Version française Nederlandse verse – in translation

Epistle of Belgium and Luxembourg Yearly Meeting, 2nd to 4th May 2025

To Friends everywhere, greetings!

We met in the peaceful surroundings of Chant d’Oiseau, Brussels on Friday evening and felt welcomed into a safe place that allowed us to explore the theme of our Yearly Meeting, which was: “Freedom in a fearful world”.

We welcomed representatives from the Yearly Meetings of Britain, Ireland, Germany, and also from FWCC, EMES and QUNO.

Any worries over unfamiliarity that we may have brought with us were quickly dissolved by the carefully planned friendly opening activities and the way in which our linguistic differences were attended to by giving translations, both spoken and written.

On Saturday, after a short Meeting for Worship, Antoinette Van Mossevelde, a teacher and engaged Christian who has worked in different parts of the world, told us of her rich experiences. She distinguished rational fear, which alerts us to real threats; and deep emotional fear, which can be used by the powers that be; and two different dimensions of freedom, both of which Jesus showed us: “freedom from” and “freedom for”. We do well to be free from the restrictions of tradition and from inner conditioning; and thus free for the possibly unexpected actions to which the spirit leads us.

A mindful sharing session opened up space to speak of our fears, and the meditative movements of ZhiNeng Qigong helped our awareness of our mind-body-spirit relationship.

Friends from Ghent, part of our Yearly Meeting, introduced their active concern around our Peace Testimony. They wish to raise consciousness, and support others particularly in Eastern Europe, around such themes as freedom for conscientious objection. Different embodiments of the testimony were expressed, and new avenues for action were opened for future consideration. For example, “Walking the second mile” can be understood as more than just being patient or forgiving.

We participated in an activity called “Deep Democracy”, which involved hearing many voices and perspectives. There was much lively conversation around how we might use this technique.

Later on, we experienced a session around “embodied worship sharing” practised in German Yearly Meeting. Seated silent worship was mixed in with gentle standing movements. This reminded us that we bring our bodies as well as our hearts and minds to our worship.

We leave with a renewed sense of the importance of embodiment for understanding both our fearfulness, and our freedom to act compassionately towards ourselves and other beings.

Signed: Jeremy Lester, Stefanie De Koker, Nick Rendle, Clerking Circle, 4th May 2025, Brussels Submitted by epistle drafting committee: Simon Grant, Carmel O’Hara and Antoine Habiyambere.