Quakers in Recovery

For years I've attended various recovery programs and have found things I like about different fellowships. In different cities and states even the same fellowship has their own manner of doing things.

In 2012 my Friends meeting stepped in when darkness crept around me and they helped me get into Sheppard Pratt where beds are hard to find (FYI, for those of you who know this, if you're Quaker and without health insurance, they will cover your costs).   I ended up in California off the Pacific Ocean where I celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas with people from all over the country who, like me, had it kinda bad.

My day looked like this:  wake up in my apartment make breakfast.  Go to gym, where I would do cardio overlooking the ocean.  Go to center where I would have individual and group therapy -- mindfulness training, art therapy, PTSD small group, etc.  Evenings we would go to meetings. We attended meetings even if we didn't particularly "qualify" to be there or "identify in" based on their primary purpose.  It was a great program and really helped me to identify and learn coping skills around my mental health needs.

While there one of the weekend counselors, Lisa M., invited me to attend Celebrate Recovery with her.  When I found out it was affiliated with Rick Warren's Saddleback Church, I thought "no friggin' way, lady."  I was not about to go hear about how bad I was for being gay.  That's a huge reason I was in California!   Still, she assured me no one would say anything, and so I went.  I will admit to keeping my mouth shut about being gay for the most part, but eventually I would tell the group of people that I would come to hang out with and who I considered friends, even if for a short time.  We did all sorts of things together, but most memorable was worship  at Saddleback and our Flashmbo at Santa Monica mall when we sang Christmas Carols.

I attended men's small groups and talked about my hurts, habits and hangups with other men, and learned that my rage, my pain, my codependency, and my means of escape weren't unique.  All sorts of people of faith, including pastors, ministers, overseers and elders of all sorts of Christian backgrounds struggled with poor coping skills. Some used chemicals (drugs and alcohol), some used behavior (sex, eating and gambling) and some used relationships (co-dependency, love and rage), some were OCD; but all had hurts, habits and hang-ups.

The Quakers in the area are largely Evangelical, but on Sundays a Quaker from a Orange County Friends would pick me up in his old convertible BMW with his partner and drive me a good half hour or more to worship.  This is the thing about Friends.  We may be somewhat socially awkward, but worship is generally the center of our lives. When there is another Friend in need, we will step up if asked (we just don't seem to be always too great about being proactive).  The first Sunday after worship I introduced myself at the time when Quakers ask visitors to introduce themselves. I actually think that Homewood sent a letter of introduction.  In any event, the Friends there knew why I was in town, and when I was afraid of rejection, strange looks, or judgment, I got none of that.  In fact, I got encouragement.

While I was doing my duty and attending Quaker meeting, I had told Lisa about wanting to attend Friends Church.  I  have wanted to attend Friends Church ever since the LA Times did a story on them back when I was in seminary.   In reading about Friends, I learned that Quakers in Eastern Region (based in Canton, Ohio) and Southwest Yearly Meeting (based in Southern California) allow for baptism.   "What?!"  You may say? Quakers who baptize?  Yes. Just like there are Quakers who have appropriated all sorts of things that are outside of our tradition; another topic for another post.

One day, during worship at Celebrate Recovery I got a notion to get baptized. I thought "oh, Lord, Kevin, you'll do anything.  If you were in a Buddhist temple, you'd probably convert to that."  And that's probably true.  I have this problem with people pleasing, and the strong desire to be accepted, It's part of my hang-ups.  So, I let it sit.  After a while, though, as I worked Step1  and Step 2, the feeling kept coming on.   Finally, I spoke to Lisa about it.  Now, Lisa naturally thought it was a great idea, she is an Evangelical Christian; a Believer.   I thought about what Friends at home would say, what John Punshon advised when I was considering baptism at ESR (he counseled to think long and hard on it).  Finally, whether it was the Holy Spirit or a fancy, I gave in.  In December of 2013, before going back home to Baltimore, I was baptized at Saddleback Church.  Yep.  After all this back and forth about religion, I was baptized at a Southern Baptist Church.  TOUCHDOWN!  When I returned to Maryland, I left Homewood to go up the street to Emmanuel Episcopal where I would worship weekly for a couple of years.

Eventually, though, I came back to Homewood and somehow I saw the meeting differently.  There were many of the Friends who were there a few years prior who had circled me with love and shipped me off to get well.  They were the same Friends who were there when I married Russell and when I lost him. They handled all of the money that was sent from around the world to pay for my legal fees for the law suit I was in.   When I got home they weren't Christ-centered enough and I needed a place where I didn't have to translate my Christianity for them.  Then, sitting in the meeting room at Homewood Meetinghouse, I sensed God calling me back to Homewood. I realized that love was more important than doctrine, and I loved Homewood. 

