SUMMER 20093/6/2009
Salem Quarter Worship & Ministry Committee met on 3/6/2009, at the home of Gloria and Bob Horvay, convening in worship at about 7:30 pm. Thirteen individuals were present from Mickleton, Mullica Hill, Woodbury, and Woodstown Monthly Meetings, as well as the quarter coordinator. In this, the first meeting following our commitment in December to seeking ways to encourage new participation, we enjoyed seeing new faces in the group.
Building on that commitment, we returned to consideration of whether to continue with our current practice of meeting at the Horvays’ home or seek a host near the meeting where quarterly meeting will be held each session. We aired several concerns on either side of the question, and decided that the next appropriate step would be experimentation. We charged our clerk with seeking opportunities in meetings later this year; however, since the June meeting will be hosted by Mullica Hill Monthly Meeting and the Horvays reside in Mullica Hill, no change is needed quite yet.
Our experiment with a mini-retreat in January went well, bringing together nearly a score of Friends from various monthly meetings. A central element of that session—consideration of Galatians 5:22-23—also served to inspire us to further discussion in our committee session:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, selfcontrol; against such things there is no law.
The pairing of Spirit and law … at times in union, at others in tension … is present throughout Quaker experience. It’s reflected in the title of PYM’s book of guidance, Faith and Practice, and in the fundamentals of “right order,” which we determine not by a rote rulebook but by a combination of living discernment and established custom.
The motivations and manifestations of love are not always as clear as Paul’s list. Any family can cite examples of tough love or harsh discipline, selfless support or selfish ingratiation. Even the internal compass of right order can be ambiguous; in times of trial, the sense of doing what you should be doing where you should be doing it might not give you joy or ease or success, but simply the peace of clarity.
We Quakers rely strongly on individual and corporate discernment, and these are trustworthy, but they are not the only tools. Chaim Potok’s novel and play, My Name is Asher Lev, illustrates that our gifts, the needs that call them forth, and the forces that shape and guide them, can have several sources, including heritage, family, and personal devotion.
We concluded in worship at about 9:00 pm. Worship and Ministry intends to meet again on 6/12/2009, the Friday evening before quarterly meeting, and we welcome participation from all monthly meetings of Salem Quarter.
For the Committee,
Mario Cavallini, clerkRETURN TO TABLE OF CONTENTS
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Saturday, May 30, 2009 at 08:35 PM
