The Continuance Institute

Reference

A glossary of the words we use

Long practices grow their own vocabulary, and a vocabulary is a wall with a door in it. Every term in ordinary use at a house is set out below in plain words, with the records in which it is used, so that a definition may be checked against the documents rather than against us.

This glossary was requested in 1993 and first issued in 1994. It is revised at each reconciliation. Where the Members' Handbook prints more than one dated definition of a term, the earlier wordings are set out in full on the House Vocabulary page; nothing has been withdrawn.

The search reads the definitions and the passages in which each term is used in the Journal, the procedural circulars, and the printed disputes.

20 terms in ordinary use

Gatherings

Circle

A local gathering that is not residential.

A group of members who meet regularly in a town where there is no house. Thirty-eight circles are active. A circle keeps a book but does not hold a copy of the Record; its entries are carried to the nearest house at the reconciliation.

A circle may hold observances and an Open Table. It may not enter a first attendance on its own authority.

In the Record

Where the term is used (6)

  • The Journal · Rosalind Achebe · Spring 2026

    A Circle Is Not an Audience

    I convened a circle for two years, which is the limit, and for most of the first year I was privately annoyed by the limit. I was good at it. The room was booked, the rota was fair, the read…

  • The Journal · Iona Reid · February 2023

    A House Is Not a Community

    We were offered a second property in the glen in 2019 and we declined it. The circle was not large enough to inhabit what it already had, and a half-occupied house does not read as modest. I…

  • Procedures · PRO/1988/06 · 11 June 1988

    Circular: The Keeping and Handing On of Rotas

    the convener of the circle. The agreement is entered in one line:

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/09 · 14 September 1991

    Standing Order: The Standing of Circles

    What a circle is, and — at greater length — what a circle is not. The most frequently cited paper in the register and the least argued with.

  • Procedures · PRO/1994/05 · 3 May 1994

    Circular: The Convenership of a Circle

    CIRCULAR TO ALL CIRCLES PRO/1994/05

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/02 · 9 February 1991

    Circular: The Conduct of a Continuity Review

    by the stewardship. It is not opened by a circle.

See alsohouse, observance, open table, first attendance

In use onGatherings

Closed observance

Earlier definitions

An observance held without visitors.

Held four times a year so that members may speak without explaining themselves. Those present are not recorded, and what is said is not entered in the Record.

The current definition adds that what is said is not repeated outside the room, including to the member concerned. Two houses have asked for that clause to be reconsidered.

In the Record

Where the term is used (1)

See alsoobservance, continuity review, common record

In use onHouse Vocabulary

House

First recorded: 1974, in a note about the building's insurance

A residential Continuance location.

A building in which members live, cook, study, and keep the ordinary work of the place going. Eleven houses are presently in use. A house holds its own books, its own rota, and its own copy of the Record, and reconciles all three each year.

Houses are named rather than numbered. The first was the North House, taken on a long lease in 1974.

In the Record

Where the term is used (20)

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · Autumn 2025

    On Finding Precedent Where There May Only Be Resemblance

    …before the Institute existed, in a hand we cannot identify, and it is still the way the North House kitchen cooks that dish. Members who are shown it tend to lower their voices. I have watc…

  • The Journal · Naomi Whitlock · Spring 2026

    What an Archive Owes the Person It Describes

    …ssment is a reason to publish. I would support a rule saying so and I would apply it to my own house first. Nor am I arguing that a reader's discomfort is a ground for withdrawal; discomfort…

  • The Journal · Mara Evensen · March 2024

    Against Permanent Availability

    At the North House we keep the morning closed. No correspondence is read before noon; nothing is answered until the afternoon. This is not a moral position and we do not present it as one to…

  • The Journal · Thomas Orrell · Autumn 1988

    On the Difference Between Privacy and Secrecy

    A house may keep records without keeping secrets. Whether it does so is not a matter of policy but of temperament, and temperament must be examined more often than policy.

  • The Journal · Naomi Whitlock · June 2022

    Why We Eat Together

    One place is laid and left empty. Visitors ask about it, and each house answers in its own way, which I have always thought was a failure of coordination that we have since agreed to describ…

  • The Journal · Iona Reid · February 2023

    A House Is Not a Community

    …clined it. The circle was not large enough to inhabit what it already had, and a half-occupied house does not read as modest. It reads as decline.

  • The Journal · Tomaž Vrhovec · August 2023

    What Is Preserved When a Practice Survives?

