Issue 10-11-2017
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Thought for the Week: War is not the answer
At Remembrance, when the British nation’s focus is so intently on the fighting (mainly) men and the victories and prosperity they helped provide, even voicing another opinion – or wearing another colour poppy – can be an act of resistance. This is important to remember, because very often a large...
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Nuclear weapons are BAD, aren’t they?
Friends have always had strong and clear political messages. How we best engage with the political process is less clear. Do we prioritise communicating our established position with clarity, focusing on our tradition of witnessing, or ‘speaking truth to power’? This is an attractive approach, coming directly from our discernment...
Interview: Gillian Allnutt
As a poet, teacher and editor, Gillian Allnutt has been a clear, singular voice in British poetry since her first collection, Spitting the Pips Out, appeared in 1981. She followed that debut with other remarkable collections, her role as one of four editors of the controversial New British Poetry anthology of 1988,...
The white poppy
Most of us probably think we know what the red poppy stands for: but what’s all this about the white poppy? As summer turns to autumn and the month we give to ‘remembrance’ in this country, it’s a question that begins to need an answer.
Dust to Dust
When the dust has settled, and battle it is o’er, What say ye then o’ sons o’ men? What say o’ bloody war? The earth is torn and ravaged, young bodies lie around, The cannon’s roar is silenced, And sullied is the ground.
Conscience and dissent
Kansas City, Missouri was once the western frontier of the United States. The sprawling Mississippi flanks its border with the state of Kansas. It marks a boundary, the former division between the Northern states (the Union) and the slave-owning states of the South.
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Quakers send white poppies to Scottish politicians
Quakers in Scotland have joined with the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, the Peace Pledge Union, and the Edinburgh Peace and Justice Centre to send nearly 200 white poppies to Scottish MEPs, MSPs in the Scottish Parliament and Scottish MPs in Westminster.
Paul Oestreicher to give peace lecture
Quaker Paul Oestreicher will be giving the Lord Mayor’s Annual Peace Lecture on 13 November at Coventry Cathedral. The lecture is entitled ‘Justice and peace – can we have both?’
QUNO’s ‘Negotiator’s Toolkit’
The Quaker United Nations Office (QUNO) has created ‘A Negotiator’s Toolkit’ to support climate negotiators in their work to engage government officials with reasons for urgent, rights-based action on climate change.
‘Quaker Quicks’ for 2018
John Hunt Publishing is launching a new series of Quaker books, called ‘Quaker Quicks’.
Remembrance peace vigil
Friends will be among those joining a silent vigil on 11 November (11am to 11:45am) in London’s Trafalgar Square outside the National Gallery.
Banner kits
Northern Friends Peace Board (NFPB) member Allison Challen has put together a new set of one-person peace banner kits that include the fabric and instructions.
Peace and war
On Saturday 1 August 1914 the German kaiser telegraphed his cousin George V: ‘The troops on my frontier are in the act of being stopped by telephone and telegraph from crossing into France.’
Taking a stand
There have been many responses to the centenary of the first world war and it is worth reflecting, at this time of remembrance, on the distinctive perspective offered by Quakers.
Letters - 10 November 2017
Red and white poppies On 11 November I will be wearing both a red and a white poppy; white as a general declaration against all wars, the red, blood-coloured poppy as a reminder of physical damage to bodies and the red poppies native to the Flanders Fields. However, the wearing of...