Issue 08-02-2013

Featured story

Thought for the Week: 1652 country

FREE 7 Feb 2013 | by Robert Straughton

The story of George Fox meeting up with the Westmorland Seekers and the Fell family is so extraordinary, and was so transformational, that it is rightly the core of what visitors to 1652 country rediscover in retreading the paths and experiencing the places where those happenings occurred. We may be uncomfortable...

Read more

Top stories

Meeting for Sufferings: Gathering by the lake

FREE 7 Feb 2013 | by Ian Kirk-Smith

Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre. | Photo: Photo: Trish Carn.

Change was the order of the day at the first Meeting for Sufferings in 2013. A rare residential weekend of Meeting for Sufferings was held at the Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre in Birmingham. It was the first time in the Centre’s one-110-year history it had hosted the event. Some...

Read more

Meeting for Sufferings: Kabarak Call

7 Feb 2013 | by Ian Kirk-Smith

The Kabarak Call for Peace and Ecojustice, which was approved at the Sixth World Conference of Friends at Kabarak in Kenya in 2012, was introduced by Barbara Windle on Saturday morning.  She reminded Friends that a concern for the earth and stewardship of our scarce resources ‘runs through’ the history...

Read more

Meeting for Sufferings: Welfare Reform

7 Feb 2013 | by Ian Kirk-Smith

The damaging effect that proposed changes to the benefit system will have on low-income working and non-working people was brought to the attention of Meeting for Sufferings on Sunday morning.  A minute from Wirral and Chester Area Meeting highlighted the effect of the cuts on the poor and vulnerable...

Read more

Meeting for Sufferings: Drones

7 Feb 2013 | by Ian Kirk-Smith

Friends at Meeting for Sufferings were urged to highlight, in different ways, the increasing use of drones (unmanned aerial vehicles or UAVs) by the military.  The military use of drones is clearly in opposition to the peace testimony and concern about drones has been expressed in the past few...

Read more

Meeting for Sufferings: Preparation for BYM 2013

7 Feb 2013 | by Ian Kirk-Smith

To assist in preparation for Yearly Meeting, Meeting for Sufferings representatives and their Meetings were asked to reflect on and respond to three questions.  During the first session of BYM, on Friday evening, a distillation of any reponses received will be heard. Contributions are needed by 7 May.

Read more

All articles

Meeting for Sufferings: Garden Room at Woodbrooke

7 Feb 2013 | by Ian Kirk-Smith

Sandra Berry, director of Woodbrooke, welcomed representatives at the opening session of Meeting for Sufferings on Friday evening and took the opportunity to thank all those who had supported the building of the superb garden room at the centre.

Read more

Yorkshire Quaker peace activist arrested

FREE 7 Feb 2013 | by The Friend Newsdesk

Yorkshire CND and Trident Ploughshares activist Sylvia Boyes, a member of Keighley Meeting, was arrested attempting to enter Faslane, home to the UK’s nuclear submarines, on Monday 4 February.

Read more

Being real Friends

7 Feb 2013 | by Michael Wright

If your Local Meeting was a hospital patient, in which part of the hospital would you find it? That question was posed in a home group at the National Outreach Conference ‘Reaching In, Reaching Out’, held at the High Leigh Conference Centre between 18 and 20 January. Replies included: intensive care; in...

Read more

Isaac Penington: early Quaker mystic?

7 Feb 2013 | by Ruth Tod

Of all the early Quaker writers, Isaac Penington speaks most to my own experience and search. I believe that he, and others of his time, were practical mystics who had a deep awareness of the wisdom, love and mystery of God. The letters that Penington wrote to Friends around the...

Read more

Eye - 08 February 2013

7 Feb 2013 | by Eye

Covert congregants They stalk the aisles of unsuspecting shops, keeping their eyes peeled and biros at the ready, primed to tell shops exactly what it’s like to be one of their customers. They are ‘mystery shoppers’. Now a new brand of clandestine volunteers has emerged. ‘Mystery worshippers’ are penning...

Read more

Letters - 08 February 2013

7 Feb 2013 | by The Friend

Trident developments There has been a significant development regarding Trident, the UK’s own weapon of mass destruction. Danny Alexander, chief secretary to the Treasury, has stated that Britain does not need to replace the Trident missile fleet with ‘like for like’ nuclear submarines that will cost the country billions...

Read more