Meeting for Sufferings: Gathering by the lake
Ian Kirk-Smith reports on the Meetings for Sufferings residential weekend at Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre
Change was the order of the day at the first Meeting for Sufferings in 2013.
A rare residential weekend of Meeting for Sufferings was held at the Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre in Birmingham. It was the first time in the Centre’s one-110-year history it had hosted the event.
Some ninety Friends gathered in a packed Cadbury room. Friends who felt rather ‘crowded’ were reminded that Gandhi had once addressed 300 people in the same space!
At the main table with the clerk of Meeting for Sufferings, Christine Cannon, were Juliet Prager, newly appointed deputy recording clerk, and Ethel Livermore, who was attending her first Sufferings as assistant clerk.
In addition to Sufferings representatives, who came from every corner of Britain, the agenda prompted the attendance of more than ten Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) trustees and several representatives from centrally managed departments.
The weekend was an opportunity, during five business sessions, to devote a lot of time and discernment to the future role of Meeting for Sufferings and its key relationships and responsibilities.
A worshipping community
In a deeply gathered worship-sharing session on Friday evening Sufferings considered what it meant to be a worshipping community.
Joy Croft, who introduced the session, said that in Meeting for Worship we connect with each other and, at a deeper and wider level, with the collective spirit, wider truth and with God. Connected to that light in our midst, it was natural to have unique insights, and natural to find that ‘someone across the room will say exactly what is in my heart’.
She described the concept of ‘heart and mind prepared’ as being open, listening and hopeful. But, she asked, could this be extended to Meetings for Worship for Business on a scale as large as Sufferings – ‘Meeting for Worship for Business Big Time!’?
Given our structures, traditions and rituals, could we continue to worship in the same way, in a spirit of expectant waiting? She suggested we could. When one began with heart and mind prepared the unexpected could happen (as it did at York in 2009) and did happen more often than we would think.
A Friend said that when Quakers come together for a Business Meeting the ‘gathering together’ is vital – the stress is on the ‘meeting’ and not only the ‘worship’.
Friends spoke of the silence in our Business Meetings. A Business Meeting is a Meeting for Worship for Business in which the opening silence is fundamental – possible even in telephone conferences. A Friend suggested that our process of expectant waiting allowed the unexpected option to emerge. ‘By allowing the space,’ she said, ‘we allow the spirit to enter and offer alternatives; the spirit is the space.’
The main focus of sessions at the weekend was to address the role of Meeting for Sufferings and the nature of its relationship with other governing bodies – from Local and Area Meetings to central committees and, particularly, BYM trustees. Subjects covered included the role of Sufferings as a visionary body, the importance of communication, the future, the need for trust and accountability.
A visionary body
On Saturday morning a session addressed the role of Sufferings as a visionary body within the Yearly Meeting. Chris Skidmore gave a thoughtful introduction, peppered with perceptive quotes. We do not, he said, behave, as Edward Burrough advised, as:
‘a worldly assembly of men, by hot contests, by seeking to outspeak and overreach one another… as if it were… two sides violently striving for dominion’ but by ‘determining every matter coming before you, in love, coolness, gentleness… as only one party.’
He also reminded Friends of words in the proposed revision of 6.28 of Quaker faith & practice:
‘Meeting for Sufferings is the body which is entrusted with the general care of matters affecting the Yearly Meeting in its life and witness. It seeks to discern spiritual values and vision to guide Friends’ corporate commitment and actions.’
Jennifer Barraclough, clerk of BYM trustees, considered what is important in a good marriage when talking about the relationships that Sufferings had with other governing bodies. She stressed the importance of ‘partnership’, ‘trust’ and ‘communication’ and having ‘confidence in our processes’.
Jennifer suggested that Friends ‘work well in small units but not so well working as a whole’ and raised a number of interesting questions, including the need to examine what it means to be a good Quaker employer, the need to model good Quaker governance, having clear terms of reference, taking responsibility when it is required and having the right conversations about it.
Trust
Trust is a vital issue. The word was present in many contributions throughout the weekend.
A Friend suggested that many people had been brought up not to trust themselves. She said that if each of us can trust ourselves then we can bring all our gifts to Sufferings and to the wider world.
The nature and quality of feedback from the centre was a concern. A Friend was disturbed that the ‘traffic’ tended to flow only one way. Concerns were presented from Area Meetings and were referred to committees – but there was poor feedback. And, she added, ‘How do we affirm really good concerns even if there are not the resources to support them?’
