At the 2018 Annual Sessions this year, there will be a booth during free time and dinner time on Thursday and Friday where Resource Friends will be available to talk with you about their work and what they might be able to support for you and your meeting. They will also be offering workshops on Friday and Saturday. Resource Friends help our community thrive by providing support in specific areas of concern in our monthly and quarterly meetings. They offer a diversity of gifts and an extensive “how-to” knowledge-base. [Read more…] about Resource Friends at Annual Sessions!
Communications & Outreach
2018 Philadelphia State of the Meeting
Name of the Meeting or Group
Monthly Meeting of Friends of Philadelphia [Read more…] about 2018 Philadelphia State of the Meeting
EMIR Healing Center ministry supported by Green Street Monthly Meeting
Green Street Meeting’s Quaker Social Change Ministry group in support of EMIR Healing Center is having a “Fill a Bookbag” drive to gather school supplies for 85 children participating in the center’s programs this year.
EMIR stands for “Every Murder is Real.” The center, in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia, was founded by Green Street member Victoria Greene, after her son Emir was murdered. Victoria has spoken about the work of EMIR Healing Center in keynote addresses at PYM Annual Sessions and the FGC Gathering, as well as in a QuakerSpeak video.
Murder is devastating to families. Children risk falling behind in school or being unprepared due to the traumatic emotional and financial consequences of murder. Parents and caregivers may still be struggling with grief and trauma long after the incident. The ministry support group is pulling together backpacks with school supplies for the children, so their families have one less thing to worry about.
You can help by writing a check to Green Street Friends Meeting, memo EMIR Fill a Bookbag, or shopping an Amazon wish list and having the supplies shipped directly to EMIR Healing Center. The ministry support group will assemble the backpacks in August. Learn more at http://greenstreetfriendsmeeting.org/emir.html.
2018 Buckingham State of the Meeting Report
Buckingham Monthly Meeting
Annual Report to Bucks Quarterly Meeting
May 20, 2018
Held at Camp Onas – Ottsville, PA
The last year has been an exciting and spiritually nurturing one at Buckingham Monthly Meeting. We recorded 62 adult members and 23 minor members (including 2 new members), for a total of 85. There was one death.
Most notably, our Meetings for Worship and First Day School have been enriched by new attenders—multiple young families with children. We try to be welcoming toward new attenders, and our post-meeting gathering—our snacks have now expanded to be nearly a brunch each week—also helps to facilitate meaningful connections. Our attenders, some of whom have become members, have shown exceptional willingness to participate in all aspects of the life of the meeting, as well as finding new ways to get the rest of the membership to be active.
Meetings for Worship have been peaceful and gathered, perhaps more quiet than in the past, with consideration of appropriate messages by Friends in attendance clearly evident. We held meeting for worship outdoors in the graveyard on several Sundays during the summer under a large shady tree. Members have been providing rides for older Friends who are no longer able to drive to meeting themselves. A few power outages also found us worshipping in Buckingham Friends School, which we thank for its hospitality.
Numerous programs outside of worship have also brought our faith community closer together. Our monthly informal “Quaker Conversation” adult programs have continued, and our Social Concerns committee has facilitated other engaging events, including a performance by the META Theater group and a guest speaker from the Peace Center. We frequently seem to have so much going on that it is difficult to schedule committee meetings to get our work done. Unfortunately we were not able to sustain our Games Night this year, but are looking forward to find other ways to gather and socialize.
This year we laid down our formal newsletter (or at least it went on a well-deserved vacation), but communicate more regularly through two different Google email groups, one for general Meeting business or announcements and one for social concerns and activism. We also maintain our web site at www.buckinghamfriendsmeeting.org and Facebook page, which attract inquiries from the wider community. Internally we completed an evaluation of our property manager, and continue to be led in business and spirit by our co-clerks, Pam Caprio and Bethann Morgan.
Last year’s Peace Fair, which we host under the care of Quarterly Meeting, was again very successful, with a record number of exhibitors. The Peace Fair committee is now a standing committee of Bucks Quarterly Meeting, and asks that every meeting try to contribute a member, or at least provide a point of contact within their meeting. Last year there were more volunteers at the Fair from the Quarter than ever on the day of the Fair. The 2018 Peace Fair is on Saturday, September 22.
Our First Day School is a hive of activity every week with new children, whose parents are attending regularly. Committee members have been rotating teaching duties so as to not put too much responsibility on one individual, but we are actively considering hiring a paid teacher to expand our program while letting parents stay in meeting to worship. Our efforts to reach out and stay connected to our college-age Young Adult Friends have resulted in several applying for full adult membership.