Friends inquired about my recovery.  However, over time, fewer people did and when they didn't it made it easier to hide in the shadows.  Isolation and lack of accountability make it easier to slide into old habits, and I found myself having to choose between Quaker community and the recovery communities.  I longed for California where my friends were in recovery and shared my faith. It wasn't one or the other, it was both. 

Truth can come from anywhere, and it's an important lesson to learn.  A person's experience, strength and hope can save me, even if that person is straight, of a different race, a different socio-economic status, and  a different religion.   I just felt for so long that Quakerism should be sufficient. I mean, after all, the 12 steps are a linear version of Quaker spirituality.  Ben Pink Dandelion writes about this in Introduction to Quakerism .  Early Friends believed that faith brought freedom.  First, God would break into our lives and we'd realize that we had direct access to him through the Light (step 2) That Light would then show us our true selves, our sinful state (step 1).  We would then realize we had a choice and possibility for change (Steps 2-6). Being given that power to live the Life, we would be transformed (Step 7-10).  Then, realizing we needed one another to live this Life, we pulled together in worship communities (Step 11).   Then we would share with one another in community and with others outside of our communities what we had found (step 12).   When I came into the rooms, and I read the steps, I thought "I know this stuff already. I can get it from Quaker meeting if I really want it."

The problem is this: i wasn't getting it from Quaker meeting..  First, most liberal Quakers I know would not necessarily articulate what I just wrote. In fact, I've heard many times in Friends Meetings, at least the liberal ones, objections to turning oneself over to a Divine Will, yielding to anything. There is a fierce individualism and pride that I think many Friends feel.  So this idea of finding an Inner Light, turning oneself over to it, yielding to it's will, admitting one's defects and faults to the group; no, that is not happening in Quaker meetings that I attend.   So while it exists in Quaker theology and history, I didn't see it in practice in Quaker meetings I attended.  At least, no one talked about it.

There's something about being in community with people who "get it" whatever "it" is.  So it was in the rooms of various 12 step fellowships where I found people who knew what it was like to be powerless over something, to know unmanageability, and to have lived a life free of that hell.  In those rooms, I met Quakers.  Then I realized they attended my Quaker meeting.  Finally, a Friend who is in AA told me "Kevin, Quaker meeting is easy, recovery is hard. Focus on recovery first, we'll be here."   I listened to him, even though sponsors had been telling me that a for a long time. 

In worship, though, I would see the Friends in recovery, and think of other Friends who have been in programs like Al-Anon, CoDA, OEA, and they would bounce back and forth in my brain.  Spirit was telling me something.  It was giving me something.  Something was coming... or was it a notion?

Then one day, in the car, where God's great ideas are often delivered, it came to me: Quakers in Recovery.   Start a group, Kevin.  I called my sponsor, who gave me some of his thoughts, and then I put it in the back of my mind.  But it wouldn't stay there.  So then I brought it up to someone who serves with me on Ministry & Counsel at Homewood and she encouraged me. Then I let it sit.

For months I attended group therapy up on the Sheppard-Pratt campus. I drove by the Quaker meeting house there each day.  On one of the rare days that I arrived early after driving from Catonsville to Towson after work (45 min to 1 hour commute), I walked over to the meeting house and looked inside. It's a teeny place built just like the old meeting houses in rural MD.  It's brick, has facing benches, a fire place and two doors; one for men and one for women; though it was never used like that.   The idea of starting a group stirred again.  A notion?  So I let it sit.

I'm not sure where to go with this, but we felt clear to see what Higher Power (the Seed, God, Light, Christ, Spirit) might have in store.   How many other Quakers are out there dealing with hurts, habits or hangups who may or may not be in 12 step programs but who would like to integrate their faith community and their recovery. Not everyone is as open to their Quaker meetings as I am about being in recovery.  What would it be like to actually talk about our powerlessness and unmanageability if we give in to our hurts habits or hang-ups? As Quakers we could share the experience of figuring out there's a Power that can restore us, the challenges and beneifts of turning our wills over to the Light, allowing the Light to work on our character defects and, most importantly, improving our conscious contact with the Light, as Quakers?  Oh, how I long for it.

Fellowship. Recovery. A la Quaker.

If you have any experience with such a thing, please let me know.