Inviting Ourselves to Be Challenged with Adria Gulizia

In this current political moment of polarization and divisiveness, when and how do we commit to staying in fellowship with one another? How do we discern individual and institutional next steps with faithfulness and humility? In this conversation, Adria discusses the ways Jesus’s life and ministry grounds her work, the importance of approaching one another with compassion in disagreement, and her continuing discernment journeys around staying aligned with personal and organizational purpose.

You can also watch Adria's Pendle Hill First Monday Lecture, "Embracing Spiritual Gifts," on Pendle Hill's YouTube channel.

Adria Gulizia is an attorney, mediator, facilitator, and coach. Her concern for the spiritual formation of Friends of all ages has led her to serve in roles ranging from children’s religious education to Earlham School of Religion’s board of advisors. In collaboration with the School of the Spirit, she is currently exploring what it might look like to step into radical faithfulness across theological boundaries amid the twin temptations of anger and despair. Adria is a member of Chatham-Summit Meeting (NYYM) in Summit, N.J. To learn more about Adria's work, visit  https://shadowofbabylon.com/  

The transcript for this episode is available on https://pendlehillseed.buzzsprout.com/
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The Seed is a project of Pendle Hill, a Quaker center open to all for Spirit-led learning, retreat, and community. We’re located in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, on the traditional territory of the Lenni-Lenape people.

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Transcript

Adria Gulizia  0:06 
And yet they felt like the stakes are too high to do things the Quaker way. We see people being oppressed, we have to do things a different way. Maybe we do or maybe that's a temptation.

Dwight Dunston  0:29 
You're listening to The Seed: Conversations for Radical Hope, a Pendle Hill podcast where Quakers and other seekers come together to explore visions of the world that is growing up through the cracks of our broken systems. I'm your host, Dwight Dunston. This season, we're exploring what spiritual alignment means in this moment of escalating social and political upheaval and violence. How do we cultivate discernment to stay the course and stay connected to our leadings. How are we being called to transform ourselves and our communities to break down systems of oppression and embody new ways of being? Our guest today is Adria, Gulizia. Adria is an attorney, mediator facilitator and coach. Her concern for the spiritual formation of Friends of all ages has led her to serve in roles ranging from children's religious education, to Earlham School of Religion's board of advisors. In collaboration with the School of the Spirit, she is currently exploring what it might look like to step into radical faithfulness across theological boundaries amid the twin temptations of anger and despair. Adria is a member of Chatham summit meeting in Summit New Jersey.

Dwight Dunston  1:42 
Adria it's such a wonderful joyful experience to wake up this morning and be in this building in Main House. Last time we were together was in this building. Even though we're virtual, I still feel your presence in some of the conversations we had you said nine months ago?

Adria Gulizia  2:04  
Nine months ago at the Quaker Institute. It's a blessing to be back together even across the distance.

Dwight Dunston  2:10 
Yes. And I'm excited to hear about where you've been in these nine months what's you've been thinking about reflecting on and don't want to get ahead of myself and want to just start with what's it like being Adria today?

Adria Gulizia  2:24 
Oh, what's it like being Adria today? I am very much feeling the reality of bi vocational ministry of balancing paid employment that is meaningful and feels like it uses my gifts and supports me in being who God calls me to be in the world. I'm currently working at a university doing training and conflict resolution processes around equal opportunity and anti discrimination policy. So that's a huge blessing. And also, there's a lot going on in the Quaker world right now. At least in my Quaker world, right now, this conversation with you, I'm working on a course with School of the Spirit, and then I've got, you know, my own monthly meeting and yearly meeting. And I'm, you know, a mom, and I'm trying to get married. So it's like, it's a lot. It's a lot, my cup overflows. It runneth over.

Dwight Dunston  3:26 
I'm hearing that I'm holding that! When that cup is overflowing, how do you manage and stay grounded?

Adria Gulizia  3:35 
So the shortest short answer is I'm really working on it, Dwight, I really,

Dwight Dunston  3:41 
We all are!

Adria Gulizia  3:41 
When I figure it out I'll let you know!

Dwight Dunston  3:44 
Please!