Meeting for Sufferings, a voice from the west country said, was too concerned with the past. It should be, he argued, a forward thinking group: ‘I think visioning is considering the future, and this is very much the attitude that Sufferings needs. It needs to be forward looking’.
While marriages, a Friend agreed, did depend very much on trust and harmony, he believed that disagreement can be both productive and constructive. Conflict, he argued, could be creative: ‘We need to trust each other – but that does not stop us disagreeing with each other and, sometimes, it will solve more problems in the long run.’
Another Friend said that he had made a practice, since Sufferings had ‘slimmed down’ in size, of visiting Local Meetings and listening to views about Sufferings and central work. He said: ‘In our Local Meetings we know each other well, but we don’t talk about the Society’. He added that he had got ‘quite a surprise’ when listening to Friends locally. He believed there was ‘a lack of trust with central work on the whole’ and cited a Friend who said ‘you’re talking about Palestine and Israel but when you talk about us – what is the centre doing for our Local Meeting’?
Knowing what matters
A London-based Friend struck a positive note when she asserted, strongly, that Friends ‘know what matters. We are talking about establishing the Kingdom here’ and that ‘many of the concerns coming from Area Meetings lead us to that’.
However, a worry about the uneven relationship between the centre and the local kept surfacing. A Friend was concerned that issues such as same sex marriage and sustainability were taken up enthusiastically in the centre but that ‘they are not bringing Friends with them’, and there ‘needs to be a space for this to happen’. Many Friends, he argued, would not leap immediately.
This concern had prompt support. Another Friend stressed the value of ‘having time… to create space to be led’. ‘We need time’, she said, ‘to think and time to discern and we need to allow space’ for this.
Communication
The importance of good communication was then raised. A Friend was concerned that ‘there seemed to be a lack of communication and engagement’ between Area Meetings and BYM trustees and said ‘we do need better communication’.
A Friend captured attention by introducing a creative metaphor. She said: ‘What we are doing here is dancing together and, when the music stops, we tread on each others’ toes and stop and work out where we went wrong – and then the music starts again. When you dance you must trust. We must have some structure, but you also need to allow space for less structured dancing.’
A Friend expressed her uneasiness about the relationship she saw between Sufferings and BYM trustees. ‘Trust’, she said, ‘depends on communication but communication was somewhat uneven between Sufferings and trustees’. She illustrated her point by referring to how she received information from trustees – in minutes – but felt this was not telling the whole story. She said: ‘You know, from minutes, what trustees have talked about but nothing about how they made decisions or why they have made decisions’.
This concern over a lack of perceived trust was repeated by a Friend from the north-west, who felt there was a ‘danger of a high priesthood’ developing and another who said ‘a number of Area Meetings feel alienated from the centre’.
Big issues
A Friend reminded those present that ‘Meeting for Sufferings is Yearly Meeting not in session’ and that there were some big issues to tackle – which was precisely the aim of the weekend.
The difficulties and challenges of the task were lucidly expressed by a Friend who said that recommendations made to trustees often had financial implications.
This practical perspective was reinforced by another speaker who reminded Friends of the ‘endemic problem in the Society of letting people get on with it… and then complaining afterwards’! While trustees should not be able to ‘make decisions that we are unaware of’, he said, ‘we need to be able, at Meeting for Sufferings, to tread the delicate line of both comforting and discomforting the trustees’.
Listening
A Friend from Wiltshire said: ‘The word that keeps coming back to me is listening. There has to be preparation and a willingness to find out but it is not all about how well you communicate – it is also about you listening.’
There was a sense of good fellowship, friendliness and cooperation throughout the weekend. It encouraged openness and the occasional lightness of touch in contributions.
‘It is no wonder’, a Friend said to some laughter in the room, ‘that Friends are known as the Awkward Squad’ and she stressed that good listening is ‘listening with heart and mind’ and that people were ‘doing things that we would not or could not do for ourselves’.
One Friend, noted for his wit and practical wisdom, reminded those present that ‘there are two things we all recognise. Where two or three Quakers gather – there will be five or six opinions. And “If I am not involved – then somebody is up to something!”’
One whole body
The idea of the Religious Society of Friends in Britain as ‘one whole body’ was, consistently, stressed. ‘I do not see BYM as a hierarchy’, a Friend said. ‘I see people who are servants of Yearly Meeting.’
The way that Friends do things is a distinctive way. It is a slow way. A Friend reiterated that ‘our style takes time and involves a lot of testing processes and very long term commitments.’ It is a way, also, that depends on people taking an interest and taking part.
‘Ultimately’, a Friend said, ‘it is the grassroots that run the system’. A whisper to my left quietly added, ‘Is it?’
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