In reading my explanation, you press both the Windows key and the period key at the same time. Thart's what opens the grey box where one of the choices contains symbols.
The windows key is basically a second function key. It has some cool features to it.
A couple of weird ones, too: When people do a group sing or group dance, they come away in greater agreement, better able to work together and coordinate with each other…
It makes intuitive sense, but no one really uses it where it might count these days. Music for most people is a personal experience enjoyed privately over one’s own headset.
A clear reminder that institutions are not four walls and a roof but rather the people inside the walls and under the roof, all of whom are imperfect human beings.
As a one-time-but-not-for-a-longtime church goer who, while not a Catholic, has some experience within the walls and beneath the roof of the Catholic Church, while none of this surprises, it is a bit disheartening when the parallel between current-day political behavior and the behavior described here is observed, since it's hard not to think of a venerated religious institution such as the Catholic Church as being "better than that" as a default position when thinking of "church vs state", so to speak.
This morning's essay is an interesting read about something I know nothing of, but it has familiar ring. It's humans again. They keep doing stuff like this.
Wow. I am not qualified to opine on the issue itself, but the rhetoric ("Many wonder if...") is pretty typical of a politically motivated polemic, unrelated to the facts of a situation. Keep us informed!
This was a great topic, and there are so many aspects and angles to it.
Some of this sounds akin to Martin Gurri’s “Crisis of Authority”, in that the rise of new media has led to more people “freelancing” their challenges to authority very stridently.
I have to wonder how much of this there would be (would have been) without the modern media landscape. Obviously, printed commentary would have required someone to get a mimeograph machine and print handouts just to circulate the ideas beyond gossipy scuttlebutt.
But even that wouldn’t allow people to share the challenges to authority among themselves over great distances. What were you gonna do as an upstart ideologue? Mail your pamphlet to your postal region as a mailbox stuffer in the hopes of finding kindred spirits?
Without the immediacy of electronic media, you also don’t get the instant dopamine response, either. When people know their responses have to wait till the mail is delivered, they actually tend to reflect on whether it’s worth the effort. The lack of online digital immediacy used to force us to “walk off” the impulse to do something *right this very instant*.
In the past, a Bishop might have had to deal with grumbly parishioners murmuring complaints to their closest two or five intimates. But now, instead, he’s confronted with 10,001 wannabe bishops who feel like they know it better *and* who have access to a platform with instant global reach just as he does, even though they don’t have the endorsement of the institutional hierarchy. The peasants, as it were, are constantly operating on the assumption that they can effectively revolt: They may lack the authority, but they’ve got the numbers on their side.
"What were you gonna do as an upstart ideologue? Mail your pamphlet to your postal region as a mailbox stuffer in the hopes of finding kindred spirits?"
I believe the previous method was to print your thoughts on paper and then nail that paper to the door of the church.
Jill Lepore has several good descriptions of what folks did after the nailing the paper to the church door thing. It's always been crazy, but it was scattered paper hanging and publishing. Then, social media brought everyone together.
Good morning. 72 degrees here, with intermittent rain and a high in the upper 70s. The mothership is covering the increased political violence, including the shooting of Minnesota state legislators, the LA immigration protests/riotsn and things like the arson attack on Governor Josh Shapiro in PA.
The priests or whoever in the Charlotte diocese who leaked that letter acted against their bishop, not in a state of submission. But putting aside the leaked draft, the timing of Bishop Martin’s decision to implement limits on the TLM is (IMO) curious at the very least. The exemption given to the diocese had several months to run, and the accession of a new Pope held out the possibility of a further extension, if not a modification to Pope Francis’s restrictions on the TLM.
Personally, I view The Pillar a bit more trustworthy Catholic news source than Where Peter Is, which is an opinionated news site. And while I absolutely respect the Holy Father, my bishop and all the bishops, the sex abuse scandals have made clear that our leaders can err, and their actions can be met with respectful (always respectful) disagreement when necessary.
