A close-up of the Friday night collage. Photo: Courtesy of David and Louise Tinsley.
Eye - 11 October 2024
Q-Eye hears from Settle Friends about a community building event, Quakers appear in The Sunday Programme on BBC Radio 4, and a Friend from Minehead shares some moments of joy
Friday friendship
Resident Friends at Settle Meeting, David and Louise Tinsley, got in touch to share an event that’s helped them build community outside of Sunday worship.
They told Eye: ‘Friday Night Quakers is a monthly session organised by Settle Quakers as a form of outreach and in-reach. We meet on the third Friday of each month to share a simple meal and take part in interesting, fun and thought-provoking activities.
‘There is no need to book and numbers have risen considerably since we started just over a year ago.
‘Previous sessions have included an “auction of values” using Quaker “pounds”, an activity to put into a Diamond Nine what Easter means to Friends [a challenge that brings people together to evaluate and prioritise ideas] and an Indian meal in which each menu item had to paid for using the same “Quaker pounds”. This money was given at random in brown envelopes before the meal, some Friends having far too much money and some having very little!
‘[Recently] we were invited by Marie Lebacq to create a collage [see below] to reflect places where we remember special spiritual experiences.’
Musings in George Fox’s resting place
David Fish, of Rugby Meeting, drew Eye’s attention to a segment on Quakers in The Sunday Programme on BBC Radio 4 on 15 September (https://bit.ly/47JQBE4).
Thirty-two minutes in, presenter Edward Stourton interviews Bridget Phillips, a member of Bunhill Fields Meeting, about the 400 anniversary celebrations of George Fox. They speak in the dissenters burial ground, before venturing across the road to the older Quaker burial ground – where George Fox and 12,000 other Friends are buried.
He also spoke with Tim Gee, general secretary of Friends World Committee for Consultation, who shared that more Quakers are alive now in the world than at any other time in history.
Moments of joy
Jenny Gateau, of Minehead Meeting, delighted Eye with some joyful moments Friends in the Meeting shared with visitors over the summer.
She writes: ‘We here in Minehead have the privilege of offering summer holidays each year to refugees who have been resettled in Taunton. We also have an ocean, well Channel, of light and love.
‘This year we hosted three large families from a faraway, landlocked country. Two small boys stood with me at the edge of the sea, looking across to Wales. “Why is it moving?” asked one. “Am I allowed in it?” asked the second, “can I walk to the other side?” And the four-year-old who said to me: “Jenny, you know that sea? It goes away, and then it comes back again!” I could go on…’
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