Young Friends:
FGConnections Winter 2006

Finding God in the Unfamiliar:
Thoughts on the World Gathering of Young Friends 2005

By Geoffrey Black

The World Gathering of Young Friends 2005 took place in Lancaster, England, UK, 16-24 August 2005. The theme of the gathering was “I am the vine, you are the branches. Now, what fruit shall we bear?” taken from John 15; and William Penn’s challenge “Let us then try what love will do.” 226 Young Friends (ages 18-35) attended, representing 58 Yearly Meetings and 9 monthly meetings and regional groups, with speakers of more than twenty different languages.

The World Gathering of Young Friends, Lancaster, England, UK, 16-24 August 2005. Photograph by John Fitzgerald.

The above paragraph, adapted from the WGYF epistle, sums up the World Gathering of Young Friends quite well on one level. But it is not enough. There is so much more—too much, all trying to tumble out onto the page at the same time. Too many memories, too many faces, too many conversations. Too many moments overflowing with joy and Spirit. As I sit down to write this, my heart is full, and I don’t know where to begin.

Quakerism, too often, can look like a sea of gray hair. So it was inspirational to spend a week surrounded entirely by Young Adult Friends. But that’s not what made the World Gathering powerful.

This is what made it powerful:

We came from every continent, every branch of Friends, every theological perspective. We were liberal, evangelical, and conservative; pastoral and unprogrammed; Christ-centered, universalist, and non-theist. We came from large meetings and small churches, and vice versa. We were many colours, we spoke many languages, and we came from many different backgrounds. Yet as we gathered together, sang and danced and ate and worshipped together, and heard each other’s journeys and struggles and testimonies, a great love grew up between us, spilling over the barriers of our differences.

I had come to the World Gathering feeling spiritually and emotionally unprepared. I had turned eighteen less than five months before, and I felt very unsure of my ability to speak for everyone between 18 and 35 in my yearly meeting. Also I simply felt spiritually dried up. I had spent the summer as a camp counselor, and the emotional stress of keeping the children in my care happy and healthy had left me little energy to cultivate my spirituality.

When I arrived in Lancaster, though, I found that God did not need me to be prepared. He simply needed me to be present, and to come with an open heart. God does not ask us to transform ourselves: he asks us only to be open to his transforming power. I came to the gathering unprepared, full of self-doubt, and spiritually dry—and God opened my heart and filled me with love and joy. I remember sitting in worship one evening and realising that I could see the Light behind every face around me—not as a principle, or a concept, but as a perceptible reality.

I don’t know any way to explain that, except to say that the Spirit brought us together, and the Spirit was at work among us. That’s what made it a powerful gathering, and that’s why I think it was important, not just for those who were there, not just for Young Adult Friends, but for all Friends. I believe this gathering happened for a reason, and it is meant to have an impact beyond those who attended.

The gathering was a transformative experience. For some it was a large transformation, and for others a small one; but I don’t think anyone went away unchanged. Some came to the gathering and learned for the first time ever to worship in silence. Some came and learned for the first time that there are Friends to whom the Bible is very important. Some learned to put their beliefs into words; some learned to look beyond words to the Spirit informing them.

And almost all of us, I think, learned to look for truth in unexpected places. I found truth in the way the Kenyan Friends led us in worship— getting us up on our feet, singing, clapping, praising the Lord. It was unfamiliar—nothing like what I know as Quaker worship—but it was filled with the same Spirit I meet in silence. I found truth in speaking with Evangelical Friends, and finding that they were children of God like me, full of the same doubts and fears and hope and compassion, and that I could learn just as much from their spiritual journeys as from the journeys of liberal, unprogrammed Friends.

I expected conflict at the gathering, but in fact, there was surprisingly little. We had differences, and as we explored them, some painful spots were probed. But the spirit of love only grew stronger as the week went on. We were gathered to worship God and have fellowship together, and our differences did not stand in the way of that.

I am not saying there’s not a chasm between liberal and evangelical Friends. There is. But I found that the grace of God to help us bridge that chasm is more powerful than we give it credit for. If we have the will to be honest—to each speak our own truth, without fear, without shame, without watering it down for fear of offending others—and then to listen in love to others’ truths, with open hearts, we may find there is less standing between us than we thought.

When I came home from the World Gathering, I carried with me a vision. A vision of Friends of all kinds coming together and mending the brokenness within the Society of Friends. Not giving up our differences or throwing away our diversity; simply choosing no longer to allow them to divide us as deeply as they have. And in that coming together, giving one another also the strength to heal the brokenness in the world around us.

I can’t make that vision real. The 226 of us who were at the World Gathering of Young Friends can’t do it. All the Young Adult Friends of the world can’t do it.

We need your help.

I live in Arkansaw, WI. I’m a lifelong attender of Menomonie Monthly Meeting, Northern Yearly Meeting. I’m eighteen years old. I was homeschooled for all twelve grades, and am currently taking a year off before college. (Planning on starting college in fall ‘06.) I will be working as an intern at Friends for a Non-Violent World, in St. Paul, MN—a small, Quaker non-profit that does peace and nonviolence advocacy and runs Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP) workshops in MN prisons.

---

FGConnections Winter 2006 Home

From FGConnections. Friends General Conference, 1216 Arch Street 2B, Philadelphia, PA 19107. Connections Home and Back Issues.