"Who do you think Jesus is?"

I was recently sitting on the grass in the shade of a tree trying to think my way through a task I've been stuck on, when two young men approached me and very politely asked me if I could tell them who I thought Jesus is.

I've noticed the campus has broken out in a rash of young Christian men lately. They're everywhere, sitting in pairs with a Bible casually propped between them as they have their mini-Bible-discussion-cum-mentor-sessions. There's also been a large group of "Christian Students" meeting after classes in one of the lecture rooms, which doesn't appear to be the old Christian Union that has been floating around for God knows how long (pun intended). Although it might be the same group with a spot of rebranding. Christian groups do love to rebrand in the 21st century.

Over the years I've occasionally found myself the target of young Christians on an evangelistic spurt. I remember once, when I was 18 and stressed out of my brain, I was literally sobbing in the street after realising I had forgotten to do something at uni and I had to go back and fix it, and most people completely ignored me except for a young Christian woman near my own age. She didn't ask me if I was okay - she invited me to her Church. I was a deeply committed Christian in a modern Pentecostal denomination myself, at the time, so I didn't think this behaviour was particularly weird or inappropriate. Looking back on it now, I wonder if maybe it was an early contributor to my eventual realisation that Christians aren't as "Christlike" as they like to believe. Jesus wouldn't have invited me to his church. He would have asked me if I needed a cup of tea and offered a hanky.

The "fun" thing about being a Christian who is occasionally targeted by other Christians on the prowl is you know exactly what they are doing and why - and it all seems so terribly forced and mercenary. I have always been polite to them "sorry, but you're preaching to the converted - I won't take up any more of your time", but part of me was always slightly creeped out by it. Especially when they would still try a few follow-up techniques on me. I couldn't figure out if I didn't look Christian enough and they still wanted to try to convert me, or if the point was to win more people over to their specific church, rather than The Church.

It's probably why I was never that evangelical myself - I knew how creepy it felt on the other end.

When these two young men approached me, it was the first time I've been hit-up by Christians for a spot of "winning souls for Christ" for a while. It's also the first time someone has approached me about it since I became a Buddhist.

"We were just wondering," said the lead boy, "Could you tell us who you think Jesus is."

I knew what they were really asking, and why, and that they didn't actually want to hear my answer. I knew they didn't want to hear it because they were just looking for an opening to tell me who they think Jesus is. I looked at them as a woman twice their age who has been "Churched" since she was a child and made her way through more than one Christian denomination before coming to see that it was easier to follow Jesus' ethos by being a Buddhist. I looked at them as someone who has been fed the answers, and who has sought the answers, and who has discovered there are problems and holes in all the answers.

I simply told them, with a polite smile, that I had been a Christian, I was now a Buddhist and they were better off trying to have this conversation with someone else. It threw them for a moment - they weren't prepared for that answer, and clearly had no follow up for it, so they muttered something polite and left.

What I wanted to say, as I watched them walk away probably trying to think of how they could respond if they had a similar reply next time, was:

"Oh, boys, I could give you at least 15 different answers to that question and they'd all be as wrong as your answer - but you are too young and in love to have this conversation right now. Go and be young and in love with your faith. In time, when you're ready to be more critically engaged with your beliefs, you might be in a place to hear the answer to the question you're asking."

Looking for Quakers in all the wrong places

I think I've previously written about Quakers (or the Religious Society of Friends) in at least one of my blogs.

Some time ago I read a memoir written by a Quaker that was all about the life lessons he'd learnt growing up in that faith community.

I liked what I read, so I borrowed books about Quakerism from my library.  These books were all old, and contained writings from various Quaker preachers, adherents and philosophers over the past few hundred years - up to about the 1920s.

I didn't read anywhere near enough to become an expert on the subject, but I read enough to realise that I liked this version of Christianity.

I grew up in a Pentecostal denomination that I found too intense, confining and (let's face it) delusional.  I came to Anglicanism because I (perhaps ironically) found it was a simpler, cleaner version of Christianity than the one I grew up with.

Yeah, I know, it's supposed to work the other way:  Flee the crusty old Church with it's crusty old liturgy and find freedom in the Pentecostal movement.

There's no pretensions in the Anglican Church.  They know they weren't founded by some prophet who knew the One Right Way to fulfil the will of God.  They're just jobbing Christians, getting on with it.  There's something beautiful about that.

It's what I needed them to be in order to give my own Christian faith a shot in the arm.

But the Quakers offered something else.  Something I found highly attractive - enforced simplicity.

Take away all of the guff that surrounds Christianity and focus on the very basics.  Be still and listen.  Look for the best in each other, try to do what's right.  Simplicity.  Equality.  Charity.  Integrity.  Peace.

This was a version of Christianity I really wanted to connect with.  It seemed like a great way to really get to the heart of what Christianity is all about:  Following the example of Christ and learning from his teachings as you try to build a closer relationship with God.

The first Quaker service I ever attended was a great experience.  I really enjoyed it.  After the service itself there was a "bull session" of sorts where we mulled over one of the Advices and Queries that specifically asked what role Christ played in our lives.

The second Quaker service made it clear that Christ doesn't play a big role in the lives of many Quakers in Australia.  It seems today's Quakers are so fond of diversity that believing in Christ is optional.  In fact, there seemed to be a sense that Christianity makes people uncomfortable, so it's downplayed as much as possible.  That first service I attended was something of an anomaly.

Look up the websites of the major Quaker organisations in Australia, New Zealand and the UK and see how long it takes you to find a reference to Christianity.  The fact that the RSoF is a Christian denomination is hardly shouted from the rooftops.

The "elder" of the Meeting I attended even said she often feels a bit funny attending inter-denominational Church gatherings, because Quakers aren't really part of the Church any more.

Christ-centered Quakers are, apparently, a particular interest group within the movement.  In fact, in other parts of the world they seem to be a new movement in themselves.

Which makes me wonder where someone like me goes?

I'm looking for the dirt basic Quaker faith that Rufus Jones wrote about in the 1920s.  I'm not interested in something that has shifted away from it's own foundations.  I'm also not interested in something that's trying to revive a revivalist movement.  Even if I was, I can only work within a limited geographical area.

I just want to find the Quakers of old.

Oh, yes - the *third* option...

One of the problems with growing up in a evangelical Pentecostal denomination with tickets on itself (then again, don't all denominations have tickets on themselves?) is that, when you get over that and want a break from the "crazy intense" side of Christianity, you tend to ignore everything that even smells like superspirituality...

Which can lead to ignoring spirituality it general. Not a good move. One's health is, after all, based on three points: physical, mental/emotional and spiritual.

I've been thinking my antsiness must be based on a physical or emotional thing that I'm not addressing properly, but what I haven't been addressing properly is the third part of the triangle.

Once I noticed that last night I started feeling a bit more settled, so I think I'm onto something.

Time to start paying a bit more attention to things I've been dismissing of late, methinks.