Your First Time in Quaker Meeting
This leaflet can be given to newcomers before they attend and is also useful at other outreach events. It describes what to expect at a Quaker meeting, offering some ways to settle into the stillness and an explanation of ministry. It highlights that all are welcome to Quaker meetings and that worship may have many forms. It suggests some next steps for newcomers.
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Your First Time in Quaker Meeting (PDF)
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order form
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'Simple. Radical. Spiritual.'
This leaflet explores how these three words capture important elements of Quakerism: simplicity in how we live and worship, and the radical expression of faith in action, grounded in our spiritual experience.
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'Simple. Radical. Spiritual.' (PDF)
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More materials are available on the Outreach materials page
Quakers support the LGBTQIA+ community
"Quakers are an inclusive faith group. We believe everyone can equally access the divine. We were the first church to affirm LGBTQ+ relationships. We campaigned for the right to marry same-sex couples in religious settings before it became legal in 2014."
This A6 card gives some information about our welcome for LGBTQIA+ people.
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Quakers support the LGBTQIA+ community (PDF)
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Advices & queries
Advices & queries is intended for use in our meetings, for private devotion and reflection, as a challenge and inspiration to Friends both in their personal lives and in life as a religious community. It is a concise expression of Quaker faith and practice and is readily available to enquirers and to the wider world. It forms the first chapter of Quaker faith & practice but is also available separately. Copies of Advices & Queries are available to give to newcomers in a standard format, in a large-print format and bilingually in English and Welsh.
You can find the whole text
online
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Getting Ready for Quaker Worship
"For Quakers, worship (sometimes called Meeting for Worship) is at the heart of what it means to be a Quaker. It is and is the source of inspiration and the root of action in the world. It is also a shared experience that is probably different from what is normally associated with the word 'worship'."
This booklet explains in some detail how to prepare for attending Quaker worship, including what to expect when you arrive, and ways to find a way into the stillness. It also describes what spoken ministry is and what happens after worship.
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Getting Ready for Quaker Worship (PDF)
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The Quaker Way
"Quakerism is a way of life, rather than a dogma or creed. It rests on a conviction that by looking into their inmost hearts people can have direct communication with their Creator. This experience cannot ultimately be described in words, but Quakers base their whole lives on it."
This leaflet gives information about how Quaker attitudes show themselves in certain ideas and practices, personal and collective. It explores some of the elements of Quakerism as a way of life.
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The Quaker Way (PDF)
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Journeys leaflets
There are four leaflets in this series: Quaker faith, Quaker worship, Quaker community and Quaker living. For each topic, there are quotes from Quakers.
The leaflets are also available as videos at www.quaker.org.uk/journeys
Quaker faith
"For Quakers, faith is about their direct and inward experience of what is most real and true for them. It is also about how this experience transforms the way they live. They believe that the deepest experience is best found through stillness and waiting rather than liturgy or ceremony; that it is something to be lived out rather than described or defined by creeds. Quakers try to be 'open to new light', from wherever it may come. This means that Quakers are open to the new opportunities and possibilities offered to them by their own experience."
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Quaker faith (PDF)
Quaker worship
"Worship is the root and source of all that it is to be a Quaker and a Quaker community. It is the strength and inspiration for all they do. Quaker worship is a shared activity and it is an experience quite unlike any other. In worship Quakers gather to open themselves to the strength and the guidance they need to live in the world. They seek a sense of connection with their own inner selves, with each other and with their deepest truth. They bring their whole lives and the world around them into this time, and they try to see it – and themselves – with new clarity. In worship Quakers seek a place beyond words or thoughts, where hearts may be open, challenged and inspired."
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Quaker worship (PDF)
Quaker community
"In Quaker communities, people of different views and experiences find themselves accepted and valued; difference and diversity are celebrated. Because equality is so central to the Quaker view of the world, the Quaker community is one in which all are encouraged to share tasks and responsibilities. There is no formal hierarchy and each voice has equal value and weight. Being a Quaker is a shared experience. Together, in community with others, Quakers find support and encouragement, seek guidance and inspiration, and open ourselves to new insights, ideas and possibilities."
Download Quaker community (PDF)
Quaker living
"For Quakers, faith is about the whole of life. It is something to be 'lived out'. They seek, in their own lives and with others, to build a fairer, more truthful and more peaceful world. Throughout their history Quakers have worked to build peace within hearts and lives, within families and communities, and between groups and nations. They continue to do this today. They recognise the preciousness and value of every life. This compels them to find ways of building peace, even in the darkest and most difficult of times and places."
Download Quaker living (PDF)