When we were filming the scene in the hut for the music video, Tom Clement and I had some down time with Max Carter and, having asked him to prepare a brief lecture on the history of Quakerism for the video, decided to let him run once through the whole thing.

What’s amazing about what follows is that Max did this without flinching, as Tom and I were moving around the room trying to get everything ready for filming the music video.

As I looked back over the footage, I realized that there is simply no online resource as concise and comprehensive as the (less than) five minute talk Max had just given. I went to work with the visuals, and would say, humbly, that the result is as good as the music video (some might say better!)

The Beginnings of My Vocational Discernment

During my senior year at Guilford (‘05-’06), there was an active discussion about vocation. “Where my great passion meets the world’s great need” was the phrase bouncing around in my head and the community’s collective consciousness.

I had been writing and recording songs as a hobby since my senior year of high school. By 2006 I had even released a few CDs and played some shows. Music was, without a doubt, my great passion. But there were several major barriers between me and committing to my journey as a musician: (1) It is incredibly unlikely that one will succeed in this line of work; (2) Success often comes at the abandonment of the passion or love that brought one to explore music in the first place; (3) The majority of successful musicians are doing no great service to anything but their own egos.

I couldn’t see devoting myself to an extremely risky line of work for the sake of nothing but my faith in my own talent. My studies at Guilford pinballed my professional future between subjects in which I have a peripheral interest: psychology, sociology, restorative justice, philosophy.

Then I discovered Quakerism.

I should say, I re-discovered Quakerism. Or: I was convinced (as Quakers like to say).

Examining My Roots – A Deeper Commitment

I grew up Quaker. I was well versed in the modern Quaker jargon, the institutional acronyms, the banter of Young Friends, the songs of the camping programs and the schedules and rhythms of the FGC Gatherings. I thought I was as Quaker as they come.

The Early Friends said that baptism comes inwardly and powerfully when we make ourselves open to the spirit of Christ. My senior project for the Quaker Leadership Scholars Program was such an opportunity. Tired of music being an isolated thread in my life, I was inspired to write and record a CD of songs about the Early Friends and the beginnings of the Quaker movement.

The experience was incredible, not just for the personal and moving stories that I uncovered about the Early Quakers, but for the way that the world seemed to rise up around me to supply the resources needed to make the project powerful, alive. In sharing that life with my immediate community of Guilford and the wider community of Quakerism, I‘ve seen its impact be deep, meaningful, transformational. I had found where my great passion meets the world’s great need.

Settling into Action

Today, four years later, I spend my time traveling among Friends, exploring art and ministry and our collective history. I see this as being sacred, and very important, work and I am well supported in doing it.

Certainly I would not have discovered such a perfect, unconventional way to use my specific set of gifts had I not been given the opportunity to explore vocation in the safe container of Guilford College. I think of it as threading a needle (or threading several at once), which takes a lot of trial and error, thought and space. It is invaluable that undergraduates be given the space and guidance to do this explorative work, and I am always glad to know that Guilford and QLSP are still out there, helping to shape our soon-to-be ministers, musicians and leaders.

-Jon Watts QLSP ‘06

Reposted from the Friends Center Fall 2010 Newsletter

John W. Baird, Head of School, Westtown School

“Friend Jon connected well with students from both Quaker and other backgrounds. His vibrant spoken word messages touched on themes of environmental stewardship, peace, equality, justice and other quaker testimonies with an authenticity and immediacy that expanded the vocabulary of worship for all of us.”

Read the rest of John’s letter…

Tom Hoopes, Religious Studies Teacher at George School

“Jon Watts brings people together across boundaries of age, theology and musical taste. After Jon’s recent performance at George School, I heard a wide range of affirmative responses from various people. A spiritually-seeking teacher in his late twenties remarked, “Wow. Jon Watts is the real deal. He’s got it.” A very savvy girl of 18 said, “He is SO hot! I have all of his CDs.” A colleague in her 50’s noted, “I love his stuff. And my kids and their friends all have his music on their iPods.”

Read the rest of Tom’s letter…

Walter Hjelt-Sullivan, Academic Dean of Pendle Hill

“Jon Watts is a skillful and perceptive performer. His performances take on the flavor of a Meeting for Worship. It is clear to me that Jon both prepares the play list to create that atmosphere and listens carefully to follow the leadings of the Spirit in the moment. What I appreciate most about Jon and his ministry is the honesty, sincerity, and transparency of his journey. He continuously seeks to be faithful – to find the true message that has been given to him.”

Read the rest of Walter’s letter…

Max Carter, Director of Friends Center at Guilford College

“After witnessing the profoundly positive impact Jon’s work has had on the Quaker community at Guilford, I have felt moved to share the fruits of his labor with the wider Quaker world. I hope that Jon’s music will inspire others to dig deep into the experience of early Friends and discover, as Jon did, deep resources for our lives today.”

