Latest News
Meeting for Sufferings: Concern for refugees
East Kent Area Meeting sent a minute to Sufferings regarding the need for a ‘policy on safe ways of allowing refugees to reach Europe to claim asylum’. The subject was introduced by Helen Drewery, general secretary of Quaker Peace & Social Witness (QPSW). She said that there is a refugee...
Friends promote peace at military celebrations
Quakers across Britain marked Armed Forces Day, 27 June, by expressing their commitment to peace in a variety of ways. Members of South East Scotland Area Meeting produced a leaflet to distribute in Edinburgh. They handed it out during a parade and military ‘entertainment’, Jane Pearn explained to the Friend.
Blue Idol doors open once more
The Blue Idol Meeting House near Coolham, West Sussex, re-opened on 27 June following extensive renovation. One hundred and twenty guests attended the celebration, including actress Sheila Hancock, and local members of parliament Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) and Jeremy Quin (Horsham).
Friends celebrate London Pride 2015 in the sun
Friends turned out in strength for London Pride on Saturday 27 June. Central London Quakers were joined by members of a number of Meetings, including Glasgow, Golders Green, Kingston, Oxford, Richmond, Sutton, Watford, Westminster and Winchmore Hill. Before the parade, some twenty Friends gathered for a Meeting for Worship in Paddington...
Refugee Week
Doncaster Quakers and the Northern Friends Peace Board, among others, support a weekly club for refugees and asylum seekers –the Doncaster Conversation Club. The Conversation Club celebrated the recent Refugee Week with a five-a-side football tournament.
Friends in fracking protest
Quakers were among those protesting on 22 to 24 June against the Cuadrilla energy company’s plans for fracking in Preston, Lancashire. Pat Carney of Cambridge Jesus Lane Meeting told the Friend that while there was no formal Quaker representation at the protest, she was ‘cheered that individual Quakers turned up out...
Call for equality continues to resonate
Twenty-seven Friends met at Central Manchester Meeting House on 20 June to review the first Quaker Equality Week. Area Meetings represented included East Cheshire, Hardshaw and Mann, Lancashire Central and North, Manchester and Warrington (M&W), and North Wales. Suzanne Ismail and Maya Williams of Quaker Peace & Social Witness ...
Peace on the agenda at Adderbury
This year’s Adderbury Gathering took as its topic Peace, peacemaking and Islam. A one hundred-strong audience travelled to the historic Oxfordshire Meeting house on 21 June to hear Islamic scholar Hojjat Ramzy speak on co-existence, self-correction and forgiveness.
Friends back ‘End Austerity Now’
Quakers were among tens of thousands of activists who took part in last Saturday’s End Austerity Now marches in Britain.
Friends in climate change call
Some eighty Quakers were among several thousand people who took part in the UK’s largest mass climate change day of action on Wednesday 17 June.