Adria Gulizia  3:45 
The longer answer is staying in relationship with people who call me back to the importance of that. But also encourage me and make me feel like it's okay to struggle. It's okay that it's hard. My life right now is hard. And it doesn't mean I'm inept. And so having those people who can be places of refuge, to have that time together that's rooted in the Spirit and have people ask me sincerely, "What is your spiritual condition right now?" And to have space answer is itself a moment of calm. I am diligent about trying to get to meeting for worship every week, because it is a protected space. And so to have those rhythms and those protected spaces, and even those committee meetings that start in worship, where we call each other back to the spirit of what God is saying is just tremendously important for me.

Dwight Dunston  4:48 
I love that intimacy in relationship where you can feel a sense of refuge simply by a question that a beloved accountability partner, Friend can ask that that can bring you back.

Adria Gulizia  5:01 
Absolutely. It's a wonderful thing and a powerful thing and also a humbling thing, that we operate in the natural world, and we do our things, and we live our lives. But that sense of supernatural peace, and supernatural power is just right underneath. And sometimes something as simple as asking a question can create a bridge between the temporary struggles of this life, and that which is eternal and pure, which is like, "Oh, wow, you mean, I could do that for somebody else? Like we can do that together? We don't need to go to seminary to learn how to do that? We could just ask and create space for a real answer?" Wow!

Dwight Dunston  5:47 
When you say it, it sounds so it sounds simple, right? That was, right that's so powerful. And you and I and others listening know, there's a long road between the head and the heart and the heart and the hand. We can do that for one another. And thinking about why does it get hard? How does it get hard? What are the conditions that make it hard for us to be witnesses for one another? Accompaniers for one another? That leads me into thinking about this time that we're in, Adria, and it's an election year, I'm curious about the politics of this time, the polarization of this time, the pulls to both be more connected and in community and the pulls to be more individual and tribal.

Adria Gulizia  6:34 
I saw in the 2016 election, how politics, you know, politics is never like a relaxing, soothing topic. It's always a contest of visions, it's always a contest of wills. There was a sense that, you know, not only do we have these deep disagreements, but like that we could infallibly identify good and evil based on who people were voting for. And I saw that line run through Quaker meetings, I saw that line run through friendships, long standing friendships, ministry collaborations, and I saw people that I love in these bitter arguments with each other, and rupturing relationships. And I knew them all to be godly people and righteous people who loved just loved deeply and loved in a love rooted in the Spirit. And so I asked myself, like, what is going on here? And so this is a question that I've been asking for a long time. In 2018, I was invited to share on a plenary panel for New England Yearly Meeting. The crux of the message that I shared was that if your gospel if your good news is only good news for Democrats, it is not the good news. If your good news is only good news for Republicans, it is not the good news. If your good news is only good news for people who live in the northeast, it is not the good news. So what is it to have like a vision of truth and a vision of what God invites us into that is embracing and encompassing, that invites all of us to be challenged--because no political party has a monopoly on truth--that invites us to be humbled, and that invites us to the transformation to which we are called? Because the good news that just reaffirms our pre existing prejudices and our pre existing notions is also not the good news. You know, Jesus is constantly challenging his listeners. "Oh, you know, oh, you you think love your neighbor and hate your enemy? Well, let me tell you something." "Oh, you think love the priest and the Levite and hate the Samaritan? Well, let me tell you something." "You think love righteous man and hate the adulterous? Well, let me tell you something." Evil is real. Ignorance is real, lies and deceptions are real. And I'd be the furthest person to say that they're not. But arrogance is its own trap. And so what does it mean to avoid that, and to approach people with a spirit of humility and love?

