Letters - 14 June 2024

‘Cloud of unknowing’

Although rather surprised, I was nevertheless grateful to see Clive Gordon’s reference (31 May) to my letter of ten weeks ago (22 March).

My understanding of Quakerism is that it eschews dogma. So any religious dogma held or promulgated to be incontrovertibly true beyond all doubt must, ipso facto, be un-Quakerly. It therefore follows that, yes, George Fox, the infallible dogmatist who never doubted that he was right, was unquestionably un-Quakerly in this particular area of faith and practice.

The problem with making this statement is that it is far too dogmatic! And so we are thrown back into that great and mysterious ‘cloud of unknowing’ where the questions always remain… what, indeed, is truth? And does anybody know the answer?

Kevin Skippon

‘The Pity of War’

In the 10 May news, I was drawn to the article about Conscientious Objectors Day, where there was a Meeting for Worship at the Quaker Service Memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum (NMA).

How moving that this remembrance sculpture has a place for such events. The NMA hosts thousands of people over the year, all wondering about the issues of war and suffering.

The Quakers now have a second sculpture at the NMA, just down the path a short way from the Quaker Service Memorial. This one is called ‘The Pity of War’ and remembers the unknown, forgotten and voiceless civilians affected by conflict. This is powerful and poignant at the moment with Gaza and Ukraine being on our minds.

As I expect most readers of the Friend will know ‘The Pity of War’ is a joint effort with Peter Walker, sculptor, his wife Katie, and Southern Marches Area Meeting. It has been a long journey, but we are there now, with the sculpture erected a month ago. Our unveiling event is on Monday 24 June at 2pm, and everyone is welcome to join us.

Do look at our website www.pityofwar.org if you would like to know more.

I would like to think this sculpture will also offer a place for Meetings for Worship at devastating times of civilian loss, as well as a quiet place for reflection for anyone suffering.

Barbara Mark

Using Zoom

I am prodded into action by Clive Ashwin (17 May). I am deeply saddened by the decision to close Meeting for Sufferings (MfS). I’ve tried to read the explanation in the Friend but am put off by frequent references to spirit-led discernment as if we Friends have never practised anything else.

I speculate that the fundamental cause of the approaching tragedy is nothing to do with equality or discernment but simply the result that the deliberations of the Group to Review YM, YMG and MfS (GRYMM) have been held via Zoom.

Clive Ashwin asks us to consider and question Zoom for being and doing Quaker. When the pandemic struck and our familiar Meeting space was closed I was an enthusiastic Zoomer. But I have come to a realisation: Zoom is not a substitute for meeting together as living bodies, people, in the same physical space. The reasons and excuses for using Zoom are not valid. If we really want to be spirit-led, then don’t let us be fooled by the confabulation that what we get on Zoom is a person. Yes, in front of the camera you are a person but what comes across on Zoom is not.

I’m not an IT dinosaur. I still use Zoom. But, as far as I can, not for Worship and not for doing Quaker Business. When the restrictions softened and came to an end, I and my fellow Loughborough Meeting Friends breathed sighs of relief that we can meet again as physical bodies in a physical space. I continue to use Zoom on occasion for seminars and for small scale discussions but I am sure its use should be curtailed.

A while ago Abigail Maxwell asked if it is possible to teach someone to be more right brained. We are driving ourselves ever further into left-brained madness of which the reasons for using Zoom are symptoms and markers. I am not surprised that Meeting for Sufferings accepted the GRYMM recommendations – half of them were on Zoom anyway. It’ll be the same at Yearly Meeting but that Friends are using Zoom does not make it valid.

Two activities are impossible on Zoom. You cannot play together in an orchestra and you cannot share a meal together. Both of these are fundamental to a Quaker Meeting for Worship, even if they are unspoken. As we sit together in stillness it is as if we are playing in an orchestra and the reason for coming together is to draw each other into communion with the Holy Spirit. As a final metaphor, we are playing Jenga. Pull out one more piece and the whole tower comes crashing down.

Anthony Gimpel

Living simply

Thanks to Paul Hodgkin (5 April) for speaking truth about the danger the Earth is in, which is going to speak, perhaps uncomfortably, to our honest inner selves even if it profoundly questions what we’re used to having. And yet I would also question a testimony against something. Testimonies arise from the good spirit, not from ideology – and Paul blames the Earth crisis on capitalism, which is an ideological analysis.

However, if we are to move on from just blaming something to actually resolving the Earth’s existential crises we need to find ways of life that are actually practical – for us all, and not top-down.

After all, I don’t think any of us, including Paul, is going to bring capitalism down – and what then anyway?

So, allow me to suggest what it could be. On one hand, take into account that we all want and respond to love and acceptance – that is the Quaker spirit to which our Testimonies testify. On the other hand, check out our tradition of shared meals. Each person brings a little to share, and we then have an embarrassment of plenty.

Given we live in an individualising economy in which people struggle alone, both materially and to find inner meaning, increasing the level of sharing would also increase community, personal contentment and material security. And it rests on how people are, here and now, as the false promises of capitalism become redundant while the impact on the Earth would take a dive as living simply becomes a reality, not just a nice concept.

Andrew Sterling

Boarding schools

I am sad that Henry Lawson (5 April) thinks that separating children from their parents is a shocking act of violence. This is not a universal view, however.

My sister spent six years from the age of ten to sixteen at Friends School Saffron Walden and loved it. She made lifelong friends there. I went to Bootham for two years and also enjoyed it.

Alison Leonard (19 April) thinks that boarding school education is harmful. An institution cannot monitor children all the time, true, but neither can parents. My family did not feel broken up by our experience.

I understand Alison’s other points but think that they may be overstated.

Colin Henderson

The sacred oneness

I have just read Harvey Gillman’s article, 24 May, and am beginning to think a little about what he says. I hope it will be acceptable to share the following thoughts.

I very much appreciate his ‘vision of the sacred oneness’. I do wish that I could enter into such a view of things; and perhaps, God willing, in time I will be able to do so.

The difficulty here, to my limited understanding of spiritual realities, is the teaching of Jesus, that our world is divided into sheep and goats. This is a theme which runs through the whole Bible. And since I personally believe the Bible to be the inspired word of God, it is difficult for such a one as myself, holding this view as I do, to enter into the beautiful concept of a sacred oneness. I wish that I could. And perhaps Friends will be so kind as to help me here.

Clearly God’s ‘common grace’, as theologians term it, is present in all creatures and all people.

Even the worst examples of humanity are a lesson to us all, concerning the human nature which we share, that ‘there, but for the grace of God, go I’. To my way of thinking, it is only the intervening grace of the God of Love that makes a difference.

Clive Gordon