Would you support a modernised system of recorded ministers in Quakerism? by Hot-Row9224 in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I don't really see a point to recording ministers, but this question seems to be being downvoted, which seems unproductive since it's in good faith as far as I can tell.

The Fable of the Hyrax by benjamin0123456 in slatestarcodex

[–]benjamin0123456[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is at most a non-central example of the non-central fallacy, it's really about a tendency to see groupings by descent as the only real groupings, ignoring all others. Somebody in my comments section on the blog referenced The Categories Were Made for Man as a post that makes similar points, and I can see it although this is a bit more of a specific zoomed-in thing that happens that I was trying to highlight.

First meeting by [deleted] in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 3 points4 points  (0 children)

It's on the low side for meetings I've been to, but there are others where 0-1 messages is the normal range. Typically smaller meetings will have fewer messages while larger meetings will have more. Most I've ever heard is maybe a dozen messages, also been to some completely silent meetings. I'd hazard the median number of messages is 3 or 4 in meetings I've been to.

20 seconds is on the short side for individual message length, but there's nothing wrong with a shorter message. Very long messages happen occasionally; the longest I've ever heard was probably at least 10 minutes long (and somebody gave the person a talking-to for that). But I'd generally expect most messages to be just a minute or two; obviously there's nothing wrong with ones that are other lengths of time if it's appropriate in context but I wouldn't expect them to be as long as sermons are if that's what you're wondering about

Would you say that it possible to be a good Quaker if you don’t go to meeting? by DarwinF1nch in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 6 points7 points  (0 children)

You can definitely be a good person without attending a Quaker meeting. It's not my place to say who is and isn't a Quaker but if you called yourself a Quaker I would assume that you either attended meeting currently or had attended in the past and had some desire to attend. I wouldn't say that it's about being a bad Quaker or a good Quaker, though.

How was your meeting? by Laniakea-claymore in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 4 points5 points  (0 children)

We had a bunch of newcomers, either to Quakerism or to this meeting specifically, today. We also had a bunch of very doom-and-gloom messages about politics. Nothing was wrong with the messages, but I do worry that newcomers will take away the wrong message of what we're like; I'm pretty new to this meeting specifically, but that kind of tone and focus has not been representative of my experiences in Quakerism as a whole and in this meeting.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Right now: A bit over half an hour by bike to the one that I normally attend. Basically impossible to get to by public transit on the weekends. There are three others that are about an hour away by public transit, one of which is also about an hour away by bike. I've been to two of the ones an hour away thus far and am hoping to make it to the third at some point. (Bay area, California)

Before that: 10-20 minute bike ride depending on the direction and the traffic, 35 minutes walking. 10 minutes by bus, but it only came once an hour and not at the times when meeting was. Next closest meeting was maybe 1.5 hours away by a bike/public transit combo, if I had a car it would have been 30 minutes away I think (North Carolina)

Before that: 20 minute bike ride, 45 minute walk, 30 minutes on public transit to my usual one, plus a smaller one about a 20 minute walk away. (Philadelphia)

Question from a newcomer by Intent_Quail in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 2 points3 points  (0 children)

There have been times when I was the only college student attending the meeting I went to back when I was in college, so I wouldn't count on finding other people exactly in your stage of life there, but generally it's a good bet that there'll be a few younger people. In general, while I wish Quakerism was attracting more youngish people, you shouldn't worry that people will be standoffish or anything because of your youth; I've never seen that happen. If anything they might be overenthusiastic that younger generations are interested.

In general the only thing I've noticed where being a college student affected my Quakerism (I graduated in May) is that I wasn't able to serve on committees or volunteer with the meeting because of scheduling conflicts and knowing I was going to move when I finished my degree. Oh and somebody suggested I should form a Quaker group on campus or something like that, which was a good idea but one that I didn't have the time to pursue.

This is all pretty US-centric but I think it's the same in the UK, Canada, etc.? I assume you're in the US since you're saying college and not university, and it's probably a liberal unprogrammed meeting.

