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Perhaps it was the stillness of that night that was the most remarkable, an unearthly stillness, as if the gap between heaven and earth had lessened and become porous. I listened to the stillness for some time – though I don’t know if you could call it listening, I was more of a witness to it. The stillness lay over the frozen land like a thick blanket of fog.
O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie!
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep, the silent stars go by.
Yet in thy dark streets shineth, the everlasting light;
The hopes and fears of all the years, are met in thee tonight.
As carollers sing this hymn this Christmas, they won’t all be thinking of Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, as it stands today. But for many Friends, the town’s fragility will be close to their minds. Bethlehem, of course, is located in Palestine’s West Bank, just a few minutes south of Jerusalem.
Are you lonely?
Did George Fox ever get lonely? He was imprisoned several times; he was in isolation for months – over two years at one time from 1664, so almost six years, in total, if you add his eight imprisonments together.
‘All hail!’ the bells of Christmas rang,
‘All hail!’ the monks at Christmas sang,
The merry monks who kept with cheer
The gladdest day of all their year.
QCCIR paper on gender diversity
In the last morning session of December’s Meeting for Sufferings (MfS), Elaine Green, clerk to Quaker Committee for Christian and Interfaith Relations (QCCIR), spoke to a paper setting out a spiritual basis for Quakers in Britain to affirm and respect gender diversity. Initially described as addressing ‘the theology of trans inclusion’, the paper draws on Christian scripture, early Quaker writings, and the Yearly Meeting’s testimony of equality. It calls on Quaker communities to welcome all by fostering safety, compassion, and deep listening. QCCIR had spent nearly a year discerning how to support the trans-affirming spirit of Minute 31 of Yearly Meeting 2021, said Elaine.
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