Quakers in Britain think this is radical

[princessleah1]

https://www.quaker.org.uk/documents/statement-of-policy-on-provision-of-trans-inclusive-facilities-bym

This is the Quaker response to the Supreme Court judgement. It's the usual flim flam about respecting people's rights...unless those people happen to be women

There was a book someone described to me once which talked about how families lost religion over three generation - I think it was specifically about American families. The idea being that you would have one generation who were believers and observant, the next with just a kind of cultural Christianity who would be happy in groups like Anglicans or similar, and then their children would typically not really have any religion at all.

I'm afraid I can't remember the name.

I sense that young people are now becoming more open to religion. The omnicause and political ideology just doesn't cut it. All human beings have an urge for the transcendent which seeks fulfilment through whichever channel is made available. Sionnach's take on it rings true.......joining religious communities but then stripping out the bits that don't resonate. This is what has happened to the Church of England. Filling old forms with new content.....but losing the form and the discipline that comes with observance, in the process.

Very interesting about the change over generations. I agree with the analysis above. Many schools have no religious content despite what the law may or may not say, so if you or your children aren’t brought up in a faith then there isn’t any exposure to religion culturally unless you specifically seek it out. I’m an atheist personally but I think there are loads of benefits to everyone of having a society with lots of different religions in it

Having taught in both secular and church schools I can say that whole school assemblies in secular schools tend to imbibe the assembly with a religious equivalent.......so the emphaiss will be on 'kindness' and 'sharing' and 'being good to one's neighbour', 'helping those less fortunate' etc

I was brought up within no particular religion though have obviously imbibed Christian ethics, but I've always liked and appreciated the strong ethos and value system that is prevalent in church schools ( especially in catholic schools). A strong and recognisable structure along with familiar narratives, and also a strong rhythm to the year.

Maybe it is because I personally do better with structure and discipline, but i find the free floating vagueness of secular assemblies unsatisfying. It really is like the Lib Dems at prayer. Airy fairy ideals, a bit vacuous, and without any real grounding.

I like that old President Eisenhower line that "a country needs a religion, and I don't care what it is." As often with Ike, there's a lot of common sense there.

Ike himself doesn't appear to have been a believer in any meaningful way. He grew up in a JW family, seems to have not observed any religion during his military career, then joined a Presbyterian church when he became president because he felt the president should belong to a church.

So I've a lot of time for religion-friendly non-believers - Simon Heffer is another one who comes to mind - who feel it's good for society to have a culture based in a religious belief system even if they can't personally believe in it. You wouldn't want to live in a society where nobody believes in a transcendent moral order.

I think western secularism to a big extent relies on society continuing to observe Christian ethics in the absence of Christian belief. If micro-cultures like Quakers and Unitarians struggle with that, it's not clear how it can work at scale.

All sane men are of the same religion. What religion is that? No sane man would say.

Will have to check attribution.

Earl of Shaftsbury; I've slightly misquoted.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1928/07/the-sensible-mans-religion-a-common-sense-inquiry/649669/

Not a Quaker but have attended a few meetings. One thing that I noted early on was that all were equal but men were more equal, were moved to speak more, and women still made the tea.

Kenan Malik describes the change in religious practise among Muslim families across 3 generations and it’s an interesting contrast. He argues that first generation immigrants were religious, but wore their religion lightly. It wasn’t an identity it was just part of who they were. Their children largely rejected religion seeing it as old fashioned. Now their children tend to be more devout. It’s very much an identity, and is sometimes an explicitly political statement.

God is a shorthand for the spiritual dimension that is beyond our comprehension, that is conscious of us, loves us and everything, and gives our lives meaning. Some people cannot cope with using the word. Learning to centre down with others in Quaker meeting for worship, and alone in daily life, and keeping coming back to the centre faithfully every time one's mind wanders, gives us a degree of access to God, to truth, to the Light, whatever you want to call it, though this is veiled and cloudy – 'human kind cannot bear very much reality'.

I reject ideas of the crucifixion as redemption, as God requiring a blood sacrifice as payment for our sins, of being washed in the blood of the lamb – I find this archaic and obscene. Another way of seeing it is that Jesus was executed as a political prisoner for living out Satyagraha, soul force, non-violent direct action, to its logical conclusion in an oppressive regime. But yes, Quakers have no creed. Everyone understands and lives these things out according to their own light, within an ethical framework of sustainability, peace, integrity, community, equality, simplicity and so on. We are answerable for our behaviour, not our thoughts.

