The Hippie Kid, and me

Ive been meaning to find again where I saw this post titled "Am I (Still) Quaker?" from (somewhere in the) Quaker blogosphere - it was one of the first articles I'd read since starting on my internet conversation with Friends (over a month ago now)... and this morning it came across my screen in a fortuitous way... Ive been calling it "the Hippie Kid" article, and it may go down as one of my most important influences in 1: What Im doing here in this Blog in the first place- and 2: What happens next in my relationship to Quakers, online at least... so it was only right that I find it and link to it, perhaps with a quote from the part that really spoke to me about my own lifes journey... the Posting of this essay by Sola Caritas author Ryan Dowell Baum is one of the best examples of how to make a long and complex History lesson into an easily digested snack (for those of us with ADD, right?)... give it a read, and learn in short order what you may need to know about "what is a Quaker anyway?"

From the page:

"The denominational family known today as the Religious Society of Friends (or more commonly by their nickname, 'Quakers'), was founded in the north of England in 1652 by a 19-year-old precocious little hippie kid named George Fox. Convinced that no one he knew had the real Truth when it came to matters of religion, young George ran away from home and schlepped all over the English countryside talking to anyone he could find--pastors, professors, and laypeople-- looking for someone, anyone, who could 'speak to his condition.' Finding no one, he was driven almost to the point of despair, when suddenly he heard a voice say to him..."

Yeah, see?
This I really get ... and in a way- it doesnt matter what words might have come to ones head from such a journey, the Clear Seeing of what exists as Truth in any moment, is just completely beyond words anyway... and this is what I find perfect in my relationship to the Silence that Friends will invite when meeting for Worship... this is so very important, to what I understand ones relationship to the Holy is... coming upon Truth for oneself - no matter how alone one may find oneself in conveying that to others ...indeed, letting ones Life speak, rather than making words fit...

Its a Blessed thing... and I thank friends and Friends everywhere who have looked with me - to discover that it was in the very meeting itself, in the mere coming together, where the Holy always resides... for me, in the Inquiry, "How do I meet you?"