I have decided not to renew my subscription for two reasons:
1) There is a fair amount of theoretical discussion and underlying principles are usually clear in reports. This is excellent. But it is 'old hat': it is a 're-hash' of what we (ie my generation) were saying and doing in the 1950s and 1960s.
Does each generation have to re-learn from the beginning what its parents and grandparents taught it? (I expect we were repeating the ideas of those who lived through the First…
On 3 September, a London magistrate refused to grant a compensation claim of £300 demanded by the ministry of defence (MoD) from Catholic peace activists Ray Towey, 68, Henrietta Cullinan, 50, and Katrina Alton, 44.
Earlier, the three had been joined by 25 supporters for a time of prayer outside Hammersmith magistrates’ court before a three-hour trial.
The three activists offered clear and moving accounts of their peace actions at the MoD during Holy Week when they…
In the end I found it an engaging read, simply written, about complex ideas. He refuses to hedge words, to compromise in order to create allies, and in some cases he seems to have gone over the top, intentionally provoking friends and enemies alike.
Atzmon…
We live in a world of epidemic violence. And since the experience of humankind is that violence begets greater violence, which then begets even greater violence, we must resolve to eschew all violence. Can we make such witness without pain or sacrifice as regards ourselves or others? No, certainly not!
The situation in the world has become so bad that only by human self-sacrifice can humankind (and the rest of God's holy creation here on Earth) be saved. If this Earth is to be freed…
At the Catholic Worker we have a theory. If 1% of those who marched against the war were willing to go into nonviolent resistance to the point of imprisonment and the other 99% who marched were in proactive solidarity with these resisters, we could have, and still can, stop these wars.
It shouldn't be a case of resisters isolated in jail and the rest of us going home thinking because "we can do little, we can do nothing at all". In truth, we are neophytes to both serious nonviolent…
Fasting not feasting
[Activists over a range of issues can find themselves less than welcome at famous churches.]
RI Jeffrey reports: "Pacifism is a political attitude and it is not our job to support it." Thus said the Dean of York in refusing his permission for the York Pacifist Group to hold a fasting vigil inside York Minster, from 7pm on Christmas Eve until midnight on Christmas Day, as a protest against war and the use of violence.
Not to worry - and…
I suppose for me as a Christian activist Christmas is a particularly important time of the year. After all, the Christmas story focuses on the birth of a baby who was born into poverty, and whose parents were fleeing a repressive regime - lots of resonance there with stuff I'm concerned with.
When I first began to connect my activism with my faith, it gave Advent and Christmas a new meaning. Itís now a time when I take stock and really think about the meaning of the season.
I…
The idea began at the Friends Meeting House in Taunton in 1981. 11-year-old Jonathan Stocks felt the room where they held the children’s meeting needed cheering up. Anne was a professional embroiderer who had recently studied the Bayeux Tapestry. She had a vision of a Quaker embroidery - a series of panels each illustrating one event or idea from Quaker history. Each panel would be made (researched, designed and embroidered) by a different Meeting or group, but she would oversee the design…
From the first, the Quakers have taken a clear stand for peace and against military action. In 1660, soon after the movement’s founding, Margaret Fell, the Mother of Quakerism, gave her testimony: “We are a people that follow after those things that make of Peace, Love and Unity.”
The Quaker Tapestry, displayed in the Quaker Tapestry Exhibition Centre, tells the history of Quakerism. A new exhibition, Weapons of the Spirit, has been created in a small space within the main exhibition…
In February, “Unite for Peace”, a group of (mainly) Christian peace activists affiliated with the Fellowship of Reconciliation, gathered in Derbyshire for our twice-yearly meeting. This weekend was particularly special as it was our tenth anniversary – an opportunity to step back and think about previous gatherings and what it is that keeps us together.
We all live in different parts of the country and have busy jobs, and some of us have families too. It’s an effort to take time out…
We have the EDL [right-wing English Defence League] coming to a nearby town this weekend and I’m really torn about going to the counter-demonstration because we came very unstuck campaigning against the BNP in the elections. My young son and I managed to “intimidate” the BNP candidate into not attending the hustings at the local town hall, which was great, and very thrilling. Then we went home to our little council house on our own, and they got their own back. Stuff thrown at the door,…
On 7 March, Emdadur Choudhury, a member of “Muslims Against Crusades” (MAC), was fined £50 after being convicted of committing public disorder during the two-minute silence last Remembrance Day. Choudhury burned two large plastic orange poppies at an MAC demonstration in west London on 11 November. Khalid Mahmood, a Muslim Labour MP, described the fine as inadequate, saying: “We don't take it seriously enough, he hurt a lot of people. I really don't think it is acceptable to protest against…
150 students at a Catholic school in Colchester, Essex, walked out of lessons in protest after two girls were reprimanded for walking into a lesson hand-in-hand. After news of the protest spread on Facebook, over 100 teenagers staged a sit-down in the playing fields, carrying placards and singing: “We shall not be moved”.
A recent edition to the New Internationalist’s “No-Nonsense” book series, Symon Hill’s short guide to religion is a readable introduction to an often controversial and misrepresented subject.
Hill, a Quaker Christian who is the co-director of the Ekklesia thinktank and former media spokesperson for Campaign Against the Arms Trade, argues: “For every example of a link between religion and oppression, there is a link between religion and liberation”.
To illustrate the former he…
Fig Tree is a new initiative to engage the Christian community in Britain on peace and security issues. It aims to preach the gospel of peace in word and deed, and to build and support the Christian peace community here in the UK.
Biblically, the fig tree is a symbol of peace, security and prosperity with Micah’s vision of “everyone beneath their own vine and fig tree” perhaps being the best known example.
However, in Mark’s gospel, just before he overturns the tables,…
