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Friend or servant, servant or friend
Henry_ Being a friend and being a servant are the names I have for how I take part in the world. They overlap like patio windows. When the window is wide open, the two panes fully overlap and the view through them is clear. My friend or servant song comes from the discourses in John’s Gospel. The discourses are about love, but also about the practical action of daily life. ‘What a friend we have in Jesus’ sings Aretha Franklin or ‘Your own personal Jesus’ sings Depeche Mode, ‘Reach out and touch faith.’ ‘I shall no longer call you servants,…
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Let’s Play!
Reham Bestawi Play is not a luxury. It’s essential for life, something we are entitled to carry throughout every moment of our waking lives.I am aware this is easier said than done, especially considering the deep grief I carry for the destruction of my homeland Sudan, and the violence inflicted on my people, and my white-hot anger for the ongoing genocide of Palestinians. When I experience joy, there’s a heavy weight of guilt that looms over me.‘How can I experience joy while people, my people, suffer?’ I become stifled. Coming from a place of suffering, however, I have found radical…
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Write for us!
Call for Submissions – Bad Apple 10 – deadline 15 August 2025 Themes for Issue 10: Direct Action, Care and Youth We are looking for writing and artwork of various styles (up to 1000 words) such as poetry, essays, drawings, stories, collages, prayers, sermons … You don’t have to be an experienced writer or artist to submit your work. We are happy to collaborate and support you to bring your ideas to print Bad Apple is a space for honest and nuanced conversations around faith, religion, politics, grassroots organising, intersectionality and relationships Some suggested themes for this issue: To submit…
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Write for us!
Call for Submissions – Bad Apple 9 – deadline 31 March 2025 We are looking for writing and artwork of various styles (up to 1000 words) such as poetry, essays, drawings, stories, collages, prayers, sermons … You don’t have to be an experienced writer or artist to submit your work. We are happy to collaborate and support you to bring your ideas to print Bad Apple is a space for honest and nuanced conversations around faith, religion, politics, grassroots organising, intersectionality and relationships Some suggested themes for this issue: To submit or ask us questions, email: badapplemagazine@protonmail.com
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Interfaith Work in Rojava
By Jo and Nora In October 2022, Jo travelled to Rojava, as part of the Water for Rojava committee, visiting co-operatives and representatives of the women’s movement and other economic, water and education structures in the region. Water for Rojava is a campaign initiated by the Solidarity Economy Association that has so far raised over £150,000 for vital water projects and women’s co-operatives in North and East Syria, a region currently facing a catastrophic water crisis as a result of Turkish state policies and damming of rivers upstream. Turkey is also currently waging a new large-scale military war against the…
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To all the gods I loved before
Towards a theory of anarchotheism An I used to talk to plants. I have a distinct memory of when I was about seven, holding the leaves of a flowering bush at school, talking to them. I would imagine that the plants would have emotions or even sentience, would hurt when they were plucked or harmed. This might sound a little silly, the sensitivity of a child that didn’t know better, but that is also the point: what lives and moves and has its being beyond our empirical world, beyond the grasp of cold rationality and naturalism, is also often what…
Interfaith Blasphemy Activist Spirituality
Bad Apple Magazine 