by Jonathan Vogel-Borne
Prepared for Friends Meeting of Cambridge in 1987
The spiritual life of the Society of Friends has long been nourished by visitation outside one’s own Meeting. Such visitation may be thought of by the visitor as “casual,” or as “concerned.” A casual visit should have some motive of concern—concern with the deepest values of friendship, of fellowship, and the life of the Spirit. Whether or not motivated by special mission, the visits of those who come in love and fellowship are likely to enrich those involved, and indeed the life of the Society.
—New England Yearly Meeting, Faith & Practice, 1985, p. 264
Introduction
Over the years Friends Meeting at Cambridge has been blessed by those among us who have felt led to travel in the ministry under a minute from the Monthly Meeting. In recent years, due to the increasing number of requests for travel minutes, the Meeting on Ministry and Counsel has felt a need to clarify the process through which these travel minutes are obtained and exercised. As well as the specific details of the process, it is important to consider the broader implications of the following queries:
What is the historical context from which we can understand the role of the traveling ministry today?
How do we determine true readings of the Spirit?
In what ways does this leading arise from the life of the Spirit moving among us as a community of faith?
Once a travel minute is issued, what are the responsibilities of the Monthly Meeting in support of
the traveling Friend?
What is the responsibility of the traveling Friend to the Monthly Meeting?
Travel under a Religious Concern
For more than a hundred years a continuous stream of traveling Ministers went forth from one end of the Society to the other, formulating the message of the Society, shaping its ideals, propagating its spirit, awakening the youth, maintaining the unity of the loosely formed body, perfecting the organization, establishing a well-defined order and body of customs, convincing new persons to join in membership, and convicting existing members here and there that they were recipients of a call and a gift to become Ministers, to take up the mantles of those who were falling by reason of age or death.
—Rufus Jones, The Later Periods of Quakerism, Page 195.
Throughout significant portions of Quaker history the traveling ministry has been the life-blood of the Religious Society of Friends. Since the earliest days women and men have been called by God to travel to various places among the ‘world’s people” as well as among already established groups of Friends. These Friends, “called by gospel love,” sought to be witnesses to the love of God as manifested in the living Christ who is present among us as teacher, prophet, priest, king, counselor. During the first several decades of the movement, these “first publishers of the truth” traveled to most parts of what was then the known world to spread this gospel message.
In succeeding generations, as our religious society became settled into monthly, quarterly, and yearly meetings, and as we became more geographically dispersed, the traveling ministry helped to provide needed communication between the various groups of Friends. When a traveling minister came to a Friends community, a number of occasions would be arranged for the minister to speak in public meetings, to meet with the local ministers and elders, and to visit many of the members in their homes. Each of these occasions provided what was called an “opportunity” for the Spirit of God to move among the gathered group. Traveling ministers were certified and trusted outsiders to the Meetings “politics.” In this capacity they could be of enormous service to the community. Their ability to discern the spiritual health of the Meeting, their mediating influence to reconcile differences, and their liberty to speak-out on potentially difficult issues both spiritual and temporal were often very helpful to Friends.
The “Call”
For the Christian the whole of life is a sphere of service in which one seeks to use one’s particular gifts to the glory of God. Yet sometimes there may come a leading to some specific task, felt as an imperative claim of God upon the individual not to be denied even if he or she feels personal reluctance. This is what Friends call a concern, an experience they have known throughout their history.
It has been the practice for a Friend who believes that she or he has heard such a call, to bring the concern before the gathered community of Friends in the monthly meeting, that it may be tested as a true leading of the Spirit. The practice is an expression of our membership one of another, of a mutually accepted obligation, that of the individual Friend to test his or her concern against the counsel of the group and that of the group to seek the guidance of God in exercising judgment
—London Yearly Meeting, Church Government, #861.
When an individual Friend hears the call to travel in religious service it is imperative that this leading be tested and exercised in the context of his or her worshipping community. It is through the gathered meeting that we may more fully discern the will of God.
There are a number of ways in which God will call individual Friends to a traveling ministry. Such a call will more than likely flow out of the individuals’s active ministry in their own monthly meeting or local community. It may be a call to a very specific work in the cause of peace and reconciliation or it may be a more general call, without a particularly defined task.
The Revival of the Traveling Ministry
For any variety of reasons during the present century, the formal practice of travel in the ministry among Friends had virtually ceased. In the unprogrammed tradition the practice of formally recognizing Friends with evident gifts in the ministry through the process of recording these gifts in the minutes of the Monthly Meeting is not a practice of the newer unprogrammed Yearly Meetings, and is only rarely used in Philadelphia, New England, New York, Baltimore, and the Conservative Yearly Meetings. It is thought that no one’s gifts in the ministry should be recognized over and above the gifts of others. Along with the advent of modem communication, where we are more easily in touch with distant Friends, and the changing understanding of specially recognized ministry, formal travel in the ministry had all but fallen to disuse.
Recently, there seems to be a revival of the traveling ministry. This is evidenced by our experience in Friends Meeting at Cambridge and in New England Yearly Meeting’s Faith and Witness working group’s plan to promote travel under religious concern. For the last three years Pendle Hill has sponsored a weekend gathering for ministers. The nurturance of ministers and support of the traveling ministry have been some of the important areas of concern at these gatherings.
Letters of Introduction and Travel Minutes
In recent years some Friends traveling without a special concern or on personal business have often been given letters of introduction to Friends Meetings in places where they may visit. Such letters of introduction may be helpful in identifying the visitors when they come among Friends.
—New England YM Faith and Practice, p. 265
It is important to distinguish the difference between a letter of introduction and a travel minute. The Clerk of the Monthly Meeting at her or his discretion may give any person associated with the Meeting a letter of introduction.