    In my experience the first thing lost is the reason. A house does something for a reason; the reason is not written down because everybody present knows it; the people present are replaced;…

  • The Journal · Rie Katsuragawa · January 2025

    The Ethical Use of Attention

    I have proposed to the stewardship that each house publish, annually, the total hours it asks of a full member. The proposal has been received warmly and referred to continuity review, where…

  • The Journal · Rhoda Aberdare · January 2025

    The Last Quarter

    The houses are organised around this fact. The rota is not a list of tasks; it is a device for producing witnesses to the unwitnessed part. Somebody sees you carry the last four buckets. Tha…

  • Procedures · PRO/1979/04 · 6 September 1979

    Procedure at a First Attendance

    What a house does when somebody comes for the first time. Clauses 4 and 6 are the paper; the rest is furniture.

  • Procedures · PRO/1988/06 · 11 June 1988

    Circular: The Keeping and Handing On of Rotas

    …rring duty is taken up, revised, carried by another, reassigned, and given back. The paper the houses cite most often after PRO/1991/09.

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/09 · 14 September 1991

    Standing Order: The Standing of Circles

    STANDING ORDER TO ALL HOUSES PRO/1991/09

  • Procedures · PRO/2026/01 · 12 February 2026

    Circular: Requests for Correction, Closure and Withdrawal

    CIRCULAR TO ALL HOUSES PRO/2026/01

  • Procedures · PRO/2001/03 · 8 February 2001

    Circular: The Annual Count of Houses

    How the Institute counts its Houses at the reconciliation, and why the figure printed in the report may exceed the number of doors a visitor could knock on.

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/02 · 9 February 1991

    Circular: The Conduct of a Continuity Review

    CIRCULAR TO ALL HOUSES PRO/1991/02

  • Procedures · PRO/1984/07 · 22 October 1984

    Circular: Closed Observances and the Absent Chair

    When a house may close an observance to visitors and to members not of that house, and what is done with the fourth place at table.

  • Procedures · PRO/1996/04 · 3 March 1996

    Circular: Periods of Separation

    CIRCULAR TO ALL HOUSES PRO/1996/04

  • Procedures · FRM/2003/01 · Revised January 2003

    Form: Application for a Residential Period

    The application pack for a stay of three to twelve days at a house. Completed by hand and posted; the Institute does not accept applications by other means.

  • Disputes · MEM/1986/09 · The Stewardship

    On what to call the people who leave

    …nt about the person. It carries no implication of fault, of disgrace, or of exclusion from any house.

  • Disputes · COR/2007/094 · Hallam & Rée, auditors

    The accounting category called Returns

    …w attention to the line described as Returns. The figure is small and is properly evidenced by house entries. Our difficulty is that the entries evidence the number and not the nature of the…

See alsocircle, steward, reconciliation

In use onHouses, Our History

Observance

A structured shared practice, usually weekly.

Two hours, ordinarily: a period of silence, a reading, discussion, a shared meal, and an hour of practical work. No performance is asked of anyone present, and no one is required to speak.

The order is printed and is not varied except by agreement of the house. Visitors may attend any observance that is not closed.

In the Record

Where the term is used (5)

  • The Journal · Mara Evensen · May 2019

    The Problem of Unwitnessed Decisions

    The Institute is good at gatherings. We are good at the table, the observance, the shared task. These are witnessed forms and they work.

  • The Journal · Tomaž Vrhovec · August 2023

    What Is Preserved When a Practice Survives?

    We have several observances whose reasons are not recorded. The stewardship has resolved twice to record them and has not done so. I have stopped assuming this is negligence.

  • The Journal · Rie Katsuragawa · January 2025

    The Ethical Use of Attention

    …he Institute has a specific exposure here. We ask a great deal of attention from our members — observances, correspondence, review, the long apparatus of participation. Each request is defen…

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/02 · 9 February 1991

    Circular: The Conduct of a Continuity Review

    attendance at observances; correspondence retained by the house; and

  • Procedures · PRO/1984/07 · 22 October 1984

    Circular: Closed Observances and the Absent Chair

    When a house may close an observance to visitors and to members not of that house, and what is done with the fourth place at table.

See alsoclosed observance, open table

In use onThe Practice, House Calendar

Open Table

First recorded: 1974

A gathering that first-time attendees may come to without arrangement.

A meal with discussion, held monthly at every house and most circles, to which anyone may come once without giving a reason. Nothing is asked of a visitor at an Open Table and no money is collected, at any point, for any purpose.

Minutes are kept. The Open Table minutes of 1979 contain the first recorded use of the phrase the absent chair.

