Issue 15-12-2023
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Glimmers of hope: Craig Barnett’s Thought for the week
Quakers sometimes make a distinction between ‘activist’ Friends, who are attracted by the social action, and ‘mystics’, whose focus is the Meeting for Worship. For me, the Quaker way is not about becoming either. It is primarily a path of discernment – a way of enabling each of us to discover...
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The quiet life: Mary Brown considers different kinds of silence
Over forty years ago, one of my daughters, then aged eleven, asked if she could bring a schoolfriend to Meeting for Worship. Of course I said yes, but left it to her to explain to her friend what Meeting was. After Meeting I asked the friend how she had found...
Soul food: At Hanukkah, Martyn Kelly talks ritual
On a recent episode of BBC Radio 4’s The Kitchen Cabinet, the Kurdish food writer Melek Erdal spoke about rituals and practices associated with food, and how important these are to immigrants. They are a way of staying connected with home, as well as of preserving identity and history. They...
Billions needed for climate loss and damage, say Friends
As Friends joined other climate activists for COP28 last weekend, to witness for continued action on the Loss and Damage Fund, Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) cautiously welcomed a deal to help pay for the irreversible impacts of climate disaster.
Carrying the cost: Jonathan Dale on reparations
For many of us, the impetus for thinking about racial justice came after the murder of George Floyd. Our local elders sought ways of opening ourselves to the subject. Eventually our informal Black Lives Matter group became an Area Meeting Racial Justice Group. We held a regional gathering, where a...
Eye - 15 December 2023
Sustainable shimmies Dorking Friends have been exploring ecological concerns during a creative community project. Tara Craig told Eye: ‘Shimmy is not a word often associated with Quakers, but Friends recently found themselves shimmying to both the left and the right in the unlikely setting of Dorking Meeting House. ‘The occasion?...
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MSPs vote for children’s rights
Friends in Scotland are celebrating the Scottish Parliament’s incorporation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) into Scottish law.
Quakers speak out on COs in Russia and Ukraine
Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) is urging UK citizens to ask their MPs to pressure the UK government to uphold conscientious objection in Russia and Ukraine.
‘No flags, no placards’ anti-hate vigil
Quakers were part of a large Together for Humanity vigil this month, to speak out against antisemitism and anti-Muslim hate. Together for Humanity was co-founded by Brendan Cox, husband of murdered MP Jo Cox.
Buddhist and Quaker interfaith peace action
Quakers and the Plum Village Buddhist Community (followers of Thich Nhat Hanh) have come together ‘in a heart-felt desire to spearhead and unify all faiths and spiritual traditions’.
Meeting for Sufferings: Non-members in Quaker service
October’s Meeting for Sufferings (MfS) agreed in principle that appointment to Britain Yearly Meeting’s central committees ‘need not be dependent on formal membership as it currently exists’. Membership was indeed an expression of a ‘reciprocal commitment’, said the minute, but this relationship could exist outside Area Meeting affiliation,...
Meeting for Sufferings: BYM trustees report
Introducing the report from BYM trustees, Caroline Nursey, outgoing clerk, said that most of it would not be very interesting to MfS representatives – a lot of it was to do with issues like health and safety, she said. There had been an audit of BYM’s response to the Covid...
Meeting for Sufferings: Yearly Meeting 2024
After a shuffle break, Friends heard from Adwoa Burnley, clerk of Yearly Meeting (YM). She introduced the agenda for YM 2024, which will be held on 26–30 July at Friends House. This longer Meeting was an experiment, said Adwoa, and it would involve sessions in smaller groups. Things might look a little...
Meeting for Sufferings: Quaker World Relations Committee (QWRC)
In the final piece of business, Friends received a QWRC report from co-clerk Ruth Homer. Its remit was twofold, she said: enriching understanding between British Friends and Friends worldwide; and engaging Quakers in Britain in concerns held by Friends in the rest of the world.
Meeting for Sufferings: Quaker Committee for Christian and Interfaith Relations (QCCIR)
Claire Bowman, assistant clerk to QCCIR, presented the committee’s annual report. QCCIR is responsible for keeping BYM informed of ‘relevant issues and movements which emerge from the faith life in our three nations,’ she said, ‘and of opportunities for dialogue and co-operation between churches and faiths’.
Cliff-hanger: Could Anne Wade remain a Quaker?
Last week I wrote about my glimpse of reality on the Dorset cliffs (Thought for the week, 8 December). Words are too limited to do a proper job, but, back then, as Young Friends, we agreed to try to share such experiences with the next generations. At the time our elders...
Rustin, directed by George C Wolfe
Bayard Rustin (1912-1987) was a pioneering US Quaker activist for civil rights, nonviolence, and gay rights. He was a pioneer of desegregation, and was beaten and arrested for sitting on the second row of a bus as early as 1942 (this later inspired the Freedom Riders). From 1944-1946 he was imprisoned...
Letters - 15 December 2023
Grieving for Woodbrooke I observe with wonder that, outwardly, we have not corporately grieved for the loss of Woodbrooke. It was so important to many of us as a physical centre, a beautiful place we loved, where we made friends, learned together and built up our varied communities. Last summer,...