I had an experience here not even a year ago when the air settled and we had what is called a “Gathered” meeting.  It is a point when all feels different, peaceful, energizing and we open ourselves up to one another and to God for speaking and especially for listening.  I have been thinking about these “gathered” meeting experiences and how they are what we call “communion” in a Quaker church.  There is a feeling of unity that I have felt at other times, but mostly when I used to do community building retreats with the Scott Peck Institute.  I invite you to consider the journey of community building as described by Dr. M. Scott Peck in the book A Different Drum, and to reflect on how this journey mirrors the sacred experience of a Quaker gathered meeting.

I had a weird “small world” event happen here in Klamath Falls.  Lee Curran who is probably speaking at the Unitarian Fellowship here in town at the moment and I have the same person influencing our lives, Latrisha Pat Callair.  That person lives in North Carolina. I became an activist when Pat was in my life.  Lee met Pat when Pat was filling the pulpit at the Unitarian Church in Honolulu.  I trained in 1992 to 1994 under Pat Callair and Pete MacDowell.  They both, Pat and Pete, mentored me through graduate school in everything from direct action, to group development, to the scientific and government intricacies of stopping a nuclear dump from locating  just outside of Raleigh, NC where I ended up living for 25 years.

The model we were working with for direct action was one started by Scott Peck, when he had his community-building model; the same one he talked about in the book, A Different Drum.  It involved three days of sitting in an open worship fashion totally emotionally exposed to one another and practicing deep listening to one another and active listening with one another, and only speaking when we felt we absolutely needed to, always honest, always sincere. There are purposeful large blocks of silence. The groups I worked with went through four predictable stages of development: Pseudocommunity, Chaos, Emptiness and True Community.  I think we sometimes go through those stages in worship as well.

In Pseudocommunity everyone knows the norms/good manners/expectations, and all play by the same rules that society and their parents have taught them about how to be nice and when to be honest in this world. There are expectations of behavior in the group, and group response when it does not work or someone goes against the group’s rules. The words used could be wrapped up in the pretty packaging of psychological language or social work lingo, but they were taught to us as children to learn how to behave in a certain societally normative way.  While this is where most people are at all times in their lives, this behavior can actually block people from becoming vulnerable enough to allow communion to happen in our hearts and can be a barrier keeping us from true unity.  Peck suggested that the “Forming, Storming and Norming” stages may keep people out of community rather than real deep listening for discernment and the change that builds a kind of community that opens us up to one another.  Because it is important that when the group is developing and the chaos or storming comes, instead of relying on normative pleasantries and acceptable behaviors, we stay open to one another and allow ourselves to feel emptiness as a community. 

Emptiness isn’t as bad as it sounds, and what also happens is a tightening of and strengthening of bonds between people if we are brave enough to stay open hearted during the tough times.  In a Quaker meeting you are more likely to get to something called a gathered meeting if you learn to go through this catharsis of self and let go of your ego and just be present in the moment.

Let’s look at Peck’s model for building community and use those four stages (pseudocommunity, chaos, emptiness and true community or communion using old Quaker language). I believe the Peck model overlaps with stages of waiting worship in development, and it is worth exploring their similarities.  The major difference is that the Scott Peck method takes three days, but a gathered meeting can happen as soon as total trust with one another is built in the room.   The room has to be safe enough for people to let their boundaries down without any fear at all.  This is security that takes the place of expectations of behavior that gives us structure.

When we first come together in open worship, we greet one another, exchange pleasantries, and quietly take our places.  We sit almost like meditative bodies all in our own little bubbles.  There is a certain amount we hold back for our own identities.  It is a comfortable space and one where we could easily just sit in silence through the whole meeting, but we might leave afterward wondering why we waste that time in silence but being nice enough not to say that or to just go along with that. 

As the silence goes on we begin to center down, we suddenly start finding ourselves prodding some difficult memories or challenges in life.  Our facades begin to crack and show old wounds, unspoken tensions, and we become egotistically aware. The air feels thick with confusion; we find ourselves being critical of ourselves or each other, and compassion seems too far away.  The mind becomes restless, and the heart becomes anxious as we feel chaos in this silence.  We seek stillness but it seems to have evaded us as our minds jump from one subject to another. Peck calls this stage Chaos—when personalities, opinions, and egos jostle for space.

But the real work is about to begin.  The next phase is emptiness where we let go of control, ignore our ego, and allow emotions to come pouring out. This is a relinquishing—a letting go. We release our need for being right and for self-importance. We open ourselves, utterly vulnerable, to the possibility that lies beyond our certainties. In Quaker worship, this is the heart of waiting upon the Spirit, the laying aside of all distractions, all self, so that we might become uncluttered vessels of Light.

