Thomas R. Kelly (1893–1941)

Friends recommended this book when they heard my 2012 New Year's resolution was to not be overwhelmed by life. A good dose of Quakerism is a nice antidote. I can't say Thomas Kelly led me to calm and simplicity, but he did offer me understanding: "For, except for spells of sickness in the family and when the children are small, when terrific pressure comes upon us, we find time for what we really want to do." With a small child, yes, living a focused life of service can be hard.

While his show more language and theology are old fashioned, Kelly's faith nonetheless inspires me:

I am persuaded that religious people do not with sufficient seriousness count on God as an active factor in the affairs of the world. “Behold, I stand at the door and knock,” but too many well-intentioned people are so preoccupied with the clatter of effort to do something for God that they don’t hear Him asking that He might do something through them.
…For the Eternal is urgently, actively breaking into time, working through those who are willing to be laid hold upon, to surrender self-confidence and self-centered effort, that is, self-originated effort, and let the Eternal be the dynamic guide in recreating, through us, our time-world. 71-74.

I want to pray unceasingly, as Kelly describes. The joy of spiritual community he portrays seems impossible to me, but I want it nonetheless. Most of all, I want to face this complex world with profound trust. I'm grateful for the guides that help me on this journey. show less

For me this was a book that just could not be read just once.
I just finished reading a testament of devotion. Is it not strange how the different parts of one's life can come together in synchronicity? This book started as both a joy and struggle to read. By the time I finished reading it tonight, I was drawn back through a second "skim" reading, where the previous essays became clear as examples of the same theme with particular attention towards different focuses. It is the same thing that show more has come to me in my scripture readings, in my prayer for walk these last few days and months, in my conversations with others, and even in my Sunday school lesson on the Rich Young ruler from Luke chapter 18 this weekend. Simply put I need to go back to the greatest commandment. Do I love the Lord with all my heart, soul and mind? Am I living my life this way? How do I practice it, so that it becomes second nature? How do I practice so that my will is directed towards god, so that God's Light then enters my central self, that my will is replaced by God's will in my life? I've already started down this path. The joy now is that I find it easier and easier to hunger for God throughout the day. I see the fruit in my life. I see it in the people around me. I also see times when the pain and suffering of this world is there. I experienced the disconnect, the tripping, the blind aley ways I falter down. Yet like Thomas Kelly says, I don't fall into despair, but I pick myself up, and redirect myself towards the Light. Not my will, but His. Love and be loved. Oh how sweet!
This will be a book to revisit continually for simple affirmation and encouragement in my life. show less

Reading and rereading Thomas Kelly, a mystic and one of the Quaker Greats of the 20th century, is essential. Here are four short inspiring addresses he gave shortly before his death, on the reality of God and the spiritual world, prayer, and fellowship. Kelly's writing is scholarly, sweet, and authentically experiential all at the same time. He's the one who prescribes, in such a calm joyful matter-of-fact way, that we learn, by practicing, to live on two levels at once, paying the necessary show more attention to the world and simultaneously deep inside, offering oneself to God. It takes some years to get it going naturally, but keep at it, he advises cheerfully. Right. Kelly is very special. show less

In his usual (almost Old-World) graceful prose, Kelly describes a gathered meeting in its various guises. He stresses that experiencing a gathered meeting, or any other mystical state, is not a prerequisite for the religious or Quaker life. The basic condition, he reminds us is the will to seek out and make our own "the will of God, so far as it can be discerned." "We walk in gratitude if His sun shines upon us, and in sereity if He leads us in valleys and dry places," he writes.