It has been explained that the timing was because the first Tuesday in July is the usual time for priest reassignments. One can still choose to treat that as "curious," but it's the thing that happens.
As a person on the ground, I know that some of what "The Pillar" is reporting is squirrelly. For example, the proposed new cathedral was 100% Bishop Jugis's baby, not Bishop Martin's. I know this because I was dragooned - by the same friend who gave us the Practically Immortal Gecko - into working on the &(*^(* Diocesan Capital Campaign. Bishop Jugis wanted a crypt for dead bishops, too. If the whole cathedral plan ends up in the circular file, yippee!
I have found The Pillar to have a particular slant, which is fine as long as one recognizes it.
Intercontinental ballistic missiles, Phil. Flying fish! You'd swear, too, if you had to work on a Diocesan Capital Campaign. "Please, Mr. Smith, if you'll just call me back and say, 'No, I don't care to make a pledge,' I'll stop calling you."
Cynthia, if you have previously reported on how the priest assignment process factored into the timing, I missed it. My apologies.
There is a lot of overblown reaction, including on matters that I would not deem rise to the level of criticism, like a draft document known only because of leaks, or the cathedral issue. I think The Pillar was reporting on the controversy, not opining about it. And I listen to their weekly podcasts where principals JD Flynn and Ed Condon do opine about matters in the Church
BTW, if you think The Pillar is biased, you have not read trad sites like Fr Z's blog, or Rorarte Caeli, or One Peter Five.
But it is true, and has been for a long time, that secular media try to stuff Church matters into the "conservative versus liberal" mold, which is a bad fit.
There's a spectrum of slant, from a little to middling to whack-a-doodle-doo. Things like choosing to publish an anonymous "open letter" and to treat the representations in it and the comments of (presumably) the author as fact are what you could call propaganda in the form of reporting. So is treating an anonymous rumor that the Pope told the Bishop to "go slow" on the cathedral as a rebuke of the Bishop, rather than, "I agree, spending tens of millions of dollars on a freaking mausoleum in this environment would be stark raving bonkers."
We need to work on your random symbology when trying to swear effectively. You need more @, %, &, #.... and don't be afraid to use the Option key to open up your vocabulary. Note...parentheses are not an approved symbol; try the Option Shift key occasionally.
I realize this is a well-intentioned piece of advice. But swearing effectively also involves doing it with personal style, and you might not want to criticize Cynthia's too much lest she tell you to mind your own &(*^(* business.
Foreign language curse words are so much more inventive, and at the same time curious as to their meaning. I am particularly fond of Yiddish curse words. For example: "Ikh hab dikh in badn" literally means "I have you in the bath" but in actuality means "Screw you. I win."
If it is a Windows machine, try the Windows button with the period key. It should open a grey box, and at the top are four categories, including symbols.
₻௹૱↬↹⇱∉ↈↂ⨇⨄⨁⨷⪓ϡψ I chose those symbols at random, apologies if I just wrote something offensive! 🤦♂️😬
Thanks, Cynthia. I’ve been following the events in Charlotte, because there are elements which mirror the schism in my denomination, the UMC.
The reactionary tendency to brand institutional changes as the work of “elite liberals” continues to spread. The nostalgia for some imagined past which was wonderful is causing people to splinter off, because the 1950’s were so great! Vatican 2, women’s liberation, immigration, gay rights—they all get thrown into the same bucket.
Yes, the modern world is complex and difficult. There are societal movements that should be rejected, but the slow work of change within institutions is too hard when you can foment rage online.
The United Methodist Church has a particular issue that has divided many Protestant denominations -- sexual morality, particularly homosexuality. It's taken longer for the UMC to split over that issue, but it seems to have caught up with them.
One of the worst things to happen is that many of us “centrists” were forced to choose sides. The conservatives couldn’t live with sitting in the pews with someone who didn’t fully agree with them.
