ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS & SIMPLICITY

Quakers have always been concerned with how their lifestyle impacts on the natural environment or contributes to injustice and conflict. Prominent 18th century Quaker John Woolman only wore undyed clothes because of his concerns over the dyeing process. In 1772 he said:

The produce of the earth is a gift from our gracious creator to the inhabitants, and to impoverish the earth now to support outward greatness appears to be an injury to the succeeding age.

Quakers today continue to strive to live simply. This might mean not using a car, refusing to fly, adopting a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle and resisting our comsumeristic society. Informed by available scientific evidence many Quakers also campaign for better environmental policies and for the rights of the poorest and most vulnerable in the world already affected by climate change.