In the Record

In use, but not presently found in any published passage.

See alsoobservance, first attendance

In use onGatherings, Our History

Standing and membership

Attention

To perceive without immediately consuming, judging, or reacting.

One of the three principles, and the one the practice begins with. Attention is not concentration; concentration narrows, attention receives.

In the Record

Where the term is used (5)

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · Autumn 2025

    On Finding Precedent Where There May Only Be Resemblance

    …is what collecting is, and it means the pattern in our shelves is partly a picture of our own attention.

  • The Journal · Peter Amiot · November 2021

    The Discipline of Finishing

    The reason is not moral. An unfinished thing occupies attention at a low, constant rate — a small tax levied every time you walk past it. Six unfinished things and a person is paying most of…

  • The Journal · Rie Katsuragawa · January 2025

    The Ethical Use of Attention

    If attention is the scarcest thing a person has, then asking for it is a moral act and should be justified.

  • The Journal · Rhoda Aberdare · January 2025

    The Last Quarter

    …d at in the last quarter. This is not a confession of weakness so much as a description of how attention actually decays. The early part of a task is performed for an audience — even if the…

  • Disputes · COR/2007/094 · Hallam & Rée, auditors

    The accounting category called Returns

    For the eleventh year we draw attention to the line described as Returns. The figure is small and is properly evidenced by house entries. Our difficulty is that the entries evidence the numb…

See alsocontinuity, obligation, observance

In use onThe Practice, The Founding Letter

Continuity

To act as though today belongs to the same life as tomorrow.

One of the three principles. In ordinary speech it also means a member's unbroken record of attendance and obligation, which is what a continuity review considers.

The two senses are not distinguished in the handbook. They are distinguished here because a reader may reasonably want them to be.

In the Record

Where the term is used (14)

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · Autumn 2025

    On Finding Precedent Where There May Only Be Resemblance

    …under which prehistories get written. Similarity of practice is not evidence of institutional continuity. I have written that sentence into the standing guidance and I have been asked twice…

  • The Journal · Naomi Whitlock · Spring 2026

    What an Archive Owes the Person It Describes

    Continuity is not the same thing as indefinite possession.

  • The Journal · Mara Evensen · March 2024

    Against Permanent Availability

    No decision is wholly private once it enters the continuity of a shared life.

  • The Journal · Mara Evensen · May 2019

    The Problem of Unwitnessed Decisions

    A member who reports everything is not practising continuity. They are outsourcing it. The steward who accepts the report is complicit in the outsourcing and usually enjoys it.

  • The Journal · Rie Katsuragawa · January 2025

    The Ethical Use of Attention

    …he total hours it asks of a full member. The proposal has been received warmly and referred to continuity review, where warm proposals go.

  • The Journal · Eleanor Vale · Letter, 1981 — reprinted 2016

    On Institutions as Necessary Dangers

    An institution is a machine for producing the appearance of continuity. Whether it produces the thing itself depends entirely on people who have not yet been born.

  • The Journal · Rhoda Aberdare · January 2025

    The Last Quarter

    The stewardship will hold its continuity review in the spring and I expect to be asked what was learned. I will say: that finishing is a collective faculty and not a private virtue, and that…

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · February 2025

    Unwitnessed Decisions: A Note from the Archive

    No decision is wholly private once it enters the continuity of a shared life.

  • Procedures · PRO/1988/06 · 11 June 1988

    Circular: The Keeping and Handing On of Rotas

    unreliable large promise damages continuity more than a reliable

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/09 · 14 September 1991

    Standing Order: The Standing of Circles

    6. A circle does not open a continuity review, does not admit a member,

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/02 · 9 February 1991

    Circular: The Conduct of a Continuity Review

    THE CONDUCT OF A CONTINUITY REVIEW

  • Procedures · FRM/2003/01 · Revised January 2003

    Form: Application for a Residential Period

    Continuity checked against the Record Y / N / NOT REQUIRED

  • Disputes · MEM/2025/07 · N. Whitlock, Steward of Orchard House

    Publication, withdrawal, and the obligations of the Common Record

    …s with parts of their lives, in most cases without being told how long the holding would last. Continuity is not the same thing as indefinite possession.

  • Disputes · MIN/1983/07 · The Stewardship

    The suspension of the Journal

    …asking for a reason. It was agreed that no reason would be given beyond “an internal matter of continuity, now concluded”.

See alsoattention, obligation, continuity review, continuous

In use onThe Practice

Fellowship

Long-term participation and study, undertaken with a steward.

