Issue 02-11-2018
Featured story
Thought for the Week: Mullinbouys
On 11 November 2004, a room in Dublin Castle hosted the most significant state ceremony of the year. The stage was crowded with men. There were only half a dozen women, one a Quaker and another, centre stage, a Catholic brought up in Ardoyne in North Belfast during the troubles, then an...
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The London Adult School Union
As Westminster Meeting prepares for its next ‘Quinquennial’ I am reminded that during the big clear-out that preceded the last major building work a cache of old papers was discovered in one of the basements. This was an assortment of notebooks, ledgers, paying-in books and minutes belonging to the now...
Stone soup and street parties
Once there was a traveller who had been walking many days with nothing to eat but leaves and wild berries. At last she came to a village and the chieftain came to greet her. ‘You are welcome, traveller, but we can offer you nothing to eat. We are starving.’ The...
The elephant in the room
Two emails caught my eye this week: the first, an article about what we mean by a ‘one in a 1,000-year event’ and, the second, an invitation to a workshop on ‘Speaking Out for Climate Justice’… and, already, half of my readership has gone. Here’s why.
No alternatives
‘No alternatives’ – a phrase used by my father (a very staunch Methodist) as his answer to my question: ‘How did you justify going to world war two at the same time as being a Christian?’ His reply was: ‘What alternatives did we have?’
Poppies and conscience
Why do people wear red poppies on and before Remembrance Day? For some, it will be simply to honour the memory of those who – willingly or otherwise – fought and died in wars for Britain. They may have relatives to give a personal dimension to this memory. As a councillor some...
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Being true to myself
‘Travel to distant and exotic places. Meet interesting and exciting people, and then kill them.’ Spike Milligan once offered this as a parody of a military recruitment campaign, which is still very much in use. One of the more worrying forms it has taken is the involvement of the armed...
Thoughts on equality
My maternal family was Welsh and their attitude, although living in England, was that the English class system was a nonsense. They felt they were as good as anyone. This attitude must have rubbed off on me, in spite of my innate shyness and lack of confidence when young. I...
Quaker housing project in line for Guardian award
A Quaker Social Action (QSA) housing project for young carers has been shortlisted for a national award organised by the Guardian newspaper. The Tower Hamlets-based ‘‘Move On Up’ project in London is one of the contenders for a Guardian Public Service Award for innovation in the housing sector after running...
Young Friends join ‘dusk walk’
Manchester Young Friends joined a ‘dusk walk’ on 12 October in a bid to raise money to support homeless young people in Greater Manchester.
Asylum seekers need to work, say BYM in Daily Telegraph letter
Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) has joined a call for a change in the law to allow newly arrived asylum seekers the right to work in the UK after six months. In a letter published in the Daily Telegraph, sixteen signatories, including Paul Parker, recording clerk of BYM, welcomed the efforts...
More churches to offer white poppies
More churches are interested in offering white poppies as well as red poppies in the run-up to Remembrance Sunday on 11 November.
Exhibition explores ‘heritage of peace’
The Peace Museum in Bradford has launched a lottery-funded exhibition exploring the ‘heritage of peace’ following the first world war.
Newark Meeting House opens
Lincolnshire Friends are celebrating the opening of Newark Meeting House by leading Quaker writer Geoffrey Durham, which took place on 13 October. After the opening he spoke about ‘Why I am a Quaker’ in the adjacent town hall ballroom and emphasised the value of shared spiritual silence.
Bath Friend talks on nonviolence
Bath Quaker professor Lois Bibbings gave her inaugural lecture on the history of nonviolence on 31 October. The professor of law, gender and history at the University of Bristol Law School talked about legal cases from different historical periods. According to Bath Quakers, the threads tell a ‘broader tale’ about violence...
Letters - 2 November 2018
Quaker belief Our good friend Stuart Yates, in his ‘Thought for the Week’ (19 October), concludes: ‘I hope that the whole body of Quakers in Britain can be involved in creating a form of words (preferably brief) that sufficiently describes the central mystery of our faith in a way that we...