As
it is important to consider the place of Pacific Yearly Meeting
within the entire Religious Society of Friends, it is important to
consider Friends relationship to Christianity, historically and in
the present.
Friends
are often asked: “Are Quakers Christians?” Whether
one
interprets the Quaker movement as a strand within Protestantism
or as a third force distinct from both Protestantism and
Catholicism, the movement, both in its origin and in the various
branches that have evolved, is rooted in Christianity.
Pacific
Yearly Meeting includes many people who were not raised in the Religious
Society of Friends and among them are some for
whom Christianity is not part of their faith experience. There is
thus a great variety of religious belief and expression. Many Pacific
Yearly Meeting Friends articulate their Quaker faith in Jewish,
Universalist, Buddhist, or other terms. Similarly, Friends hold
diverse definitions of Christianity, interpreting and reacting to
traditional Christian terminology differently. Some do not accept
the defining beliefs required by the church of their youth or of
current mainstream Christianity. This has been a point of lively
discussion in Pacific Yearly Meeting for the past fifty years.†
Early
Friends considered themselves Christians; they interpreted and justified
their unique vision in Biblical and traditional
Christian terms. However, from its inception the Quaker movement
has offered critiques of many accepted manifestations of
Christianity while at the same time empathizing with people of
other faiths. We might use the phrase “primitive Christianity” to
describe more closely where Friends fit across the Christian
spectrum. Primitive Christianity usually refers to those teachings
which pre-date Fourth Century Christians, who had been embraced
by Constantine and were becoming “established.” These
earliest
followers of Jesus were radical revolutionaries, representing
a “new
order” of faithful who lived communally, eschewed violence
of all
kinds, and practiced simplicity.††
For
some contemporary Quakers, the concept of the Divine Light Within
emerges from the Bible, teachings of Jesus and traditional
Christian doctrine; for others, it comes through different sacred
sources. Quaker history demonstrates that an excessive reliance on
any one perspective, neglecting the essential unity among them, has
been needlessly divisive.
In
the centuries since its founding, the Religious Society of Friends
has embraced a wide variety of beliefs and practices;
however, there are important commonalities throughout much of
the Society. As Robert Vogel said in 1993, “…[most
Quakers adhere
to] plainness and devotion to truth, a clear understanding of
spiritled worship, and essential inwardness; the use of queries and
advices
in framing faith; seeking the sense of the meeting in business
sessions; the peace testimony and other social concerns; and the
rejection of outward ordinances and sacramental worship.”†††
Friends
in London Yearly Meeting (now Britain Yearly Meeting) spoke practically
on these matters:
We
respond [here]…in
Christian language, but many Quakers would prefer less specifically Christian terminology. We worship, live and work together in unity, however, valuing the variety of expressions of truth which each individual brings.
london yearly meeting
to lima with love, 1987, pp. 7-8
† See “Quakerism
and/or Christianity” Friends Bulletin (December 1966),
which is the transcript of talks at Pacific Yearly Meeting by Henry J.
Cadbury.
†† See
Primitive Christianity Revived in the Faith and Practice of the
People called Quakers,William Penn, 1696 and Quakerism and Christianity,
Edwin
B. Bronner, Pendle Hill Pamphlet 1967.
††† Friends
Journal, March 1993, p. 18