This year our meetinghouse will be 250 years old! Caring for our National Historic Landmark property is always a challenge, particularly financially. We applied for and received one grant from PYM’s Quaker Buildings & Programs Granting Group to repair our roof, but were unsucessful in securing another to help strip our shutters of centuries of built-up paint. Our all-volunteer effort to renew the wooden cap on our graveyard wall continued, and now over half of the wall is completed. The many storms we had last winter wreaked havoc on trees all around our property, some of which fell in the graveyard and damaged the wall. We discovered that it is possible to make insurance claims that will cover some of the removal and repair costs, and that doing so does not raise our premiums.
Our relationship with Buckingham Friends School has continued to be strong. It is very helpful that the clerk of the school board, Michael Godshall, is a member of our meeting, but we (and other meetings) have not yet filled our quotas for membership on it. While the school continues to be challenged by enrollment and budget considerations, they have hired a new permanent head for next year, Paul Lindenmaier, who will help take them in a new direction (and who is a Quaker).
2018 Bristol State of the Meeting Report
Bristol Friends Meeting Annual Report
Presented at Quarterly Meeting – May 20, 2018
Camp Onas, Ottsville PA
Bristol Friends Meeting membership continues to be low. We have had a few meeting with six or eight folks attending, but that is the exception. Many meetings have had just three people. We are happy to see a new Quaker couple has moved into the borough, and look forward to them joining us in worship. We continue to gather once a month, usually on the second Sunday, for worship followed by our business meeting.
It was approved by the Quarter that Bristol Friends become a preparative meeting under the aegis of Fallsington Meeting. This move reflects the reality of our current situation and provides needed financial oversight for endowments and accounts in Bristol Friends’ care. The members of Bristol Friends thank the Quarter and Fallsington Friends for their loving concern and generous help.
Jim Fine continues as our treasurer, currently performing his duties from far away Iraq. Although halfway across the world, his quick responses and active involvement in our affairs makes it feel as if he is still here in Bristol. We wish him safe travels and look forward to his July return.
Bristol Friends collected many bags of warm clothing, including coats and jackets. These were passed along to families who had fled to our area from Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria.
We worked locally promoting peace and non-violence in cooperation with the Peace Center. They presented an anti-bullying program in the Bristol schools.
Paul Shaffer attended the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting gathering of clerks at Hockessin Meeting in Delaware. The clerks spent time working on examples of microaggressions and institutional racism.
Going forward, Bristol Friends Meeting will continue working with the clerk’s committee on small meetings to explore ways to increase our outreach effectiveness. And finally, this October, Bristol Friends will have an extra special event held during Historic Bristol Day…
Historic Bristol Day dig! Researchers from Bucks County Community College and Bristol Cultural and Historical Foundation are conducting ongoing excavations in Bristol borough. It is just possible that our yard is untouched over the past three hundred years. The public would be invited to participate in the archeological dig. Who knows what we could find?
Respectfully submitted,
Paul Shaffer, clerk
2018 Bucks Quarterly Meeting State of the Meeting Report
Annual Report of the Clerk
Bucks Quarterly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
Presented to Bucks Quarterly Meeting
May 20, 2018
Held at Camp Onas, Ottsville, PA
The Bucks Quarterly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends continues to be an active and sound part of its Members and Attenders religious, spiritual, social, political, educational and economic lives.
Our Meetinghouses have the financial support to keep open their doors and to improve facilities. Southampton has been able to reopen first day for worship. Bristol has received new support from Fallingston Meeting as it has become a Preparatory Meeting under its care. The Quarterly budget once again has proven that we are currently sustainable, as Friends have met their obligations and responsibilities.
I believe a fine example of the attention to the religious and spiritual needs of the Quarter was the success of the Spiritual Formation Group which involved 14 members from many Meetings – more than were expected.
Singing and reading groups were organized. A group attended an aptly named Trenton Thunder baseball game. Many attended the showing of the movie “Quaker Oaths” for a great success. Our poets contributed to and did well in a regional contest. Newtown Meeting invoked a scavenger hunt to explore its history.
Politics and government concerns have played an especially important part in many of our lives. Changes and upheavals in policies that are important to Friends have led to disappointment, frustration, calls to action, anger and even depression. We were shocked and heartbroken over more gun violence. Individuals, committees and Meetings are working to find ways to express feelings and opinions as they look to find appropriate paths to seek truth and justice.