Adria Gulizia  9:30 
If you are a political scientist, or a sociologist, you might look at what we're going through as a crisis of social capital. There's a lack of trust in institutions that filters into our lack of trust in other individuals. If you're talking in the spiritual sense, you might say that these institutions that have their God given purpose for which they're created that varies from institution to institution. So the purpose of the court is to do justice and the purpose of the school is to educate and inform the intellect. And the purpose of the church is to embody God's love in the world. These institutions seem to be rejecting their own purpose. Oh, you think it's important that the courts do justice, but it's more important that they punish our rivals. It's important that politicians create laws for the good of the people, but it's more important that they signal their partisan bonafides and the fact that they're on quote "our side" or the side of our team. When you do that, what you see is that the faith that we give them no longer feels justified. If the courts have goals other than doing justice in an impartial way, why should we trust the courts? If the schools have goals other than teaching children how to be good thinkers, if they have ideological goals, why should we trust our children with them? Moreover, if we see the other side, Team Red, or Team Blue, depending on where you sit doing it, why shouldn't our team do the same thing? And if the church now has a motive that it's not primarily concerned with embodying the love of God, but is instead focus on being Team Red or Team Blue, who's going to be the church, you know? And so this temptation is everywhere. And by the way, it's not all on one side. So I've been reading Yuval Levin "A Time to Build" he talks about this thesis of institutions in crisis, because people don't fundamentally believe in the institutions. So they come in, and they get these positions of leadership, but they're not playing their assigned role. They undermine trust in the institution for those on the outside, but they also prevent the institution from engaging in its purpose. And so when you do that, you feed the fires of polarization, but you are also dishonor the trust that people have put in you and dishonor the blessing of authority and leadership. From a spiritual perspective, that's where I'm really interested. What does it look like to be faithful in a system where people are continuously dishonouring the trust that they're given? To acknowledge the spiritual realities going on and to hold firm in what is true, live with integrity even when we feel like such a pressure to deviate? Because that's why people deviate. People feel like, "Yes, I know where the lanes are, I know what the rules are. But if I don't do something else, the whole system is going to be smashed!" That we have to go outside of the usual way of doing things. I mean, you see this in the evangelical church. That pastors will preach from the Sermon on the Mount, and people will come up to them and say, "Where did you get those liberal talking points?" The person's like "liberal talking points? This is  Jesus, this is what we're all here to do." And they'll say, you know, "Yeah, that worked then. But that doesn't work anymore. Okay, we're in too much of a hostile environment. And if we follow that, 'turn the other cheek' stuff, then the Liberals will take over and mess everything up!" You see it in the liberal church as well. I know somebody who used to be in a leadership role in New England Yearly Meeting, who left who's no longer a Quaker. And part of the reason she's no longer a Quaker is because the clerk's table was swarmed with people with a petition saying that they didn't like the way that the agenda was set, and that they had XYZ number of signatures, and that they demanded to have their priorities put on the agenda. Petitions and demands is how the world works. That's how the political system works. That's not how the religious Society of Friends is supposed to work. And yet, they felt like the stakes are too high to do things the Quaker way. "We can't do it the Quaker way." I've heard people in leadership roles in my own yearly meeting say we don't believe in Matthew 18. When there's a power imbalance, Matthew 18, doesn't work. Turning the other cheek has only ever been for the people who are on the low side of the power. Power imbalances are not new. But to have people come out say, and say outright, "We don't believe that our traditional way of doing things works cecause look at the fruit. It's not working, things aren't moving quickly enough. We see people being oppressed, we have to do things a different way." Maybe we do. Or maybe that's a temptation. And actually understanding how to discern around that is the challenge of this age, when everything feels like it's so chaotic, when the trust is so low. And when we see that, you know, things are falling apart, what are we called to do in that moment? Is it a moment to cling to our tradition? Is it a moment to be flexible? Is it a moment to deviate? When is the deviation the natural evolution in how God calls us and what is the deviation a betrayal of the heritage that we've been given?

Dwight Dunston  15:07 
I want to zoom in with you Adria to ask how have you cultivated that sense of discernment in your own life? Just your own experience with cultivating that discerning compass?

