Issue 19-07-2019
Featured story
‘British Friends listened carefully to Irish Friends as they described twenty years of change.’
When my daughter pointed out the warship moored in the bay, I couldn’t see it at all. I was waiting for cataract surgery, and details had completely disappeared for me. Things around us were somehow not there at all. I relied on someone describing them, but they were inevitably...
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‘At Midsummer we go from the wild joy of the resurrection to the insight of slow extinction.’
With midsummer passed, the nights are again drawing in. In April, May and early June I savoured the spring, the enveloping warmth and nature’s colourful gifts. On Midsummer’s Eve my thoughts turned to the ramble towards the sweaty heat of summer, the fruits of autumn, and the black...
‘We remain convinced that ridding our high streets of these addictive machines is to be welcomed.’
Friends may have heard the recent announcement that the bookmaker William Hill plans to close 700 (thirty per cent) of its outlets, with the loss of around 4,500 jobs. Ladbrokes, Betfred and other major bookmakers are expected to follow, with one analyst suggesting that up to 3,000 could close. William Hill blames its...
Luminary
In memory of RS Thomas You say the mystic, when she’s not a poet, fails to mediate the – hang on – mysterium tremendum et fascinans, (that’s God), and then you riddle us with the immediacy of the mystic Deus absconditus. So, God’s absconded, and the mystic’s in...
‘War is much bigger than just the military offensive.’
I would like to ask children and young people who may be reading the Friend for some help, conversation and contacts. We are a group set up by Southern Marches Area Meeting to support a project to promote understanding and sympathy for the plight of noncombatants during war. You will...
Friends ride for ‘Freedom from Torture’
Two Quakers are part of a group of cyclists making an epic trek from Hastings to Edinburgh to raise awareness and funds for ‘Freedom from Torture’.
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Jobs ‘deleted’ at Friends House
There was tension in Friends House last week when three Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) posts were ‘deleted’ with imminent redundancies.
Scottish Friends hail climate declaration
Friends from Forres in Moray are celebrating the news that Moray Council in Scotland has declared a climate and ecological emergency after a Quaker-backed campaign.
Quakers at Glastonbury on ‘Songs of Praise’
The group of Quakers who hosted a tent at Glastonbury Festival featured on the BBC programme Songs of Praise last week.
Quakers meet Elizabeth II
A representative from London Quakers met Elizabeth II last month at a Buckingham Palace reception to celebrate the work of faith groups promoting community cohesion.
Quakers at Global Mennonite conference
Friends took part in a global gathering of Mennonites in the Netherlands last month. The event, which takes place every three years, focused on migration, peace, gender-justice and decolonisation within a peace church context.
‘The Educated Underclass: Students and the promise of social mobility’ by Gary Roth
Having returned to bus driving in 1998, I became a member of ‘the educated underclass’. Simply put, I was educated above my job’s needs, yet economically unable to mix easily with equivalently educated – wealthier – people. There are growing numbers like me in Britain since the backdoor privatisation of UK higher...
‘The Cambridge Companion to Quakerism’, edited by Stephen W Angell and Pink Dandelion
The big surprise in this book is that unprogrammed Friends number only about ten per cent of the world’s Friends. Kenya has the greatest number of Quakers, followed by the USA, and Bolivia. Kenya once had 1,500 Quaker schools, although some have been taken over by the government. Kenya, Bolivia,...
‘Beginner’s Luck’, by UA Fanthorpe
What constitutes a voice – that outward-and-audible sign of being who we are? Finding our voice always matters, but it has a special meaning in a poet’s case. The thing that makes the reader say ‘Ah, yes, that’s so-and-so’ in a couple of lines, that’s the writer’s â€...
‘Bury the Chains: The British struggle to abolish slavery’, by Adam Hochschild
In 2014 I read Adam Hochschild’s To End All Wars, his brilliantly-written ‘story of protest and patriotism in the first world war’, which served as a useful corrective to the centenary commemorations. Bury the Chains is not a new book but it is tragic, compelling and as empowering as the...
Letters - 19 July 2019
Not guilty Rosemary Wells (28 June) asks, in response to her reading of the report of Yearly Meeting and its epistle: ‘Why should we be made to feel guilty and ashamed for being who we are?’ If that had been the message of Yearly Meeting and the epistle then I would...