tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5664821601466952220.post66957430097354426..comments2023-08-12T02:27:12.548-07:00Comments on Pennmanship: Inreach, Outreach and QuakerismBrad Ogilvie/The William Penn House/The Mosaic Initiativehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17229228501877444698noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5664821601466952220.post-39981518233195088142011-02-16T03:29:22.640-08:002011-02-16T03:29:22.640-08:00I totally agree we should work to practice this in...I totally agree we should work to practice this in our home communities in our daily lives, and not start from a distance. Our Monthly Meetings are good places to bring consciousness to the effort, but it is also in our homes and places of work, where we shop for food. The fact is that many people do not live in the community where they worship. Here in DC, people drive from Bethesda to worship at Langley Hill, or Silver Spring to worship at FMW. In places like my home Meeting (Downers Grove, IL), people come from 30+ miles. It is the daily practice of this - no matter where we are - that I hope to encourage. <br /><br />As an aside, Stephen, I'd love to talk with you more about these in young Friends gatherings.Bradhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14533747600725610845noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5664821601466952220.post-64484247445690839682011-02-15T21:16:33.926-08:002011-02-15T21:16:33.926-08:00Hi Brad,
I love the questions, I love the directi...Hi Brad,<br /><br />I love the questions, I love the direction. I think there is something precious to explore within our individual selves and share with the wider world, BUT I think perhaps the most important piece is that we start in our home communities, and allow it to speak for itself from that foundation.<br /><br />I think the idea of outreach is typically, in many ways, unbalanced and incomplete. I say this because many Friends don't know how to reach out to the very people that they sit across from regularly on First Day. When we can tell our stories, our embodiment of testimonies to each other, to one another, only then can we actually do the outreach work that you're speaking of. And at that point, it happens naturally, by creating a unity and togetherness that possesses its own gravity and undeniable attraction.<br /><br />It is always a balancing game, I will readily admit. I struggle myself to try and bear myself to the community immediately around me first, and also bear myself to the world at large second, but both the immediacy and the impersonal nature by which I'm able to share with that second world (second life!? Facebook... hmmmm....), almost enable me to become both insulated and synthetically vulnerable at the same time.<br /><br />I want to believe that the sharing we do, the outreach and spreading of The Good News, comes first and foremost from a place of being on fire and incorrigible about our witness to what is already happening within our own hearts and our communities. We can't pretend that this is easy, but at the same time we can't pretend that we don't know each other at a level of spiritual depth and intimacy that enables God to work through us in miraculous ways.<br /><br />My message, I guess, is that we must always first start from a place of attesting to the deep vulnerability and openness shared with those around us, otherwise our desires for growth and witness become similar to the worldly desires for quantifiable growth, instead of qualitative depth and Divine discovery. <br /><br />But, it's midnight, so perhaps I don't really know what I'm saying anymore :)s.sonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01064324306570459224noreply@blogger.com