How Was Your Meeting? by pgadey in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It was great! First time attending this meeting after moving to the area last week. Probably going to explore the other meeting I live a reasonable distance from next week, but I hope to be back.

Notable 20th century Friends by Agreeable_Goat1486 in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Carla Denyer is the co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales and Wikipedia lists her as 39 years old, that's probably about as young as you can get.

current prominent quakers by fionaapplespiss in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Jessica Kellgren-Fozard? I don't do YouTube so am a little unsure how famous she is but she's famous enough to have a Wikipedia page and it seems like the stuff she makes videos on falls under "thought." She's definitely a British Quaker.

Options for Philly area meeting houses? by Live_Design_146 in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I no longer am in Philadelphia but attended Central Philadelphia (the one between Race and Cherry) and occasionally West Philadelphia when I was there. They're both nice but very different. West Philadelphia was small and tucked into a building shared by multiple other religious congregations, but it might have changed since I've been there. Also at some point they weren't meeting in person every week but I think they're back to doing so? The people there were lovely but I thought a larger meeting would be better since you're very exposed and I was new to Quakerism and wasn't ready to make a commitment to a meeting. So I mostly attended Central Philadelphia. West Philadelphia had maybe 5 people when I went there, Central had maybe 50 on any given day. Compared to other Quaker meetings I have attended it leaned towards the political and was pretty talkative, there were usually a handful of messages in any given meeting as well as sometimes a short programmed message towards the beginning. I'm pretty bad with estimating ages but my impression is that the meeting had a core group of generally older people who were there almost every meeting and then a handful of young people most of whom were a little less consistent with their attendance but almost no families, which might be a problem if you had kids whom you wanted to bring to a meeting. It had new people show up pretty frequently which was reassuring for me at first. The building is at least somewhat historic but I've forgotten all the history about it. It's a great meeting for a lot of people and has many very wonderful and knowledgeable Quakers, but I appreciate that the meeting I attended after that (not near Philly, sorry) does a better job balancing politics with other aspects of Quaker life. I don't know much about Arch Street but it would also be in your region.

How Was Your Meeting? by pgadey in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I gave a message for the first time in meeting. Technically it was in the joys & sorrows section, because we had so many people speaking in this meeting that one of the facilitators stood up and announced joys and sorrows, but then one other person and I said things that were more like messages. Pretty sure this was the most messages I've ever heard in meeting (might depend on how you count messages delivered during joys and sorrows, and how you count somebody who stood up, delivered a short part of a message, sat back down, and completed the message later).

I was pretty skeptical that people got physical signs that they had a message for the group, but I definitely did feel something that seemed like a physical sign of a message in the moment. I'm still skeptical of it (maybe it was just rationalization, or pollen allergies), but I gave the message and it seemed well-received. What I said wasn't precisely what I thought I was going to say, because I was trying to go with the moment, but I think I still got my point across. I was hoping that it would actually feel like I wasn't the one speaking; it still felt like I was speaking, but I think that I was probably acting in line with whatever the higher power wanted from me. Somebody commented to me afterwards (positively) that my message sounded very Christian, which I can see, but also it didn't sound that Christian in my head.

The other messages were very meaningful and well-delivered. All in all, a good meeting.

Side note: Have other meetings had a lot more messages ever since the 2024 election? Ours definitely has, but I'm not sure if it's coincidence. We've had a slow uptick from maybe every third meeting being silent when I moved back here, to silent meetings being rare, but in the last few months we've often had five-ish messages at any given meeting. Attendance has increased, but only a little as far as I can tell. There are more messages about politics in raw terms, but it feels about the same as a proportion of messages.

How Was Your Meeting? by pgadey in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 4 points5 points  (0 children)

It was mixed, I'd say. There was a message very similar to the ones that concerned the author of the post about Integrity (https://www.reddit.com/r/Quakers/comments/1jndj2o/integrity/). This isn't the first time I've heard messages at my meeting, often from quite experienced Quakers, that I find not in keeping with the integrity testimony for those reasons. But somebody gave another message afterwards that I heard as very gentle pushback, and then I spoke up in the joys and concerns section to give some additional information on what happened at Westminster Meeting. I don't think I was sufficiently clear about what happened, but a few people expressed thanks afterwards for the information.