One of the things Bishop Jugis did shortly before his retirement was issue an order that churches weren't allowed to use projectors or video screens to show music lyrics, the texts of prayers, church announcements, etc. This resulted in a substantial expense, in many parishes, for hymnals or other dead-tree materials. (Weirdly, the order said you couldn't project lyrics on the wall, but you could put a file on the web and encourage parishioners to look at their phones.)
The diocesan newspaper ran a page of comments on the instruction. About half were, "Can't you just let people be?" and the other half were, "It's great that you're making everyone do what I prefer."
A lot of Friends during the pandemic began using something like Zoom, and "sharing" a screen with the lyrics to songs on it. We still have that, and I look at the monitor rather than a hymnal. And yes, "Imagine" is in the latest hymnal.
What's sad about it is that songs like Imagine appeals to Boomers and older, and in no ways suggests being current. And they are too clueless to get it. It's like preferring to watch Model T races over horseracing....
We had a major schism among Friends in 2012 (we have them regularly). One question is the role of authority between the local congregation and the higherups (What UMC calls a Conference, what we call a "yearly meeting"). Friends were founded on the principle of a direct relationship between a person and God: there was no need for a minister, no need for any rituals (although we developed our own, but we'd never call them that).
Interestingly among Friends, the schism is a horseshoe: some very liberal and some very conservative meetings both want freedom to do stuff (very different stuff) that the yearly meeting would not have them do. Liberals wanted to be "welcoming", which was codespeak for performing gay marriage before Obergefell. Some conservatives want to offer physical communion and baptism. And the conservatives literally cut and pasted the same arguments from the liberals into their letters justifying what they wanted. That's really what led to the schism: there was a fear the yearly meeting would lose all authority. So now Indiana Yearly Meeting has much more authority over local congregations.
BTW, one reason IYM wanted autonomy over local congregations was that some small Friends meetings have been taken over by outside groups, because it's an easy way to get a free building. A meeting's attendance might drop to a dozen people, then 25-35 newbies from outside all begin attending, and take over. The Yearly Meeting is fighting to keep that from happening, but doing so intrudes on the local congregations.
We don't ordain ministers, we consider all Friends to be ministers. But we do recognize gifts of ministry among Friends (we call it "recording"). It used to be that local congregations decided this, and the Yearly Meeting simply recorded that decision in their records. In 1928 the yearly meeting removed that from Monthly Meetings, and added formal training to it. When my former local congregation wanted me to go through recording, the yearly meeting wanted me to attend seminary for training. I decided to come to UD, instead. The issue is there are too few seminarians to staff all the local congregations.
My home meeting (liberal) left the yearly meeting and is in a new one that has no authority on anything. A conservative meeting joined us, and many liberals are gritting their teeth because they do stuff we don't like. I smile at it, as I find it amusing.
"Some conservatives want to offer physical communion and baptism."
In terms of the Society of Friends, wouldn't that be the opposite of "conservative," more like "completely different"? Or if one reaches back past the founding of the Friends, it would be "conserving" the practices of the Church of England.
It gets messy with labels. One branch of liberalism has a lot more in common with "primitive" Friends (their term), in that both go back to the origins of Friends for their influence. But they arrive at almost polar opposite places as a result.
Thomas Hamm (a Friends historian) talks about it this way. Friends are guided (or "Led") by "the inner light". To ensure it isn't their own opinion, Friends testing their leading against both scripture and the inner light of others. Hamm calls this the "orthodox" position. How much influence to each? A substantial amount, close to 50/50, although we never use numbers for that. BTW I consider myself orthodox.
Conservative Friends tend to give more influence to scripture, the Liberal Friends give more influence to the inner light of others. Progressives rarely use scripture (these are the people who sing "imagine" as a hymn), other than to confirm what they already want. They really don't test against anyone else, but will seek out those who agree with them. A progressive speaking out in open worship will often conclude with "and this is my message", thus being oblivious to the idea that open worship is not about our message, but that of God's, given through us.