Quakers unexpectedly gained a lot of Brownie points in 1963 by publishing Towards a Quaker View of Sex, welcoming gay and lesbian people as equals when male homosexuality was still criminalised. Quakers welcomed transsexual people into meetings for worship equally with everyone else. Transwomen were courteous and respected the needs of women. We thought that as long as everyone behaved well, there need be no problems. Many Quaker meetings still believe this, especially those far from London, Brighton and Bristol.

Quakers failed to respond to the bizarre developments of critical race and gender theory, and the distressing way that Mermaids went from being a decent family support group to advocating child mutilation. We failed to notice how 'transsexual' became 'transgender', and how some Quaker groups were being infiltrated by younger, aggressive transactivists, who gained undue power over the gay and lesbian Quaker groups, driving any dissenters out; and then how they did the same to the Young Friends. We dismissed the excesses of minutes and statements from Young Friends about trans as the normal extremes of youth, which elders would have the sense to modify – except that they didn't. YF managed to convince enough people that it was sinful to hold savings, and to give them away, so that now Quakers are strapped for cash, and vulnerable to corruption at the centre because elders are reluctant to leave legacies to such an inept shower. Transactivists gradually became dominant in various significant areas, including social media. We failed to believe that Stonewall could be betraying the people who set it up. We dismissed any unease as our own paranoia, failing to identify all this as entryism, and failing to realise how much secret American money supported all this.

Paul Parker and the trustees seem to think they can repeat the 1963 publicity coup by giving trans people preferential treatment on the grounds that they are so oppressed and persecuted, which they are not. PP and the trustees utterly reject any equivalent concerns about women as ridiculous, to the extent that PP sent a notice round advising Quaker meetings not to let rooms to women's groups, as they tended to cause trouble – in denial of the fact that the trouble was caused by transactivists trying to intimidate women into giving up meeting each other without men.

Quakers were never as good as they thought they were on women's equality, as the appalled reaction to the 1986 Swarthmore Lecture by the Quaker Women's Group, Bringing the Invisible into the Light, showed. https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/quakerstudies/vol11/iss2/8/

And yet... Quakers have been here before, over slavery, and found their way on to the right path again. Meetings are vulnerable to deceit and manipulation. Too many Quakers prioritise kindness and allow themselves to be taken in by those who are out of order. We need courage to stand up to the bullying and silencing we are experiencing, a fierce faithfulness to truth, peace, equality and simplicity, and a firmness in our belief that if we are open to guidance, God will show us a way through the mess we are in.

I found this really interesting and helpful, thank you.

What you said about "Quakers have no creed" is one of the things at the heart of the current issue: we should have no creed, but Friends House are pushing for some of their decisions to have the status of a creed. Which, of course, many Quakers will reject on principle, but their position isn't reflected in any of the comms or literature, because that is controlled from the centre.

It's a recurring tendency in progressive religion. I remember an American friend saying about her experience with a Unitarian congregation, that belief in God was optional but belief in George Floyd definitely wasn't.

I attended a few Unitarian services. Really odd. I found it very like this poster described:

but i find the free floating vagueness of secular assemblies unsatisfying. It really is like the Lib Dems at prayer. Airy fairy ideals, a bit vacuous, and without any real grounding

I read a while back that Catholic evensong and evangelical churches were growing areas in Christianity. I think maybe because Catholics and evangelicals have firm and clear beliefs. They do provide structure and a clear shared set of beliefs to build community around. Nor have they allowed themselves to just become a religious branch of modern progressive secular values. Why bother with Church to get that, when you can get it anywhere else?

Hi @GreenFritillary . Thanks for that fascinating post.

Could you tell us more about “the appalled reaction to the 1986 Swarthmore Lecture by the Quaker Women's Group, Bringing the Invisible into the Light,.”

Only if you have time and are happy to do so, of course. I can’t open your study/document.

I think it probably can't.

The issue is, if the outcomes or forms or ethics do actually come out of whatever the basic metaphysics of the system are, or "story" of the religion is about, and they are, in fact, true and good for society and individuals, what are you saying if you saying the manifestation is true but you don't believe in the principles that they emerge from?

Most religions talk about the underlying fabric of reality and how we fit into it as human beings. If you deny that the underlying fabric part has any validity, why would the forms or ethics have any validity?

It becomes hollow and if people know it's hollow many won't observe the forms if it doesn't suit them. And without attention to principles understood as grounded in truth your forms etc are very open to manipulation, bad actors, and fads. Which is where the CofE is today, and it seems the Quakers too.

