Quaker Pagan Reflections

One of the conversations I didn't get to have at NEYM this year was with Will T ., who said at one point that he'd like to talk with me about my relationship with Herne. I'm pretty sure Will is not looking at converting to Paganism anytime soon. Instead, I suspect that his me . Mountain Lion. by Julie Langford interest was meant as a friendly conversation-opener, since he knows that Herne is important to I like Will, and would be happy to talk about almost anything with him. This conversation didn't happen, though, and that's maybe just as well. It's hard to talk about Herne. It's hard when I'm among Pagans, and, yeah, it's probably a bit harder among non-Pagans, but for some reason, it's difficult at any time. I am not sure why... I know that some Pagans have the habit of adopting any "cool" sounding spiritual this-n-that. You know the type: they meet a shaman who speaks of their relationship to, say, the Elk spirit, ...

On the floor of New England Yearly Meeting Sessions, in the middle of a discussion of the ongoing controversy over NEYM’s affiliation with Friends United Meeting , someone rose and read a passage from the Richmond Declaration of Faith , written in 1887 and recently reaffirmed by FUM. It included the line, “We disavow all professed illumination or spirituality that is divorced from faith in Jesus Christ of Nazareth.” The speaker pointed out how this directly contradicts the Quaker testimony of continuing revelation. He urged NEYM to make a complete split with FUM, saying that we could continue to engage with them as we would with any other Protestant church, but they are not really Quaker. The comment was hurtful to a lot of people in the meeting who are Christ-centered and identify with FUM and also consider themselves very much Quaker. The same day, a commenter on this blog told me that “Quakerism is founded in Christ. … With respect, you can no more be a pagan quaker than a virgi...

Part I: A freaky little book Part II: A Convergent Conversation / Small Gods Part III: The Human Face of God / And the LORD saw what He had made… Part IV: A few things missing Part V: An Evolving Covenant / The Initiatory Challenge Postscript: The Expulsion from Eden Afterward: Why does it matter? I’m writing this from New England Yearly Meeting Sessions 2008. It’s been a bit of a whirlwind for the last two or three days, so I’ve been away from the blog for a while. I’ve written six impassioned posts after an in-depth reading of Genesis and a perusal of several commentaries. I’ve gotten dozens of lively and intelligent comments. But I’m coming back to it now with a much broader question than any I’ve asked so far: What does it matter? Having learned what I’ve learned about J and P and E , and about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, what has that told me (if anything) about G*d, or about Quakers, or about my own spiritual life? The Bible was written by writers, and I’ve long felt that m...

To the many Pagans who said supportive things about my last post --thank you. Your kindness was much appreciated. That said, this one is going to be a pretty Quaker-centric post--I don't want you to think your support wasn't important, though, so I'm mentioning it first. If, to strain a metaphor I used in my last post , the Quaker family had put me out on the street, it would be difficult to explain the many supportive comments I received. I wrote that last post, " Theologically Queer ," feeling braced against rejection by the Quaker community. But almost as soon as the post went up, folks began trickling out of the house and sitting down next to me on the curb. Really kind, lovable folks. And nobody called me names, or even pointed out how silly I was being. Nope. They just came out to see how I was, and to wait patiently with me until I felt a bit better. Peggy Senger Parsons --a woman I consider to be one of the spiritual grown-ups of the world--came out and ...

I have mixed feelings about the article Are the Quakers Going Pagan? that recently ran online. I've especially been challenged by the discussion which has followed the article, especially among Friends. Evangelical Quaker Bruce Butler's blog post A Firm and Loving "No" is probably the best example of what I mean. Cause, I gotta say, while I'm hearing the Friend's "firm," I'm not really feelin' the "love." I think I harbored some secret, painful wishes that, however heretical and perhaps flat-out wrong I might seem to the more conservative branches of Quakers, I would still be seen as a member of the family tree. Maybe in the place of the crazy elderly aunt or second-cousin who has too many cats, but still, part of the family. I mean, maybe I even knew better, but I could not help but hope. Having lived my entire life in a Christian culture that disowned me, I've found more acceptance and welcome among Friends than I'd...

So here I am, back reading more of Marcus Borg 's Reading the Bible Again for the First Time : Taking the Bible Seriously but not Literally . I'm making a slow job of it--in part because Peter has had the book for a while. Partly, though, I just find Borg... thin. I may have to stop every two or three pages when I'm reading a meaty Quaker writer like Lloyd Lee Wilson , just to reboot my head after I hit my personal limit for Scriptural references, but I can feel the weight of both thought and Spirit pulsing through the pages. Borg is easier to read, on the one hand... but less absorbing on the other. I take it that he's the the theologian that fundamentalist Christians love to hate . His two big insights--that the Bible is most useful for it's metaphorical truths (what I, a Pagan, would call myths, in a positive sense) and for its metaphorized (mythologized) history of a people's relationship with Spirit--seem pretty straightforward to me. And the reading...