Evangelicals are orthodox, but more modern in music and worship style. Here's another difference. It's rare that conservatives or liberals have a paid minister bringing a message, and a worship service might be entirely open worship (most begin with some music and a prayer, then go into open worship).
I summarized this just among 4 major positions, but there are a boatload more.
All the worlds that existed before today were complex and difficult, too. There's just a tendency, looking back, to imagine that they weren't, simply because the complexity and difficulty took some different forms.
The romanticization of "great factory jobs" is a similar phenomenon.
Hi CynthiaW
In reading my explanation, you press both the Windows key and the period key at the same time. Thart's what opens the grey box where one of the choices contains symbols.
The windows key is basically a second function key. It has some cool features to it.
I believe the Catholic Church is the longest lasting most powerful political organization in mankind history. Some good. some bad.
People in numbers}}}》》 3 have politics....
animals, not so much
Animals can have very strict hierarchies, but (1) they are observably survival adaptations, and (2) the groups tend to be small, no more than dozens.
I wonder if animals prove some social organization things? Like the lowest common denominator for social survival is authoritarian? Ykes!!! 🫠🌿
I don't know. Cooperation with no apparent authority is also observed among many different kinds of animals.
we humans do that more than we realize. Especially when a crisis, small or large, creates a focused task for a group.
Accident- help victims, direct traffic etc
Flood- sandbags, rescue, aid..food
A couple of weird ones, too: When people do a group sing or group dance, they come away in greater agreement, better able to work together and coordinate with each other…
It makes intuitive sense, but no one really uses it where it might count these days. Music for most people is a personal experience enjoyed privately over one’s own headset.
Interesting. I'll suggest that the Spanish Volunteers meeting open with a song next time.
I think we see this uncoordinated cooperation more than we admit, because, we'll, it's still normal.
Baseball game - National Anthem. Flag passes, most salute or hand over chest.
Music!!
just like us humans!
animals are far more egalitarian!
love and let live.
or be eaten.
I think it's better if people don't eat one another, even though it would be simpler.
Apologies to all... just a funny here..
Thou shall not eat Thou brethren!!
A clear reminder that institutions are not four walls and a roof but rather the people inside the walls and under the roof, all of whom are imperfect human beings.
As a one-time-but-not-for-a-longtime church goer who, while not a Catholic, has some experience within the walls and beneath the roof of the Catholic Church, while none of this surprises, it is a bit disheartening when the parallel between current-day political behavior and the behavior described here is observed, since it's hard not to think of a venerated religious institution such as the Catholic Church as being "better than that" as a default position when thinking of "church vs state", so to speak.
This morning's essay is an interesting read about something I know nothing of, but it has familiar ring. It's humans again. They keep doing stuff like this.
Yes, humans again!
Wow. I am not qualified to opine on the issue itself, but the rhetoric ("Many wonder if...") is pretty typical of a politically motivated polemic, unrelated to the facts of a situation. Keep us informed!
This was a great topic, and there are so many aspects and angles to it.
Some of this sounds akin to Martin Gurri’s “Crisis of Authority”, in that the rise of new media has led to more people “freelancing” their challenges to authority very stridently.
I have to wonder how much of this there would be (would have been) without the modern media landscape. Obviously, printed commentary would have required someone to get a mimeograph machine and print handouts just to circulate the ideas beyond gossipy scuttlebutt.
But even that wouldn’t allow people to share the challenges to authority among themselves over great distances. What were you gonna do as an upstart ideologue? Mail your pamphlet to your postal region as a mailbox stuffer in the hopes of finding kindred spirits?
Without the immediacy of electronic media, you also don’t get the instant dopamine response, either. When people know their responses have to wait till the mail is delivered, they actually tend to reflect on whether it’s worth the effort. The lack of online digital immediacy used to force us to “walk off” the impulse to do something *right this very instant*.
