Latest News
Meeting for Sufferings: Quaker Life update
Restructuring in Quaker Life is largely complete and Rachel Matthews, the new head of supporting communities for BYM, offered an update on how the new arrangements in the department are working. She outlined what support was going to be available to Meetings, which included LDWs, Woodbrooke, and peer-to-peer networks. She...
Push to withdraw arms-linked pensions
Lancaster City councillors are calling on the Lancashire County Pension Fund to withdraw £8 million of investments made in companies that ork in areas of Palestine illegally occupied by the Israeli government. The move follows demonstrations last month when hundreds of protestors – including Quakers – descended on BAE Systems in Lancashire criticising...
Local authorities failing bereaved
A major report by Quaker Social Action (QSA) into public health funerals reveals that bereaved people are being pushed into unmanageable debt due to councils abdicating their legal duty and responsibilities.
Scottish Quakers welcome new MSPs
Friends across Scotland have been sending postcards to their newly elected MSPs highlighting their hopes for the future as Quakers.
Alastair McIntosh on climate threat
The Quaker writer and activist Alastair McIntosh highlighted the urgency of the climate threat at an annual talk last month. The Quaker academic spoke at the annual Adderbury Gathering of Banbury & Evesham Area Meeting, held online for the second year in a row, rather than its usual setting at...
Meeting for Sufferings: Welcome
July’s Meeting for Sufferings (MfS) – still online via Zoom – opened with the welcome sight of two clerks sat alongside each other. They were sharing a table at the new Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) hub in Leeds. It was part of how MfS is ‘continuing to innovate’, said Margaret Bryan,...
Meeting for Sufferings: Meeting dates
Early business was processed quickly and a consideration on Meeting dates was reached sooner than expected. Representatives will meet in person in October, with a residential in 2022. Other Meetings will remain online. But some Friends were concerned that there weren’t enough Meetings for the proper discernment of all matters....
Meeting for Sufferings: Young Friends at MfS
In this most recent triennium, MfS reserved four places for adult Friends under the age of thirty-five. Naomi Major, the Engaging Young Adult Quakers project manager, had consulted with young Friends on this experiment and reported back. Feedback was positive, she said, though a buddy system would have improved the...
Meeting for Sufferings: Trustees reports
Introducing her report, clerk to BYM trustees Caroline Nursey said that they had replaced their July weekend away with six online sessions. Trustees had felt upheld despite these constraints she said, thanking Friends. Becoming a Society that resisted racism had been one of the main matters, she went on, which...
Meeting for Sufferings: Simplification
Carolyn Hayman and Ellie Harding offered an interim report on five simplification workshops held during April and May. The workshops had summarised the thinking so far, with discussions on what brought people joy in their service. There was also an opportunity for Friends to suggest solutions for a simpler, more...