Our Quarter has struggled to find the right way to make and to take corporate action regarding a request to endorse a Minute on Korea from Newtown Meeting. We were reminded by Yearly Meeting about the importance of seasoning minutes of action and have experienced the difficulty of communicating among ourselves in a timely and rightly ordered fashion. I believe this process will need more exploration and development. I also believe that this exercise gave me the chance to see how different Meetings looked at the proposed Korea Minute. All agreed with the basic sentiment of encouraging diplomacy and avoiding war. However, there were enough differences to show that we, as Friends, should not allow ourselves to be caught up in “group think”. It is not fair to assume “all Friends” might be in favor of any one particular action such as boycotts or sanctions, for example. However, as a result, we were not as a Quarter in unity with the Newtown Minute as written.
A few other notes of vitality and interest:
The Quaker School at Horsham reported a very healthy enrolment and much positive feedback from its community; the elevator at Friends Home is completed; children have been an important part of fund raising for refugees and animals and recreational needs for Rwandan children at Quakertown, Lehigh Valley, and Wrightstown Meetings.
- Solebury and Fallingston Meetings organized hugely successful clothing and furniture drives as many help in our continuing support for refugees.
- Buckingham Friends sponsored a sobering and important look at women’s prisons via a presentation by the Meta Theater group.
- We have seen structure support for the Peace Fair increase as a Committee guide entered the Quarter Handbook.
- Well known speakers such as Eugene Sonn and Paul Chappell have been invited to address Friends.
- Quarterly Meetings have gone “off campus” to United Friends School and Camp Onus.
- Quakerphernalia has now become electronic except for a few which are still sent or delivered.
In conclusion, it is very important to note that our coordinator, Holly Olson experience a year with health challenges. We are grateful for the hard work that she continued throughout her treatment. And, we are also grateful for the support that so many gave to help her doing this time.
Respectfully submitted,
Rick Dow
Bucks Quarter Clerk
2018 Fallsington State of the Meeting
Fallsington Friends Meeting Annual Report
To Bucks Quarterly Meeting
May 20, 2018
Held at Camp Onas, Ottsville PA
This past year Fallsington Friends Meeting continued to grow as a close, loving community. Grounded in worship, we support each other in our individual and Meeting-wide ministries and are an active presence in our local community. We have paid renewed attention to our nominating process, strengthened committees and worked to avoid burnout. Nurturing spiritual gifts and sharing leadership roles have been central to this process.
This past year we completed moving all our investments to Friends Fiduciary, reaching a long-held goal of screening and greening our money. As a result of this work, more financial resources are available to support charitable causes and address long delayed maintenance of our buildings and grounds.
Our membership continues to grow. We welcomed three new members, and are blessed by the presence of new attenders. Our inreach and outreach are supported by public events and our adult classes, including an on-going study of PYM’s new Faith and Practice and “Meeting for Healing,” a powerful practice of holding in the Light and laying on of hands. We enjoy singing at the close of worship (we put the “sing” in Fallsington!) and sharing lunch each Sunday.
We have wrestled with ways to reduce disturbance to worship by late coming. We affirm that worship begins at 11 am, and ask Friends arriving after to wait to enter until the children leave at 11:15 for First Day School. This practice of waiting has caused distress to some Friends, but has led to deep discernment about caring for each other and our commitment to our worship life as a community.
In January a concern to provide winter clothes for people moving to our community from the hurricane destruction in Puerto Rico lead to an unforeseen outpouring of local community support. Our Meetinghouse became the collecting point of 80 bags of clothes! Sweaters, hats, socks and more covered the benches as volunteers sorted and prepared for donation. Clothes were also available to people coming to Bucks Food For Friends, a monthly shared meal for those in need held at the Meetinghouse.
Other concerns of our Meeting and individual members have been:
- Climate change
- Mindfulness Meditation
- Earth Quaker Action Team
- Middle East peace
- Bucks Peace Center
- Refugee aid
- Mercer St. Friends Center
- Heifer International in Bangledesh
After careful discernment, and the support of Bucks Quarterly Meeting, we agreed to take Bristol Friends Meeting under our care as a Preparative Meeting. We are supporting Bristol Friends in caring for their finances and Fallsington Friends have attended Bristol Meeting’s worship.
As we look to the coming year, we feel a strong concern to attract more families and grow our First Day School. We hope to make deeper connections with the Hispanic Community, working with them on issues of racial profiling and deportation. We also want to be allies with those in Trenton, NJ who are working on issues of racial injustice, mass incarceration and poverty.
