Profession and Practice: Quaker Perspectives on Healing as Ministry

Over the past twenty-five years, my experiences as a Quaker family physician have provided many occasions for reflection on professionalism. In my daily practice, in my advocacy for people with limited access to health care resources, and in my efforts to promote the integration of spirituality and medicine, I have been led to question whether the current understanding of professionalism is consistent with my Quaker beliefs and values. While some of the issues with which I have dealt are peculiar to family practice and to small meetings, I learned that many Quakers in fields other than medicine and in diverse meeting communities face similar challenges. Quaker history, I found, has much to teach us about the perils and paradoxes of professionalism that appear alongside its promises.