Issue 22-08-2014
Featured story
Thought for the Week: A gift of a week
A little while ago over two thousand creative, thoughtful, enquiring, campaigning Quakers travelled to Bath in search of inspiration. You may have been one of them and I hope you found everything you were looking for. You may even have come across the Quaker Legacy Garden. Out on a limb,...
Top stories
Diversity of art at Bath
Celebrating the publication of his thirteenth novel this week, Howard Jacobson wrote ‘To lose oneself in making art – all questions of quality apart – is an incomparable way of living life. Never mind self-expression. The truly wonderful thing about being a painter, a writer or a musician is escaping self.’ It...
Spiritual connectedness
Over the past three years we have been looking at ‘What it means to be a Quaker today’. From 2015 to 2017 Yearly Meeting will explore ‘Living out our faith in the world’. I have been asked to approach this session as a bridge between these two. In looking at how we...
Llanfoist
The Sugar Loaf, The Blorenge and The Skirrid are hills well known to walkers. We saw them on the way. Coming through the Usk Valley or the Brecon Beacons, glimpsing in passing remnants of battles – Raglan castle, Abergavenny castle; or skirting Blaenavon, a World Heritage Site for industry, as we...
Young people at YMG
An extensive programme of activities for young people was organised at Yearly Meeting Gathering. Members of staff from Friends House and a large contingent of volunteers put an enormous amount of effort in during the week to ensure that the days were rich with adventure, fun and stimulation for all...
From the archive: Meetings in wartime
The news pages of the Friend in August and September 1914 show many Meetings taking action. Darlington offered its Meeting house as a hospital: Llandrindod Wells and Devonshire House opened daily for prayer and silent worship: Wycombe looked for spare land for growing food and made jam with otherwise waste fruit. ...
All articles
Thirsk Friends highlight choice
Quakers in Thirsk marked the centenary of the outbreak of world war one with a series of events highlighting the choices available at that time. Thirsk Meeting saw the centenary as an opportunity to engage with non-Quakers and were inspired by Yearly Meeting recording clerk Paul Parker’s talk at...
Blackburn Quakers behind bars
Anti-social behaviour in their burial ground has forced Blackburn Meeting to put up railings, leaving Friends mulling over the irony of Quakers once more being ‘behind bars’. The decision was taken following several months of noise and disturbance, which led to the grassy area by the Meeting house being littered...
New Zealand Quakers mark war anniversary
Friends recently took part in a series of peace vigils held across New Zealand. The events were organised by Peace Movement Aotearoa. Nine of the eighteen held across the country were organised by Quakers, who also participated in several others. The peace vigils were aimed at changing people’s perception...
Northern Young Friends gather
More than fifty young people gathered at Ackworth School between 26 July and 4 August, for the Northern Young Friends Summer Shindig. They had travelled there from Scotland, the north of England, and Ramallah, Palestine. Hexham Meeting made it possible for Marwa Afaneh of Friends School, Ramallah to attend.
Welsh peace vigil condemns NATO event
Friends from Caerleon, Newport Meeting staged a peace vigil on 17 August, to protest against next month’s NATO summit. This will take place at Newport’s Celtic Manor Resort on 4 and 5 September.
YMG Special interest groups
Neurodivergence and Quakerism Neurodivergence (ND) includes people with autism, ADHD, Tourette’s, dyslexia and related conditions. These conditions have a neurological basis and are, therefore, a special group within the group of people who have unusual biochemical conditions.
Junior Yearly Meeting Epistle
To all Friends everywhere Between the second and ninth of August 2014, eighty-one Quakers between the ages of fourteen and seventeen, along with sixteen adult volunteers, met at Junior Yearly Meeting at Yearly Meeting Gathering in Bath to consider the theme: ‘The Changing Face of Quakerism – where are we going?’ During...
Letters - 22 August 2014
‘Homes’ for Gaza? During the second world war lots of people in Britain lost their home. We built pre-fabricated houses and although basic, difficult to heat and not built to last many were well cared for and became so loved that those living in them did not want to leave....