of themselves and the world around them was formed by those who had "dropped" acid.   The second is referring to Jim Jones and the Jones town cult in the 70’s.  This was a group of people interested in starting a Utopian community where racial segregation, poverty, hunger, and illness were not present because people were living in a radically Christian way.  Over a thousand people moved to Guyana to escape American Culture all together.  When doubt and failure became eminent, dissent spread through the ranks and measures were taken to control it.  It ended tragically, when the charismatic leader told people that they had already achieved utopia and it was prudent to go into the next life of heaven before their utopia was taken from them.  He convinced men, women and children to drink poison all at once, reassured all along that everything they needed was waiting for them on the other side, that fear had no place in the process.  

So, in these cases, drinking the Kool-Aide means there’s no going back.  

My mother, now a liberal, republican, Mennonite in Kansas, once described the 60’s and 70’s as a complete cultural overhaul, where a generation of young people woke up and empowered themselves to choose what was good in the culture and what they felt needed to be left behind.  I think of this cultural overhaul as asking questions, powerful questions, about what is important and how do we know.  What makes us free and who defines the boundaries of our freedom?  I was old enough to notice the disappointment felt by some folks in the 80's who became what folks called yuppies, those who gave up and said "yup" to the very systems they had hoped to escape. 

How do we know when to accept and participate and how do we know to ask questions?

In my Quaker faith community, I notice we are both seeking and providing a safe space to explore what we encounter in silent expectant communal worship.  We are expectant upon the Spirit/God, but we are seemingly challenged to explain what will occur.  I came to Quaker meeting with some fear about what I might encounter in the community.  I was afraid I might be pressured to believe beyond my comfort zone.  What I found is that many Friends have helped to bring peace to the words we use to describe our experience, noticing that folks need to share these transformative discoveries.   Others have honed Quaker process to reflect our spiritual experience.  Still others help to edit and realign our Faith & Practices to keep with the evolving nature of our faith while maintaining a vessel that can be called Quakerism.  In fact, our faith seems to be about query.  I have found that the elders among us have been practicing or are well gifted in being open to this kind of continuing revelation.  Out of this questioning come the answers, each in some way providing a kaleidoscopic vision of the Way.  The love we find in this vision is confirmed by a cloud of witnesses.  Perhaps we trust that what we will encounter is goodness and love, even when it is a harsh and burning bright light of Truth.  

It seems that when we grow brittle and stop trusting this goodness will come in the silence, our ability to entertain questions in our Quaker community also diminishes.    

Standing Still in The Light

Here I sit on an island amid the history of video games at OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) reading a pamphlet on Quakers traveling in the ministry.

Most of the 125 games are silent while people of all ages engage in separate, but complex journeys toward some form of everlasting life. The din of a large screened dance floor, antiquated Centipede and Donkey Kong, and voices create a symphony of white noise in the darkened spaces of electronic imagination.

What is this urge to jump hurdles, float impossibly in the air, and think fast as the constant barrage of conflict and resolution form a strange entertainment built on digital creativity?

I can't help but think of my own spiritual journey standing

between the different branches of Friends and between the wider world and the still, quiet place that is the Light of God in each and all. I am sitting here idle in this world of games, not because I am unwilling to participate, but because I would rather center into the gentle place of witness. My son is enticed by the action and adventure and waits patiently for his turn. When he finally gets his hands on the controls, he says this, "I was pushing all the right buttons, but I just couldn't make it move."  This is how I often feel on my spiritual journey when I think I am in control. If I could step into the character on the screen completely, and co-create the world we encounter, it might be some kind of good practice. Trouble with this is that I am so in love with the real thing, as indescribable and kaleidoscopic as it is.

How are we called to witness to the stillness in this active world?

Accountability to God

There is a formula I go to in times of complex consternation.  God=Love.

It’s a simple formula with complicated maneuverings of the mind.  Sometimes, I feel as if I am wrestling for simplicity in this interwoven tapestry of American life.  After all, there are many avenues of discovery. 

My Family 2008 by Glee 

Science, for me, is often an experience of awe and delight.  The patterns we create, being life, and flowing through our universe folded into infinite pockets of time and space never fails to open my mind up to new possibilities.  It is, after all, a kind of truth.  A couple of weeks ago, my friend Julie sent out a photo on social media of a glorious sunrise in Portland, Oregon.  She pointed out that there was a shadow of our majestic Mt. Hood on the sea of pink and orange clouds.  I looked again.  I softened my eyes.  There it was-- and of course it was there.  How could the light flood into Portland from the East and not encounter Mt. Hood?  My mind and my eyes had been tricking me into seeing what I thought I should see.  When I realized this beauty, I also realized how connected we are to this place. I could see the big picture. 

Several years ago, I was driving home via my usual route and saw a billboard sporting a giant photographic portrait of two lovers, standing, holding hands and gazing into one another’s eyes.  There was my formula, God=Love.  They looked so happy to have found one another in this vast fish bowl of humanity.  I knew what that felt like.  I had just found my truest love, married, and I was pregnant with my first child.  Spray painted over part of the sign was “die faggots”.  I saw what wasn’t there in the sign, a mountain of violence, like a warring anthill of humanity embroiled in a forgotten battle over the definition of Love. 

Walk In The Light

I feel it is imperative to the future of Friends to heal a connection to our roots, which was based in an intimate connection to Jesus.  Many of us, including myself, have wanted to leave behind all connection to a faith that takes part in violence toward the LGBTQ members of society, disregard for indigenous people, in-fighting between denominations of Abrahamic religions, and many countless historical immorality involved in this notion of God.  I would rather believe that we are universal in our worship.  I have come to understand, however, that it is our responsibility to call Quakers and all faith traditions into a place of compassion and peace.  It is one of those visions that seems too big to ever accomplish.  

Enduring Flame   2007  by Glee 

Karen Armstrong, through the Charter For Compassion, has been able to show the world that at the heart of all spiritual and moral societies is the golden rule and has inspired many religious leaders and organizations to begin invigorating toward compassionate communities.  She is absolutely inspiring to hear and read.  I believe the golden rule is another way of saying “the light of God in every person”.   When we refer to the light of God in every person, we mean to say that we see that kernel of goodness and well meaning in that other person.  In staying centered in this light of God in our selves, it is easier to walk each day by this light.  By this light, we respond to what is our goodness as we encounter the other, like a mirror to the divine.  Because this way of finding compassion is a bit deeper than the golden rule, Friends may not see a need for Friends’ efforts to heal the conflicts between world religions.  Quakers, as many of us know, are not immune to conflict.

 The section in the Bible from which we take our name, Religious Society of Friends (John 15:15) , ends with Jesus saying the friendship we share is knowing how to love one another.  This is not easy to do, so it becomes our divine practice to seek compassionate processes in our community and beyond.  Perhaps it is time to join a larger effort toward compassion and help to call humanity back into divine relationship with one another.