Culture Articles
Seeing animals differently
In their introduction to Living By Voices We Shall Never Hear - a collection of reflections, poems and essays - editors Pauline and Les Mitchell put the matter bluntly: for thousands of years, nonhuman animals ‘have been our unpaid, unacknowledged and, for the most part, appallingly treated slaves on whose...
The pilgrimage paradox
‘To kneel where prayer has been valid.’ This line from TS Eliot’s ‘Little Gidding’, quoted in the preface of Arthur Kincaid’s new book The Cradle of Quakerism, sums up the paradox that Quakers have to surmount when deciding how to commemorate and celebrate their roots. For prayer can...
Settling
Not quite silence but on the other hand the ambient sounds diminish –
Corridors of light
A while ago I heard someone on the radio use the expression ‘mental furniture’. She was referring to those comforting thoughts and ideas that come to the forefront at times of trouble, anxiety, illness or perhaps even danger. They are the thoughts that we turn to in order to give...
Black Fire
The subtitle of Black Fire is African American Quakers on Spirituality and Human Rights, though no definition of spirituality is given. I would offer: spirituality – a growing into relationship of self with deeper self; self with neighbour; self with cosmos; held together in an embrace of Spirit. What, then, would...
Departure
I am part of what once was But might be so again. Did we love once? Were we one? Two hearts with but a single rhythm?
Practising the Presence
There is a chamber of the mind prepared for me. When I am ready, willing to surrender. When I am quiet, I may enter there To find a place of stillness, a place already occupied By the light of the welcoming Presence.
Climb up to the moor
Judith Bromley paints as a way to discover, explore and express the relationship between her inner being and everything around her. She says: ‘For me, the process of drawing and painting is a meditative experience.’ Through this book, Judith’s painting and writing has also become a powerful ministry, creating...
Magical stories
The Tear Thief, The Greatest Gift and The Barefoot Book of Mother and Daughter Tales are three recent releases by Barefoot Books.
Meeting for Worship
I lug this great laundry basket to Meeting Filled with damp twisted bundles of problems, tasks and commitments, And I shake them out one by one and peg them on the invisible line.