The Message and Mission of QuakerismBraithwaite, William C. (William Charles)
Religion
The Message and Mission of Quakerism
Braithwaite, William C. (William Charles)
Society of Friends
I desire an atmosphere of large-hearted charity and brotherly
confidence, which will allow the Seeker after truth to live in the
power of his experience, even if it is not a full experience, without
being expected to live beyond his experience, an atmosphere which will
allow him to make use of all the great aids which we have to-day in
the search after truth—the great aids of scientific investigation, and
what is still more important, in my opinion, the modern historical
method which we are using to-day. We want to have as the motto of our
Church the motto of one of our Yorkshire towns, “Weave truth with
trust.” We want a Church that believes in the nobility of the truth;
as this belief prevails amongst us, so shall we find a deeper reality
in all our Church life, and a fresh release of energy and renewal of
inspiration. For Quakerism is essentially _a religion of sincerity,
answered by the incoming of the living Christ_.
VI.
What then shall groups of Friends, who have reached the vital
experience of which I have been speaking, do with their experience?
Surely there are great demands confronting them to-day, great duties
and convictions to be entered upon, great Messianic hopes stirring in
the world. This world of change is also a world that is fertile in the
promise of richer life. There is the passionate craving after truth.
Surely we are to stand for reality in religion and life. There is the
fresh sense that is coming to men of the meaning and the worth of
personality. Men are learning what the early Friends reached as a fact
of inner experience, that their hearts could be places where the
Divine side of life could spring up, and that here in this world of
our own personality, in personal responsibility, personal dedication,
personal service, is the very heart of religion.
There is another Messianic hope: Woman’s place in the universe in
equal fellowship with man. Surely we can stand for that. We have
expressed that in our Church life long before it came as a great hope
to the mass of the people.
Then there is the hope of the establishment of the reign of law
instead of brute force in international affairs. We stand and have
always stood for that.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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