Crawling and churches

Joel has developed two new talents . He can now crawl and he is able to get food everywhere (on his forehead, between his toes, etc.) when he eats. The crawling has hit in a major way in the past 2 days. He has gone from kind of moving forward every once in a while to being able to see something across the room, move from sitting to crawling position, and then moving at a reasonable pace across the room to get it. He now has the ability to set movement goals and meet them! That reminds me...we need to get those drawer-locks into place.

Anne and I have continued our Toledo and Perrysbuirg area church-shopping. We have (so far) been to Adat Adonnai, Westgate Chapel, Perrysburg Friends (Quakers), and Grace United Methodist. It has been a while since I have written about our search, so I will start right after Adat Adonnai (because I wrote about this earlier). Yes, we have skipped a few weeks due to summer stuff and once because Joel was having an intolerable morning.

Westgate Chapel was ok. It is a big-box Alliance church and they had a pretty standard service...decent praise-type band (even though it looked like the Lawrence Welk show was taking place on stage at times), engaging speaker, very friendly follow-through with visitors. We could see how it could be a solid choice for many people, but it did not seem to have the right vibe with us. I think it had to do with politically-conservative overtones and that it felt too "standard." That, and it was kind of a long drive.

The Quaker church meeting for the Toledo area meets at the 577 foundation in Perrysburg (it is a parkish, nature reserve-type old estate). We (like most people who I have talked to about the Quakers) had no idea what the Quakers are about, except for the oatmeal man. I suggest everyone give the Quakers at least 5 minutes of research. This is the most rebellious and avant-garde set of believers that I have ever seen. There are a large host of beliefs that they ascribe to...and there is no way I can do them justice with a non-comprehensive list here, but I will list the things that are most on the top of my mind.

• They stand for peace. Serious peace. Not some "well, but it doesn't work out that way in the real world" or "peace for me, but not for THAT group" kind of peace...real, unequivocated peace. Not only do they say these things, but they take action. They write letters, they have a huge church presence in Africa that takes on these issues. I don't like it when churches take political stands. Most of the time this is because the churches are super-conservative and try to justify things that go counter to the gospel. If anything, the Quakers cross the line of not being political by being on the other side of the line...they are constantly in front of politicians about making the world just and peaceful--in the current political climate, that means they are not fans of present political leaders. They keep it all above the belt...they are NOT partisan, they are just adhering strongly to creating peace and justice in the world. It makes me wonder how ANY church can call themselves followers of Christ and not feel that this should be an essential part of the church's mission. The Quakers just act on it and are serious about it more than any other church I have seen around. It is personally-challenging to see people striving for the application of these attitudes.
  
• Quakers are serious about simplicity. They do not do have flashy things. They realize and embrace that you are owned by the things that you own. They drive simple cars and they have their needs met. Many are vegetarian. Many abstain from things that they don't need. There is no shame or guilt about these things if you happen to do them (for instance, most of the drinks they serve during coffee/tea conversation time were caffeine-free, but they offer caffeinated tea) it is just that they value the use of being able to live a simple life by not chasing after luxury. It was a beautiful and fulfilling thing to see a group of people who actively strive and love simplicity. Simplicity is also personally-challenging.
  
• Quakers are serious about being respectful and accepting. I have NEVER walked into a place and felt more welcomed or loved. They accept everyone as instant family. It was a wonderful thing to experience. When there were disagreements, they were resolved or accepted by all involved and the matter was understood to exist--and they pride themselves on getting along and not letting little things escalate into ugly divisions. Taking pride in having a beautiful and peaceful style of communication was a beautiful thing to behold.
• The adhere to throwing out the rituals and symbols that people sometimes end up worshipping as a god in themselves. There are no archaic second-person pronouns. There is no unbreakable time-structure or use of "holy" items. They really take the "no idols" business to a new level. The only objects they need are books to help one learn.
  