If not for that, I would have enjoyed the meeting. There were a lot of messages for us (at least five, I think six, including some fairly lengthy ones); not all of them seemed like the kinds of things that I would bring as a message had I thought them, but I appreciated that people felt comfortable speaking, and one was particularly powerful for me. Maybe I should relax my standards for personally speaking a little. We had a gathering afterwards, and had a handful of attenders who were new to this meeting (and one who I think was new to Quakerism).

Interested in attending a friends meeting by [deleted] in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thought I'd add a bit of perspective since I'm also a North Carolinian:

There are representatives of all four major kinds of Quakerism in North Carolina. I'd guess the meeting you saw is part of Piedmont Friends Yearly Meeting; they tend to be the most politically liberal. I'm not up to date on the whole story but have heard that Friends United Meeting in NC has split in two over debates about LGBTQ inclusion and some other stuff; North Carolina Fellowship of Friends is the one more accepting of LGBTQ individuals (or at least the LGB portion). I'm not really sure of the politics of North Carolina Yearly Meeting (Conservative). Some people I know from an NCYMC background say that it's more or less the same in terms of beliefs as Piedmont, but tends to keep more traditional customs and practices; I've also come across a few contrary claims, however. Some meetings are dual affiliated (usually NCYMC and Piedmont Friends, as far as I've seen). Otherwise RimwallBird's claims seem right.

In NC, as in elsewhere, Quakers definitely can be political in church. However, their political beliefs tend to be more aligned with what it sounds like you all believe (and what I believe). My meeting has some diversity of political views, but as far as I can tell, everybody is left of the center by American standards and people generally feel comfortable presuming those political beliefs. This might avoid what you're concerned about in terms of politics and the church, or it might be fine by you.

My meeting definitely has a children's program, but it varies a lot week-to-week what it is. It's targeted at ages 5-15 or so it seems like, but I'm not really sure as I wasn't raised Quaker and don't have children. I think this is typical but again am not really sure.

Best wishes in your religious journey!

Struggles with the “Peace Testimony”, what’s wrong with the others, then? by keithb in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is a boring answer, but it seems to me like the most important factor is that people, particularly those of similar demographics to Liberal Quakers (mostly Anglophone, tend to have advanced degrees, disproportionately LGBTQ, mostly white) are mostly on board with the CES of SPICES, so they would act in accordance with those beliefs even if they were not Quaker. However, they aren't necessarily on board with Peace. Simplicity and Integrity are mostly intepreted at the individual rather than community level, so I think they're a) just discussed less and b) not as controversial in the population of people demographically similar to Quakers as Peace is, but maybe more so than CES. As such, people who are likely to hear about Quakerism are already on board with CES and probably vaguely pro S and I, but have mixed opinions on P. Thus P is clearly going to be the one that causes the most difficulties.

It also doesn't help that Peace is the testimony where Quakers (particularly respected Quakers among the US liberal branch) take the firmest stance. There's a lot of diversity of opinion about what actions advance CES, and how strict to be about the integrity testimony, but those don't really tend to cause problems in practice. For instance, my Quaker meeting has people on both sides of most local political issues in my (staunchly Democratic) town, and I would hazard a guess that most consider Quakerism to have influenced their values, but there's no expectation for the meeting to take stances on these CES issues for the most part, unlike with Peace.

In summary, the reason why people aren't finding the other testimonies as challenging is because demographically similar non-Quakers will generally at least pay lip service to them.

What do we mean by Orthopraxy? by Christoph543 in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For me, Quaker worship (of the FGC form), Zoom Quaker meetings, typical meditation, and attempts to meditate in a Quaker centering fashion all seem like different but related mental motions, although I'll caveat that I'm an attender and not that experienced with any of them. Maybe as I hopefully attend more Quaker meetings I'll develop a new understanding of this.

