ANNUAL REPORT 2014-15
Officers and Committee members | ||
Chairman: | Terry Lilley | |
Secretary: | Julie Crow | |
Treasurer: | John Rayner (until May 2014); Charles Rudd (from June 2014) | |
Rosemary Bennett (until November 2014) | ||
David Cryer (co-opted) | ||
Eileen Bostle | ||
Tony Thorne |
Committee meetings were held on 10 April and 13 November 2014
Membership: in April we had 23 paid up members. By November we had 15 active members and were still in touch with 9 other members who for various reasons were unable to attend meetings. One member resigned from the society. Some potential new recruits have attended one or more of our meetings.
Death: Sadly, our long serving Treasurer John Rayner passed away in May and many of our members attended his funeral on 12 June. The eulogy consisted of memories from many of us read out by our Chairman.
Resignation from Committee: Due to persistent ill health and with great regret our very long serving member and previous Secretary, Rosemary Bennett, had to resign from the committee. A small commemorative gift was presented to Rosemary in thanks for her immense contribution to Harrow Humanists.
Meetings Programme
Our programme of meetings and social events was advertised in local newspapers, on our website and in the Humanists UK e-bulletin.
Other activities
Several of our members attended the World Humanist Congress which was held in Oxford in August. Plenary sessions were held in the atmospheric Sheldonian theatre and there were also many multiple parallel smaller group sessions covering a wide variety of topics of interest to humanists. Some of these were led by well known people from academic and media backgrounds.
The theme of the congress was expressed by the adoption of the Oxford
Declaration on Freedom of Thought and Expression which has the following paragraph headings:
Humanists UK Group Representatives Annual Meeting (GRAM)
David Cryer and Terry Lilley represented Harrow Humanists at the Humanists UK GRAM at the Clerkenwell Centre, in November. There were excellent presentations about: the Humanists UK work at the UN Human Rights Council, reports from Humanists UK Groups country-wide, Humanist pastoral support at Guy's and St Thomas's, working with young humanists, Humanist celebrants and the work of the Humanists UK Dialogue Officer for engaging with faith and community groups.
Schools
Julie continues to represent Humanism on Harrow Standing Advisory Committee on Religious Education (SACRE). The Harrow Agreed Syllabus for teaching Religious Education is in the process of being revised and she has been asked to chair the Agreed Syllabus Conference (ASC) of the SACRE which is the body responsible for approving the new Syllabus.
In July two of us attended an RE presentation at Newton Farm Junior School in Rayners Lane. We had a stall and talked to parents and children about Humanism. The children presented audio-visual summaries of their RE lessons, and it seems they learn about Humanism in Year 6.
Coffee mornings
Informal meetings for general chat and exchange of views continue to be held on Tuesdays from around 10.30-11.00am in the upstairs café of BHS in St Ann's shopping mall, Harrow. Any members and friends are welcome.
JC April 2015