posted by Kathy
Beeston Quakers will be meeting in Chilwell Memorial Hall for the next month - and possibly for a long time to come. The hall seems to meet all our needs so we're trying it out, starting on Sunday 23rd October at 10.30 a.m. As always, visitors are welcome. Meeting for Worship lasts an hour and is mostly (sometimes entirely) silent. It is followed by notices after which we usually share hot drinks, biscuits and friendly conversation.
The memorial hall is at 129, High Road, Chilwell (near the turnings off to Cator Lane and Meadow Lane). You can find a map HERE.
Some people may find it strange that Quakers meet in a hall commemorating soldiers who died in the First World War but I think it right to remember all those who died in war. John Woolman, the 18th-century Quaker who refused to pay taxes for war, offers a more pertinent challenge. In his essay "A Plea for the Poor" he calls on Quakers to look at their own possessions and "try whether the seeds of war have any nourishment in them."
I think Beeston Quakers will also feel content that the original principles laid down by the trustees of the memorial hall included these:
“That the Institute shall be used as a club or place of assembly for the inhabitants of Chilwell and the neighbourhood and that in determining what persons or class of persons shall be entitled to use the Institute no regard shall be had to or distinction made on grounds of religious discrimination, political opinions or sex.”
I reckon that chimes well with Quakers' testimony to equality.
