V is for Vänner

Vänner – Friends – are what Quakers call each other. In John, chapter 15 verses 14-15, we read: “You are my friends if you will do all that I command you. No longer do I call you servants, because a servant does not know what his master does, but I have called you my friends, because all that I have heard from my Father, I have taught you” (from the Aramaic Bible in plain English).

In England, those who attend Quaker meetings but are not members are called Attenders. In Sweden we call them Vänners vänner, friends of Friends.