Read the rest of Max’s letter…

Reposted from the 2009 Friends Center Newsletter

Max Carter, Director of Friends Center at Guilford College

I am not adept at most of the modern social networking devices. No Blackberry or cell phone, even. At the insistence of Friends Center staff and students, there is a Facebook account with my name attached – for purposes of getting the word out on campus ministry programs. But I don’t know how to operate it.

Thus, I was unaware of a YouTube video that recently went “viral” – at least in proportion to Quaker numbers – until friends referred me to it. The video shows 2006 QLSP graduate Jon Watts rising in the silence of worship in the Barn at Pendle Hill. His vocal ministry turns into a “rap” about Quaker history and theology, focusing on the diversity of views among Friends and his own upbringing in Friends General Conference. All around him, the worshipers gradually begin to dance about, sing, and play musical instruments. It turns into quite the “Quaker Holy Ghost Revival” – if liberal, unprogrammed Friends emphasized the Holy Ghost!

Anyone familiar with Jon’s QLSP senior project, a compilation of original songs based on the spirituality of George Fox, James Nayler, and Solomon Eccles – or his subsequent recordings through his own Bull & Mouth label – would recognize some of the themes in the video. He gives a “shout out” not only to his Quaker heroes, but also to Guilford, QLSP, Baltimore Yearly Meeting camps, and other influences on his spiritual journey. While emphasizing his deep roots in the liberal tradition of Friends, he makes a clarion call for mutual listening, understanding, and sympathy across the Quaker spectrum.

I dare say that some Friends might be taken aback by theological statements made in the video, but those of us who have known and worked with Jon are taken aback even more by how much he has grown and developed in his Quaker faith. I encourage Friends to read the “Proceedings” of Friends Center’s November 2008 Quaker Renewal Program conference on Convergent Friends (available on the Friends Center site). At that conference, young adult Quakers shared their deep concern that they had been shortchanged by their Friends meetings: pastoral Friends by the lack of teaching on Quaker distinctives and the testimonies; liberal Friends by the lack of teaching about the Bible and Christian beliefs.  Jon’s video displays that he has, indeed, become aware of the rich tapestry of a broader Quakerism – and that he is finding his home in it.

In Friends Center programs such as QLSP, campus ministry, the Quaker Renewal Program, and academic offerings, we have witnessed many students and older adults come into an awareness of a richer, deeper, more complex Quakerism. Few have had the capacity to express that growth in entertaining YouTube videos and music, but their journeys are no less fascinating. In this year’s Friends Center newsletter, you will be introduced to some of our ongoing work in continuing the mission to “strengthen Friends and their institutions” and to be companions along the way of spiritual pilgrimage. I hope you enjoy the articles.

And if you are inspired to create your own video on YouTube, be sure to let us know! But we’ll continue to maintain that the theological views and opinions will not necessarily be those of the management!

-Max L. Carter

Excerpt from an interview with Max Carter, director of Friends Center at Guilford College

interview with max carter 11/30/05

What happened, as often happens with those enthusiastic movements, those things get formalized and Quakerism becomes a religion of “don’ts” and “thou shalt nots”. When people ask “What do Quakers believe?” you run off this litany of things that we don’t do. “Well, we DON’T baptize, we DON’T do communion, we DON’T take oaths, we DON’T…” and as part of that Quietist Quaker culture, we don’t do music, we don’t dress the way the world does, we don’t worship the way the world does, and that became hardened.

… and it had just hit hard after the Civil War, so you’re already spiritually exhausted from the migration, the battle of the Underground Railroad, the war, the poverty, and in come these holiness revivals. It was just singing and vocal prayer and praising the lord and people’s eternal assurance that they had been saved and sanctified. They knew if they died tomorrow, this is where they’d spend eternity. And you go back to these Meetings and the elders are saying, “Well… you can never be absolutely sure, you know… its too much creaturely activity. It’s too much self will. You have to be – if you think you’ve been saved – your personal salvation… you know, that’s pretty prideful.” So in order to literally save the Quaker youth for the Friend’s Church, the elders, who had no evangelical tendencies themselves, would incorporate some of these, what we call “new measures.” Bring in some hymn singing, some vocal prayer, some planned messages out of the silence to add some more spiritual vitality to the meeting. And that evolved from the 1860’s and 70’s into kind of a full blown pastoral protestant form of worship.

It’s the old dilemma: in order to save the village, we had to destroy it… the old Vietnam adage. In order to save Quakerism, they had to essentially destroy the Quakerism they inherited. But, in retrospect, we probably lost more than we gained. But they had to do it.