In the past, a Bishop might have had to deal with grumbly parishioners murmuring complaints to their closest two or five intimates. But now, instead, he’s confronted with 10,001 wannabe bishops who feel like they know it better *and* who have access to a platform with instant global reach just as he does, even though they don’t have the endorsement of the institutional hierarchy. The peasants, as it were, are constantly operating on the assumption that they can effectively revolt: They may lack the authority, but they’ve got the numbers on their side.
"What were you gonna do as an upstart ideologue? Mail your pamphlet to your postal region as a mailbox stuffer in the hopes of finding kindred spirits?"
I believe the previous method was to print your thoughts on paper and then nail that paper to the door of the church.
Jill Lepore has several good descriptions of what folks did after the nailing the paper to the church door thing. It's always been crazy, but it was scattered paper hanging and publishing. Then, social media brought everyone together.
Good morning. 72 degrees here, with intermittent rain and a high in the upper 70s. The mothership is covering the increased political violence, including the shooting of Minnesota state legislators, the LA immigration protests/riotsn and things like the arson attack on Governor Josh Shapiro in PA.
The priests or whoever in the Charlotte diocese who leaked that letter acted against their bishop, not in a state of submission. But putting aside the leaked draft, the timing of Bishop Martin’s decision to implement limits on the TLM is (IMO) curious at the very least. The exemption given to the diocese had several months to run, and the accession of a new Pope held out the possibility of a further extension, if not a modification to Pope Francis’s restrictions on the TLM.
Personally, I view The Pillar a bit more trustworthy Catholic news source than Where Peter Is, which is an opinionated news site. And while I absolutely respect the Holy Father, my bishop and all the bishops, the sex abuse scandals have made clear that our leaders can err, and their actions can be met with respectful (always respectful) disagreement when necessary.
It has been explained that the timing was because the first Tuesday in July is the usual time for priest reassignments. One can still choose to treat that as "curious," but it's the thing that happens.
As a person on the ground, I know that some of what "The Pillar" is reporting is squirrelly. For example, the proposed new cathedral was 100% Bishop Jugis's baby, not Bishop Martin's. I know this because I was dragooned - by the same friend who gave us the Practically Immortal Gecko - into working on the &(*^(* Diocesan Capital Campaign. Bishop Jugis wanted a crypt for dead bishops, too. If the whole cathedral plan ends up in the circular file, yippee!
I have found The Pillar to have a particular slant, which is fine as long as one recognizes it.
Cynthia, I'm shocked - SHOCKED! to see a Christian lady swearing, even with typographic characters! 🙂
Intercontinental ballistic missiles, Phil. Flying fish! You'd swear, too, if you had to work on a Diocesan Capital Campaign. "Please, Mr. Smith, if you'll just call me back and say, 'No, I don't care to make a pledge,' I'll stop calling you."
A while back, I got some good business advice. Try not to work for churches if at all possible and NEVER work for your own church.
🤣
Cynthia, if you have previously reported on how the priest assignment process factored into the timing, I missed it. My apologies.
There is a lot of overblown reaction, including on matters that I would not deem rise to the level of criticism, like a draft document known only because of leaks, or the cathedral issue. I think The Pillar was reporting on the controversy, not opining about it. And I listen to their weekly podcasts where principals JD Flynn and Ed Condon do opine about matters in the Church
BTW, if you think The Pillar is biased, you have not read trad sites like Fr Z's blog, or Rorarte Caeli, or One Peter Five.
But it is true, and has been for a long time, that secular media try to stuff Church matters into the "conservative versus liberal" mold, which is a bad fit.
There's a spectrum of slant, from a little to middling to whack-a-doodle-doo. Things like choosing to publish an anonymous "open letter" and to treat the representations in it and the comments of (presumably) the author as fact are what you could call propaganda in the form of reporting. So is treating an anonymous rumor that the Pope told the Bishop to "go slow" on the cathedral as a rebuke of the Bishop, rather than, "I agree, spending tens of millions of dollars on a freaking mausoleum in this environment would be stark raving bonkers."
Also, exclamation points !!! and ALL CAPS FOLLOWED BY EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!
Trumpian punctuation infects all! My response: Stop shouting!
