Letters - 13 November 2026
'In essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty, in all things charity.'
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Pomp and circumstance
Are our Meetings for Worship for Business truly free from ‘pomp and formality’ as Quaker faith & practice (Qf&p) 3.02 advises? Or do we secretly revel in rigid procedural orthodoxy?
Early Quakerism was profoundly suspicious of religious formalism. George Fox and the first Friends challenged the assumption that religious truth depended upon established institutions, ordained authorities or prescribed ceremonies. Their emphasis was upon direct experience, spiritual authenticity and the possibility of continuing revelation. There is, therefore, something paradoxical about contemporary Quaker Meetings becoming excessively concerned with procedural correctness.
I believe procedural rigidity can have consequences beyond administrative inconvenience. It can discourage younger people from accepting responsibilities, exhaust experienced volunteers, and divert energy from the purposes for which Meetings exist. It can also contribute to a culture in which maintaining the organisation becomes more important than the spiritual and social witness of the community.
There is a particular danger for smaller Meetings with ageing memberships and limited numbers of Friends willing to undertake formal responsibilities. An organisation can become increasingly elaborate in its procedures even as its capacity to sustain them diminishes. This seems to me precisely the difficulty that the Simpler Meetings initiative sought to address. Yet Simpler Meetings faced, and continues to face, strong headwinds from some Friends.
That invitation to freedom from ‘pomp and formality’ strongly suggests that procedural rigidity is not an essential characteristic of Quaker discipline but may actually contradict its underlying spirit. Might we ask of everything we do: ‘Does this practice help us respond faithfully to the Light, or has the practice itself become an obstacle?’ That question seems as relevant to modern Meetings as it was to the religious institutions challenged by early Friends.
Peter Bellenes
Sacred days
In our Quaker concern not to name certain days as extra holy or special, I wonder whether we may be missing out on the power of church festivals to remind us of great spiritual truths.
In our small community in North Norfolk, our churches come together for All Saints’/All Souls’ Day to remember, honour and celebrate the lives of those who are now – in those glorious words from the King’s College Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols – ‘upon another shore and in a greater light’. Our simple service includes the reading aloud of names and an opportunity to light a candle of remembrance. With the church lights lowered the annual sight of those thirty or forty lighted candles on the altar becomes a witness to lives which have been lived but continue to inspire us.
In his daily meditation for All Saints’ Day, Richard Rohr likens this celebration of All Saints to the process of ripening. As we grow in wisdom, grace, maturity and patience we ‘move beyond any exclusive concern with physical aging because our concerns are much more than that. We want to talk about notions of maturity, eldership, staging, sequencing, growth and direction’.
Our annual ecumenical All Souls’ service here enables us to do just that. I always remember that moment of power when I heard my mother’s name read out. I was surprised at the force of that experience. It was truly a ministry!
Richard Rohr continues: ‘Ripening at its best is a slow, patient learning, and sometimes even a happy letting go – a seeming emptying out to create readiness for a new kind of fullness.’
So by all means let us Quakers hold fast to our conviction that we can make every day holy, sacred and precious, but may we also be open to experience the power and potential of special days of remembrance and celebration.
David L Saunders
