Special events over the Christmas period

Posted onAuthorCentral England Quakers

Is your meeting holding an extra Meeting for Worship, or skipping a week, over the festive period? Are you holding a different special event? Please let us know so that we can publicise it here next week: website@ceaqm.org.uk

We already know about several special events over Christmas and New Year:

Special Events

  • Friends' Cinema at Barnt Green & Redditch Quaker Meeting House on 21/12/2024 at 7:00 pm

  • Friends' Cinema at Barnt Green & Redditch Quaker Meeting House on 27/12/2024 at 2:30 pm

Next Thursday (21st Dec) will be the last newsfeed of 2023 – we will take a break over the festive period (while our website administrator is away) and will return in January 2024. The CEQ Office will be contactable as usual up to and including Thursday 21st December. The office will then be closed until Tuesday 2nd January.

But, do Quakers celebrate Christmas? This reflection on the Quakers in Britain national website gives some helpful insights:

Early Quakers did not observe Christmas nor mark other ‘times and seasons‘. They believed that no day was more holy than any other, and believed that each day, and all of life, was sacred (Quaker faith & practice 27.39 and 27.42). Today, as with so many things in the Quaker community, there is a full spectrum of practices and responses.

There are those who do the full Christian event to mark the birth of Jesus with candles, carols, presents and Christmas pudding, and others who will observe simply and quietly. There are also those who will choose not to mark this Christmas season in any way, but who nonetheless give daily witness to their faith.”