M&O April 23 Update

20/04/23 07:43 Filed in: SBQM Update

April is a busy month around the Meeting - as indeed March was! Amy and David’s Meeting for Worship at which they will marry is a particularly delightful event to which we have all looked forward. And many of us will be attending parts of or indeed the whole of Ireland Yearly Meeting in the middle of April, either in Tallaght or online.

We are also delighted as a larger Meeting to be supporting Friends in Hillsborough Meeting, which has now established itself as a Worship Group. Many South Belfast Friends have been, and will continue to be, closely involved with Hillsborough and the next stage on its journey.

Reaching out is also an important focus of the M&O team, seeing how we support all Friends and Attenders at South Belfast, helping - along with the new Clerking team of Kate Fletcher, James Nelson and Lorna Burke - to keep everyone connected and feeling at their spiritual home.

Connection too is important in reaching out to those for whom our community can be a support. So we are for example seeing how we can encourage more Friends and Attenders to set out their “My thoughts” on our website, to increase our dialogue and let others understand how we seek to live out our Quakerism. If you have something you would like to share, please do talk to us.

And in the Meeting House, where so many people visit during the week, we are planning some simple posters, to explain what we are about.

And we feel that we need as a community to have a Quaker banner, to use when we enter the public space, at larger meetings and events. These are not frequent, but we do need to stand up and speak out at times, so we need to be prepared.

The Ministry and Oversight team - Felicity, Jonathan, Ian, Kerry, Marie, Michael, Sylvia and Will

SOUTH BELFAST QUAKERS

Quakers (or the Religious Society of Friends as they are also known), have held Meetings for Worship in Ireland since 1654. After a previous failed attempt to establish a lasting Belfast Meeting around 1665, the first permanent Belfast Quaker Meeting was established in 1799, and in 1810 it moved to Brewery Lane, now known as Frederick Street. It wasn’t until 1956 that a second Meeting was approved for Friends who lived in Belfast, this time based in the south of the city. South Belfast Meeting House is an active Meeting with approximately 45 adult members and attenders who worship together each Sunday. Children & Young People also play a large part in our meeting, and we have on average 22, 1-18 year olds joining us for the last 10 mins of our worship, after their own activities.

Meeting for Worship takes place at 10.45am each Sunday at our meeting house ( see address and directions on the contact page )

Alternatively you can join us on Zoom with the following details:

Meeting iD: 4613195026
Pass: 143412

South Belfast Meeting is part of the larger Ireland Yearly Meeting (see details of Quakers in Ireland below)