We are both soothed and challenged by our worship and community life. We find comfort in our close Meeting friendships. We seek to deal lovingly with diversity and conflict, and to grow from it. We encourage each other to seek the Spirit and go deeper in faith, as were challenged in our recent intergenerational Easter program to “roll away the stone!”
Jonathan R. Snipes
Clerk
2018 Germantown State of the Meeting
The Process
Germantown Friends Monthly Meeting 2017 State of the Meeting Report
In response to the January 9, 2018 call from Philadelphia Yearly Meeting’s Quaker Life Council, we undertook an examination of the state of Germantown Monthly Meeting (“GMM”). Following is our report, which we submit with gratitude for having been led to engage in this meaningful process.
In gathering the information for this report, the Meeting decided to involve as many members and attenders as possible. We recognized at the outset that simply appointing an ad hoc committee, or convening the committee clerks, to write the report would not allow us to arrive at a right and true spiritual assessment of our Meeting. Over a period of several months the Meeting undertook the following:
On January 31st, 2018, all committee clerks met to discuss the strengths, challenges and future aspirations of each committee. This group of about 25 people decided that each clerk would meet with their committee to discuss these questions and then provide a summary of the state of their committee.
- The next phase of the process was a meeting-wide Retreat on March 10. Sixty-five members and attenders participated. This daylong event included group activities such as singing, games, a shared meal, and breakout groups to discuss the queries provided by Yearly Meeting. After lunch each breakout group reported its findings to the larger gathering for discussion.
- On March 17th there was a follow-up Adult Class, with focus on the query about how the meeting helps its members prepare for worship.
- The Standing Nominating Committee created and sent out a survey to assess interest in committee service and to learn of any concerns.
- The clerks’ committee reports, summaries of our discussions at the Retreat and the Adult Class, minutes from the 2017 monthly Meetings for Business, and letters and concerns from individuals were summarized in a draft report. Penny Colgan-Davis (clerk of Meeting) then convened a group consisting of Becky Johnson (recording clerk), Karen Lightner (clerk of Worship & Ministry), Ed Nakawatase (clerk of Racial and Social Justice), David Mettler (clerk of Standing Nominating Committee) and members Ruth Seeley and Moira Clare Duggan, who reviewed, supplemented, and edited the draft.
- The report was sent out to all members and attenders on May 9th and discussed in Meeting for Business on May 13th.
- On May 27th there was a follow-up discussion and final meeting to approve the report. The Queries
What are the challenges to and opportunities for enhancing the worship of our Meeting, and what are we doing to address these? And what opportunities are provided to address topics important to deepening both personal spiritual journey of member and the spiritual life of the Meeting?
As with many Meetings, the drop in general attendance has been challenging. Some of our older members recall 60 years ago needing to arrive early on First Day in order to be guaranteed a seat; today, we fall far short of filling the room. In a meeting room that can sit 400, a weekly attendance now of 45 to 55 imparts a feeling of emptiness and a lack of vitality; the echo quite literally makes it harder to hear one another’s testimony. This decrease in attendance has had a ripple effect on many aspects of the Meeting, which will be addressed later in this report.
Despite these challenges, much has been done to enhance the worship of our Meeting, expand on the spiritual life of the Meeting, and to promote attendance.
- 5th Sunday – Three or four times a year there are five Sundays in a month. Like some other Meetings, GMM uses 5th Sundays as a way of experimenting with or providing a different format for Meeting for Worship to help revitalize attendance. During the past year we have used bible stories, singing, meeting outdoors, exploring how other religions use sacred music in their service, and had a special meeting for worship led by our Young Friends.
- Quaker Basics – On consecutive weeks in the fall of 2017 we held short informative sessions after Meeting for Worship for new attenders and anyone else who wished to participate. Meeting members gave short presentations on worship, the testimonies, how Quakers do business, the work of committees, Quaker alphabet soup (local and national organizations like AFSC, PYM, FGC, FCNL, etc.) and invited questions and discussion.
- In light of decreasing attendance, we have experimented with roping off part of the meeting room and asking everyone to sit closer together. We have also met in our committee room, which is much smaller than our meeting room. Some Friends felt the worship was deeper and more gathered when we sat physically closer. Many Friends commented that they could hear better, and some felt the group seemed larger and more vital. We have not, however, reached unity about making any significant change, as some Friends feel strongly about the historical connections to the meeting room, or that roping off a section could be perceived as unwelcoming.
