Laying down a concern

Marion McNaughton writes about Friends’ witness at Manchester Pride

Manchester and Warrington Friends have joyfully played a part in the annual Manchester Pride events for the last ten years. In that time Friends have walked with banners in the Pride parades, danced at the Quaker ceilidhs, prayed in outdoor Meetings for Worship, listened deeply and shared information at the Quaker stalls. We have also organised and run a Pride Quaker Quest series and a conference celebrating fifty years of Quaker concern for gay equality, and published two books on Quaker involvement in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) issues.

All this has been done under concern. Ten years ago our Area Meeting not only acknowledged and upheld individual Friends in their personal concern for gay equality, but also minuted that it recognised that a corporate concern for LGBT rights was laid on the Area Meeting as a whole, and we pledged our support to be active and visible in the annual Manchester Pride celebrations.

But, as Quaker faith & practice reminds us (13:13), there may come a time when a concern ‘has run its course’, and we need to be vigilant to that. It is painful to contemplate letting go of something that has been so important to us. Nevertheless, in the last few years, as the political climate has changed so dramatically and equal rights started to be won, we have also acknowledged our discomfort with the growing commercialisation of the Pride events. We wondered: ‘Is this particular witness what is still being asked of us?’ We held a Meeting for Clearness a year ago, which confirmed that we were probably being led to change the form of our witness, though the exact nature of the next steps still eluded us.

But this year, with clarity and thankfulness, we have minuted that we continue to be committed to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues but feel we should no longer focus on a token annual event; we are open to new possibilities and on-going engagement throughout the year. So, we have laid down our Quaker Pride group.

However, aware that Quaker faith & practice also advises us that ‘celebration for the right ending of what was rightly begun may be appropriate’, we accepted the invitation of our friends the Unitarians to walk in the parade this year with them and celebrate with a party afterwards! A joyful ending.

So, our celebration, our discernment and our witness continued, and on Saturday 26 August we walked in Manchester with our rainbow parasols (the sun shone so we did not need our rainbow umbrellas) for one more time.

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