"An adequate life . . . might be described as a life which has grasped intuitively the nature of all things, and has seen and refocused itself to this whole. An inadequate life is one that lacks this adjustment to the whole nature of things—hence its twisted perspective, its partiality, its confusion."
Douglas V. Steere, describing the life of Thomas R. Kelly, in A Testament of Devotion.
I got into an extended conversation yesterday on Facebook about street harassment. I mentioned that I have had some recent experiences with men (yes, grown men) yelling at me from cars. I added, "And don't even get me started on men telling me to smile." A man who I know to be kind and thoughtful asked what was wrong with telling a woman to smile. The following is a slightly edited version of my response:
Thanks for the question! When I said don't get me started, it's because I have so much to say about this. I am happy to respond and point you toward some other sources. Men telling women to smile is a problem for a lot of reasons. One is that if I am not smiling in a public place, I might have a good reason. Maybe my sister is in the hospital, or I just got fired, or I was just thinking about something. But when a man I don't know tells me to smile, I have to stop thinking about whatever it was I was thinking about and engage him. I have to either smile for him, even if I don't want to, or I have to refuse. I have to decide how badly he might respond. Will he get mad? Is it possible he could attack me? In the end, it is a form of body control. It reinforces the idea that I am not out in public for myself, but to be pretty for men. It may seem like a small thing, but when it happens often, it is pretty demoralizing. In sum, strangers are not entitled to my body, my time, or my attention.
My friend, Monika T, added:
The thing is, telling someone to smile is telling them what to do and how to feel. And you would be astounded how many men regard women that way. Its insidious and pervasive. Every time I go into the city, I have to devote some of my mental energy and focus to assessing who might harass me, and how they might react if I push back. This happens often if not always on my way to class, when I have better things to be thinking about.
There are some wonderful videos illustrating how ridiculous and awful telling women to smile is, such as this one called Smile, and this one from Stop Telling Women to Smile: This morning, I saw that I was not the only one thinking or writing about this issue yesterday! Here is a wonderful article about street harassment: You're a Good-Looking Girl . . . I Want to Attack You. Cameron Esposito sums it up well:
I do not care if you think I am beautiful. Your feedback or evaluation
isn’t needed. I also do not care if you think I am not beautiful. Your
feedback or evaluation isn’t needed there either.
[As part of my second year in a Master of Divinity program at Candler School of Theology, I am required to spend eight hours a week in an ecclesial setting. My site is Atlanta Friends Meeting, where I am a sojourning member. This week, in the class connected with that site work, we were asked to interview our site mentor about his or her views on pastoral authority and leadership. These are my reflections on our conversation.]
When I interviewed my site mentor, Paul B, about his understanding
of pastoral authority and leadership, we agreed that it is a tricky
question for unprogrammed Friends. In my site, Atlanta Friends Meeting
(AFM), there is no pastoral staff. Paul stated that the pastoral nature
of Quakerism is that the community cares for itself instead of having a
designated pastor or minister to provide care. Thus, every Friend has
an obligation to support the community.
At AFM, we do have a
committee that focuses on pastoral care, the Care and Counsel committee.
That committee is made up of people who choose to be on it and serve
for a designated term. The committee draws people who are gifted in
pastoral care, but they are not the only people who provide pastoral
care in the meeting. One of the tensions in an unprogrammed meeting is
how to hold (mostly) volunteers accountable. Having people rotate off
the committee after their term is one way to do that.
As we
spoke, the primary metaphor that Paul used for pastoral care was the
body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12:27). Christ is the head of our meeting
and we are the body. Within that body, people care for each other and
provide care as needed. Friends are resistant to the idea of authority,
other than the authority that comes from the Holy Spirit, but we do
recognize the need for leadership.
Three committees in AFM cover
three of the roles that a pastor traditionally fills. Care and Counsel
provides pastoral care as described above. The Ministry and Worship
committee focuses on the worship within the meeting and attends to
things like weddings, support for ministry, and applications for
membership (I serve on the Ministry and Worship committee). We also
have a Social Concerns committee, which connects the meeting to the
larger community context and does outreach.
Reflecting on this
conversation, I agree that the body of Christ is a very good metaphor
for pastoral care in a Friends meeting. I also realized that my
personal metaphor for ministry has been the story of Peter’s shadow
falling on people and healing them (Acts 5:15). In that story, if
Peter’s shadow is behind him as he walks, he will never know whom he is
healing.
I have been a public minister among Friends for over six
years now, and in that time I have lived in four different cities.
Each time I moved, I felt like God was calling me to the next place,
but it has been very hard for me. I feel like I have been planting
seeds in ministry, but I do not get to stay long enough to see how they
grow or if they bear fruit. I have to trust that God is working through
me even as I move on.
Having a year to spend deeply involved in
the life of the meeting at AFM feels like a gift. My site mentors and I
are still discerning what ministry will look like for me in this
context, but I know that there are needs in the meeting and that I have
gifts to bring. I am also grateful that I will not be doing this work
alone. We have a well-developed committee structure with many people
bringing their time, gifts, and skills to support this community of
Friends.
A few weeks ago, a Friend wrote me asking if I knew of any resources about the Quaker process for recording ministers. He said he was new to this, and it had been hard to find resources online. I compiled a list of resources for him, and thought it might be useful for others as well. My home meeting, Freedom Friends Church, has a page of resources on recorded ministry.
Here is a YouTube video of me talking about my recording process with Friends Journal:
I also posted quite a bit about the process of being recorded on my blog under the Recording label, as well as sharing stories from other women who have been recorded as ministers. Steven Davidson wrote about some of the objections to recording in an article called Recording Gifts of Ministry in New York Yearly Meeting's Spark. (See also Resources on Ministry.) I highly recommend Brian Drayton's book On Living with a Concern for Gospel Ministry. The whole book is excellent, but he talks specifically about his experience of being a recorded minister and reporting back to his meeting in Appendix 1 and 2.
Are there other resources you would recommend, Friends?