We need to work on your random symbology when trying to swear effectively. You need more @, %, &, #.... and don't be afraid to use the Option key to open up your vocabulary. Note...parentheses are not an approved symbol; try the Option Shift key occasionally.
I realize this is a well-intentioned piece of advice. But swearing effectively also involves doing it with personal style, and you might not want to criticize Cynthia's too much lest she tell you to mind your own &(*^(* business.
I accept computer-related advice with becoming humility.
Chinese swear words....
https://www.mandarinblueprint.com/blog/chinese-cuss-words/
Foreign language curse words are so much more inventive, and at the same time curious as to their meaning. I am particularly fond of Yiddish curse words. For example: "Ikh hab dikh in badn" literally means "I have you in the bath" but in actuality means "Screw you. I win."
I know a few German swear words that are very similar to their English counterparts.
Maybe it was first used by a parent to a child who didn't want to wash.
I would be afraid to use Chinese strong language because of the tones.
Well, we learned the other day that you can laugh with a Chinese accent, so no surprise that you can swear with one as well, I suppose.
Watching two Chinese women yelling and swearing at each other is especially wild.
Thank you for the suggestions. Where would I find the Option Shift key, other than "on your keyboard"?
If it is a Windows machine, try the Windows button with the period key. It should open a grey box, and at the top are four categories, including symbols.
₻௹૱↬↹⇱∉ↈↂ⨇⨄⨁⨷⪓ϡψ I chose those symbols at random, apologies if I just wrote something offensive! 🤦♂️😬
Maybe you could just subcontract your online swearing out to Kurt? I've got a feeling he'd be probably be happy to do it for you.
I should have indicated plural. The Option AND Shift keys....
Making progress. Now where is the Option key?
if you have a Mac keyboard, it's clearly marked. If you have a windows keyboard, Google tells me it's the "Alt" key.
:-)
Thanks, Cynthia. I’ve been following the events in Charlotte, because there are elements which mirror the schism in my denomination, the UMC.
The reactionary tendency to brand institutional changes as the work of “elite liberals” continues to spread. The nostalgia for some imagined past which was wonderful is causing people to splinter off, because the 1950’s were so great! Vatican 2, women’s liberation, immigration, gay rights—they all get thrown into the same bucket.
Yes, the modern world is complex and difficult. There are societal movements that should be rejected, but the slow work of change within institutions is too hard when you can foment rage online.
The United Methodist Church has a particular issue that has divided many Protestant denominations -- sexual morality, particularly homosexuality. It's taken longer for the UMC to split over that issue, but it seems to have caught up with them.
(morality)
One of the worst things to happen is that many of us “centrists” were forced to choose sides. The conservatives couldn’t live with sitting in the pews with someone who didn’t fully agree with them.
Amazing! So much is similar in all congregations, I guess: people want power to impose their will/ ideology on others.
There is a joke among Friends "Where two or more are gathered in my name, there shall be a religious schism". It's not quite that bad, but still....
This is exits in all organizations. defined as any group of 3 !
🐾🐾🫣
Humans doing human things.
One of the things Bishop Jugis did shortly before his retirement was issue an order that churches weren't allowed to use projectors or video screens to show music lyrics, the texts of prayers, church announcements, etc. This resulted in a substantial expense, in many parishes, for hymnals or other dead-tree materials. (Weirdly, the order said you couldn't project lyrics on the wall, but you could put a file on the web and encourage parishioners to look at their phones.)
The diocesan newspaper ran a page of comments on the instruction. About half were, "Can't you just let people be?" and the other half were, "It's great that you're making everyone do what I prefer."
A lot of Friends during the pandemic began using something like Zoom, and "sharing" a screen with the lyrics to songs on it. We still have that, and I look at the monitor rather than a hymnal. And yes, "Imagine" is in the latest hymnal.
"Imagine" is not in any of our sources.
