Once you give to God what belongs to God, there is nothing left for Caesar! Dorothy Day

Good Shepherd, you have a wild and crazy sheep in love with thorns and brambles. But please don't get tired of looking for me! I know you won't. For you have found me. All I have to do is stay found. Thomas Merton

"If someone enquires about the Quaker faith and what it means, Friends are inclined to describe the version they know best. However...within the world today, Friends exist in several quite distinct and divergent forms: Conservative, Evangelical, Pastoral, Liberal, and Pluralist."

"Do unto those downstream as you would have those upstream do unto you." Wendell Berry

“As humanity stands on the precipice...perhaps it is only the deepest form of surrender and the spiritual empowerment and fearlessness that this can bring, which will enable us to make the right choice...” Tangled Roots: Navigating the Complex Legacy of Early Quakers, p.83

My dear hearts, be faithful every one in your particular measure of God's gift which he hath given you. Margaret Fell, 1654

Like the ancient prophets, we are dispatched back to the good work entrusted to us. It is the work of peace-making. It is the work of truth-telling. It is the work of justice-doing. It is good work, but it requires our resolve to stay it... Walter Brueggemann

“The principle on which worship (in the Pauline churches) was conducted seems to resemble the one followed by the Society of Friends, who have no set form of worship, but who gather together in silence in the presence of God, waiting for individual members of the congregation to be stirred to speak”

There's a reason the prophets so consistently connect idolatry and social justice: In the end, idols will always demand things of you that you can only give them by exploiting other people. Kaitlyn Schiess

"Beware of anyone who describes a human being as something other than a human being." George Monbiot

The first Friends believed that they were living in the same Spirit that had inspired all the holy people in the Scriptures. This meant that they didn’t just read the Bible, they entered into the narrative and acted it out in visible and embodied ways in their lives. Tangled Roots, p.73

Early Friends concluded that communion with the risen Lord must be substantially the same as that enjoyed by the first disciples - a fellowship in which he teaches his friends. Doug Gwyn

"The cross is an eternal reminder that evil always goes too far, and because it goes too far it contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction." Raphael Warnock

"You may shoot me with your words, you may cut me with your eyes, you may kill me with your hatefulness, but still, like air, I'll rise!" Maya Angelou

"[It] certainly provides an accessible introduction for those looking for texts for students or to get a decent overview of this tradition." Dr. Paul Hedges – British Association for the Study of Religions Bulletin, 148 (May 2026)

“…as a teaching tool this may well be a useful resource to get a sense for students of not only what Quakerism is in terms of it as a tradition but also how this actually works out, at least ideally, in the lives of Quakers.” Dr. Paul Hedges – BASR Bulletin, 148 (May 2026)

Digger, Gerrard Winstanley and Quaker, James Nayler seem to have drawn inspiration from the same stream of 17th century radical Puritanism.

A tree is known by its fruit; a man by his deeds. A good deed is never lost; he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love. Saint Basil the Great

When you forgive somebody, when you are generous, when you withhold judgment, when you love and when you stand up to injustice, you are, in that moment, bringing heaven to earth. Rob Bell

...the metaphors of a temple of living stones and a body with many parts points in the direction of an ecological perspective... Tangled Roots: Navigating the Complex Legacy of Early Quakers, p.47.

"The prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures and Jesus in the Gospels... denounce the use of religion to sacralize unjust privilege and to ignore the needs of the people." Rosemary Radford Ruether - Prophetic Tradition and the Liberation of Women

"No one can be authentically human while he prevents others from being so.“ Paulo Freire – Pedagogy of the Oppressed

“We all too often have socialism for the rich and rugged free market capitalism for the poor. Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God's children” Martin Luther King Jr.

The faith and practice of the first generation of Friends combined a complex mix of characteristics that presented future generations with a set of creative tensions to be negotiated and interpreted. The Quaker Faith: Friends of Love and Truth, p.28

"Action is the antidote to despair." Joan Baez

“Competition is the law of the jungle, but cooperation is the law of civilization.” Peter Kropotkin

"Your 'yes' to God requires your 'no' to all injustice, to all evil, to all lies, to all oppression and violation of the weak and poor..." Dietrich Bonhoffer

Anabaptists and Quakers have been united in their opposition to the entire Christendom system and their desire to return to the vital and simple faith of Jesus, the apostles, and the earliest Church as this was described in the New Testament. The Historic Peace Church Contribution

All the diverse expressions of the Quaker faith in the world today look back to the founding mothers and fathers of the Quaker movement for inspiration... they each interpret this received tradition in quite different ways, emphasising some characteristics at the expense of others.

To be truly radical is to make hope possible rather than despair convincing. Raymond Williams