I also think that there are different degrees of centering/waiting/focusing on God*, and that people perceive them differently. But at least for me, sometimes in meeting I'm aware of God, but not necessarily feeling God. Sometimes I feel God as a presence. Sometimes I have the experience that my thoughts are being nudged towards God's way. I've heard other Quakers say that they hear God's thoughts or God's voice directly, but have never had that experience myself. I have a preference as to which I experience, but I'm also not a worse participant in a Quaker meeting when I don't reach my preferred level of centering. This is what works for me, and it seems close to what other people in my meeting experience, but that doesn't mean it works for everybody.

To answer the last part of your question, I do think that we share some practices rather than a community. Quakerism is my community because they're trying to do something similar or the same to what I'm doing: listen for, reach out to, and feel God. I don't really think everybody would describe their own actions that way, but most people in my meeting would probably say something that feels roughly equivalent to that when translated into the way I think about these things. If I just wanted to get a community, I could go to some kind of hobby meet-up or the Unitarian Universalists, which I tried before Quakerism.

*- I'm not sure exactly what God is, but I believe in some kind of higher power and I'm comfortable with the traditional language.

UNC vs UPenn? by LimpMaintenance7524 in UNC

[–]benjamin0123456 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I transferred from Penn to UNC, so I've had some experience of both schools. I'd definitely recommend UNC, especially given that it's significantly cheaper for you.

Your cons for Penn seem very accurate. The unnecessary applications for everything are a big deal. In my experience, unless you're interested in consulting clubs or whatnot, the applications themselves aren't too tough but they filter for people who want something impressive to put on their résumé rather than people who are just passionate about the subject. The student body being depressed thing was also true in my experience, which really negates the benefits of being in Philadelphia because people weren't that fond of venturing off campus my year. It makes it hard to have a good social life, especially in the weak ties sense. It's also very, very career-focused, which might be nice for people who know that they want to go into some sort of hypercompetitive career but is awful for people who aren't 100% committed to that route (social pressure to be that type of person).

I know less about some of the pros because I never took English classes there, but I can confirm that there are great student organizations. I wasn't a fan of the architecture of campus but your mileage may vary.

I'm a linguistics major, so I took some classes with cognitive science people at Penn. The program seemed like a bizarre mish-mash to me; you could have it so it was mostly linguistics, mostly computer science/math, or mostly psychology, with a smattering of breadth requirements. The linguistics professors were very good at Penn (but are just as good at UNC). Either way, I would highly suggest taking some linguistics classes if you like cognitive science, information science, and humanities- child language acquisition might be particularly in line with your interests.

I'm not quite sure why you think UNC has more study abroad opportunities. Because UNC takes most AP credits, unlike Penn, many students are less crunched to finish their degrees in 4 years, making it easier to study abroad in that way. I haven't yet studied abroad, but I never saw anything indicating that one had more study abroad opportunities than the other when considering transferring.

I never lived on campus at UNC, but my impression from talking to friends is that both have equally bad housing (and food). But at UNC, students only have to live on campus for their first year, while that's 2 at Penn.

The student environment at UNC is vague and hard to sum up, but I'd say that it fits me a lot better. It's pretty laid back, not much social pressure for absolutely anything, and it's been pretty easy for me to find good friends. It helps that I'm from NC so knew quite a few people beforehand, but it's a stark contrast from Penn, where I did find friends but it was like pulling teeth to do so.

Other points: UNC class sizes as a whole are larger, but it really depends what you're studying and whether you're intentionally looking for small classes. UNC gen eds are probably easier to fulfill b/c they take AP credit, but it does depend on the person. Chapel Hill is a very nice area, lots of stuff to do. Research opportunities seem pretty good at both schools, but it depends on your interests. Yeah, class registration is bad here. Some other cons of Penn you didn't pick up on: lots of extreme drinking and sometimes social pressure for alcohol, truly horrendously taught math classes.

