The following letter was sent to ILYM by the NFM Healing Circle Committee:
Septermber 17, 2019
Dear ILYM Friend - we have glad tidings!
Recently, the body at NFM approved the following minute:
NfM takes under its care a newly formed ad-hoc committee, named Healing Circle, charged with shepherding the healing gifts of our NFM Quaker community, which may take many forms, including: home visits, regularly scheduled HCs, called HCs to lift concerns inside and outside our Quaker world.
After convening our first three Circles, Spirit directed us to: Be generous, extend your healing gifts to all Chicagoland Friends in need of, and/or led to provide, healing.
As a result, if your MM members and attenders are interested we will begin to send you the dates of our upcoming Healing Circles.
We hope Friends won’t be shy - and will bring their healing skills - along with their aches, physical or social or psychic - to any and all of our scheduled Healing Circles.
If you’d like more information about what to expect during a Healing Circle keep reading…..
Meetings for Healing have a long Quaker tradition, tracing back to the healing work of George Fox and the first Friends.
During Friends General Conference (FGC) Gathering healing sessions have been offered in the Healing Center for more than a decade, along with various week-long workshops focused on healing practices.
Locally, NFM formally convened Healing Circles, most recently when our Clerk was burdened with cancer. And, monthly scheduled Healing Circles were practiced by Evanston Friends for several years.
In a traditional format for a Healing Circle a group gathers for a Meeting for Worship with a Concern for Healing, led by a clerk, and focuses, for a period of time, on individuals who have requested healing support. Afterwards, the Circle may decide to hold those not in the room and who need healing in the Light. Finally, the Circle may decide to lift concerns about the world outside of Quakerdom in to the Light.
1.Before the work is begun an individual briefly voices their challenge/need.
2.Then they choose to sit on a chair in the center of the circle or lay on a massage table in the center of the circle or remain where they are seated.
3. Then they let everyone know if they prefer the healing work be done with, or without, touch.
4. Then the work begins, prayer or song or massage or energy work or the laying-on-of-hands or or or… the modalities of healing work are many.
Friends may request time in the Circle beforehand, or can do so as the Healing Circle progresses. Everyone participates as led. This usually deepens in to very Gathered Worship. Verbal messages are welcomed.
Finally, as you may have noted in the approved minute, Healing Circles is prepared to offer healing services "which may take many forms, including: home visits, regularly scheduled HCs, called HCs to lift concerns inside and outside our Quaker world.”
All are welcomed to Receive, and all are welcomed to Give. There are no “right” ways to do it. While some may have more experience or obvious Gifts, the Spirit and energy moves through us all. Join us on the 9th as we begin the journey and see what unfolds! We will start as early as practical after rise-of-Worship socializing, and likely remain past 1:00. (though, of course, folks will leave as they need to) All are welcomed to Receive, and all are welcomed to Give. There are no “right” ways to do it. While some may have more experience or obvious Gifts, the Spirit and energy moves through us all. Join us on the 9th as we begin the journey and see what unfolds! We will start as early as practical after rise-of-Worship socializing, and likely remain past 1:00. (though, of course, folks will leave as they need to)
Feel free to contact the ad-hoc Healing Circle Committee ‘with all your healing needs’!
And, please let us know if your MM is interested in our posting our scheduled Healing Circle dates to your list-serve.
Faithfully,
The ad-hoc Healing Circle Committee members