Issue 04-07-2014
Featured story
Thought for the Week: The Friend
The Friend was established in 1843. It is one of only a handful of weekly magazines in the world that have been published continuously since then. In over 170 years it has failed to appear only a couple of times. This was during the second world war when there was a severe...
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Friends of the Truth
What’s in a name? Well, quite a lot it would seem when it comes to dissenting religious movements. Early Quakers called themselves ‘Friends of the Truth’ but their opponents called them Quakers ‘in scorn’ due to the physical shaking or quaking that represented the outward sign of a process...
Fraudcast News
Press corruption is, sadly, a subject we’re now familiar with, from the press’s own coverage of the Leveson Inquiry and, more recently, the trial of Rebekah Brooks, Andy Coulson and others who – in what might become the longest criminal trial in English history – are charged with phone hacking...
Sustainable living
Friends from Central England, Banbury and Evesham and Stafford Area Meetings were joined by two others involved in local low carbon initiatives on Saturday 24 May at Northfield Meeting House in Birmingham. After a short period of worship the group walked to Northfield’s Ecocentre for a project update. For over...
Dear George…
The testimony written after his death in 1982 starts: ‘George Gorman was one of the few members of London Yearly Meeting who was known in every Monthly Meeting and possibly in every Preparative Meeting; he was also known to a great many Friends in Yearly Meetings of continental Europe and of...
My father’s ashes
It was a beautiful autumn day last year when I stood in the churchyard with other family members for a short service to bury my father’s ashes. He had given faithful service as rector’s warden in that church for over twenty-five years and it seemed right and proper...
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Three Westminster Friends receive honours
Three members of Westminster Meeting, London, featured in the recent birthday honours list. Michael Bartlet, lately parliamentary liaison secretary for the Religious Society of Friends in Britain from 1996 to 2013, was awarded an MBE for services to equality and social justice.
FWCC meets in Moyallon
Sixteen representatives of the Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC) took part in a residential meeting at The Moyallon Centre in Northern Ireland last week. The centre adjoins the Moyallon Meeting House in County Armagh and for several of the participants the event offered a first glimpse of Ireland.
Quakers reject Trident Commission recommendations
Quakers in Britain strongly disagree with the conclusion of a report published this week that says the UK should retain its nuclear deterrent. The report by the independent cross-party Trident Commission, set up by the British American Security Information Council (BASIC), states that there is no credible alternative to Trident.
Friends General Conference Gathering underway
More than 1,200 Quakers are attending this week’s Friends General Conference (FGC) Gathering at the University of California’s Pennsylvania campus. This year’s theme is ‘Let Love Be the First Motion’, a quote from Quaker and eighteenth century abolitionist John Woolman.
Protest targets arms dealers’ use of church property
Eight Christians, including several Quakers, held a silent vigil at Church House in London on 24 June to demonstrate against the taking place there of the first of two Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) conferences. Among the conferences’ sponsors are some of the world’s largest arms companies, including BAE Systems,...
Eye - 4 July 2014
The namer of clouds The man who named the clouds will be celebrated this month. Tottenham Ploughman, ‘a group of local like- minded people who want to celebrate the best of Tottenham’, will be marking the 150th anniversary of Luke Howard’s death at CloudFest on 6 July. Luke Howard was...
Letters - 04 July 2014
Being a Quaker today Thank you Mary Penny for your ‘Thought for the Week’ on ‘Being a Quaker today’ (27 June). I have real understanding of your concern. Discipline and manners extend beyond the dining room table and into many areas of life. This includes Quaker Business Meetings. We are all...