Messages

  • A Surgeon, Not a Band-Aid

    “When we make efforts to not cause conflicts within our congregations so as to diminish the pastoral benefits that religious community, ritual, and teaching can offer — under the fear that discussing likely contentious and challenging issues will create rifts in our communities — we risk simply offering a Band-Aid when what is actually required is a surgeon. We do not create rifts when we address the lived reality of our congregations; we simply uncover the rifts and conflicts which were already extant.”

  • Margaret Fell, Mother of Quakerism

    “I want to articulate the yoked spiritual legacy of George and Margaret Fell Fox, who married in 1669. This seems to me to be the holistic approach to Fox’s life and legacy, for he did not journey alone. His partnership with Margaret meant the world to him, shaped his thought, and had a profound impact on the development of the Religious Society of Friends. George and Margaret represent the origin of the river called Quakerism. […] George would not have been anywhere near as influential as he was without his longtime relationship and eventual marriage to Margaret Fell. This spiritual marriage uniquely molded early Quakerism.”

  • You Are Not Responsible for Others’ Happiness

    “Each of us is responsible for our own actions and our own reactions. We are not responsible for someone else’s actions and reactions. This is very important for women especially because most women have been taught that they are responsible for the happiness of everyone in their family. They are taught that all family unhappiness and discord is their fault. But responsibility rests within each individual.”

  • Some Hearts Are Only Reached by Motherly Counsels

    “In Friends’ meetings also, from the fact that everyone is free to speak, one hears harmonies and correspondences between very various utterances such as are scarcely to be met elsewhere. It is sometimes as part-singing compared with unison. The free admission of the ministry of women, of course, greatly enriches this harmony. I have often wondered whether some of the motherly counsels I have listened to in our meeting would not reach some hearts that might be closed to the masculine preacher.”

  • Our Quaker Foremothers

    “As we grow in solidarity with one another, enriched by how we express our faith, we will all be enabled to surmount the cultural, economic, and political barriers that prevent us from discerning and following the ways in which God leads us. We honour the lives of our Quaker foremothers as patterns which help us recognise our own leadings. Their commitment, dedication, and courage remain as worthy standards. May our lives be used as theirs were to give leadership to women everywhere to be vehicles of the love of God.”

  • The Vital Work of Caregivers

    “There is much work to be done which is not paid, but which is vital, desperately undervalued and undertaken to a large extent by women. I refer, of course, to caring for children and/or elderly disabled relatives and homemaking. The work itself is often hard, stressful, mundane and repetitive, unseen and unacknowledged, with low status. We need a transformation of our attitudes to this work, giving it all the esteem it deserves.”

  • Mother Love Is One of the Greatest Powers

    “Mother love is one of the greatest powers, and it’s universal. Mothers of all creeds and colours, religions and no religions, whatever government they are under, desire the best for their children. I thought we might use that great link between mothers to help break down a little fear and mistrust.”

  • Imagine Mary’s Breasts

    Imagine Mary’s breasts, / warm brown as the earth / pale gold as the moon, / the breasts of a young girl / ripe as perfect plums.

  • How Quaker Women Made Decisions

    “Quaker women in history have a reputation for being bolder and more publicly visible than their contemporaries, being involved with preaching and publishing from the very beginning of the movement. Until the end of the 19th century, however, the members of the main Quaker decision-making groups were men. Female Friends were considered spiritually equal, but there was vocal opposition to giving them any earthly authority.”

  • A Sisterhood of Dissent

    “Decisions about nuclear weapons and about military things in general, they’re all taken by men. It seems right that it should be women [protesting].

    I began to have visions of women walking down the road with our banners and our placards. We walked from Cardiff, the capital of Wales, to Greenham Common. The press were not interested. We had to do something more dramatic, and we decided to chain ourselves up to the gates of Greenham when we got there. We had to stay a night, and another night, a week two weeks… gradually, the support did come in.

    It was the biggest women’s demonstration ever, I think, in this country.”

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