Speaking from his personal experience, Paul Lacey examines Quaker attitudes toward truth and power. "What I believe we are experiencing is a distrust of power so deep that the institutions which we have created to act as channels for our religious concerns frequently find themselves paralyzed and incapable of any action, because to act is to exert power." From where did such a mistrust arise? "Psychologically we continue to live in the starkly-defined allegorical world where Truth and Power are eternally antagonists."

And out of this mistrust Lacey sees a gamut of conflicts arise: "Conflicts arise between the leadings or wishes of individuals and those of the group, between the accepted ways and new insights, between prophetic vision and institutional stability. Conflicts arise out of differences in degree of commitment to Quaker ideals or differences in emphasis on those ideals. They arise out of injured pride or personal antipathy which get dressed up as conflicts of conscience."

Join Paul Lacey in this analysis of our condition, and join him in facing what he terms the failures of our past: "To understand our institutions, and therefore to understand more about ourselves as individuals, we must clear our minds of cant - the slogans and clichés which substitute for clear thought - and stop living in bad faith."

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