Quakerism – Peace, Equality, Simplicity and Truth

Not Enough Peace?

This week is Quaker Peace Week, I went to the Quaker Meeting House in Leicester last night (6 October 2010) for a taste of peace with two Peaceworkers. One was my former colleague, Daniel Edge, who left the Forum last month having completed his 12 months with us. Despite this he is currently on a national tour of Meeting Houses sharing his experiences of being a Peaceworker and working for the Christian Muslim Forum.

The evening began with an introduction to the core values of Quakerism – Peace, Equality, Simplicity and Truth – hopefully values at the heart of both Christianity and Islam. And these moving words, ‘love is at the heart of existence, all are equal before God’, again with resonances in both faiths.

Daniel told us of his journey that has included both Quakerism and Islam, from his first encounter with an elderly Quaker relative who recited al-Fatihah (the opening chapter of the Qur’an) to him and his wife on hearing of their conversion to Islam to bursting the seams of the Hertford Friends Meeting House when the local Muslim community were offered a space for prayer. He also shared how he was inspired by the words of George Fox, ‘appreciate that doubt and questioning can lead to spiritual growth; take time to learn about the experiences of others.’ Through this comes ‘a greater awareness of the light that is in us all.’

He shared his experience of leading our Safe Spaces programme, some of the highlights were:

• Organising a church-masjid (mosque) exchange in Newcastle
• Our Men’s Retreat in June
• One of our Muslim friends telling us that ‘dialogue has to go beyond cucumber sandwiches and samosas’

Chris Walker one of the new intake of Peaceworkers told us about his placement with the ‘Alternatives to Violence Project’ which helps people to deal with conflict without resorting to violence. He shared the truly disturbing statistics that the UK has twice as much interpersonal violence as the global average and that 27% of women have been victims of domestic violence.

Questions and Comments

• Where can one go for a good presentation of Islam for non-Muslims? – ‘Understanding Islam, the First Ten Steps’, Chris Hewer; ‘Unveiling Islam’, Roger Du Pasquier, trans. T. Winter
• Are there resources for inter faith relationships? – http://www.interfaithmarriage.org.uk/resource_packs/Resourcepack.pdf
• How to avoid the burden of feeling the need to apologise for violent distortions of one’s faith – this is an ongoing peace project for us all

Julian Bond
Director
Christian Muslim Forum