Issue 26-07-2019
Featured story
‘The vase provided me with a symbol for exploring the fact of impermanence.’
It was our monthly mid-week Meeting for Worship. We were a small group: only three. The table, usually blessed on Sundays with a beautiful display of flowers, was bare, except for an attractive empty Grecian-style shallow pottery vase that stood on a hand-woven cloth.
Top stories
‘Some sought sanctuary in the Meeting house… The soldiers followed, continuing their onslaught’
This summer has been marked by a season of events commemorating what came to be known as the Peterloo massacre. On 16 August 1819, troops attacked a peaceful demonstration of 60,000 people in St Peter’s Field, Manchester, wounding and maiming over 600 and killing at least fifteen men, women and children. The peaceful...
‘At Glastonbury, it is clear that people feel able to be who they want to be.’
After a whole week at Glastonbury Festival it was very difficult to return to everyday life. I was hit by an enormous, irresistible wave of music, beauty and humanity, and my faith is stronger because of it all. I was left with the sense of a child who has just...
Words to conjure with
It’s OK – you don’t have to call yourself a Christian. That’s a word where too many difficult relations Are all too ready to drop in, some of whom You really wouldn’t want to meet for a coffee However many custard tarts were on offer.
‘Stop Being Reasonable: Six stories of how we really change our minds’, by Eleanor Gordon-Smith
At the end of anti-religious polemics, there is often the conclusion ‘since there is no evidence for religious belief, you shouldn’t have any – if you do, you’re irrational,’ as though that were straightforward. One is interested to find, at the end of her book about being rational, Eleanor...
Friends join call for tax justice
Quakers lent their support to Tax Justice Sunday this month, joining other churches in calling on businesses to ‘Say what you pay with pride’ amid increasing public concern about tax avoidance.
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Peace walk in Southampton
Quakers from Bournemouth Coastal Area Meeting and Hampshire and Islands Area Meeting joined around sixty people on an annual Peace Walk through Southampton this month.
Exeter Friends welcome local mosque
Exeter Friends invited the local mosque to an afternoon at the Meeting house this month as part of its commitment to supporting Muslims in the wake of the Christchurch shootings.
George Richardson Lecture
The Quaker author and academic Hilary Hinds, of Lancaster University, gave the annual George Richardson Lecture at Woodbrooke last month in which she spoke about her new work on early Quaker poetry.
Award for Quaker councillor
A Quaker local government councillor for the Green Party has received an award for proposing the first successful climate emergency motion in Europe.
QSA project hailed as ‘best practice’
A shared Quaker Social Action (QSA) project has been profiled as an example of ‘best practice’ in a report by The Children’s Society which looked at gaps in provision for young adult carers.
Letters - 26 July 2019
Blast from the past A letter in the Friend (28 June) questioned the desirability of maintaining historic Meeting houses. There are multiple reasons for doing so – not the least of which is that the stability that comes from maintaining historical connections fosters self-identity and enables groups to move forward with confidence. ...