A Recorded Minister was originally a male or female

Quaker Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abili ...

who was acknowledged to have a gift of spoken ministry. The practice of recording in a Monthly Meeting Minute the acknowledgment that a Friend had a gift of spoken ministry began in the 1730s in

London Yearly Meeting The Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Britain, also known as the Britain Yearly Meeting (and, until 1995, the London Yearly Meeting), is a Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends ( Quakers) in England, ...

, according to Milligan's Biographical dictionary of British Quakers in commerce and industry. Milligan's Biographical dictionary of British Quakers in commerce and industry p. 582 (Glossary) The acknowledgment did not involve anything like

ordination Ordination is the process by which individuals are consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the denominational hierarchy composed of other clergy) to perform ...

or any payment, in view of early Friends'

testimony In law and in religion, testimony is a solemn attestation as to the truth of a matter. Etymology The words "testimony" and "testify" both derive from the Latin word ''testis'', referring to the notion of a disinterested third-party witness. ...

against "Hireling Priests". Acknowledgment did permit the Recorded Minister to attend at

Yearly Meeting Yearly Meeting is a term used by members of the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers, to refer to an organization composed of constituent meetings or churches within a geographical area. The constituent meetings are called Monthly Meetings in ...

and

Meeting for Sufferings Meeting for Sufferings is an executive committee of Britain Yearly Meeting, the body which acts on behalf of members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Great Britain and the Crown Dependencies. It has about 200 members who meet fiv ...

. In London Yearly Meeting the practice of recording Ministers was discontinued in 1924. 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 acknowledgment of a variety of ministries, including teaching,

chaplain A chaplain is, traditionally, a cleric (such as a minister, priest, pastor, rabbi, purohit, or imam), or a lay representative of a religious tradition, attached to a secular institution (such as a hospital, prison, military unit, intelligence ...

cy, and evangelical and pastoral ministry.Ohio Yearly Meeting ''Book of Discipline'' (2001): sections on recognizing and recording Gospel Ministers
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References

{{reflist Quaker ministers Quaker practices

See also

References