Experiment with Light: Movement of the Spirit
Hilary Pinder brings the series on Experiment with Light to a close
The practice of opening oneself to the searching Light of the Spirit can bring many benefits. Among these are a deepening of consciousness and a strengthening of our Quaker faith: ‘… it wasn’t just my faith that had grown strong, it was Quaker faith. That is, I had come to discover in my experience how deep and powerful the Quaker faith really was.’ - Rex Ambler
In the beginning
The first public Experiment with Light was held in 1996 and, as Rex Ambler says in A Light to Live By, this showed that:
‘it was possible to teach this practice, it did help people to open to the Light and, surprisingly, they could help one another to understand it.’
Light Groups began in 1997 following a talk at Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM). Initiated by Alan Kirkham, small groups met regularly in Norwich and Lynn Monthly Meeting to ‘wait together in the light’ and to share their experiences.
In the fourteen years since that first talk at BYM, Experiment with Light has gradually taken root across Britain. A website has been developed with meditation outlines, details of introductory courses and a Practitioners Pack for those who wish to start a Light Group (www.experiment-with-light.org.uk).
A network of such groups has sprung up, with about sixty known groups currently practising together. The first newsletter has just been circulated and a growing band of facilitators are available to deliver introductory retreats and workshops at Quaker Centres and in Area Meetings.
Many introductory workshops have been run in Europe (see ‘Beyond our shores,’ 11 November), in the USA and as far afield as South Africa and New Zealand. Introductory workshops may be offered at the Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC) World Conference in Kenya in April 2012.
Light Groups
Jane Holmes (21 October), Ann Banks (28 October) and Gerard Hewitson (4 November) have all testified to the value of the practice in their personal lives. The practice of sharing our discoveries with others in the supportive witness of a Light Group can deepen our sense of the transformation that is at work in us. Regular practice can also make it easier for us to speak our truth in ministry in our Local or Area Meeting for Worship.
‘In this way, small Light Groups can be a great service to a larger Meeting, deepening the life of its members and preparing them “in heart and mind” for their more public worship together.’
- Rex Ambler
The focus of the meditations does not have to be on one’s own life; groups can share a focus, for example, on the life of the Meeting or on the state of the world. Sharing what comes in these settings can provide opportunities for mutual support and for extending our thinking beyond what we thought was possible. Ros Smith (14 October) talks about Experiment with Light as a practice that fits quite naturally with the healing ministry of the Friends’ Fellowship of Healing.
A Framework for Action priority is ‘strengthening the spiritual roots in our Meetings and in ourselves’. It is the experience of practitioners that Experiment with Light provides both a meditation practice and a supportive setting in which both our souls and the spiritual roots of our precious Quaker tradition can be nourished and enabled to flower anew.
The future
The Experiment with Light Network is a small group charged with steering the development of Experiment with Light within BYM and beyond. At a conference held in May 2011 thirty practitioners came together with representatives from Quaker Life, the European and Middle East Section of FWCC, Young Friends General Meeting and Friends’ Fellowship of Healing to discern the way forward for this movement of the Spirit. The Epistle has been distributed to all Area Meetings in England, Scotland and Wales as well as being available on the website http://bit.ly/sJLNxq
The vision that emerged from the conference was one of an increasingly vibrant gathered community, a community that:
* allows us to be raw and real and vulnerable with one another;
* encourages us to challenge and to be challenged in love;
* expresses, acknowledges and resolves conflict;
* is open to new light, to amazement, to astonishment, to awe and wonder, to passion;
* is able to face the truth of our condition as individuals, as groups and, through this courageous encounter, be freed to change.
Helen Meads, in last week’s article, contrasts this sort of culture of contribution with a culture of silence that can suppress the honest sharing of difference and avoid the open expression of conflict. We see Experiment with Light as a ministry to the Religious Society of Friends, a ministry that needs a resilient community of practice that is rooted in Quaker discipline to take it forward. We have laid plans to develop just such a community and will hold our next conference in September 2013.
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