What's sad about it is that songs like Imagine appeals to Boomers and older, and in no ways suggests being current. And they are too clueless to get it. It's like preferring to watch Model T races over horseracing....
We had a major schism among Friends in 2012 (we have them regularly). One question is the role of authority between the local congregation and the higherups (What UMC calls a Conference, what we call a "yearly meeting"). Friends were founded on the principle of a direct relationship between a person and God: there was no need for a minister, no need for any rituals (although we developed our own, but we'd never call them that).
Interestingly among Friends, the schism is a horseshoe: some very liberal and some very conservative meetings both want freedom to do stuff (very different stuff) that the yearly meeting would not have them do. Liberals wanted to be "welcoming", which was codespeak for performing gay marriage before Obergefell. Some conservatives want to offer physical communion and baptism. And the conservatives literally cut and pasted the same arguments from the liberals into their letters justifying what they wanted. That's really what led to the schism: there was a fear the yearly meeting would lose all authority. So now Indiana Yearly Meeting has much more authority over local congregations.
BTW, one reason IYM wanted autonomy over local congregations was that some small Friends meetings have been taken over by outside groups, because it's an easy way to get a free building. A meeting's attendance might drop to a dozen people, then 25-35 newbies from outside all begin attending, and take over. The Yearly Meeting is fighting to keep that from happening, but doing so intrudes on the local congregations.
We don't ordain ministers, we consider all Friends to be ministers. But we do recognize gifts of ministry among Friends (we call it "recording"). It used to be that local congregations decided this, and the Yearly Meeting simply recorded that decision in their records. In 1928 the yearly meeting removed that from Monthly Meetings, and added formal training to it. When my former local congregation wanted me to go through recording, the yearly meeting wanted me to attend seminary for training. I decided to come to UD, instead. The issue is there are too few seminarians to staff all the local congregations.
My home meeting (liberal) left the yearly meeting and is in a new one that has no authority on anything. A conservative meeting joined us, and many liberals are gritting their teeth because they do stuff we don't like. I smile at it, as I find it amusing.
"Some conservatives want to offer physical communion and baptism."
In terms of the Society of Friends, wouldn't that be the opposite of "conservative," more like "completely different"? Or if one reaches back past the founding of the Friends, it would be "conserving" the practices of the Church of England.
It gets messy with labels. One branch of liberalism has a lot more in common with "primitive" Friends (their term), in that both go back to the origins of Friends for their influence. But they arrive at almost polar opposite places as a result.
Thomas Hamm (a Friends historian) talks about it this way. Friends are guided (or "Led") by "the inner light". To ensure it isn't their own opinion, Friends testing their leading against both scripture and the inner light of others. Hamm calls this the "orthodox" position. How much influence to each? A substantial amount, close to 50/50, although we never use numbers for that. BTW I consider myself orthodox.
Conservative Friends tend to give more influence to scripture, the Liberal Friends give more influence to the inner light of others. Progressives rarely use scripture (these are the people who sing "imagine" as a hymn), other than to confirm what they already want. They really don't test against anyone else, but will seek out those who agree with them. A progressive speaking out in open worship will often conclude with "and this is my message", thus being oblivious to the idea that open worship is not about our message, but that of God's, given through us.
Evangelicals are orthodox, but more modern in music and worship style. Here's another difference. It's rare that conservatives or liberals have a paid minister bringing a message, and a worship service might be entirely open worship (most begin with some music and a prayer, then go into open worship).
I summarized this just among 4 major positions, but there are a boatload more.
"Yes, the modern world is complex and difficult."
All the worlds that existed before today were complex and difficult, too. There's just a tendency, looking back, to imagine that they weren't, simply because the complexity and difficulty took some different forms.
The romanticization of "great factory jobs" is a similar phenomenon.
I blame the pointy head people. They're always sneaking in and causing trouble.
No doubt there was complexity on the mammoth steppe, too.
No doubt whatsoever.
Wondering now if archeologists have found caveman pelvic bones with animal furs stuck to them. Could be a sign of a caveman wedgie.