Issue 27-04-2018
Featured story
Thought for the Week: Area Meetings: an experiment
‘Was that your first time at Area Meeting?’ ‘Yes,’ he replied, ‘and possibly the last!’ It was a joke, of course. But with our Area Meetings typically attracting only fifteen to twenty people, a fifth of local Friends, maybe it is one that resonates with others. Why should this be...
Top stories
Six weeks at Pendle Hill
I recognized immediately in Pendle Hill a kind of oasis in the wasteland of the spirit… I went there again and again not only to join in the dialogue between the confused modern soul and the ultimate meaning of life, but to be encouraged by the conviction that in Pendle...
Taking positive action
I have a chronic inability to see the wood for the trees or, more accurately perhaps, express the wood for the trees. I roll around in the waves and am grateful to those who stand on firm rocks and are able to express important issues with clarity. I’m not...
‘Silent’ podcast in the spotlight
A recording of a silent Quaker Meeting for Worship made by The Young Quaker Podcast has received widespread attention in the national press.
God, words and us: Three levels of reality, truth and faith
In the seventeenth century, Isaac Penington and Isaac Newton were searching for something similar. As Isaac Pennington described it: ‘The end of words is to bring [us] to the knowledge of things beyond what words can utter.’
From the archive: With hearts and minds prepared…
As Yearly Meeting 1918 approached, several subjects were on the minds of Friends. The propositions relating to ‘War and the Social Order’ (now eight rather than the previous seven) were due to return to the Meeting. A ‘Message to all Friends’ from the War and Social Order Committee appeared in the...
All articles
Hexham Debate on prisons
Friends from Hexham, Allendale and Stocksfield gathered last week to hear a talk on ‘Prison, prisoners, politics and power’, as part of the longstanding series of Hexham Debates. The event, on 21 April, which also attracted a large audience of non-Quakers, featured speaker Dan Gunn, a former prison governor for Barlinnie...
Experiment with Light Conference
Thirty Friends from all over Britain met in Glenthorne Quaker Centre and Guest House in Grasmere, Cumbria last month for the Experiment with Light Conference. Questions explored at the weekend gathering on 26 to 29 March included: ‘How might we be open to the leadings of the Light?’ and ‘How can we...
Quaker MP speaks out about Syria
The Quaker MP Catherine West spoke out on the BBC programme Daily Politics last week (16 April) about the recent government decision to launch missile strikes on Syria.
Gathering of the Northern Friends Peace Board
Eighteen Friends came together at Huddersfield Meeting House this month for a meeting of the Northern Friends Peace Board (NFPB).
Writer talks about his Quaker faith
The Quaker author Gregory Norminton, who recently published his first novel for ten years, has spoken out about how his Quakerism influences his writing.
More low-cost rented homes needed
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) has called on the government to build 78,000 low-cost rented homes a year to tackle the housing crisis.
Exhibition highlights fate of ‘missing’ persons
‘Fate Unknown: The Search for the Missing after the Holocaust’ an exhibition at The Wiener Library in Bloomsbury, London is highlighting the efforts made to trace the missing in the UK after the Holocaust, in which British Quakers played a big part.
Letters - 27 April 2018
God, words and us God, words and us appears to be gaining momentum as our entry point for a revision of Quaker faith & practice (Qf&p). When our Meeting considered it, a good half of those present found it lacking in spiritual inspiration and over-concerned with contributors’ names. ...