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Friends United Meeting |
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Quaker Life
December 2002
Why I Am a Quaker
By Jeri Horn
I didn't find the Society of Friends; it was a chance meeting. When I was 22, I wasn't looking for a spiritual home, but circumstances led me to Friends, an encounter I still regard with gratitude and awe. This is my story.
I am strong willed, contentious, stubborn and skeptical; so are Quakers. If you ask one for an opinion, you get it. If you ask for help, you get that, too. If you want rules, you might get a report on custom and seeking God's will, but no rules. Quakers don't put much stock in labels or rituals, but they do distinguish between birthright Quakers and convinced Quakers. Birthright Quakers take some pride in their generational edge, as they should, but I'm inclined to think that starting out as a Baptist has got to be harder.
My parents were Baptists. So was I.
In the southern Indiana community of Versailles in the mid 1930s, there were three churches: Baptist, Methodist and a third church we called "Holy Rollers." Methodists owned grocery stores and drove cars. Baptists worked hard and got through the depression hoping that money was the root of all evil, because we didn't have much, and most of us didn't know how to get it. The Holy Rollers left the front doors of their church open during summer services while they shouted and prayed and sang all the way down Main Street. I didn't know any "Holy Rollers," but it sounded like they had a lot more fun on Sunday nights than we did.
I became a church member when I was 12. My entire Sunday School class went down front on the second verse of "Standing on the Promises." Standing alone in the fifth row with a hymnbook in my hand, I suddenly felt called. I joined them at the altar, where we pledged our lives to Jesus. The official baptism was the following Sunday in Laughery Creek. The choir stood on the bank singing, "Shall We Gather At the River," while we waded in one by one to have our sins washed away. It was a beautiful experience.
Dorothy Gray was the minister's wife and our Sunday School teacher. I was 14 when I asked her why it was necessary to pray aloud. It seemed to me that communication with God might be inner and personal. She silently stared straight at me a very long time, then replied, "Because the Bible says so."
It was clear to me that the Bible was not to be trifled with in any way. Still, there were sections that were beyond my understanding. During the lesson on the Ten Commandments, I questioned the meaning of the word adultery. This time, Mrs. Gray's stare had overtones of panic and pain. By the time she stammered out a vague suggestion about asking my mother, I had made the decision to keep theological questions to myself in the future.
Hanover College, my alma mater, was a Presbyterian college, a fact I didn't discover until my sophomore year when I joined the church choir. I wasn't tempted by the Presbyterian slant on religion. They had the situation pretty well mapped out without much room for embellishment. The matter of authority was settled; parishioners were at the bottom of the pyramid. I kept my mouth shut and got two credits for singing in the choir.
Bob, my agnostic husband, and I landed in Quaker territory when we accepted jobs in New Castle, Indiana, the first year after our graduation. My first assignment was in a high-ceiling, drafty, oily-floored classroom with 25 eight-year-olds. My major in secondary education to teach music and social studies did not discourage the school from signing me up to teach third grade. Needless to say, any spiritual issues that might have surfaced in my first year of marriage were shoved aside for multiplication tables and recess squabbles. In the middle of the year, one of the room mothers, Ruth Clements, learned of my musical background and invited me to be substitute organist at the First Friends Meetinghouse.
That was the beginning. I did not become a Quaker right away; I just played the organ. The organ bench was up front, a great place to observe the church in action, but there wasn't much action. No communion, no baptisms, no altar calls. Just a quiet service leading up to the heart of the meeting—silent worship, when everything stops while the congregation waits upon the Lord. It lasts a long time, especially for a Baptist. Waiting on the Lord involves clearing your mind of distractions so God's messages can get through the haze. If you get a message and are fairly sure it's more than your own ruminations, you stand up and share it. Perhaps another soul in the room is waiting for your message. Quakers have this notion that God speaks to everyone, and through every one, a revolutionary notion that turns the pyramid of authority upside down.
Although it is hard to grasp, I signed the application for membership, and here we have been for almost 51 years. We stayed for several reasons: the people were warm and easy, many still working out their own destinies; the church allowed me to play the organ, direct the choir, write the Christmas plays, and offer divergent opinions. They even liked my children. But one reason overshadowed all the rest—I was free to ask questions without the instant fix of someone else's pat answers.
Since then I've asked many questions, and little by little, have gained a few understandings. I look forward to more questions, more freedom, more community, and more insight into the nature of God, as I have found through the Society of Friends in the last five decades. That's why I am a Quaker.
Copyright (c) 2002 Friends United Meeting
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