What is our vocation? (Twelve years later)

Source: 
christart.com, all rights reserved.  

About twelve years ago I wrote a blog post on things that I appreciated about being a Friend. Somewhere in there I asked,

So what is our vocation among the larger body of Christians? We are called to shape a community around the simplicity of New Testament Christianity. Our central testimony is trust in the promises and power of God, freeing us from the endless searches for control, security, and wealth. Trust is our central testimony; all the others spring from it. With trust in the promises and mandates that Jesus made in person to our family 2000 years ago and confirms daily, we can lay down our dependence on weapons, false social distinctions, and affluence.

Three factors (at least) weaken us in our contemporary realization of this calling: not enough of us know our own spiritual gifts and how they mesh together in the community; we pay far too little attention to making our communities accessible to those who would find spiritual liberation among us; and too often we cover up the weaknesses caused by these failures by the usual counterfeits: legalism (either a Christian legalism or an absurdly thorough mastery of Quaker trivia); lame imitation of "successful" models outside Friends; uncritical sentimentality; a social quakerism devoid of belief in the power of God -- what Parker Palmer called functional atheism.

Twelve years later, do I stand by this diagnosis of our weaknesses? I've become far more optimistic, actually. The first and third points (lack of knowledge of spiritual gifts, and the counterfeits we employ to distract ourselves) are being addressed by a new generation of Friends. Many of these Friends cross the lines of Quaker divisions far more easily than we did decades ago when I first jointed the Friends World Committee staff, where crossing those lines, sometimes slipping past the gatekeepers, was my job. I dare to hope that these Friends are remixing the creative elements of our legacy (to use Wess Daniels's verb) to good effect, and questioning some of the old cliches and assumptions.

As for the remaining weakness, making our communities accessible: Instead of addressing this with a tone of discontent, I'd like to be encouraging. I think we are becoming more aware of our spiritual gifts and how they strengthen each other, and we also seem to be loosening up the old false polarities of salvation-first vs Quaker distinctives. These developments free us to look directly at the task of becoming more accessible and welcoming.

(By the way, I don't mean to set up a generational comparison -- the renewal I see crosses those lines, too. For example, I love the mutual encouragement I see in our new yearly meeting, Sierra-Cascades Yearly Meeting of Friends.)

Here are some aspects of the task that seem very realistic to me. You can add more, or challenge me on what I'm listing.

The freedom to explore spiritual gifts unleashes the gift of evangelism. I'm still convinced that most -- maybe all -- Friends meetings and churches have people with this gift, no matter how alien the word is to the local subculture. We just need to liberate, encourage, and if necessary train these Friends instead of marginalizing them or being totally unaware of them. It's correct that we Friends don't "proselytize" but we still need to communicate our faith. The concern is to communicate with integrity.

The Friends testimonies work together. At the center of Friends discipleship is trust in God. (Elsewhere I've argued that "trust" is the first testimony.) That trust allows us to experiment with letting Jesus be at the center of our church governance and discipleship, rather than a fearful reliance on status and coercion. Evangelism involves not only a winsome and honest expression of faith, but also an invitation to experience a community formed by that faith, so proclamation and witness reinforce each other.

(NOTE: I'm not asserting Quaker exceptionalism; we retreat to those fallbacks far too often ourselves; and other churches have produced amazing legacies of faithful witness. We just have fewer excuses for wriggling out of our own claims.)

(Related post: Division of labor, part two, on what this collaboration might look like.)

A community empowered by spiritual gifts is not culturally narrow. This assertion is backed by vast hopes and very little experience. Many Friends meetings and churches yearn for cultural and racial diversity, but seem to be stuck arguing about theoretical ideals rather than choosing to examine hurdles: location, unintended or unexamined "we-they" messages (no matter how benevolent or progressive the intention), and a tendency to see non-members as objects of service rather than co-equal participants already part of "us" in God's story. But most of all, I believe that spiritual power unites while cerebral analysis divides.

Russian translation of Christ in Catastrophe
by Emil Fuchs. Very relevant.

Let empathy and creativity loose in new ways!  A decade ago, I became involved in choosing Quaker literature for translation into Russian, and our committee did some marketing research into other Christian publishers' priorities, and the apparent demands of the market. One thing I noticed early on: much religious publishing begins by prioritizing the audience, not the church organization behind the publication. Some books address addiction, some address loneliness or financial stress or raising children, some directly address spiritual hunger, and some simply aim to deliver an entertaining read. Whatever the specific issue in the reader's life, the writer and publisher bring biblical or theological or devotional insights to bear on that issue.

In contrast, so much Quaker literature seems to be concerned with delivering nuggets of Quaker goodness -- our history, our testimonies, our famous ancestors, our social justice arguments, our "wisdom." Much of that stuff is wonderful, but maybe we can become more audience-centric, addressing actual life situations of our readers.

What have I left out? And am I right to feel hopeful?

---

Nancy Thomas continues her series on Bolivian Quaker history. Catch up on her blog, mil gracias.

Nadia Bolz-Weber on talking to our children about sex without shame.

Kirill Medvedev on the anti-fascist legacy of Stanislav Markelov, ten years after his death.

Palestinians, Israelis, and others protest an apartheid-style highway and its implications for the future.

The atomic scientists' Doomsday Clock and a new abnormal.

---

Blues singer and guitarist Mike Ledbetter leaves us, dying at age 33.