• Quakers are seriously thoughtful. There are regular times of "tell us what you have been thinking about and we will listen, support, and share as a group." There is an idea in our society in general that the older you get, the less you have to think and the less you have to do. The Quakers do the opposite. If you have twice as much experience and knowledge, you are twice as thoughtful! It was nice to see that. The Friends who were in the 65+ age group were constantly challenging what they do, constantly thinking of how they can improve things in their lives/the world, and always open to fresh ideas and approaches to living. When I am 65, I want to be that cool.
• There are no paid clergy. They take the priesthood of all believers very seriously. It works well. By meeting in a public place, there is little overhead too (at least I assume there is)! It is always awkward so see the way the modern church works with money. Quakers don't pass a plate. You don't have to fret about how the pastor (who they don't have) justifies owning a Benz (which were definitely not in the parking lot). Honestly, I have no idea how they fund the very meager needs they have as a corporate body. With the simple attitude and grassroots structure of this group, the question of financial integrity is answered before it is even asked.
  

Here is how the meeting breaks down: you go into the cottage at the 577 foundation and talk until 10, when you enter the living room-type area. Then there is a full 60 minutes of silent worship. Yes, it is completely silent. Then you talk about the experience for about 15 minutes. Then everyone moves into the kitchen for tea/coffee/family-like conversation time. This lasts around 30 minutes. Then you either leave or you go back into the living room for another 45ish minutes of conversation about your life/what the church is doing/everything else. It was obvious that these were really loose pictures of what usually goes on, and that no one was looking at a watch or waiting for a certain time to elapse so they could get to the next stage of the meeting.

I think I have already written too much about the Quaker service, but there are so many other things I would like to write. I guess I will jump to the most peculiar and challenging aspect of the service to me: the silence.

I had the reasonable thoughts of "how can I get anything out of a service if there is silence and only silence?" Well, at Westgate the most meaningful 10 seconds was a pause for silent prayer. It was during that short interval that I realized that I was profoundly disconnected to the silent, meditative, contemplative sort of experience that should be second-nature to me as a followers of a wandering rabbi for whom worship was more meditation and comtemplation than following along with a projector screen, hymnal, or bulletin. After all, if God is truth, and truth can be self-evident, then there can be incredible value in allowing God time to work through you--to expose those changes you need to make, to expose the grace God has given, to expose the how God is at work in things that we would normally pass by as "unspiritual" or think of as a distraction from God. Too bad that hour was the only hour I have had in my recent life to step back from "doing" and to simply engage in God in an unprogrammed discourse about who God is and who I am.

Ok, that is the good side of silent worship. The bad side is that people can think about ANYTHING (after all, who knows if they are really worshipping or compling a shopping list) Worse yet, people could even SLEEP during the worship time. It is a good thing that these things cannot and do not happen at litergical/traditional services (yes, that is sarcasm you are detecting)! I have gone through the possible downsides of having a service in silence, and the only things I see that is bad is that sometimes it is nice to be taught stuff so you can be changed or inspired by the thoughts of others. But even teachings are meaningless if one does not have the time to meditate on the changes or inspiration. The real reason people do not like silent worship is because it is a scary new thing. It goes completely against the "always be doing something" culture. It is confrontational. You cannot ignore the things God tells you by movign on to the next activity. It requires motivation--it is hard to justify sitting for an hour without truly believing that God can/will speak to you. It is easy to make excuses about why silence is a bad idea, especially at a personal level. It is ironic how silence and doing nothing is the most extreme thing many people can do.

Anyway, I can say that I have not been as inspired by any other service. I would love to go back. I think we are dealing with the fact that silent worship does not work well with an infant. That, and there are some things that we would like more at a "standard" church (Bible studies, a youth group we can work with, mission trips, music groups, etc.). A lot of me wants to be a half-time Quaker attender and half-time "standard church" attender!

Speaking of standard churches, we attended Grace United Methodist today. I have a history with Grace, starting in highschool, when I attended services/youth group and got seriously into Bible studies there. I also was an attender and presenter at mens CRHP (Christ Renews His Parish) retreats at Grace. Ok, I will admit that we stuck Grace at the end of our list of churches to attend because we had a feeling that it would be the one we would stick with. I really really really like a lot of people there. Grace also seems to be growing and changing in the right ways. They are embracing change in many ways (services, property, missions, etc). In short, it seems very compatible with us. I would like to know more about the way it challenges people and enbraces that challenge.

I am drawn both to say "we are done searching, let's throw down roots at Grace" and also to say "we are learning through searching and there is probably something else good out there too." I guess we have 6.5 more days to think this out.