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204
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1 Important initiative to put the matter of the relationship between BYM
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2 the charity and AM charities. There's a request from BYMT to AMT to
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3 feed back to them about this [ref. Agenda paper]. Online meetings
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4 planned for May. Heading towards an MoU between BYMT and AM Trustees,
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5 by the end of 2021.
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6
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7 Note that Wales is actually going ahead with a merger at the Charity
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8 level!
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9
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10 Assisted dying: Deep sense of worship and care in the meeting
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11
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12 control of the body; we don't have a settled view;
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13 unravelling the tangled web around how we die in this country is not
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14 best started by pulling on the end labelled "legalise assisted dying"
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15
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16 Punt [with support for palliative care and the Hospice movement]
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17
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18 'Overseers' and 'Elders' -- AM encouraged to experiment with
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19 alternatives both to names and to the structure itself.
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20
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21 Yearly Meeting Gathering 2021: Booking information coming soon, bookings open
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22 in June
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23 AM to be ask facilitate opportunities for fellowship, f2f if possible
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24 3 weeks, intensifying in wk2
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25 YM itself 30 Jul/6--8 August
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26
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27 Theme: For our comfort and discomfort: living our
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28 testimonies of equality and truth
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29 (Privilege and Climate Justice)
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30 1) Responses to racism;
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31 2) Working on our responses to gender diversity;
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32 3) Faith-based actions in support of climate justice.
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33
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34 YM 2022: Unchanged at 27--30 May Friends House
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35
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36 Workshops coming soon on reorganisations towards a Simple
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37 Church/Simple Charities
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38
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39 Jeffrey Dean: We can't go on as we did before, only meeting online,
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40 but We need physical community sometimes _as well_.
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41
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42 Tradition vs. traditional_ism
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43
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44 [HST: My experience as I come to the end of 6 years on Sufferings
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45 And the wide range of sources from which I've heard the same
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46 thing
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47
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48 By a series of well-meaning, and individually not unreasonable,
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49 steps, we have arrived at a point where Meeting for Sufferings
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50 is no longer fit for purpose. Not so much because we're doing a
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51 bad job at what we've been asked to do, piece by piece, but
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52 because our business has grown and ramified to the point where
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53 it is almost never the case (today's sessions on assisted dying
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54 being a notable exception) that the full power and value of a
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55 gathered meeting for worship for business are being brought to
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56 bear.
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57
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58 So I was very pleased to see what I take to be the most
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59 important sentence in the paper before us:
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60
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61 "The Working Group considered the core functions from first
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62 principles, setting aside our understanding of existing
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63 structures."
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64
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65 I hope almost _nothing_ will be off the table as we start
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66 consideration of possible new approaches to the governance of
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67 the Church and the Charity. What I mean by 'almost' is that the
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68 place of Yearly Meeting in session as the ultimate worldly
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69 source of authority for BYM is not, at least for me, at issue.
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70
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71 But _anything_ else, particularly wrt the Church, and what is
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72 delegated to what bodies by BYM when it is _not_ in session,
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73 needs to be rethought again from the ground up and the top down.
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74 Sufferings obviously have a key role to play in this, and our
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75 dissatisfaction with our current situation now needs to turn
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76 into an energetic contribution to fixing it, even if this means
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77 laying ourselves down in our current form (or indeed with our
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78 current name).]
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79
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