From Steven Davison:
This transference of blame, hurt, and anger to the meeting calls for a special kind of pastoral care that we don’t seem to do very well or even talk about much. I am not at all clear about what’s called for myself, but I grieve for the people I know who have been hurt in this way and also for the meetings in which this pain and tension lives as a shadow on the fellowship.
He has some good observations here, like this one: “Friends also have a perverse tendency sometimes to minister to the perpetrator in a fraught situation, rather than the victim.” This is certainly a phenomenon. I remember a meeting situation some years back in which everyone at the meeting privately agreed that a certain member was being mean-spirited in their characterization of other members but didn’t say anything even as people started leaving the meeting.
He talks about early Friends’ use of the concept of gospel order, but admits that “modern-day Friends hardly even know it exists.” I’ve seen a relatively traditionalist meeting fail a fairly straight-forward test of gospel order. Why would we pass up an opportunity to help a recalcitrant member find some inner heal? Do we secretly think that people can’t change?
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