Then something mystical happens, sometimes with a sudden rush as if out of nowhere—the miracle of communion arises. A gathered meeting descends like Christ himself is walking among us. This was the idea painted by James Doyle Penrose (1862-1932), a Quaker from Ireland, called The Presence in the Midst. This picture shows Jesus, seemingly standing in the middle of a silent Quaker meeting for worship.  The title of the painting is based on Matthew 18:20 where Jesus says, “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them.”

The setting for the painting is the historic Quaker meeting house at Jordans, Buckinghamshire, England. Penrose said, “It seemed as I contemplated all those who had worshiped there in the past, to be surrounded by them in imagination as if they were gathered there. I pondered on what it was that gave them all their power; for they had power in those bygone times, and then I realized that it was the presence of Christ amongst them.”

This feeling of the Sacred walking among us brings with it a sense of unity, a deep peace, a presence that is felt but not seen. In Peck’s words, “the emptying of oneself leads to the fullness of community.” Boundaries between those in worship seem to fade.  You are no longer in a self-contained bubble, but you are a group of those who have let go of all of all pretense of control and given away completely to the silence.  This is sacred space that happens on rare occasions, sometimes when someone has shared something very vulnerable, and we realize how safe the space is for expression. Sometimes just as we all sit in silence waiting for Spirit to move.  When someone does speak in a gathered meeting, they may speak for themselves or might be saying just what you are thinking – Rather than agreement, “Friend speaks my mind” means that what is being said is a resonating between what happened to be said and what moves you.  You will hear from others that they will quietly say, “He is saying what I was thinking.”

During the silence, we wait to hear the voice or movement of God.  We have discerned that it is the voice of God and not our own opinions or our own thoughts, we rise to speak, and those who are left in the pews focus and listen deeply with open hearts and open minds.  What everyone is doing is praying.  So when you stand or don’t know if you should come to speak, think, “Is this I am going to say worth interrupting someone’s prayers.” This is not our opinion because we have emptied ourselves of opinion.  It isn’t about politics even though when you had monkey-mind you might have been thinking about the world.  Once emptiness comes, your soul becomes a blank slate and the questions or queries resonate with you, and when you want to share you just know it is the right time.  It isn’t about you.  It’s Spirit speaking through your totally emptied vessel.  It doesn’t always make you look good, because it is honest and sincere, and we are human beings with flaws. But it is a witness that waiting on the Spirit to move through the congregation has begun.

It should be a protected time for someone when they speak, and what is spoken must be honest and kind to all.  God is love, and the litmus test of whether something is truly from God is to candle it for the Spirit of Love.  Many times, what is said builds the community up and makes everyone stronger, and at times it might not resonate with anyone else in the room.  But when it is spoken, it is listened to, and then we return to the silence, waiting on what we are being asked to share or truths that are being shared with us by Spirit in a very mystical way.  The silence becomes thick with energy.  We all begin to intently listen to the silence and all feel the closeness this has brought about.  It is communion for Quakers.  It is said by many that we don’t have sacraments, but we do.  We just wish to experience them all in a sacred, mystical way rather than with concrete examples like the challis and the bread in other denominations or religions.

But this only happens when there is trust between one another and confidence in the process, two things needed for church to work in general. Everybody is raw and open to hearing God’s Spirit.  It is an exposed state  where the bonds between people transcendentally strengthen as if weaving a tapestry of connection outside of our control. It is a time of very deep listening for Spirit and what our Friend might be sharing. We come to respect one another, not as roles and opinions, but as sacred souls, each with Light worthy of dignity to share.  There is a sense of safety and goodness that rises through the room. If in a meeting for business, discernment takes place where all people are heard and consensus is generally easily reached.

It is an amazing act of Holiness that is felt and shared only time to time, and sometimes not at all by  some meetings.  But when it is felt there is an openness and availability to each other. A bond is formed.  In a gathered meeting, there is something that happens beyond meditation.  There is a sense of strong connection with one another.  There might be a vibrance to the meeting, a good energy that makes you feel touched or healed in some way.  What is shared is deeply moving.

Scott Peck said reaching a state of community is rare, and it is. He said that people typically get into psuedocommunity feel a touch of chaos and jump back into psuedocommunity, always being nice, always having hardened boundaries.  Let us commit to not being so quick to choose that feeling of safety society’s rules give us.  Help us to empty ourselves of all ego and feel the binding together that community can bring.  Let’s help to create that safe space for God to speak as we empty ourselves to God and for each other.

Have you ever been in a gathered meeting and what was it like?

When you are moved to speak, do you go through a discernment process?