Meeting for Sufferings: Yearly Meeting Review Group
‘The big question is: can we really have discernment at all if the bulk of the people are online and it’s a contentious and heartfelt decision?’
The first main item on Saturday saw Sarah Donaldson, convener of the Yearly Meeting Review Group (YMRG), which is appointed to review Yearly Meeting (YM), Yearly Meeting Gathering (YMG) and Meeting for Sufferings (MfS), speaking to the group’s second report. ‘As reported in October, we’ve heard that Spirit-led discernment is central to the heart of the Society,’ said Sarah. This discernment, the report suggests, is not being well practised everywhere, and communication is a challenge across the YM. Friends were asked to consider eight questions. These looked at how to create opportunities for Spirit-led discernment (by allowing enough time and opportunity for experimentation); membership and representation; and communication (‘Does anything need to change in the system of MfS representation?’, ‘How can we achieve better methods of communication throughout the Yearly Meeting?’ and ‘How can we reduce friction in the relationship between MfS and BYM Trustees?’).
MfS clerk Margaret Bryan noted that ‘There is a lot in the report and a lot to think about’, as Friends welcomed the findings, particularly its emphasis on Spirit-led discernment. One Friend raised the issue of discernment when many people are meeting online. ‘The big question is: can we really have discernment at all if the bulk of the people are online and it’s a contentious and heartfelt decision?’
Another Friend asked why BYM trustees had been identified as the group to take the issue of communication forward: ‘It’s not germane to their task. There may well be other bodies within the society that might be well placed.’
Sarah Donaldson said that, while personally she wasn’t ‘envisaging the trustees telling everyone how to communicate… what trustees have got is a resource’, but suggested that there could be a separate group set up to explore the issue. ‘If Friends have a better idea, that’s marvellous… our sense of reality is that, if it starts there [with trustees] and moves forward, that’s most likely to be successful’. However, the decision was open to Friends’ ‘hearts and minds’, she said.
One Friend from the Midlands suggested that instruction from trustees to address the perceived problems of communication ‘could feel a bit too top-down’ which is ‘a dangerous way to go’. Another Quaker suggested that it might ‘work better if this is something that can be owned at a slightly wider level and perhaps appointed as a subgroup of Sufferings’.
‘Trustees hear that there is a perception of friction and telling people what to do,’ said one trustee, but gently reminded the gathering that ‘we are all Quakers and members’. The paper’s diagrams weren’t ‘helpful’, she suggested, as they show the trustees ‘on the outside’. Clear diagrams and an updated website would help, she added, which were being worked on, and could help clarify the decision-making process. ‘So please take some comfort that we all recognise it’s a problem and that we have to do it better.’
Margaret Bryan suggested that, rather than trustees being asked to take the issue of communication forward, it could be taken to Arrangements Group (AG) and brought back to MfS. This was recorded in the minute.
One Friend then asked if there was a memorandum of understanding (MOU) ‘explaining the clear areas of working between these various groups’. Paul Parker said there was no MOU, but ‘trustees have terms of reference which are put in place by YM and reviewed periodically’ (last in 2021). The definition of MfS came primarily from Quaker faith & practice, chapter 7. One Yorkshire Friend asked that the matter should go to YM2023, which Friends agreed in a revised minute.
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