Letters - 14 January 2011
From The Religious Society of Friends to the Black Panthers
In the issue of 21 January there will be no letters as it is a special issue on the 350th anniversary of the Peace Testimony.
Religious Society of Friends
In Britain Yearly Meeting and other liberal Yearly Meetings I have frequently come across ‘refugees from Christianity’ who have pleaded to Friends not to use difficult words such as ‘God’ or ‘Jesus’ or ‘Bible’ because they upset them, and that to do so would tend to drive them away. In response, to a great extent Friends defer to these wishes and avoid these words. Unfortunately, others joining our worship judge us by what they hear and come to the not unreasonable conclusion that despite our name, ‘The Religious Society…’, we are not religious, not god-centred. They are mistaken, and we should be ashamed for allowing so many to be so misled for so long. The first sentence of Advices & queries makes plain. ‘As Friends we commit ourselves to a way of worship which allows God to teach and transform us… all our testimonies grow from this leading.’ And similarly throughout our descriptively-titled handbook, Quaker faith & practice (Qf&p).
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