- Recorded Minister
A Recorded Minister was originally a male or female
Quaker who was acknowledged to have a gift of spoken ministry.The practice of recording, in a Monthly Meeting Minute, the acknowledgement that a Friend had a gift of spoken ministry began in the 1730s in
London Yearly Meeting , according toMilligan's Biographical dictionary of British Quakers in commerce and industry Milligan's Biographical dictionary of British Quakers in commerce and industry p. 582 (Glossary)] [John Punshon says the practice of recording Ministers arose from a dispute about membership of Second Day Morning Meeting in 1772 - Punshon, John "Portrait in Grey: a short history of the Quakers" 2nd edn, London, Quaker Books (2006) ISBN 0-85245-399-X - pp. 159-162.] . The acknowledgement did not involve anything likeordination or any payment, in view of early Friends' testimony against "Hireling Priests" [ [http://chaucer.library.emory.edu/cgi-bin/sgml2html/wwrp.pl?act=next&f=%2Fdata%2Fwomen_writers%2Fdata%2Fquaker.sgm&offset=111095&len=21247&endpos=108485&elmt=DIV1&t=Glossary-%20%20Text%20Glossary%20for%20Judith%20Boulbie. A 17th C tract against "Hireling Priests".] ] . Acknowledgement did permit the Recorded Minister to attend at Yearly Meeting andMeeting for Sufferings .In London Yearly Meeting, the practice of recording Ministers was discontinued in 1924 [Punshon, John "Portrait in Grey: a short history of the Quakers" 2nd edn, London, Quaker Books (2006) ISBN 0-85245-399-X - pp. 159-162. Punshon discusses the cessation of the practice in LYM on page 276. He is a Recorded Minister in
Indiana Yearly Meeting ] .While many Yearly Meetings have discontinued the practice of recording ministers, it is maintained by many others. Today, Friends are recorded as ministers as an acknowledgement of a variety of ministries, including teaching, chaplaincy, and evangelical and pastoral ministry [ [http://www.nyym.org/pubs/recording/index.shtml "Recording Gifts In Ministry": pamphlet produced in 1992 by New York Yearly Meeting, as guidance for their constituent Meetings.] ] [For Chuck Fager's views on the proposal to re-establish the practice of recording, see [http://www.quaker.org/quest/ministers-1.htm "The Trouble with 'Ministers" (Undated but after Spring 2000).] ]
ee also
for the beginnings of a v e r y long list.
References
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