Letters – 9 October 2015
From living out our faith in the world to white poppies
Living out our faith in the world
David Bradley-Willmetts and David Fish (25 September) call for all Quaker employers to pay a living wage.
Thanks to the generosity of Friends supporting the work of Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM), we are fortunate to be able to pay all BYM staff more than the Living Wage, and are recognised as a Living Wage Employer. There is a strict 1:4 ratio between lowest and highest paid staff.
In addition, staff receive generous benefits, including eight per cent employer pension contribution, subsidised meals, permanent health insurance, childcare vouchers, a cycle-to-work scheme and access to a free confidential employee assistance programme.
We recognise that not all Quaker organisations are in this position, sometimes due to financial constraints, but hope that all seek to discharge their employment obligations responsibly and with due discernment and care. Quaker Life offers employment advice to Local and Area Meetings and welcomes enquiries at any time to wardenship@quaker.org.uk from any Meetings which are reviewing their employment arrangements.
Elaine Green, clerk
BYM Trustees Employment Committee
Knowledge and wisdom
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit: wisdom is not adding tomatoes to a fruit salad.
Frank McManus (25 September) writes ‘… Science when separated from Wisdom is always a knowledge of good and evil (and) brings a corresponding evil in its train… Medicine… brings with it the disaster of overpopulation…’ He refers, presumably, to the fact that the application of science has greatly reduced infant mortality, and the growth of population is a consequence. True, but science has also provided the antidote: contraception, which, unfortunately, is not accessible to everyone who wants it. We have grasped the one benefit of science, but not the other: indeed, some actually deny the legitimacy of contraception.
Science’s job is to supply the knowledge: it is for us to supply the wisdom. You wouldn’t blame your greengrocer if your tomato fruit salad didn’t turn out as you had hoped.
Roger Plenty
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