A course of reading, service, and regular conversation, typically of four years and often longer. It confers no rank and no authority over other members. A fellow may set it down at any time and take it up again later.

In the Record

Where the term is used (1)

  • The Journal · Naomi Whitlock · June 2022

    Why We Eat Together

    Ask why a community eats together and you will be given reasons about fellowship. The reasons are true and they are not the mechanism. The mechanism is duration and constraint. You are seate…

See alsosteward, continuity review, obligation

In use onThe Fellowship

First attendance

Earlier definitions

The occasion from which a person's continuity is counted.

The date, the house, and the name of the member who brought the person are entered in the house book. The entry is not shown to the visitor and is not concealed from them; it may be read on request.

First attendance cannot be revised once entered. Where a visitor arrives unaccompanied, the fact is recorded and reviewed.

In the Record

Where the term is used (1)

See alsoopen table, continuity, common record

In use onOrientation

No longer continuous

First recorded: 1986, MEM/1986/09

The administrative designation of a member who has stopped attending.

Entered by the Record, not by the house, after four consecutive quarters without attendance and without an agreed separation. It is not an expulsion, not a judgement, and not a bar to return, and stewards are instructed to say so if asked.

The designation has been objected to in writing since 1986, on the ground that it describes a person as a property of our administration. The objection stands and has not been withdrawn.

In the Record

Where the term is used (1)

  • Disputes · MEM/1986/09 · The Stewardship

    On what to call the people who leave

    The form of words proposed is: no longer continuous. It states a fact about the record and not a judgement about the person. It carries no implication of fault, of disgrace, or of exclusion…

See alsocontinuous, period of separation, reconciliation

In use onThose No Longer Continuous, Standing Disputes

Obligation

To accept that a meaningful life is formed through responsibility to others.

One of the three principles. Obligation is not treated as a burden placed on freedom but as the material a life is actually made from. In house use it also means the specific work a member has undertaken: a rota, a visit, a repair, a meal.

In the Record

Where the term is used (6)

  • The Journal · Naomi Whitlock · Spring 2026

    What an Archive Owes the Person It Describes

    …s a letter in 1989 they were consenting to a filing cabinet in Maine, not to a search box. The obligation they accepted and the obligation we now impose on them are different obligations, an…

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · Spring 2026

    Against the Clean Record

    …is narrower than it sounds. It is a presumption, not a rule. It applies where the law and our obligations to living people allow, which is a large exception and I do not pretend otherwise.…

  • The Journal · Iona Reid · February 2023

    A House Is Not a Community

    What actually produces a community, as far as I have observed it, is a small number of obligations that are genuinely enforced. Not many. Four or five. Enforced kindly, but enforced — which…

  • Procedures · PRO/1979/04 · 6 September 1979

    Procedure at a First Attendance

    5. No obligation of any kind follows from a first attendance. The

  • Procedures · PRO/1988/06 · 11 June 1988

    Circular: The Keeping and Handing On of Rotas

    1. A rota is a recurring practical obligation which another person may

  • Disputes · MEM/2025/04 · G. Sørhaug, Archivist

    Publication, withdrawal, and the obligations of the Common Record

    …uests are seldom frivolous. My position is a presumption and not a rule: where the law and our obligations to living people allow it, a record which has been corrected, superseded or dispute…

See alsoattention, continuity, public work

In use onThe Practice, Public Work

Period of separation

Earlier definitions

An agreed period during which a member does not attend.

Taken by arrangement with a steward and entered with an expected date of return. A separation that passes its expected date is reviewed.

The 1977 wording made separation a matter for the member alone. That wording was restored by vote at the Shore House in 1998 and superseded again in 2016.

In the Record

Where the term is used (3)

See alsoreturning member, no longer continuous, continuity review

In use onHouse Vocabulary

Returning member

Earlier definitions

A member who resumes attendance after a separation.

Standing resumes from the date of return rather than from first attendance. Some observances are open to a returning member only after one full year.

The 1977 handbook made no distinction between a returning member and any other. The distinction was introduced in 1994.

Where the term is used (1)

See alsoperiod of separation, continuity, first attendance

In use onHouse Vocabulary

The Record

Common Record

First recorded: 1974

The central archive of the Institute.

Every entry held by every house, brought into one account: minutes, rotas, correspondence, first attendances, continuity reviews, reports. It has been kept continuously since the first collection was assembled at the North House.

Until 1985 the Record was maintained house by house. A single consolidated account was proposed that year and carried, over an objection that a single account creates a single point of authority. The objection was noted.

