New Year’s Eve at Summer Gathering

New Year’s Eve with Quakers at Summer Gathering

It has been many years since Mike and I celebrated New Year’s Eve with a crowd. But this year found us barefoot among a large group of Quakers, breathless from having completed several contra dances, standing in a circle holding hands and counting down the seconds to midnight before singing Auld Lang Syne.

We were at the New Zealand Summer Gathering of Friends, held this year at a wonderful lodge in the Kaimai hills southwest of Tauranga. Over 100 Quakers gathered – mostly from the North Island, with a few visiting Quakers from U.K. (5), U.S.A. (3), and the Netherlands (2).  The week (Dec 28 – Jan 4) was filled with regular worship, morning presentations, activities such as swimming, hiking, and kayaking,  afternoon interest groups, evening intergenerational activities, and lots of times for eating and schmoozing. (The schedule listed breakfast, morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, and supper [light before bedtime snack]).

Many Friends asked us if this was a new experience. My answer was that in many ways, we felt completely at home. Many of the books on the “Quaker Books” table were familiar. The clump of teenagers sleepily emerging from the bunk rooms each morning was familiar. The songs we sang were familiar. Quakers in NZ share familiar concerns with Quakers in North Carolina and the U.S about peace, right relationship to the earth, how to nurture our youth, what feeds our souls. If there was a difference, it was in the specific traditions of this gathering: the annual “picnic day” where folks go on long or short hikes (or stay at the camp and do nothing); the talent show at on the last night, emceed by the teens and including a ballad in which everyone raucously joins in the chorus, which begins “When you’re feeling down the best way up is chocolate!” And then there is the sheer amount of tea that 100+ people can drink in a week!

One of the traditions is to assign every attender to a “working group”. This group meets every day to attend to a designated task, and to prepare for worship together. I was on breakfast crew, and Mike served on the Pastoral Care committee. He felt well-used over the week as several issues arose with individual friends. I found it quite nurturing to return each day to the same group. We not only navigated our different work styles as we learned how to efficiently make and serve breakfast when there was no one person taking charge, but also prepared for worship each day by sharing reflections on our own beliefs and actions, prompted by daily readings. Being in separate groups with different foci also gave Mike and I individual perspectives that gave a fuller picture of each day than either of us could have had alone.

We also felt well-used as a couple offering joint ministries.

In conjunction with the other two facilitators of the Spiritual Nurture Programme that will take place March-Sept 2018, we led a 90 minute session on “Spiritual Autobiography” with over 30 participants. We offered examples of various ways to think about and organize reflections on a spiritual journey – e.g., looking at events that changed the flow of your spiritual life, looking at what teachers you have had, looking at threads that keep surfacing, looking at important physical spaces/places that you link to your spiritual journey. After small group sharing, we returned to large group discussion and listened with awe and joy as Friends spoke of seeing new connections and insights through reflecting on their journeys.

Our interest group on “Deepening Marriage: A Proactive Ministry” provided opportunity to share how Meetings have proactively supported marriages and relationships in their communities through Couple Enrichment. The immediate result was invitations from three Meetings to continue conversations about when we might visit and lead some sort of Couple Enrichment event. We have found, again and again, that when we offer a short dialogue in which Mike and I discuss something fresh on our minds (in this case, daily exercise) while using the structure of taking turns to be speaker and active listener, people begin to glimpse the power of dialogue to deepen understanding and love, rather than simply a tool for handling conflict. And by serving as witnesses to Mike’s and my dialogue, friends begin to glimpse the community-building power of couple enrichment.

 

 

We shared our love of music by leading rounds at the New Year’s celebration and by gathering a half-dozen singers into a “Quaker Quire” which performed at the final evening’s talent show. We also offered a piano duet for the talent show. We participated in a committee meeting discerning how to better serve young Quakers and families. And we had several precious opportunities to listen to individuals in extended private conversation.

We came home on January 4 feeling spiritually invigorated and physically tired – another similarity between Quaker gatherings the world over!