Fellowship of Reconciliation
The Fellowship of Reconciliation (FoR or FOR) is the name used by a number of religious
In the United Kingdom, the acronym "FoR" is normally typeset with a lower-case "o"; elsewhere, it is usually typeset in all capital letters, as "FOR", such as in "IFOR".
The FoR in the United Kingdom
The first body to use the name "Fellowship of Reconciliation" was formed as a result of a pact made in August 1914 at the outbreak of the
There were a number of people involved in the creation of the organisation, among them Lilian Stevenson, Pierre Cérésole, and its first secretary, Richard Roberts.[1] Stevenson later wrote up the first history of the organisation.[2]
To take that pledge forward, Hodgkin organised in 1915 a conference in Cambridge at which over a hundred Christians of all denominations agreed to found the FoR. They set out the principles that had led them to do so in a statement which became known as "The Basis".[3] It states:
- That love as revealed and interpreted in the life and death of Jesus Christ, involves more than we have yet seen, that is the only power by which evil can be overcome and the only sufficient basis of human society.
- That, in order to establish a world-order based on Love, it is incumbent upon those who believe in this principle to accept it fully, both for themselves and in relation to others and to take the risks involved in doing so in a world which does not yet accept it.
- That therefore, as Christians, we are forbidden to wage war, and that our loyalty to our country, to humanity, to the Church Universal, and to Jesus Christ our Lord and Master, calls us instead to a life-service for the enthronement of Love in personal, commercial and national life.
- That the Power, Wisdom and Love of God stretch far beyond the limits of our present experience, and that He is ever waiting to break forth into human life in new and larger ways.
- That since God manifests Himself in the world through men and women, we offer ourselves to His redemptive purpose to be used by Him in whatever way He may reveal to us.
Because the membership of the FoR included many members of the
The FoR had a prominent role in acting as a support network for Christian pacifists during the war and supporting them in the difficult choice to become
During the 1930s, the FoR's members included George Lansbury.[4]
The FoR was active in the anti-war movement of the 1930s, and provided considerable practical support for active pacifism during and after the
A history of British FoR from 1914 to 1989, entitled Valiant For Peace, was published in 1991.[5]
FoR remains active:
Currently, there are separate FoR organisations for England and Scotland, and for Wales. The Welsh branch is called Cymdeithas y Cymod .
The FOR in the United States
United States Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR USA) was founded in 1915 by sixty-eight pacifists, including A. J. Muste, Jane Addams and Bishop Paul Jones. Norman Thomas, at first skeptical of its program, joined in 1916 and would become the group's president. It was formed in opposition to the entry of the United States into World War I. The American Civil Liberties Union developed out of FOR's conscientious objectors program and the Emergency Committee for Civil Liberties.
The FOR USA claims to be the "largest, oldest interfaith peace and justice organization in the United States."[6] Its programs and projects involve domestic as well as international issues, and generally emphasize nonviolent alternatives to conflict and the rights of conscience. Unlike the U.K. movements, it is an interfaith body, though its historic roots are in Christianity.
The FoR in Canada
Among the first chapters in Canada were those established in Toronto by Richard Roberts in the late 1920s and in Montreal by J. Lavell Smith in the mid-1930s.[1]
Fellowship Europe
The Fellowship also has a European branch. In the post-World War Two period, the secretary of the European FOR was Pastor André Trocmé, known for saving Jews at Collège Cévenol during the Nazi occupation of France.[7]
Religious Peace Fellowships
Since 1935, FOR has helped form, launch, and strengthen peace fellowships of many faith traditions to form a network of faith-based nonviolent action. Membership of these peace fellowships has changed and grown over the past decades; what follows are fellowships that are currently affiliated with FOR:
- Adventist Peace Fellowship
- Baptist Peace Fellowship
- Buddhist Peace Fellowship
- Catholic Peace Fellowship
- Church of God Peace Fellowship
- Disciples Peace Fellowship
- Episcopal Peace Fellowship
- Jewish Peace Fellowship
- Lutheran Peace Fellowship
- Muslim Peace Fellowship
- Presbyterian Peace Fellowship
- Unitarian Universalist Peace Fellowship
See also
- Buddhist Peace Fellowship
- Fellowship Party
- List of anti-war organizations
- List of peace activists
- War Resisters' International (a more secular organisation).
Footnotes
- ^ ISBN 0-313-22565-6.
- ^ Towards a Christian International: The Story of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation,. IFOR, London. 1929.
- ^ "The Basis on the FoR (England) website". For.org.uk. Archived from the original on 20 July 2007. Retrieved 24 August 2016.
- OCLC 246898140.
- ISBN 0 900368 40 3.
- ^ "Fellowship of Reconciliation - For a World of Peace, Justice and Nonviolence". Forusa.org.
- ^ Thomas W. Currie, Searching for Truth: Confessing Christ in an Uncertain World.
Westminster John Knox Press, 2001
ISBN 0664501397(p.99 ).
Further reading
- Raymond Arsenault, Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006)
- Nicholson Baker, Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008)
- Vera Brittain, The Rebel Passion: A Short Biography of Some Pioneer Peacemakers (Nyack, New York: Fellowship Publishers, 1964)
- Derek Charles Catsam, Freedom’s Main Line: The Journey of Reconciliation and the Freedom Rides (Kentucky: University of Kentucky Press, 2009)
- Paul R. Dekar, Creating the Beloved Community: A Journey with the Fellowship of Reconciliation (Telford, PA: Cascadia Publishing House, 2005)
- Frazier, Nishani (2017). Harambee City: Congress of Racial Equality in Cleveland and the Rise of Black Power Populism. University of Arkansas Press. ISBN 1682260186.
- Joseph "Kip" Kosek, Acts of Conscience: Christian Nonviolence and Modern American Democracy (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010)
- Murray Polner and Stefan Merken, eds. Peace, Justice and Jews: Reclaiming our Tradition (New York: Bunim & Bannigan, 2007)
- Louisa Thomas, Conscience: Two Soldiers, Two Pacifists, One Family – A Test of Will and Faith in World War I (New York: Penguin Press, 2011)
- Walter Wink, ed. Peace is the Way: Writings on Nonviolence from the Fellowship of Reconciliation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2000)
External links
- Official website
- Archives of the Fellowship of Reconciliation (England) and Fellowship of Reconciliation (London Union)
- Selected material from the Fellowship of Reconciliation included in the Peace and Internationalism Digitised Collection on LSE Digital Library
- Ahimsa Farm collected records from the Swarthmore College Peace Collection