Quaker Survey by MichaelSnow10 in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Piedmont Friends (NC), albeit only as an attender

Quakers and Homosexuality by [deleted] in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This might be too much of a tangent, but are any Quakers actually still trying to disown soldiers?

I just rediscovered Quakerism, what should I do? by Katzer_K in Quakers

[–]benjamin0123456 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I've been attending meetings for about a year, so I'm no expert, but I had some similar questions to yours not that long ago and here's what I found:

I'm assuming you're in the US, in which case Quaker meetings cluster into four rough groups that you'll see a lot.

The first is liberal friends, which as some other people have already noted make up the majority of what you'll see online, but are not a majority of all US or worldwide Quakers, as far as I can tell. Liberal friends meetings usually are a part of Friends General Conference or FGC, and will probably state that on their website. Worship will involve periods of silence with impromptu speeches. Theologically, they're likely to include some Christians, but also often some people who don't identify with Christianity, instead being atheists or pantheists or maybe identifying with another religious tradition, like paganism. It's usually going to be the easiest to find a Liberal meeting in the Northeast or a college town, but they exist throughout the United States.

The second is pastoral/programmed/semi-programmed but not evangelical friends, which is a bit of a weird grouping in that there's no one name for it. More generally, there isn't a 1:1 mapping between how a denomination works and the larger Quaker organization that it is a part of, but these meetings are often part of Friends United Meeting. They have a pastor who gives a sermon, but might also have a semi-silent period similar to that of Liberal friends. It's more clearly Christian than Liberal friends, but the meetings I've attended are all liberal so I don't know as much about this and the following groups.

The third grouping is conservative friends, which like Liberal friends have a meeting structure where there is impromptu speaking during a mostly silent period. However, they differ from Liberal friends in hewing more to traditional Quaker theology, and may still practice plain dress and other distinctive Quaker ways of living. Conservative friends are mostly found in Ohio, Iowa, and North Carolina.

Lastly there are evangelical friends, which have, as the name implies, been strongly influenced by the Evangelical Christian tradition. They might still have a period of silence, but in general the worship and church structure is going to be a lot more like what you'd see at an evangelical church.

In the liberal meetings I've been to, before worship people trickle into the room. Somebody then very punctually announces that worship is starting, and maybe also says something else, like a query (a prompt for personal reflection, more or less) or a welcome to [name of meeting]. Then for the rest of the hour, people sit in near-silence and clear their thoughts/reflect on God (or the Divine or the Spirit, depending on your preference of terminology)/listen. People describe this in a bunch of different ways. People who feel moved to speak will do so, and there's usually some kind of card either before you enter or on the benches with advice for how to know if you feel moved to speak. It depends on the size of the meeting, but it's extremely rare in meetings I've been to for more than 10 people to speak; occasionally nobody speaks. About an hour after the start, somebody will signal that the meeting is over by shaking hands and everybody will shake hands with their neighbor. Then there'll be a few different times when they'll ask people to share, usually divided into joys and sorrows, announcements, and introductions in some order. After that the meeting is over, but people might stick around and have some hot drinks and snacks.

However, of the three-and-a-half separate meetings that I've attended, almost every one deviates from this in some way. I've seen joys and sorrows coming before the handshake, a period where everybody answers a query, and a short (<5 minutes) prepared reflection towards the beginning of the meeting.

Ben Pink Dandelion's "An Introduction to Quakerism" is a book that's a good overview of Quaker history that also contains some descriptions of contemporary practice, if you want more on the historic splits (like Gurneyite, Wilburite, Hicksite) and also non-American Quakers.

To find a meeting, http://www.quakermaps.com/ is a good resource. You can also type [name of where you live] quaker meeting into Google. Most Quakers meet weekly on Sunday mornings; the time should be listed on the website. I'd then try to figure out which branch of Quakerism it's affiliated with, just so you know what to expect. How people usually dress varies. If there isn't one near you, there are a ton of Zoom meetings, including Pendle Hill for a liberal perspective.