I was recently at Jeff Lilly's Druid Journal , and a post and comments thread there evoked something from me I've been trying to say since summer, though it has never come out right before. Maybe it isn't right even yet, but it's the closest I've come... As we've written before, Peter and I deliberately sought out workshops and activities at New England Yearly Meeting this past August that we hoped would be challenging to us. Obviously, we're what would have to be termed, not just liberal Quakers, but universalist Quakers. At different times and in different ways, Peter and I both have taken a look at Christianity, as it is currently practiced and understood in our culture, and determined that, to say the least, it did not "speak to our condition." I've never been Christian--Peter was at one time, but walked away. (That's a story I hope he'll share some day, so I won't touch on it here, for him.) Instead, the religious path t...

I am reading a book called "Reading the Bible Again For the First Time: Taking the Bible Seriously But Not Literally," by Marcus J. Borg. I’ve just finished chapter 1, and my pulse rate is up. If I were somebody who took blood pressure medication, my doctor would be telling me this book was bad for me. I am agreeing with Borg. His religious feelings are in sympathy with my own, and his outlook on history and on the nature of truth seem not only dead-on accurate but obvious. Yet Borg is presenting one side of a debate in our culture, and it seems to me to be the losing side. Conflict about the Bible is the single most divisive issue among Christians in North America today. And because of the importance of Christianity in the culture of the United States, conflict about the Bible is also central to what have been called ‘the culture wars.’ … The conflict is between ... a “literal-factual” way of reading the Bible and a “historical-metaphorical” way of reading it. Maybe the...

Image: Courtesy Oddworldly I’ve decided to try spelling it “G*d.” I once saw a Jewish author do that. It was thirty years ago and I no longer remember who the writer was, but I recognized at the time that he was echoing the practice the ancient Hebrews had of never speaking the name of the Holy One. I think that practice came partly out of a deep, visceral nervousness about too lightly invoking a Name of such Power, but I think also it was a way of reminding themselves of the transcendent and ineffable nature of their God. YHVH was father to His children, but He was also creator of the universe, and it was an awfully big universe even back then. You could call Him Papa, but you always knew He had a special secret name besides; a Name that spoke of infinity and eternity and thus would never fit on a human tongue. I’m probably projecting more onto ancient Hebrew theology than was really there. Modern Christian ideas about infinite-and-eternal-God may descend more from ...

Not too long ago, I was visiting the home of a close Pagan friend of mine, and I made mention of "God" in a conversation which included Laura's very bright and inquiring son. Laura stopped me, saying, "In this house, when someone says 'God' we always ask, 'which one?'" And it's true--adopting monotheistic language can make polytheist, panenthest, animist, and nontheist points of view invisible. Laura, of course, was politely insisting I not marginalize her son's religion (and hers) in her own home. The irony, of course, is that we're co-religionists, she and I. I don't mind at all Laura calling me on apparently privileging monotheism, particularly in the context of her family life. But if I describe my experiences among Friends at NEYM this year in any detail, I'm going to wind up using a lot of words and phrases that may give my Pagan friends reason to get a little nervous about me "going native" in my time amon...

Spiritual Identity and Membership Series: Part 1: Quakerpagan or Paganquaker - Part 2: Membership and Identity - Part 3: Marshall Massey Replies The following is a reply by Marshall Massey of Earth Witness Journal to my post about Membership and Identity. I think it raises points that are important enough to both Quakers and Pagans that I want to feature it in a post of its own rather than have it tucked away as an appended comment. Marshall’s reply: --------------------- Friends Peter and Cat, you don't have to publish this comment on your site if you don't want to; you can read it and then delete it, and that's fine with me. I'm not sure what I am about to say is better discussed on an open forum than in private e-mail. But since I am mentioned in the opening paragraph of this post, I believe I have a bit of a duty to respond. The truth may be either that there are many things we call "divine", or that the divine has many faces. Different paths take one t...

Spiritual Identity and Membership Series: Part 1: Quakerpagan or Paganquaker - Part 2: Membership and Identity - Part 3: Marshall Massey Replies This week, I encountered an update to the link to this blog that Quaker blogger Marshall Massey posted recently. To begin with, let me say that I'm really honored to be listed under Kindred Souls at Earthwitness*. Beyond the Earthwitness itself --on its own an important reason to respect Marshall--I've noticed that he not only links to, but praises writers he has had important disagreements with. He is truly open to new perspectives, at the same time that he is rooted firmly in his own very traditional, very Christian Quakerism. So. I take this guy seriously. And I like that he's linked to us here. And he says nice things. Recently I revisited his page, and noticed that the blurb linking to this blog had been revised, partly to point to our post Waging Peace in All Things , discussing the ways Quakers are laboring with the...