Culture Articles
Posters for peace
The poster has been used as an instrument of radical protest for hundreds of years: pasted on walls, carried in processions and held up in demonstrations, it has been a cheap, portable, and visually striking way of speaking ‘truth to power’. Peace posters are part of the Quaker tradition and...
Costing not less than everything
‘I want to see us living our testimony in such a way that other people think not just, “Quakers – peace” but also, “Quakers – peace – the environment”.’ Pam Lunn
Meeting at Glenthorne
We met in silence, the cows and I in the long wet grass, in worship they, ruminating I. They sat. I stood by the wooden fence that set apart the sprawling house from the winding path that climbed in awe to the passing clouds. Again I saw the hill I...
Being a Quaker: a guide for newcomers
There is a difference between ‘narrow’ casting and ‘broad’ casting. In the first you are talking to the converted. In the second you assume little and communicate your message in an open, inclusive and engaging manner. If you can do so with humour, humility and a touch of irreverence then...
The spirit of creation
The National Gallery, in London’s Trafalgar Square, contains some of the finest paintings in the world. They are an enduring expression of the very best in humanity – especially of that need within the human spirit to create and celebrate.
The inferior sex?
Mary Wollstonecraft, an eighteenth century dissenter and staunch pioneer of women’s liberation, fought against the exploitation and subordination of women by men. In 1792 she published her book A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. It was not a well-received work, and many people at the time thought her book...
Oblivion
Enjoying the humour I sit to one side Until your approach, feeling Warm inside I take your hand And feel the world fall away Around me.
Around the world…
South Korea The flag of South Korea | Wikimedia Commons Ninety per cent of the world’s imprisoned conscientious objectors are in South Korea. Since 1950, 16,296 Jehovah’s Witnesses have been sentenced to a total of 31,204 years’ imprisonment for refusing to perform military service. In recent years they have been joined by...
Once upon a [war] time
At Yearly Meeting Gathering, Friends revisited the Peace Testimony, 350 years on, and asked themselves, ‘Do you stand up for Peace, use your voice, try to discern what action you can take?’ One Friend who used his very distinctive voice to stand up for peace is being celebrated, this year and...
Making the Quaker connection
‘Language bursts out of the silence. Creation emerges out of the void.’ Quaker writer and poet Sibyl Ruth penned these words in her script for a recent BBC Radio 4 programme on Quakers and poetry. She reflects on her experience of making the programme. I used to organise poetry readings. I...