Conservative Friend

Friends, I'm trying to update the page on the host ConservativeFriends.org website to include later blogs and sites, and to fix links that no longer work. There are more and more of us out there who communicate or publish journals in this way.

If you write a blog, administer a website, or know of someone that does, would you please post the link here so that I can include it in the web page?

It doesn't have to be specifically related to religion. If you write poetry or collect photographs of South American marsupials, let me know.

Kevin - I am working on a website on Ohio YM history. I hope to have something posted by the end of the year. I'm not sure if it will be on the Ohio YM site or freestanding. I'll keep thee posted.

Hey, please do. If you do, explain where the term "Conservative" originated, and how and why OYM came to use it. I can't find specific mention in the usual sources.

Kevin - the term "Conservative Friend" was coined in the 1870s for the group of yearly meetings then dividing from the Gurneyite yearly meetings. Prior to that time, Ohio YM was a Wilburite body. When it recognized these Conservative YMs, it assumed the label "Conservative." Interestingly, in the 1930s, Ohio Friends tried to drop the label "Conservative," but it came back in the 1960s.

Now when did OYM recognize these other bodies? "Wilburite" was always an informal term, I think,  although I seem to remember that "Ohio Yearly Meeting Gurneyite" was actually used by those folks. EFI Eastern dropped the OYM name only in the 1970's, and in my conversations with EFI priests, I've learned that they know little or nothing of the history of their church prior to that time, and can't answer questions.

OYM today is not officially "Conservative" in that there is no other OYM anymore, and "Conservative" doesn't appear in our literature. But we mess about with names all the time. I was amused to see that the Olney Friends Boarding School in Barnesville now claims that it was founded in 1837, which was the date of the founding of the Orthodox school at Mount Pleasant. In 1927, the Barnesville school officially celebrated its "50th Anniversary," NOT its 90th. The usurpation of the 1837 date was since then.

The Mount Pleasant school never called itself anything except "Friends Boarding School," and since it burned down there hasn't been any other school to fight with over the name. Still, it seems dishonest to me to claim "1837" instead of "1878" as the year of the Barnesville school's founding. But that's marketing.

Kevin - sorry for taking so long to reply. I believe that Ohio YM recognized the Conservative yearly meetings (Western, Canada, Iowa, and Kansas) in 1882 or so.

The following is the best understanding that I have of Ohio YM's labels.

Ohio YM (Orthodox) 1828-1854

Ohio YM (Wilburite) 1854-1882

Ohio YM (Conservative) 1882-1930

Ohio YM (Barnesville) 1930-1960

Ohio YM (Conservative) 1960-1985

Most of the time since 1985 or so, Ohio YM has not used a qualifier because, as thee said, none has been needed.

Also I believe that there is some value in dropping the label "Conservative" anyway. Friends in Iowa and North Carolina sometimes object to Ohio YM making statements about Conservative Friends. They have some good grounds, since they are technically Conservative bodies while Ohio YM is a Wilburite body. I have been using the term "Ohio Friend" for us since the locals here in southeastern Pennsylvania started to call us that, and it seems to meet the current need without warranting a historic explanation.

If the recognition was in 1882, then that would be the year OYM Wilburite transferred its share of the Mount Pleasant meeting house to OYM Hicksite, thereby spurning OYM Gurneyite. The recognition of the "Conservative" bodies would therefore be coincident with OYM Wilburite cementing its new identity as something officially distinct from the Orthodox/Gurney Friends.

While OYM is descended from the Wilburites, I wouldn't classify it as a Wilburite body in theological or doctrinal terms. We're lots more laid back, I think, in terms of discipline, and lots more Orthodox than he ever would have been comfortable with. I tend to agree with Wilbur in most of what he wrote, and I am regularly accused of being a "Liberal" Friend by modern Conservatives.

Go figure.

Friends. I have a special interest in know the real influence of Jakob Boheme in the Quaker theology.