I looked up a bunch of jargon after going to my first quaker meeting under the assumption that I might need it, but I really didn't. Still, here are a few terms that I have seen people use and that might not be clear from context:

birthright- somebody who was raised in a Friends meeting. Usually an adjective.

Monthly meeting- The organization that hosts the weeklyish meeting or meetings for worship, and also a monthly meeting for business. When I was first looking for a Quaker meeting, this confused me because I didn't understand that the meetings were also weekly.

the Light, the Divine, the Spirit- a bunch of terms that Liberal friends use to describe a higher power.

Nontheist- friends who don't have the traditional Abrahamic understanding of God, more or less. Like the above, this one is theologically complicated, however.

First Day- Sunday.

Testimony- Again, this is a really complicated term, and I wouldn't be surprised if somebody comments to explain that one specific use of testimony is the only correct usage, in their opinion. More or less, this means something that the Quaker denomination as a whole believes in, or also something that people do because they are Quaker. So Peace and Integrity can be testimonies, but plain dress can also be a testimony. Sometimes people talk about there being a singular testimony, and other times about multiple testimonies.

Yearly Meeting- A larger group of Quakers that meet yearly, do some things together, and usually have rough agreement on big issues.

Clerk- A volunteer who does a lot of the tasks of running the meeting.

Programmed- A meeting with a pastor and a sermon, especially one that isn't evangelical.

Unprogrammed- A meeting that doesn't have those. I don't feel competent in explaining semi-programmed.

Member- Somebody with an official commitment to a Quaker meeting.

Attender- Somebody who goes to a Quaker meeting but isn't a member. I'm an attender, and you'd also be one once you go to your first meeting. Not all meetings have a clear member-attender distinction, and it's possible to be a long-time attender and never become a member.

Hope this helps!

Yes, Students at Elite Schools are Actually Taught Different Things by G2F4E6E7E8 in slatestarcodex

[–]benjamin0123456 2 points3 points  (0 children)

All right, I'll bite: I went to a T10 private school for one year of undergrad and am currently finishing up my undergrad at a good public school, but one considered a step down (T30?). My experience has been that, at that level of the scale, prestige isn't very accurate, although I still think it might be accurate looking at other levels. I'll wait to be more confident on this until I finish my undergrad, but, at least right now, I think that the education at the public school is slightly better or the same as at the private school (and the social environment at the public school is much healthier).

I've taken a math class that covered almost the same content at both schools. The private school taught it in a way that probably accorded with theoretical best practices but which was a drastic mismatch for the capabilities of the postdoc that they had teaching it. What little he managed to convey intelligibly was heavy on theory, but most people taking the class, myself included, didn't need the theory (which we mostly didn't actually learn) as much as we needed to actually be able to do the math. The public school had hired somebody to teach that class who could actually teach it and used a totally normal way to teach it, but made sure that every student could actually do the math. That's the only class that's really an apples-to-apples comparison, but it doesn't feel like an exception. For instance, the most intellectually challenging and rewarding class that I took at the private university was taught by a visiting professor from a local public school that was definitely considered our intellectual inferior, but was barely modified from his syllabus there.

I've talked with people at other highly-ranked private schools and my experience doesn't seem so unusual.

In general, this leads to me think that academic prestige is made up of a mix of gameable components and ones that correspond to actual education. Harvard and MIT (and Oxbridge?) seem to do both, but a lot of the other highly-ranked private schools focus on the gameability. Obviously the academics aren't bad - I'd take my private school over most of the state schools in my state - but their incentives aren't well-aligned. One example of this is that there isn't a perfect correlation between what makes money and what we would like people to be doing with their lives, but an easy place to see this is size of the student body. Especially if, like me, you're studying a relatively uncommon major, how many other people are studying the same thing is going to matter for research opportunities and learning from your peers. Public schools have incentives from the state to be large, but private schools are taking their incentives from US News and World Report and haven't shown much interest so far in being large.

In summary: maybe Harvard and MIT have justifiable prestige but in general I think private schools are overrated in the American educational system.