That makes sense, I think that where you have a kind of community within a community that could be a powerful source of community unity. A bit like the way some groups like Italians or the Irish in the US actually increased certain cultural practices compared to people that remained in the homeland (I am thinking of some wedding customs for example.)

The book I am thinking was looking specifically at American mainline Protestants, I don't think it's a universal experience but it's one that could happen in a lot of environments.

That being said, I am seeing now a lot of younger people coming into religion with a background of almost no exposure. They don't seem very moved by the milquetoast kinds of churches though, they seem to like strong evangelical groups, Catholics, the Orthodox churches, and sometimes certain high Anglican parishes.

One group I keep an eye on which is almost a pure example of decline is Community of Christ, what used to be the Reorganized Church of Latter Day Saints. They originated in the 19th century with the anti-polygamy faction of Mormons who opposed Brigham Young and stayed in the Midwest instead of migrating to Utah.

The old RLDS church used to have a very distinctive spirituality, but at some point in the 1960s the leadership decided to move away from their Mormon heritage and assimilate to mainline Protestantism. Which seems silly in retrospect, because mainline Protestants were never going to accept a church with a prophet and a temple and the Book of Mormon, and the more they downplayed their distinctive elements, the more they upset their core membership.

The big flashpoint was the 1984 argument over women's ordination that became a lightning rod for everything else, and to cut a long story short the hippie faction expelled the traditionalists and what is now CoC became basically NPR in the form of a church.

CoC still exists, but I'm not sure what motivation anyone has to join it. It still picks up converts from missions in the developing world, and it attracts a steady trickle of (mostly gay) ex-Mormons in Utah, but the core membership - those extended families in Missouri and Iowa who kept them afloat for 150 years - they've either left to join small breakaway denominations, or more often just died and their children don't attend.

Anecdotally, while the Utah LDS church has kept more of its countercultural elements, it's been gradually toning them down for decades, and now seems to have hit a point where it's having trouble retaining young members. It's interesting that the only young members who seem to have energy are the ones who are into the weird and supernatural side of Mormonism - though they give the heebie jeebies to the geriatric leadership, whose instinct is to assimilate more to the culture.

PriOn1
How about I try and get the document downloaded, and you PM me with an email address I can send it to when I've done it? It's quite long, and I won't have much time this weekend, but I want to download it anyway so it would be no problem.

All religions are subject to bad actors, manipulation and fads, though.

I wonder if a hollow faith or a pretence of faith is worse, in terms of moral integrity, because atheism is more likely to be a sincere [absence of] belief. There's not generally much to be gained from faking atheism.

If you sever your practice from its roots however it becomes very easy for things to drift.

I once heard a priest say, in reference to a discussion about the parish prioritising action in the community, that when churches let prayer and focus on the fundamentals of the faith fall away, inevitably the community action starts to fail. It becomes unfocused and disorganised and can't set priorities because it doesn't know what is important any more.

In a way churches that have avoided capture by gender ideology are instructive. Both the Catholic and Orthodox Churches have rejected it, not because their members are inherently better than the people in the CoE or Quakers, but because it simply is not compatible with an orthodox Christian understanding of the nature of the body.

I had a chat with my mom, who is a practicing Quaker of 40+ years, about transgender people. She said that she supports anyone who feels they were born in the wrong body, but every instance of GC beliefs that I brought up she completely agreed with (TW should not compete in women’s sports, they should not be allowed in public changes rooms, they should not be allowed in school changing rooms, they should not be allowed in women’s prisons, and medicalization for gender dysphoric children should never happen). She also said she didn’t think it was right that trans men should get pregnant, because if you truly yearn to be a man with all your heart then that’s something you should give up. So to sum up she didn’t seem to know what the TRA movement is actually advocating for, or that she actually holds GC beliefs.

@feministmom4ever that kind of thinking is very common, both within Quakers and without, and is understandable in an individual, if not very consistent. But we are supposed to be rigorous about truth, however uncomfortable it is, and so at a corporate level ought to be a lot clearer about everything.

Just a small point but Evensong is not a Catholic service; it's firmly Church of England and part of the Book of Common Prayer. Maybe you read that cathedral Evensong attendance was increasing, which it is. There's definitely a structure there, not to mention some intellectual rigour.

I have rented a couple of meeting houses for events.

They will have to stop renting out their spaces if they are determined to NOT provide single sex spaces.

Also their employees have a legal right to single sex spaces

Catholics have Benediction , sometimes called Devotions iirc. It used to consist of some hymns , often in Latin, a litany or recital of the rosary. Or some combination of the above. I remember thinking it was less stressful than Mass and I liked the incense.