Being a Quaker : a guide for newcomers

I have not been going to church; as a Christian, that is not good and yet, it is probably worse to turn up as a conscript, rather than a willing volunteer. When I found an advert (in Private Eye!) For some information upon the Quaker movement, I thought that this was a good opportunity to see if

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this was a new start.

The book is well written and, for a religious work, pleasingly bereft of preaching. In fact, that is almost part of the problem (for me): Mr Durham paints a picture of an religion without prejudice - it does not matter if one is black or white, male or female (so far, so good) it also seems not to matter whether one believes in God or not. This seems to be just a little too liberal, for my tastes, and sadly, I do not envisage that I shall be taking this any further. This makes reviewing the book a little tricky - it is, as I said previously, well written and, I feel sure, an accurate picture. The Quakers come across as decent people and the knowledge of their belief system makes me feel more sympathetic towards them, it is simply that I do not feel it to be my path. It is a pity that the Church of England cannot be as open: I cringe each time I hear the powers that be telling me that they want to open the ranks of the clergy to women, but that we must allow those who want a male vicar to chose to be bigoted! I guess that I'm just hard to please.

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