All are equally invited to contribute to the spiritual journey of the group. Pastoral work and administrative work are done by committees and by a monthly Meeting for Worship with Attention to Business, which all can attend. Decisions are made by consensus of the group, so that there is no tyranny of the majority and the consciences of all individuals are respected. The method of worship may seem odd to many but would be familiar to Catholics and Buddhists, who have a strong contemplative tradition. For those who come in unprepared and ask when the service is going to start, the running joke is that the service starts once the Meeting for Worship is over.
Friends have a long activist tradition in peace and justice and human-equality issues.
There is a strong emphasis on both the inner and outer paths of spiritual work, meditation and service, complementing each other and being necessary to each other. The belief in the Inner Light for all human beings underlies several principles. Group decisions must be made by consensus, which is not the same as unanimity but which allows for decisions to be improved by modifying them to meet individual objections. Friends use testimonies in place of creeds on the grounds that the wording of creeds places truth in a box where truth cannot go and puts too many limits on the insights offered by the Inner Light. Testimonies are principles that are discussed and applied but do not take the form of a written document.