{"id":2424,"date":"2022-01-26T20:07:31","date_gmt":"2022-01-26T20:07:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/?page_id=2424"},"modified":"2022-01-31T15:50:47","modified_gmt":"2022-01-31T15:50:47","slug":"steeplehouses-social-media-and-send-worship-and-worth-ship-as-a-burned-out-parent","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/february-2022\/steeplehouses-social-media-and-send-worship-and-worth-ship-as-a-burned-out-parent\/","title":{"rendered":"Steeplehouses, Social Media and SEND: Worship and Worth-Ship as a Burned-out Parent"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nicole Gilroy<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Those of you who know me (and for reasons that may become clearer as you read, that is quite a limited number), will be aware that I am a heavy user of social media. Social media comes in for a lot of criticism, with its risks to mental health, its ability to suck away precious time, and its addictive qualities. And also, I mean, mega-businesses mining the details of our lives, feeding us with ads for barefaced consumerism; it\u2019s not very, well whisper it Quakerly, is it?<\/p>\n

As a single mother of two, with no local support, and with a child for whom finding an appropriately skilled carer is such hard work that it defeats the object of having a break, social media represents the overwhelming majority of my social interactions with adults. Sure, I go to work, but my short days due to limited wraparound care mean long lunches, drinks, and socialising with colleagues don\u2019t really feature in my day.<\/p>\n

Sadly, the restrictions extend to meeting for worship. The weekday meetings are impossible as they are either too early or take too much of a chunk out of my working day. Weekend meetings are almost impossible as one child is ultra-keen and the other is so dead set against coming that the experience and aftermath is unbearable. The zoom meetings gave me a chance to attend for a while, but there\u2019s no companionship and the constant interruptions to deal with the needs of the small people make settling to worship impossible. And then on 16 January, the anniversary of George Fox\u2019s death, his picture popped up on my newsfeed.<\/p>\n

This weekend just past, I made the superhuman effort to drag the children along to a meetup of two wild swimming groups I follow. (I say follow, as regular swims are another thing I can\u2019t fit in, but occasionally the planets align, and I can fit in a dip.)<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Toasting marshmallows after a swim.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So maybe 50 or more folks, on a freezing day, stripped off and immersed themselves in a lake. Some swam, some bobbed about chatting, most swore loudly on entry. All emerged beaming, with the glow of ‘ice tan’ on their skin. Afterwards we huddled together around a fire and drank our flasks of tea, sharing around handfuls of cake and toasting marshmallows. For new attenders, badges were handed out, but membership isn\u2019t a formal affair. If you want to belong, you belong. There are no rules but looking out for each other and making sure no one is left behind, or spotting signs of ill effects in someone who has been in too long are unspoken obligations.<\/p>\n

Our wonderful Friend Taz posted this meme on Facebook recently:
\nIt spoke to my condition. Clearly, I sit at the radical corner on both axes. I feel like hot chocolate and marshmallows absolutely can be consecrated for communion. I\u2019ve experienced it. Maybe it extends to baptism.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Is stripping naked on a lakeside with a bunch of strangers symbolic of throwing off what\u2019s unnecessary and experiencing the wonders of creation? Maybe. Do we need to have a badge, or show up religiously at a certain place and squeeze our messy and overflowing lives into a setting that doesn\u2019t meet our needs in order to belong? I hope not.<\/p>\n

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Back to February 2022 Newsletter Main Page<\/a><\/p>\n

Forty-Three<\/em> Newsletter \u2022 Number 514 \u2022 February 2022
\n<\/strong>Oxford Friends Meeting
\n43 St Giles, Oxford OX1 3LW<\/p>\n

newsletter@oxfordquakers.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nicole Gilroy Those of you who know me (and for reasons that may become clearer as you read, that is quite a limited number), will be aware that I am a heavy user of social media. Social media comes in for a lot of criticism, with its risks to mental health, its ability to suck … Continue reading Steeplehouses, Social Media and SEND: Worship and Worth-Ship as a Burned-out Parent<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":0,"parent":2408,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2424","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2424"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2424\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2534,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2424\/revisions\/2534"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxfordquaker.com\/newsletter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}