Letters - 31 January 2014
From the Week of Prayer for christian Unity to being a Quaker
Week of Prayer for Christian Unity
For many of us one of the most helpful practices encouraged by the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity [18 to 25 January] has been the experience of worship with Christians in other denominations, but for some Quaker Meetings this poses difficulties. We do not have the same pattern of ministry, and so cannot easily exchange pulpits. Many of our Meetings are quite small, so that if we are dispersed around different local churches on one particular Sunday, there might be very few Friends left to welcome visitors to our Meetings.
One solution might be for us as a religious society to deliberately worship with other Christians on some of those festivals that are not part of our tradition, and when we would not usually have a Quaker Meeting. Being lost among the crowd at Christmas might rebuke our vanity. Ash Wednesday might bring home to us other aspects of the puritan and ascetic inheritance we share. Ascension Day, Corpus Christi and the Feast of the Assumption might open our hearts to aspects of Christianity we do not sufficiently consider.
Graham Shaw
Zero Carbon Britain
I welcome Anne Adam’s reflections on Zero Carbon Britain (17 January).
I hope that Friends can become active in pioneering the dietary changes recommended in the report.
On my last visit to Woodbrooke, in September 2013, I was disturbed by the fact that, although courses on Green Spirituality and Sustainability were being publicised, what was actually on offer in the dining room remained very traditional. In fact, it was this visit that prompted me to write my article about the meat industry and its effects, ‘Wear it as long as thou canst’ (25 October 2013). The considerable correspondence that followed showed that many Friends were thinking in the same way.
Surely, we should be practising what we preach? What an opportunity we have to show Friends and the wider world how plant-based food can be appetising and nutritious.
Angela Howard
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