No clergy leads them through prayer or sermon. The Fort Worth Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, as the local Quaker group is formally known, gathers on Sunday mornings at 11 at Texas Christian University's Wesley Foundation, at 2750 W. Louden St. A group of 10 to 20 members on average settles into the well-worn couches in a meeting room of the Methodist student center, which the Quakers rent from the foundation. But the surroundings seem inconsequential as most of the worshippers are seated with their eyes closed, hands folded on their laps. One woman reads to herself from a book of Quaker devotions. The air is rife with silence.
Car engines roar and fade on the street outside.
The sound of the Sunday school teacher's voice, leading the Quaker children through their lesson down the hall, is barely audible. For those unfamiliar with Quaker worship, their practice is at once more rewarding and less forbidding than it might seem. While sitting in a room full of people without talking is somewhat unusual, the silence becomes a comfort, not a strain. After about 20 minutes, one of the Quakers stands and speaks to the group, relating in a calm but impassioned voice what the spirit has led him to share. A few minutes pass before another member speaks.