Finding hope in today’s world

22/08/19 16:50 Filed in: SBQM Update

Finding hope in today’s world
Megan Corrigan, South Belfast Meeting

Following recent ministry in Meeting, and conversations with my teenage daughter, I have been thinking a lot about hope. In the current climate it can be very difficult to feel hopeful, the problems in our societies and across the world can feel overwhelming. However, if we have no hope and feel that the future is bleak, how do we engage with our children and young people about their future? If they feel there is no hope in the future then we are in a dangerous place.

Over the summer I happened to take on holiday a book that has been on my reading pile for a long time – a book by Rabbi Lionel Blue on everyday Jewish spirituality (1). Despite all the horrors and failings in Jewish history (from accounts in the Hebrew Scriptures right up to the current day) Rabbi Blue feels that what keeps Judaism going is ‘its essential hopefulness about time’ (pg91). Hope is written into the liturgy of Jewish worship and prayer.

This made me start to think about what Quakers say about hope so I looked up the word in the index of both Quaker and Faith and Practice (BYM) and Quaker Life and Practice (IYM) and it is not there (maybe it should be). I turned to the internet and on the Quakers in Britain website came across an interesting blog by Clare Bonetree (2). It ends by saying ‘Yes, these are very troubled times. This also means they are the time to come together, and step into our collective courage to 'do' hope, over and over again’. She points to a book Active Hope by Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone (3).

Central to the book is the idea that ‘active hope’ is something we can do: it’s about knowing what we hope for and then playing an active part in working towards it. The authors contrast ‘passive hope’, the ‘waiting for external agencies to bring about what we desire’, with this ‘active hope’, which ‘is about becoming active participants in bringing about what we hope for.’ They describe the three key steps involved in practising ‘active hope’, the guiding impetus of which is intention rather than optimism. As such ‘we can apply it even in areas where we feel hopeless’.

Active hope is a challenge, a way to do hope in today’s world. It is something that is probably already taking place at grass root levels but we need to talk more about it. We need to minister hope and find ways to inspire our young people about the world they are growing up in. However hard this may seem, it is our responsibility. Maybe ‘hope’ is partly what faith is and doing something about it is faith in action.

(1) Rabbi Lionel Blue (1975) ‘To heaven with Scribes and Pharisees,’ London: Darton, Longman and Todd.

(2) Clare Bonetree (2019)
https://www.quaker.org.uk/blog/finding-the-courage-to-hope

(3) Joanne Macy & Chris Johnstone (2012) ‘Active Hope’, California: New World Library.
http://www.activehope.info/active-hope.html

SOUTH BELFAST QUAKERS

Quakers (or the Religious Society of Friends as they are also known), have held Meetings for Worship in Ireland since 1654. After a previous failed attempt to establish a lasting Belfast Meeting around 1665, the first permanent Belfast Quaker Meeting was established in 1799, and in 1810 it moved to Brewery Lane, now known as Frederick Street. It wasn’t until 1956 that a second Meeting was approved for Friends who lived in Belfast, this time based in the south of the city. South Belfast Meeting House is an active Meeting with approximately 45 adult members and attenders who worship together each Sunday. Children & Young People also play a large part in our meeting, and we have on average 22, 1-18 year olds joining us for the last 10 mins of our worship, after their own activities.

Meeting for Worship takes place at 10.45am each Sunday at our meeting house ( see address and directions on the contact page )

Alternatively you can join us on Zoom with the following details:

Meeting iD: 4613195026
Pass: 143412

South Belfast Meeting is part of the larger Ireland Yearly Meeting (see details of Quakers in Ireland below)