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Quakers in Dialogue - QCCIR conference - April 2012

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Tuesday 10 April to Thursday 12 April 2012

This mid-week Conference will be hosted at Woodbrooke by the Quaker Committee on Christian and Interfaith Relations (QCCIR).

As a working conference, we shall be seeking to examine and deepen our understanding of Quaker relationships with those whose faith practice is based in other Christian and non-Christian ways of life. Helped by invited participant speakers and using our own experience, we hope to reflect on, for example, the language we use, the contexts in which we meet one another, and the scriptural, moral and cultural understandings that underpin for each of us our approaches to the mysteries of daily living.

Outline programme

The conference runs from lunchtime on Tuesday 10 April until lunchtime on Thursday 12 April. It is designed to both hear and respond to prepared contributions offering different approaches to Quaker dialogue, and also to share participants’ own experience of dialogue.

Our aim will be to produce initial conclusions about distinctive ways in which Friends relate to other faith bodies and people. For example:

  • How are we answering the Jewish community when they challenge our boycott of Settlement produce?
  • What do we say when fellow-Christians ask if we are saved?
  • How do we react when shamed by the universal hospitality of a Sikh Gurdwara?
  • How do we talk with an observant Buddhist who admits to no god and no soul?
  • Can we frame a set of Quaker responses that matches up to the growing public debate on faith issues we see in the media today?

As well as hearing our speakers there will be discernment sessions in the programme to focus the Conference’s work.

Participant speakers

  • Robin Bennett (Ludlow, QCCIR Clerk)
  • Marigold Bentley (QCCIR Secretary and QPSW)
  • Nick Clifford (Manchester, QCCIR)
  • Peter Colwell (Secretary for Church Life and Inter Faith Relations at CTBI)
  • Eoin McCarthy (Malvern; also founding member of Quakers and Business)
  • Colin McKenzie (Warrington)
  • Stuart Masters (Woodbrooke)
  • John Myhill (Wymondham, QCCIR Assistant Clerk)
  • Linda Pegler (Sutton Coldield, QCCIR Assistant Clerk)
  • Chas Raws (Heswell)
  • Janet Scott (Cambridge)
  • Richard Seebohm (Colchester QCCIR)

Bookings are to be made directly with Woodbook Quaker Study Centre, telephone: 0121 472 5171 or email: enquiries@woodbrooke.org.uk

Further information from the Committee via Friends House, telephone: 020 7663 1060