Quaker History Lessons

I've just been over on Rob's blog betraying my ignorance of Quaker history. Perhaps some of the more knowledgeable (I wonder if Lor, Rich or Larry are reading) amongst us can go and answer his question (why are Quakers called Quakers)?

Anyway - as well has having been a Pentecostal/charismatic, I was also brought up Baptist. To explain - although they were originally Pentecostals, my parents started going to a Baptist church when I was about 9 and there we stayed until I was about 14, when I decided to go to a more lively charismatic church because they had drums and guitars and cool stuff like that. (Ah the fickleness of youth!)

Rob is a Baptist so we have been sharing a little banter. Did you know that Catholics only wash their hair, Baptists wash all over and Quakers dry-clean only!

Aren't I just hilarious! Anyway - Rob suggested that this joke could be adapted to express our diverging theologies about meeting God - baptists:jesus, catholics:the church, quakers:in all.

One of the things Rob said that made me think was that while he could agree that there is a little bit of God in each of us, he felt that this should lead us to a full discovery of him in his 'exact representation' in Jesus.

Perhaps it is the Christ within us that draws some of us to the life and teachings of Jesus as recorded in the Bible. However, growing up Baptist/Pentecostal/Charismatic (did I mention I also went to the presbyterian youth group for a while...) meant that I was introduced to the person of Jesus from a very young age. It was in his life and teachings that I first encountered this presence some call God. However, more recently I have began to experience an awareness of the presence in all things.

Perhaps a poem from the Jesuit poet, Gerard Hopkins might help...

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies dráw fláme;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves—goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying Whát I do is me: for that I came.

Í say móre: the just man justices;
Kéeps gráce: thát keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is—
Chríst—for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

Gerard Manley Hopkins