Sometimes we don't have language for the things we do. We just do them.
Clerking a Quaker meeting for business is one such task. Facilitating group discernment engages a variety of interpersonal skills, and—especially when the question under consideration is emotionally charged—it can get complicated. A friend of mine once asked how exactly one learns to be a clerk. I didn't have an answer. Another friend hazarded a response: "I guess it's just something you learn to do by listening."
We agreed it wasn't a very helpful response. Several others jumped into the discussion, trying to put into words this thing we've all experienced but didn't quite know how to explain. It got complicated.
Later, I did what I normally do after that kind of discussion. I started looking for resources. And I found one—a book for children—that was so simple and clear, I decided to offer it through the Barclay Press bookstore.
With support from Wellesley Monthly Meeting, Nancy Haines wrote and Anne Nydam illustrated a story about children who are deciding what to do with the money they raised in a hot dog sale, Approved!: A Story About Quaker Meeting for Business. The genius of this book is an eleven-word description of what it means to clerk a meeting for business: "She leads the meetings and helps us as we make decisions."
In the story, the children self-manage, coloring quietly if they don't have something to say, so they "can still be a part of our community." After a financial report, they try, as best they can, "to listen to God." They share a variety of ideas, recognizing that "sometimes we have to listen to God and to each other for a long time until we know what is best for our community." And when one of the children doesn't get what she wants, she admits that even though she "really wanted to give the money to help animals," she knows that the proposed minute "is right for our group."
There's a reminder at the end of the book that "children are quite capable of participating in Quaker process." Maybe because it's not actually complex at all. Just hard.
Eric Muhr
Take publishers, for instance
There's something unique about Quakers. It might be that we have a peculiar singularity of purpose that keeps us moving forward. It might be stubbornness. But the truth is that there's no good reason for the number and variety of Friends institutions in the world.
Take publishers, for instance.
The field of publishing is a place where the news is of budget cuts, reorganizations, mergers, and bankruptcies. Yet Quakers have more than a dozen publishing houses in the U.S. alone. I'm not sure the survival of so many presses is a mark of our success. But it says something — maybe even something good — about what kind of people we are. That we keep going when so many others are giving up. That we are survivors.
Last month, I attended my first meeting of Quakers Uniting in Publications, an international network of Quaker booksellers, authors, and publishers concerned with the ministry of the written word. And much of the talk was of a way forward, of what it might mean that we're still around when so many other religious publishers are being bought out or shut down. We listened in our times of gathered worship for what God might reveal about his place and purpose for us in the world.
So what did we hear?
Some spoke of budget concerns. Some spoke of the need to more creatively engage young Friends through technology. Some spoke of the places in which the world needs us now more than ever. Many of us didn't speak much, but we listened. And there was a shared sense that God continues to call people to feed the hungry, to welcome the stranger, to clothe the naked and care for the sick, to visit the prisoner. And that God continues to use us as vessels through which that call can be carried to the people God calls.
Eric Muhr
This is how life goes
More than half a year has passed since my first day on the job as publisher at Barclay Press. In that time, we've shipped roughly 10,000 items—books, study guides, CDs. We've shared 23 newsletters (this is 24). We're in the middle of two book projects with half a dozen more in the works. We've partnered with EFM in producing Easter Offering materials. We've helped Tilikum Center for Retreats develop an application process for the Christian Writers Cabin they're building. We've replaced three sets of fluorescent tubes, addressed a plumbing problem in the upstairs bathroom, had the carpets cleaned, and saved a failing hard drive. We've taken out the trash on Tuesday nights and brought in the empty trash cans on Wednesday mornings.
This is how life goes. We do what needs to be done, try not to drop any details, and take what time's left over to think about what might come next.
So what comes next?
Well, it won't be long before we're mailing out orders of Illuminate for Fall 2016, a study on Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. The quarterly includes writing from Bruce Butler, Priscilla Hochhalter, Judith Shoemaker, Nancy Thomas, and Catherine Trzeciak. After that, we'll send out Fruit of the Vine.
In the meantime, we're building an online imprint, which will remain separate from the work we do here at Barclay Press. We hope to have more than a thousand readers and 30 contributors by the end of this summer.
We're also dreaming.
About what God is doing and where God is leading. About how we might plant seeds today—little, tiny seeds—that might one day break into bloom. About what we can do that might make a difference in the world.
Eric Muhr