Culture Articles
The spirit of creation
The National Gallery, in London’s Trafalgar Square, contains some of the finest paintings in the world. They are an enduring expression of the very best in humanity – especially of that need within the human spirit to create and celebrate.
The inferior sex?
Mary Wollstonecraft, an eighteenth century dissenter and staunch pioneer of women’s liberation, fought against the exploitation and subordination of women by men. In 1792 she published her book A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. It was not a well-received work, and many people at the time thought her book...
Oblivion
Enjoying the humour I sit to one side Until your approach, feeling Warm inside I take your hand And feel the world fall away Around me.
Around the world…
South Korea The flag of South Korea | Wikimedia Commons Ninety per cent of the world’s imprisoned conscientious objectors are in South Korea. Since 1950, 16,296 Jehovah’s Witnesses have been sentenced to a total of 31,204 years’ imprisonment for refusing to perform military service. In recent years they have been joined by...
Once upon a [war] time
At Yearly Meeting Gathering, Friends revisited the Peace Testimony, 350 years on, and asked themselves, ‘Do you stand up for Peace, use your voice, try to discern what action you can take?’ One Friend who used his very distinctive voice to stand up for peace is being celebrated, this year and...
Making the Quaker connection
‘Language bursts out of the silence. Creation emerges out of the void.’ Quaker writer and poet Sibyl Ruth penned these words in her script for a recent BBC Radio 4 programme on Quakers and poetry. She reflects on her experience of making the programme. I used to organise poetry readings. Iâ€...
Curmudgeonly sonnet at YMG
More humility, please. For we did not ‘Abolish slavery’. The record also shows How slaves at fearful cost themselves arose To fight, forgive, and change the global plot.
The other pilgrim
A Quaker was there also, as ye wistė That I had almost forgot from my listė So silent was he – when that it was Sunday, But talkėd more than any by the Monday.
Radical Quakerism
Quakers must be not be afraid to take extreme positions and proclaim them to the world. That was the message from Simon Best, who delivered this year’s George Gorman Memorial Lecture in Canterbury on Sunday. Hundreds of Friends of varied ages displayed a range of reactions as Simon...
Quaker silhouettes
Portraits of early Quakers are extremely rare. One of the reasons for this was strictly practical – most Friends did not come from the social class that could afford painted portraits. However, there were also serious religious objections to images of all kinds. Early Quakers shared with other nonconformist religious groups...