Obtaining A Travel Minute From The Monthly Meeting
Often Friends have a special concern to visit other groups of Friends. A Friend with such a concern, which he or she feels is genuine, will be glad to test its genuineness by presenting it for approval at a session off the Monthly Meeting.
—New England YM, Faith & Practice, pp. 264-265
The Role of the Meeting on Ministry and Counsel
The Meeting on Ministry and Counsel is the body of the Monthly Meeting that has particular care for the process of obtaining travel minutes. When a Friend feels the inward call to travel in the ministry under a minute from the Monthly Meeting she or he contacts the Clerk of the Meeting on Ministry and Counsel to begin the discerning process. This request for a travel minute is brought to the next meeting of Ministry and Counsel.
The Clearness Committee
The Clerk of Ministry and Counsel or another designated Friend sets up a committee of clearness of three or four seasoned Friends to help the individual test his or her leading. A true Spiritual leading is given by God through an individual to strengthen the religious body and deepen its witness in the world. The clearness committee meets with the individual Friend in prayer, in worship and in discussion to determine the rightness of such a leading in the context of the life of the Spirit moving in the Monthly Meeting. When clear, this committee makes its recommendation to the Meeting on Ministry and Counsel.
The Travel Minute
If the recommendation is to proceed with the process, the clearness committee writes a draft travel minute for consideration by Ministry and Counsel and, upon approval, the minute is recommended to the Monthly Meeting for its consideration.
The Meeting gives its endorsement to a project of visitation by providing the traveler with a minute, which may be presented, to other Meetings and Friends. A travel minute should be carefully worded providing a succinct account of the purpose of the visit and identifying the traveler in places where otherwise he or she would be a stranger.
—New England Yearly Meeting, Faith and Practice, p. 265
The Monthly Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Business
Upon approval of the draft travel minute, Ministry and Counsel recommends the proposed minute to the Monthly Meeting. The minute is read during the Monthly Meeting at which time, the Friend whose leading is under consideration, may be asked to speak to her or his concern. This is another opportunity in the discerning process to further clarify the genuineness of the leading and to come to a fuller understanding of how it arises from the life of the Spirit moving in the Monthly Meeting. As the sense of the Meeting is being gathered, it may be helpful for the Friend whose minute is being considered to leave the meeting room during this time.
The Monthly Meeting’s Responsibility to the Traveling Friend
As the Monthly Meeting is able to unite with the travel minute, it is important to be mindful that the care for the traveling Friend is now just beginning. If there are potential impediments to the proposed travel such as family obligations or financial difficulties, the Monthly Meeting is responsible to see that the traveling Friend is assisted in whatever ways necessary to surmount these obstacles. In the past, it was the custom to appoint another Friend to accompany the traveling minister as a companion in prayer. If practical and desirable, the Monthly Meeting may appoint such a companion.
The Monthly Meeting might also appoint a small committee to help oversee the progress of the spiritual and physical concerns of the traveling Friend. This is of particular importance when the period of service is open-ended and may involve a number of separate visits. The committee of clearness appointed by Ministry and Counsel may be asked to continue their service in this oversight capacity.
Travel Beyond the Quarterly and Yearly Meeting
If a visit is planned outside the Yearly Meeting, it should also be presented (in person, if reasonably practicable) for approval by the Quarterly Meeting and by the Permanent Board.
—New England Yearly Meeting, Faith and Practice, p. 265
When a Friend is called to travel beyond the region of their Quarterly or Yearly Meeting, the travel minute from the Monthly Meeting is forwarded to the appropriate decision-making body within these Meetings. For example, say a Friend, who is a member of North Shore Monthly Meeting, Salem Quarterly Meeting, is called to travel in the region of Northwest Quarterly Meeting, New England Yearly Meeting. The travel minute issued to that Friend by North Shore Monthly Meeting would be forwarded to the Clerk of Salem Quarterly Meeting for consideration at the next Quarterly Meeting or at the Quarterly Meeting Board. Upon the approval of Salem Quarterly Meeting, the action is minuted and the Clerk is instructed to write the Quarterly Meeting’s endorsement on the travel minute from North Shore Monthly Meeting.
Perhaps that Friend’s travel might also include religious visits to a few Monthly Meetings in the New York Yearly Meeting region. The travel minute from North Shore Monthly Meeting would then also be sent to the Clerk of New England Yearly Meeting Ministry and Counsel for recommendation either to the Permanent Board or to the annual sessions of the Yearly Meeting. Again, upon approval, the action is minuted and the Clerk is instructed to write the Yearly Meeting’s endorsement on the travel minute from North Shore Monthly Meeting.
Friends considering travel outside the region of the Yearly Meeting should take into account that the entire clearness process, from the Monthly Meeting through the subsequent endorsements, could take as long as six months to complete.
Returning the Travel Minute
Meetings visited customarily write return minutes or endorsements on the back of the travel minute, to be presented to the issuing Meetings of the traveling Friend upon return.
—New England Yearly Meeting, Faith and Practice, p. 265
In order for Friends in the home Meetings to share more fully in the Spiritual enrichment of the traveling ministry, occasions may be arranged for traveling Friends to speak about their sojourns shortly following their return. The home Monthly, Quarterly, and Yearly Meetings will formally receive the returning travel minute at a business session following the return of the traveling Friend. This is an occasion where the endorsements on the travel minute might be read and the Friend would have a further opportunity share about his or her visit.
Conclusion
The process of obtaining a travel minute as outlined above is obviously an ideal. There never seems to be enough time to accomplish each of the procedures in their good order. God works in God’s time. Under specific conditions the Meeting may wish to modify or circumvent one or more of these steps. Remembering that at the heart of this process is the discernment of how the concern to travel arises from life of the Spirit moving among the Monthly Meeting, we can be open to how God would lead us in each specific call to the traveling ministry.