In the Record

Where the term is used (1)

See alsoreconciliation, continuous, steward

In use onArchive, Revisions of the Record

Continuous

A status meaning that a document or account remains part of the current record.

Applied to documents, practices, and accounts rather than to people, although in practice it is applied to people as well. A continuous document is one the Institute still stands behind; it may be revised, and remains continuous through revision.

The opposite status is not withdrawn. Nothing is withdrawn. A document that is no longer continuous is retained and marked.

In the Record

Where the term is used (5)

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · Autumn 2025

    On Finding Precedent Where There May Only Be Resemblance

    …The repair book has a column in which things are carried forward, and once, at the back, kept continuous. The hospital note directs that a record be retained in both forms and that correcti…

  • The Journal · Gunnar Sørhaug · Spring 2026

    Against the Clean Record

    …itution it belonged to. This is not because archivists are deceitful. It is because tidying is continuous and nobody notices any single act of it. A description is improved. A duplicate is d…

  • Procedures · PRO/2001/03 · 8 February 2001

    Circular: The Annual Count of Houses

    than Continuous. Standing is a matter for the Record and not for

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/02 · 9 February 1991

    Circular: The Conduct of a Continuity Review

    The standing procedure for reviewing whether a member's participation is continuous. Issued to stewards; sections 1 to 8 are printed for members.

  • Disputes · MEM/1986/09 · The Stewardship

    On what to call the people who leave

    The form of words proposed is: no longer continuous. It states a fact about the record and not a judgement about the person. It carries no implication of fault, of disgrace, or of exclusion…

See alsoreconciliation, no longer continuous, revision number

In use onRevisions of the Record

Reconciliation

Earlier definitions

Determining which version of a record is the authoritative one.

Where two accounts of the same event differ, they are compared, and one is entered as the version the Institute holds. Reconciled documents carry a revision number.

A document that cannot be reconciled is not destroyed. It is held.

In the Record

Where the term is used (4)

See alsocommon record, continuous, revision number

In use onRevisions of the Record, Procedures & Circulars

Revision number

The figure carried by a reconciled document.

Printed at the foot of house documents and of these pages. It counts reconciliations rather than edits, so a document may be revised in wording several times within one revision, and a document may change revision without any wording changing at all.

In the Record

In use, but not presently found in any published passage.

See alsoreconciliation, continuous

In use onRevisions of the Record

Office and responsibility

Continuity review

Earlier definitions

An annual conversation between a member and a steward.

Attendance, obligation, contribution, correspondence, and standing are considered together, and a short entry is made afterwards which the member may read on request at their own house.

It was not minuted at all before 1994. The clause and at other times as required was added in 2016 without discussion at any general meeting; two houses have objected in writing.

In the Record

Where the term is used (4)

  • The Journal · Rie Katsuragawa · January 2025

    The Ethical Use of Attention

    …he total hours it asks of a full member. The proposal has been received warmly and referred to continuity review, where warm proposals go.

  • The Journal · Rhoda Aberdare · January 2025

    The Last Quarter

    The stewardship will hold its continuity review in the spring and I expect to be asked what was learned. I will say: that finishing is a collective faculty and not a private virtue, and that…

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/09 · 14 September 1991

    Standing Order: The Standing of Circles

    6. A circle does not open a continuity review, does not admit a member,

  • Procedures · PRO/1991/02 · 9 February 1991

    Circular: The Conduct of a Continuity Review

    THE CONDUCT OF A CONTINUITY REVIEW

See alsosteward, continuity, common record, closed observance

In use onHouse Vocabulary, Standing Disputes

Public work

Service carried out in the places where the houses stand.

Food programmes, restoration, hospice support, book repair for public libraries, and community education. It is undertaken as obligation and is not conducted as recruitment: no visitor to a public-work project is asked to attend anything.

In the Record

In use, but not presently found in any published passage.

See alsoobligation, house

In use onPublic Work

Steward

A person entrusted with institutional or house responsibility.

Stewards hold the rota, receive visitors, keep the house book, and conduct continuity reviews. The office is practical rather than spiritual and carries no claim to insight. Stewards are appointed by their house and serve at its pleasure.

A steward who finds themselves eager for a particular visitor to return is required to say so to another steward the same evening.

In the Record

Where the term is used (9)

See alsofellowship, continuity review, common record

In use onProcedures & Circulars

Earlier wordings are kept on the House Vocabulary page. A member who thinks a definition wrong may write to the archivist at the North House; the comment is entered whether or not it is adopted.