There’s often an underlying tension when one professes to be a member of two religions. There’s the constant challenge of “Well, how can you be both X and Y?” And often one avoids answering the question by either outright ignoring it or starting a long convoluted explanation about how even though these two religions seem to have differences, they’re really not all that different when all is said and done.

Except sure they are, or you wouldn’t find it necessary to be part of…

It’s funny: I’ve had this blog title floating around in my head for months now. I thought the title was going to be referring to my return to Meeting for Worship after my hip surgery.

It’s not, though: it’s about my return to Jesus.

Five years ago, I began an annual tradition of reading the New Testament, starting on Christmas and finishing by the end of Lent. Two years ago, after I finished my annual reading, I felt that I was being called to take a break. I…

I’ve always felt a certain discomfort about Nontheist Friends and other dually-affiliated Friends. (But, you protest, aren’t you a dually-affiliated Friend?? Yes, but I don’t identify as a Buddhist Quaker or a Quaker Buddhist: I am both a Buddhist and a Quaker.) Some of this discomfort about Nontheist Friends stemmed from preconceptions I, as a theist* (more on that later), had. A few weeks ago, I joined a Nontheist Friends Google group. At the time, I was questioning my belief in…

I often think that we Quakers don’t give ourselves enough credit. We liberal Quakers look at our diminishing numbers and fret about whether our religion is going to be in existence in 100 years or whether our Meetings will just die out. What I think doesn’t get talked about enough is how Quaker ideas have spread into general society.

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Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu

Buddhist, sufi, or zen. Not any religion



or cultural system. I am not from the East

or the West, not out of the ocean or up



from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not

composed of elements at all. I do not exist,



am not an entity in this world or in the next,

did not descend from Adam and Eve or any



origin story. My place is placeless, a trace

of the traceless. Neither body or…

Imagine this: you and your wife have tried and tried for years to have a baby. After so many failed attempts, you and your wife have finally given up all hope. Your wife no longer has her periods; you both have entered into old age. Then, God comes to you and says:

“I will surely return to you about this time next year, and [your wife] will then have a son.”

Your reaction, of course, is to burst out laughing. And when you tell your wife, she does the…

There’s been a lot of discussion recently and not so recently within Quaker circles, both online and off, about whether Quakerism is a Christian faith or not, who should or shouldn’t be allowed to be a Quaker, and as many variations of these two as one can think of.

What it boils down to, Friends, is a discussion about notions. And I feel that we are missing the point.

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