Issue 24-10-2014
Featured story
Thought for the Week: Silent worship?
The room breathes in. And out. Hands find a variety of poses. There is a pair of sandals with socks, a pair without. Two fine beards. Malcolm stands, tries to find words about calm. Sits. A stomach growls. Lunch beckons, until we remember to think of God.
Top stories
A new morality
It is an ordinary morning. The BBC news informs us of yet another paedophile ring. This one involved people who are amongst the highest echelons of our society. An unsolicited telephone voice offers to repair the malfunctioning software on our computer – for a certain fee. Unfortunately for him, we do...
British values?
Sibford School, along with other independent schools, Quaker and non-Quaker, received notification on Friday 26 September 2014 of changes to Part 2 of Schedule 1 (Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural Development of Pupils) that were to come into force three days later, on 29 September 2014. There had been a consultation over the summer holiday, when...
Words: Prayer
Prayer arises because life is precarious. Both of these words derive from the Latin precari: to beg. Feeling powerless, we may begin by declaring our unworthiness (confession). We may then beg for a favour, for ourselves (petition), for those we love (intercession) and then against our enemies (though prayers of...
Benedict XV
Benedict XV was called ‘the unknown pope’ by one of his biographers. He was elected to head the Roman Catholic Church on 3 September 1914. He died on 22 January 1922. On 28 July 1915, when the first world war had run for nearly a year, pope Benedict addressed an Apostolic Exhortation ‘To The Peoples now...
Dylan Thomas: A compassion for mankind
The most unworldly Quaker in Wales could scarcely have failed to register that 2014 is the centenary of the birth of a much-mocked, much-misrepresented and much-adored Welsh poet – Dylan Thomas.
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Banbury Friends host sustainability forum
Banbury Quakers recently held a forum dedicated to topics such as food waste, biodiversity and the impact of poverty on children. The discussion was held at Banbury and Bicester College on Thursday 9 October. It was intended as an outreach event, designed for those new to sustainability. An eighty-strong audience attended,...
Ethical finance
National Ethical Investment Week has been rebranded as Good Money Week. The newly renamed initiative runs from 19 to 25 October. The UK Sustainable Investment and Finance Association (UKSIF), who support the week, hope that the new name will help take the ethical finance message to a wider, more mainstream, audience.
Huddersfield Friends back campaign
Huddersfield Friends are supporting a climate change campaign for a Fossil Free Kirklees. A member of Huddersfield Meeting was involved in the launch and helped to set up the petition. This prompted Quakers to officially back the campaign at Meeting for Worship for Business.
Woodbrooke appointment
The Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre in Birmingham has appointed Simon Best to the position of head of learning. Simon is currently Nurturing Friends and Meetings tutor at Woodbrooke. He will step into his new role on 1 December.
Anti-slavery play performed in Mansfield
The issue of modern day slavery has been raised, in a dramatic form, at Mansfield’s Meeting house. The Plain Quaker theatre project recently staged an updated version of their play Nine Parts a Quaker there.
Quaker school in China marks anniversary
A new school museum has been opened in the Guangyi Friends School in China as part of the school’s 120th anniversary celebrations. The museum opening, on 6 October, launched a programme of events to mark the anniversary of the founding of the school in 1894. The museum traces the school’s...
Quaker schools harness new technology
Online video chat technology has allowed two Quaker schools to join together for the first time in a special Meeting for Worship. Sidcot School in Somerset and Sibford School in Oxfordshire used a Skype link to share their morning Meeting on Friday 10 October.
Norway Friends in peace plea
The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Norway have written to new NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg, urging his organisation to play a stronger role in peace building. Quakers in Norway stressed the importance of diplomatic channels ‘from first to last in all conflicts’, and asked that the United Nations...
For God’s Sake
It is surprising what a male enterprise the current debate between theism and atheism is. The atheists, Jack Smart, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, AC Grayling, attract as opponents male heavyweights like John Haldane, Antony Flew, David Bentley Hart, and Deepak Chopra. As in other male preserves, the debate takes on...
Eye - 24 October 2014
Zip-a-dee-do-dah Suspended by a harness, wind buffeting her face… September saw octogenarian Kitty Grove-Stephensen swooping across the sky on a zip line, dentures stashed securely in a handy pocket. In 2012 Kitty, a Friend from Middlesbrough Meeting, did a zip slide off the roof of the former Baltic Exchange building in...
Letters - 24 October 2014
Ebola in Rokel, Sierra Leone Friends in Rokel, Sierra Leone, are experiencing unprecedented difficulties at the moment. They are not able to hold Meeting for Worship because of the Ebola crisis. Those who have visited the area may have been taken to the John Thorpe hamlet where the river sand...