Timothy,I may be wrong, but it sounds like you're ...

2007-06-06T07:42:00.000-07:00

Timothy,
I may be wrong, but it sounds like you're referring to my post "Four ways to make your meeting Christian." I wish I had seen this post sooner.

I'm a little unsure why hearing someone say that Christian Friends should be *included* in liberal Quakerism -- and not in the spirit of "I grant you permission" but "Just want to make sure you didn't think I was saying they shouldn't" -- should make you feel marginalized. I suppose that since your vision of Quakerism involves the outward profession of Christianity being at the center, outward Christians being reduced to the status of one among many may feel like marginalization. But "you're included on equal terms with others" isn't really marginalization compared to "you're included on lesser terms" or "you should leave," as non-Christian and nontheist Friends often hear.

I would affirm Marshall's suggestion that it may be unwise to assume anyone is laughing behind your back. I've seen honest, sincere opposition, of most any Quaker point of view, in private and in public, but I don't think I've ever seen a Friend laugh at or mock Christian Friends, or any other subgroup for that matter, and if I did I'd be the first to consider eldering them.

I note that you haven't included the rest of the Gamaliel's pronouncement: "Therefore, in the present case I advise you: Leave these men alone! Let them go! For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God." We talked about this once on the list, and you thanked me for the message in which I said how I read this passage (though I don't know if you were referring to that or to something else). I am curious if you can affirm both halves of the statement. Like Gamaliel, are you willing to remain open to the possibility that we might in fact be right? Here I'm simply referring to nontheism -- I don't mean to suggest that easy syncretism or relativism are right (though I suppose that's possible to), as I think they actually aren't, and that those are phases liberal Friends may come to grow out of.

A few thoughts that flicker through my head each t...

2007-04-18T03:12:00.000-07:00

A few thoughts that flicker through my head each time I re-read this essay:

You write, "It challenges me to hear non-theist Friends from far away telling me that there will always be a place for me by the fire of the Liberal domain of the Friends Movement. I wonder if they realize how patronizing that sounds, how marginalized that pat on the head makes me feel."

You know, dear friend, that I have no personal attraction to, or sympathy for, the "nontheist Friend" point of view. But I doubt they mean to sound patronizing or to make you feel marginalized. And if they don't mean it, then why not set these feelings aside? This is not a rhetorical question; if you have reasons for not setting these feelings aside, I am genuinely interested in learning what they are.

You also write that "...in some places it appears that I am just humored, now. Tolerated. Laughed at behind my back because of the 'need' I have for the 'crutch' of belief in a power beyond myself and my own 'reason.'"

If this is happening behind your back, dear friend, then how do you know it is happening at all? Is there a possibility it is just your own imagination? And again, if it is only in your imagination, then why not set these feelings aside? This too is not a merely rhetorical question.

I share your distaste for "the replacement of Truth with 'your truth and my truth'"! But I lack your confidence than you that it won't last.

And I am curious as to what you mean by referencing Acts 6:8. It's a fine verse, but it doesn't seem to me to fit the context in which you reference it.

The quotation from Penn is apt, and splendid!

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Timothy,I may be wrong, but it sounds like you're ...

A few thoughts that flicker through my head each t...