Trident submarine. Photo: Photo: JohnED76 / flickr CC
Pilgrimage for peace
Friends involved in plans for a Pilgrimage for Peace and Economic Justice
Quakers are involved in plans to develop a major pilgrimage in 2013 that will focus public attention on the coalition government’s proposal to spend billions of pounds renewing the Trident nuclear weapons system.
The 2013 Pilgrimage for Peace and Economic Justice, it is hoped, will begin at Pentecost on Sunday 19 May at Iona, in Scotland, and finish at Westminster, in London.
Along the way pilgrims will visit historic centres of prayer, including a number of Quaker Meeting houses. The aim of the pilgrimage is to follow a ‘somewhat similar pattern to the way the Olympic torch was carried across the country in relays’.
The 2013 Pilgrimage for Peace and Economic Justice has its origins in an Inter-Faith Service for Justice and Peace held at Hexham Abbey, Northumberland, in January 2012. It was organised by Northumbrians for Peace and SCANA (Scottish Clergy Against Nuclear Arms) as their second annual Easter Week Act of Witness outside the gates of the Faslane Naval Base in March 2012.
Hexham Friends hope that Quaker Meetings and other groups along the route will promote discussion in the news media about the proposal to renew Trident and wider issues of social and economic justice.
The Pilgrimage for Peace, as reported in the latest Tynedale newsletter, is ‘a powerful act of witness affirming our collective faith in a non-nuclear, more equitable future for all.’
‘A principal aim of the 2013 Pilgrimage is to focus public attention nationally on the coalition government’s proposal to spend many billions of pounds renewing the Trident nuclear weapons system, while continuing to slash NHS, education and social welfare budgets; including vital financial support for some of our most vulnerable and disadvantaged communities across the UK.’
Friends in Hexham have encouraged Quakers to walk some of the way between Iona and London, to help with arranging hospitality for participants in the pilgrimage as it passes different areas, and to contribute thoughts and suggestions.
