Working Group on Right Relationship with Animals Annual Reports
The text of recently received Annual Reports are below, with the most recently received at the top and older reports below. To jump to a particular report, simply click the year listed below.
| 2016 Report | 2017 Report |
2017 Report
Our working group engaged in the following activities in the past year.
- Annual Session August 2016
- Offered Pendle Hill Pamphlet #440 for sale (Enlarging our Circle of Love).
- Provided vegan snacks during one of the Meeting for Business breaks.
- Offered animal face painting at the All Age Celebration.
- Filmed Friends talking about their relationship with animals and posted the video on our website.
- BYM Women’s Retreat
- Performed an amusing song during the Coffee House. Posted a video on our website.
- Meeting visitation
- Margaret Fisher led discussions at two more Meetings (for a total of fifteen so far) and continues to seek invitations to other Meetings.
Members of the working group have demonstrated very limited enthusiasm for meetings or email discussions.
Respectfully submitted,
Margaret Fisher (Herndon), Clerk
2016 Report
Our working group convened officially for the first time at Annual Session last year. Our mission is to stimulate thought and discussion among Friends about the effect that our food choices and other personal decisions have on the lives of animals and on the rest of the living world. We have come up with several ideas for starting the conversation.
- Adult Discussion sessions: Margaret Fisher has been travelling to meetings to lead discussions and would welcome invitations to the Meetings she has not yet reached. Pendle Hill Pamphlets will be publishing her manuscript this month (August 2016).
- Video series: We have created four very short videos which can be viewed through our working group web page. More videos are in progress.
- Plant-based meals: Vegan feasts at potluck time are a joyous way to break down misconceptions about meatless meals.
- Self-study: Our web page includes suggestions for engaging books and videos.
It is an interesting challenge to learn how to address the topic of food in a way that welcomes all to the discussion. We are finding that humor, story-telling, self-deprecation, and non-dairy ice cream are invaluable tools in this endeavor. The greater challenge has been in attracting people to participate in the discussion to begin with. Apparently there is no subject more likely to drive away an audience than “The Spiritual Nature of Vegetarianism!”
A logistical challenge has been in finding ways for our group to meet, given the distance to Interim Meeting where those few Working Group members present often need to attend the meetings of other committees. Two attempts at teleconferencing were not well attended.
