Nontheist Friends

One person attended because of the laughter from the nontheism workshop at the Friends General Conference Gathering. Another came because a fellow Meeting member who attended in 2007 was so impressed. A third signed up because he questioned whether Quakers could be nontheist. A teenager brought her dad.

Zach Alexander (Cambridge MM, NEYM) and I, co-leaders for this weekend, met for the first time at the 2008 FGC Gathering, 5 minutes before we were scheduled to facilitate an interest group together. The interest group went well, and we agreed to pair up again.

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My friend Nat Case, from my own Twin Cities Friends Meeting, has a blog I hadn’t paid much attention to until a month or two ago. I don’t know how much of my inattention is because I hadn’t noticed how smartly provocative his writing is, and how much is because, as a cartographer, he’s been writing less for a mapmaking audience lately, and more for Quakers and other people who question the meaning of religion. People like me.

This post expands on a brief comment I made on his post Fragments of a Religion That Never Existed, where Nat writes in part:

“What I’m interested in here is the idea of scripture not defined by its innate qualities (e.g. dictated by God), but by its functional qualities. What does scripture do? I find scripture-as-community-glue interesting, but my sympathies lie with scriptures-taken-to-heart. I do have a series of books, passages from books, poems, some formal religious texts, ballads, and films that form what I believe is similar to the sort of scripture-taken-to-heart that orthodox folk might have. Except I do not have a community that draws from the same set of texts.”

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“If you think Richard Dawkins is too easy on religion, go down to that end of the room,” I said, indicating the steps up to the bookstore. “And if you…”

“Careful…” someone said.

And I was. There were several believers-in-God present – the exact number depending on your definition – and I didn’t want to make a joke that might be taken the wrong way.

“If you’re, uh… very theistic, go down to the other end,” I finished, indicating the fireplace. “And if you’re somewhere in between, go somewhere in between.”

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For three days I have been at the beautiful Powell House Quaker retreat center, up in Old Chatham, New York. I have been attending a workshop on “nontheist Quakers” led by Robin Alpern and Zach Alexander with about 16 other Quakers from around the northeast area.

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