Adria Gulizia  15:21 
The place that I always start: What is our purpose? What am I doing here? What am I called to? Five years ago, my ex husband left our family. It's not a secret, I'm very public about it. I had quit my job, I was going to go with him to Europe, he had gotten a fellowship in Europe, we were going to all go there, I had a going away party at my meeting. And then he sent me an email with a nine page attachment, explaining why he was done with our marriage. And so there I am, I don't have a job. I have a two year old son and a mortgage. Thank you very much. What am I going to do? You know, I was blessed with a lot of support, and had some money in the bank. So I was able to kind of just like decompress and wrap my mind around the fact that I was starting not from scratch, but from rubble. But I knew a couple of things. I had been discerning for the last previous few years about "Should I go to seminary or what?" So I knew that I needed to foreground my ministry. Whatever my next job was, it needed to have enough space for my ministry to be active and alive, which was a challenge in the work I'd previously been doing at a law firm, which was like 60 plus hours a week. And I would like for my paid work to not just be expedient as far as paying my bills and expenses. But I would like to leverage my gifts so that I can feel like it's meaningful, like I'm being used, like I'm serving. And I knew that I needed to have space for a robust family life. Ultimately, after the first Quaker Institute, when Ernie Buscemi was like, "Wait, you don't have a committee for your ministry? When you go home, get a committee." It took me awhile, but maybe about six months later, I requested an anchor committee and I said, "Please help me say no to the things that don't align with this purpose. Because I really believe that God is calling me to have these three parts of my life, my paid work, my ministry and my family life, be mutually supportive." Once I was clear on my purpose, and clear on how God was calling me, opportunities have manifested. But the same way that I do that for myself, that's what we need to do organizationally. Because a lot of times opportunities will come up and they'll feel like they're really positive opportunities, but they're not actually aligned with our calling as a people. And so yes, it might be good, but the fact that it's good doesn't mean that we need to do it. Maybe it happens in another sphere, maybe it happens in another space. But it's really hard to stick and wait for the opportunity when you don't know how you're going to pay your bills. Yeah, we need to trust we need to have the vision and we need to be ready. But I don't mean for it to sound like it's easy, because it is not easy. And you don't know in the moment how it's going to work out or if it's going to work out. Every time I would think like "Well, maybe I should just do this. Or maybe I should just go to it. Maybe I should..." It's like, I can't do that I had that internal block like "I cannot do that, and live with myself and also be able to show up at work the way in a way that gives me pride. I can't do it. I can't do it in integrity." So I felt like the door was closed behind me and that I had to go forward. But that was not an easy process. And so I don't want anybody to think that it's easy. But I will say that there's been so much gratitude along the way and there's gratitude now. Because the faithfulness and the waiting for the opportunity the opportunities did did appear. But it took time and it was not obvious that they would. But I felt like I had to to stand in integrity. And I think that's what I want for all of us and for all of our institutions that we're willing to take the risk that God will provide and that you know the Spirit will show up and that the doors will open if we are doing our very best to be faithful.

Dwight Dunston  19:36 
Adria I want to make some space to continue to bring in your practices around gratitudes and also how you hold griefs in your life.

Adria Gulizia  19:47 
Grief is a hard one for me, and it has been a journey to encounter grief and to be willing to encounter grief. My seminary friends turned me on to the Enneagram. I identified in myself that those type seven tendencies, the enthusiast you know, there's this performative aspect of like my job here is to make other people happy. And what that means is turning away from my own grief, and oftentimes turning away from the grief of others, or accepting the grief of others only insofar as it can be held at a distance. Actually, in that period of reintegration, after my ex husband and I separated, I did a lot of self exploration, and I watched a series on an Enneagram that Richard Rohr did, and he said, something that has stuck with me for the Enneagram type seven, the growth path is a grief that you can't escape from. It's a grief that you can't escape from, and that by, in fact, staying with grief, that that would be a form of development. At the same time, as you walk through those griefs, to be aware of the many blessings that you still have. One is just that rest that comes with being faithful. The way that Jesus comes into it, for me is understanding in his life, it was the full breadth of human experience. Religious people were ragging on him because he was coming with wine and a party. And, you know, they felt like he wasn't serious enough. But at the same time, when he was abandoned by his friends, he wept. When his friend Lazarus died, he wept. All of that is okay, it's okay to bring all of that to the table. And in fact, it's necessary to be fully human as Jesus was fully human, even as he was fully divine. The other thing, if you're again, at all familiar with the Enneagram, the seven is a pleasure seeker tends to go overboard, indulging the self. Another thing that's very powerful to me about Jesus's ministry and life is that it's a grounding thing. In our world today, right? We talk about integrity. The old fashioned meaning of integrity is like standing by your commitments. But I think a lot of how we use integrity today in our contemporary language is around authenticity. It's being myself. Well, sometimes that authenticity, and I'm putting that in scare quotes, is really about indulging the self. So somebody will leave their family because they need to find themselves, they need to follow their bliss. Their idea of integrity is actually walking away from commitment. Because that's, quote, their authentic self. And so my temptation is always to make an excuse for why I should make Adria feel good at somebody else's expense. Our care for each other is part of discipleship, the purity that we're tempted to in today's age, we see the willingness to cut each other off, even among friends. When you get to certain topics, we're very quick sometimes to say, "Well, if you believe that you're not a real friend, and if you don't believe this, you're not a real friend." When I come back to the ministry of Jesus, it doesn't always give it doesn't give a clear answer to this. But what it does say is humility, relationship, forgiveness is the path it's the only path. And we have such a divisive spirit across the world today, that that's not the way. We think we know what love is. We think we know what truth is. We think we know what integrity is. We all have our different view. Coming back to the ministry of Jesus gives us something concrete to say, "Okay, what did He do in this situation? Did He shake the dust off his feet and say, 'I'm not going to be Jewish anymore?'" Or how did he operate within the Jewish framework as a faithful Jew, while at the same time lifting up an alternative vision to the legalism of the Pharisees.

