Meeting for Sufferings: Review of YM/YMG
'The group had focussed on the purposes of YM/YMG: worship, business, decision-making, learning, inspiration, and being in community.'
Saturday morning was chilly for those Friends gathered in The Light. The room garners its environmental credentials from using body heat. Unfortunately this needs 100 or more people to be present; it was easier to settle when a heater was brought in.
Morning worship again referred to Ukraine. One Friend saw a picture of Jesus standing amid the rubble. Considering church structures might seem like a waste of energy in the light of the precarious state of the world, said Sarah Donaldson, clerk of the group reviewing Yearly Meeting. But witness and worship required these structures. Friends needed to organise in ways that were nurturing; if they were inaccessable or cliquey then we would miss opportunities to thrive. The group had focussed on the purposes of YM/YMG: worship, business, decision-making, learning, inspiration, and being in community. YM sessions were the first and best place to experience Quaker business done well. YM and YMG offered a different balance of these multiple purposes. What was less clear was how they might be simplified – these Meetings were not really a target for that. But accountability was something that needed work: there was sometimes a disconnect between different decision-making bodies. More generally, it was felt that some Friends didn’t understand just how important Yearly Meeting is. This was something Friends needed to address.
Responding, one Friend thought that the report spoke to YM as it currently operated, rather than what it could be. He was confident that Friends were open to change. The report was a first stage, said Sarah, and concerned with purpose. Stage two would deal with the expression of those purposes. The bigger questions were about why some Friends didn’t want to, or couldn’t, attend. How could we hear from those people when standard forms of Quaker communication didn’t reach them?
One Friend wanted more clarity on the distinction between YM and the residential YMG. Friends she knew understood YMG as a place that allowed greater discernment. It was YM in which there was little interest.
A Friend from Quaker Committee for Christian & Interfaith Relations felt that YM in session was ‘the most important Meeting for Worship for Business that there is.’ Time for fun and community did matter, but discernment was key. The distinction between YM and YMG was ‘a nonsense’, she said. She had found research that suggested that, over the last century, a consistent six per cent of Friends attended. If Friends didn’t want to deal with business that was because they had not experienced it. Friends needed to rediscover the joys of discernment. The ‘fights’ that happened within her AM were actually extremely productive.
Another Friend took a different view. He understood the connection with buusiness but ‘Basically, I want to be a Quaker because I want to worship in a Quaker manner. The rest is baggage – duty.’ At YM he had been horrified by the ‘rushing around and anonymity.’
One representative thought perhaps a renaming might help. She didn’t often hear about threshing in the context of business, for example. Perhaps it ought to be called ‘Meeting for Listening’. That was a counter-cultural act. People expected it to be ‘bad’ or ‘sad’, but it actually gave rise to joy.
Another thought it important that Friends accepted the duty to prepare for a Meeting. ‘By doing that we can come to a quite different view from the one we originally held.’
One more Friend spoke cautiously about her time at MfS. She had tried for three years to understand what it all meant. She found that she still didn’t. She saw a range of central committees and bodies that were populated by people who had expertise with committees. This meant there was an imbalance of power between those who had those skills and those who didn’t. This meant a resulting imbalance between central and local work.
This contribution moved the Meeting seamlessly to its consideration of a review of MfS itself, said Margaret Bryan, clerk. Should the review of YM/G and the review of MfS be combined?
This recent ministry was interesting, said Sarah Donaldson. She was one of those ‘apparatchiks’ who was familiar with committee work. It was useful to have that experience and she hoped it wouldn’t be lost in the search for new voices.
Margaret said the call for ‘not the usual suspects’ had been heard, and hoped that would be taken on board as an extended review group was constructed. A representative of Central Nominations Committee reminded Friends that they could ‘only work with what we’ve been given’. She encouraged Friends to ask people to fill in their service forms and make themselves available.
One Friend was concerned that MfS couldn’t be reviewed without a corresponding review of BYM trustees. That had already happened, said Margaret, and a minute combining the reviews was approved.
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