Sunday Friends Meeting: Haiku
silent Friends meeting ...
the sound of chairs being moved
to enlarge the circle
-- Robert Major
I'm proud to have my family history deeply tied to the Religious Society of Friends, also called Quakers. Without realizing it when I moved here, my house is just a few miles from a Quaker Meeting (~ church) founded by my 7th great grandparents in the 1750s.
I always think of the Goose Creek Meeting on snowy days: the woodstove burning, everyone sitting in silence on old wooden benches in an unadorned room. It speaks of simplicity, reflection, purity, and honesty.
What I appreciate about this poem also is its simplicity and matter-of-factness. Someone else arrive in the silence, folks make room for the newcomer, and the silence returns ... enlargened.
For me, there are few experiences more moving than sitting with other people in silence. A Quaker meeting does not require a building or a big group; it happens when any two Friends get together with intention.
This will always by my spiritual home, even when I attend services elsewhere. I will always carry the silence with me.
Nice event meeting
Did you hear about the book that is out describing the Quakers as the most efficient group for social change in the United States? I wish I could remember the title, I heard the author talk on radio and now I can't find the thing. There were a list of core principles (as defined by someone not of a Quaker background) that made the cultural changes they brought about happen, what sticks in my mind are: not caring about how credit is given for the accomplishment, not caring about having to be alive should the change take long, and a bunch of other great ideals to follow. Pretty much all of them were polar opposites of the principles today that we see in national politics in the United States, lol.