Dwight Dunston  24:00 
Adria as we close out our time today, I'm wondering if there's any practices, or last words that you want to share with listeners to support them in moving towards their own journeys of routing more purposefully in their calling and in Spirit and love?

Adria Gulizia  24:23 
I think that if there were one thing that I could say, as a good first step, it's being aware of your heart and the words that you use to describe people that you think are wrong. There's that phrase in the Bible "right out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks." So the words that we use for each other when we disparage each other. You know, that phrase that was going around for a while "I can't believe those people are allowed to breed." That's one that I heard in the height of the last election season. And when we use language like that that's dehumanizing that denies the reality that we are all made in the image of God, and that we all are enlightened by the inward Light, that we all are precious creatures made for love and relationship, it turns your heart against those that you're called to love. I would just invite us, when we see someone doing something, or saying something that we think is so wrong, and so misguided, and maybe even so evil, that we cultivate compassion for them. Understanding that in our own minds, right, we always have a reason we always have a story. Sometimes that story is us lying to ourselves, but there's always a reason. And that if we can be gentle and compassionate, and say, "If I were stuck in a lie, how would I want someone to approach me? If I were confused about wrong and right, how would I want someone to approach me?" And would it be by yelling and name calling? Or would it be, by some other way, wanting to be understood or find fellowship in the areas that we can agree on? Or just to share a meal or a moment or a smile? If that's all that we can share, but just to be gentle with each other. Our world could use a little bit more gentleness in these times.

Dwight Dunston  26:31 
Adria, I want to thank you so much for the gentleness, the passion, the grace, the vulnerability that you've brought to our time together. I'm feeling into the hope that transformation and connection is possible. Thank you. Thank you.

Adria Gulizia  26:51 
Thank you, Dwight, thank you for the for the conversation, the questions, and that hope is real. Just gotta get there. Thankfully, we're not walking alone.

Dwight Dunston  27:28  
The Seed is a project of Pendle Hill, a Quaker center open to wall for Spirit led learning, retreat and community. We're located in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, on the traditional territory of the Lenni Lenape people. Many of our guests are teachers, leaders and speakers at Pendle Hill, and we host retreats workshops and lectures all year round. For a full list of these upcoming education opportunities, visit PendleHill.org/Learn. To learn more about Adria's work visit ShadowOfBabylon.com. This episode was produced and edited by Anna Hill with consulting from Peterson Toscano. Our theme music is the I Rise Project by Reverend Rhetta Morgan and Bennett Kuhn produced by Astronautical Records. This project was made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H and Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund. You can stay in touch by following us @PendleHillSeed on all social media platforms, or by emailing Podcast@PendleHill.org. If you're finding these conversations meaningful you can support our work financially by heading over to PendleHill.org/Donate And please subscribe, rate, and review us wherever you get your podcasts. These seeds could not be planted without you.