‘Those who came to mock remained to pray.’ A paraphrased quote from Oliver Goldsmith provoked a wonderful fellowship of laughter late on Monday morning.

The question of whether journalists should be allowed into sessions of Yearly Meeting had produced plenty of interesting, thoughtful and challenging views… and the odd laugh.

Issues of misrepresentation, trust, the integrity of process, secrecy, outreach, control and self-confidence were all raised.

An early contribution set the tone: ‘Is a visiting journalist part of the meeting or an “observer?” I am confused.’ A genuine sense of anxiety underlay several contributions. There was a fear of losing control.
‘Journalists do not always get it right’, a Friend argued. ‘I would rather give them the information that we would like them to print.’ Another agreed. He was ‘very confident that our communications staff at Friends House could do it’.

There was a concern that: ‘We may find details reported that have no great importance – and points of enormous importance to us that are not reported.’ A sense of fear was clear. Some journalists ‘did not have integrity’. They were an ‘unpleasant group’. The best solution was to keep them out. Some Quakers slipped into stereotyping people who, like Quakers, come in many forms. The implications of continuing to ‘keep them out’ were then raised.

‘Do we want to be seen as a secretive society?’ said one Friend. ‘Closing our doors to the world reinforces this opinion of us.’ A feeling to be more positive was reflected by a Friend who urged others to ‘live adventurously’ and to take away the ‘walls that surround us’.

Allowing journalists in would ‘open us up’, a Friend admitted. ‘Some journalists might misrepresent us, others might not care what we do, others think we were idiots – but there will be others who find what we do interesting.’
One Friend, quoting Oliver Goldsmith, again urged Friends to ‘take a risk’. ‘Journalists,’ she claimed, ‘are not a virus. They are children of God also. Who knows, some of them may report us and then join us!’

Confidence was the key. Just how confident are Quakers? How solid is the edifice of Yearly Meeting to the potential threat of the ‘virus journalistic’?

One Friend stated firmly: ‘We must have confidence in our processes and discipline and in our Quaker ways.’
‘I would rather be misrepresented by a journalist who attended, who actually heard what I said, than not be represented at all’, someone admitted. ‘What other churches shut journalists out? Do we consider God to be so weak?’

There were still major concerns. A Friend reminded Quakers of what discernment was: ‘to go within to the deepest, stillest, calmest part of our psyche’ and that a decision should not be made out of ‘fear of dropping rolls and a concern for misrepresentation’.

Others suggested that the presence of journalists might either inhibit or affect the way Friends spoke; was a Friend in session writing a blog or report for their Local Meeting a ‘journalist’? The Friend is an independent journal, which has reported BYM for decades; would their representatives have to sit beside the dreaded ones?

A mischievous few were wondering where the cameras might one day be positioned and whether seasoned hacks could cope with the excitement of some business sessions.
A central question, however, hung in the air: How can Quakers take advantage of the media while protecting the integrity of our Business Meetings?

A minute was finally arrived at and an historic decision taken: a qualified yes. Journalists will be admitted in the future, with appropriate briefing, and not to all sessions.