Quakers - human rights group or cult?

[crashedman]

Hi,

Have any members on here had any experience with the Quaker movement?

I'm somewhat surprised that this has never been talked about on the Australian forums.

The Quaker's Religious Society of Friends is unique to having won a Nobel peace prize in 1948, as well as having a history of supporting the rights of indigenous people and demonstrating against the abuse of government powers. The ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) was formed by Quakers in 1972.

One poster I talked to offline a few months ago criticised them for being a 'cult', even though there hasn't been too much media slamming of them to the extent that Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses have got.

I chat to a few Quakers on the Internet myself and they seem to be really great people.

Crashedman

 

[inquisitor_11]

Quakers rock. I haven't had much personal experience of them, but I doubt you could genuinely classify them as a cult. From what I know, they have a very loose organisational structure, and in terms of doctrine they are very open (to the best of my knowledge)

 

[nonnie]

I don't know much about Quakers and have never actually spoken to any myself, but I have never heard of them being called a cult before.
I guess maybe it hasn't come up on the Australian forum because they're not a big movement in Aus, at least I don't think they are, or am I missing something???
Just from personal experience I have personally known people from many faiths including JWs, Mormons etc, but no Quakers.

 

[seebs]

Hi! Hope you don't mind me popping in, as one of the four or so people on this entire BBS who are involved in any way with the RSOF.

I would say that the Quakers are about as far from a "cult" as it is possible to be. No special creeds, no teaching that members are special or better or better informed, no restrictions on fellowship with outsiders. People are welcome to attend meetings just because they feel like it. Pretty much the opposite of a cult in every way.

There's a pretty good web site: http://www.quaker.org/

To summarize... Quakers are a Christian group, at least in origins. Some Quakers are not particularly Christian, because the group does not value or recognize creeds as important. Quakers are generally very aggressive in pursuing equal rights for many different people, which is where you might get the idea that they are a "human rights group", but really, it's a religious group founded on Christian principles. Most Quakers I know are Christians, although they don't always discuss doctrine as much as some people might.

Particular Quaker traits (not necessarily universal, but close to it) are pacifism, honesty, belief in universal equality of humans, and a refusal to distinguish between secular and religious aspects of life.

Let me tell a Quaker story. I go to a Quaker meeting house. There are double doors on the meeting room, which fold in such a way that, when they're completely closed, you can see the part of the door which is facing out when they're completely open.

On these doors, there are signs which say "Please Enter in a Spirit of Worship".

On my second meeting, I noticed that, once the doors were closed, these signs faced the inside of the room, so I observed that, in fact, you can read them on the way out, and enter the world in a spirit of worship. This observation has become a thing shared with other members of the meeting, and sometimes with new visitors. It's apparently fairly Quakerly to think like that.

Hope this helps.

I'm not an actual member of the local meeting. I think we do have one or two "real Quakers" here, and one of them is even from somewhere near Australia; "kiwimac", whom I believe to be from New Zealand.

Anyway, to the best of my knowledge, the Quakers are not a cult. If we were, we'd be a very polite cult, probably even less dangerous than those Dr. Pepper people.

 

[Bevlina]

Seebs...you are more than welcome to pop into the Aussie Forum.

Thankyou for that information.