You Are Not a Quaker (So Stop Calling Yourself One)

I would have posted this on my Meeting's listserve, but know it would have been received with instant hostility and plentiful angry commentary. Instead, I'll just put it up here.

Transcribed from the Maggie Harrison.

Included below is the most crucial passage.

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So, if you attend meeting because it’s nice, or because you enjoy having a group of liberal friends to talk with about politics, THIS IS NOT ENOUGH TO CALL YOURSELF QUAKER.

If you call yourself Quaker because you like the social messages and the fact that we’re ‘so accepting’ or that we’re not going to stuff religion down your throat, that’s all fine and good, I feel the same BUT THAT’S NOT ENOUGH TO CALL YOURSELF A QUAKER.

If you attend Friends Church so that you can feel connected to God/Christ and do the things a good Christian would do, THAT’S NOT ENOUGH TO CALL YOURSELF A QUAKER.

If you call yourself a Quaker because you went to a Friends School and now work at a nonprofit and always compost your banana peels, THAT DOESN’T MAKE YOU A QUAKER.

Are you all getting my point? Please stop diluting our movement and muddying the waters with your wishy-washy comfort-driven engagement with this group that you think is cool or enjoy ‘meditating’ with. You are not Quaker. Go join some other group that’s not going to tell you what to do and will accept your lack of interest in real radical transformation.

That’s not what we’re about. And yes, we ARE about something. Don’t you dare imply otherwise and I’m sorry if we mislead you by acting like anything goes because we don’t believe in anything specific or challenging. IT DOESN’T. PLEASE LEAVE.