- The Worship & Ministry and Care & Visiting Committees held their annual joint meeting and discussed William Taber’s Pendle Hill pamphlet, Four Doors to Meeting for Worship. We then used the pamphlet for an all-meeting read and discussed it during an Adult Class.
- Once a month during Meeting for Worship and Meeting for Business, we read one of the twelve queries from Faith and Practice.
- Our vital Adult Class program addresses diverse topics that both deepen our spiritual growth as individuals and as a faith community; many of the topics are listed under the anti-racism query.
- Our annual “Bring a Friend to Meeting” month encourages members and attenders to invite friends, family and acquaintances of like mind to worship with us.
What is most needed to strengthen the communal witness of the Meeting to the local community and beyond?
We have an active Outreach Committee which sponsors many programs and events. In group discussions at the Retreat we acknowledged that we could be doing more, both with respect to Germantown Friends School (“GFS”) and the larger Germantown community. The Meeting needs to grow and sustain membership to be able to continue outreach. We need to learn how to become more open and welcoming to all kinds of visitors and seekers. Our hope is that, as we become more diverse, GMM will be more welcoming to the Germantown community.
Ways in which we have sought to strengthen our ties with GFS have included a jazz concert featuring GFS jazz bands, and a GMM outreach table at the school’s Fun Day. To help us maintain a connection with our older and treasured Friends, each year we plant and maintain a vegetable garden at Wesley Enhanced Living, a local continuing care facility formerly known as Stapeley Hall. Our Outreach Committee, in cooperation with individuals from nearby Green Street Monthly Meeting, held a Germantown Summit to which we invited “Men Who Care of Germantown” and several other organizations for a chili lunch, fellowship and discussion, and will sponsor the event again in June. Several members have become very involved with the John B. Kelly Elementary School in Germantown, where fifteen volunteers now provide library classes and activities for the 650 students. Looking outward to the greater Philadelphia area, last year GMM joined POWER (Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower and Renew) on the recommendation of our Racial and Social Justice Committee. Our Outreach Committee prepares and serves an annual breakfast for families staying at the Philadelphia Ronald McDonald House.
In addition to the corporate community events and relationships formed by the Meeting, many of our members and attenders are engaged in work for Germantown and Philadelphia-area non- profits and community groups confronting issues such as food insecurity, youth, housing, parks, and the arts. These individuals draw strength from and are nurtured by our Meeting just as we are enriched by their participation and ministry.
What specific issues of concern has your community experienced in the past year? What threshing, dialogue and or discernment has your community recently experienced regarding the purpose and importance of membership?
Racial inequality and racism continue to be weighty concerns for this meeting. Please refer to other sections of this report for a description of our ongoing work in this regard.
As noted above, attendance at Meeting for Worship has dropped over the last ten years or so. Likewise, attendance has decreased in our First Day School and Young Friends programs. For the second year in a row, we canceled the yearly Meeting Retreat at Camp Swatara. There has been much exploration by the various committees on how to best address this. Cogent questions raised are, “Whose role is it to promote the importance of membership?” and “What are the benefits of being a member?”
The total membership of GMM is 393 (this is not an accurate representation as many members do not live in the area and this number does not include regular attenders). On any given 1st Day as mentioned earlier we have approximately 45-55 attending, this is down from a few years when it was closer to 65-75. There are 117 members and attenders who fill approximately 230 committee positions. In recent years, as membership and attendance have declined and the outside pressures of time, family, travel, and other commitments increase, the Standing Nominating Committee has found it difficult to fill some of the open positions. We must address how we will continue the work of the Meeting with fewer individuals. We are truly grateful to all those who serve so diligently on committees; however, during this assessment process we heard that some feel marginalized and left out. Wishing to ensure that no one feels excluded from committee service, the Standing Nominating Committee quickly sent out a survey to the membership regarding this concern. We ask ourselves: Do we adequately call upon and utilize all of our members’ and attenders’ wealth of talents and skills? Have any committees become stale, and are any in need of a fresh point of view?
Germantown MM has served as an official sponsoring meeting alongside Green Street MM for Quaker Voluntary Service Philadelphia for a number of years. Recent years, however, have been disappointing as meeting members and Fellows have not felt connected or supported. There does not seem to be one specific cause for this deterioration, but a confluence of differing personalities and events have conspired to erode the relationship. The 2017 QVS Fellows sent a minute to the Meeting relaying their experience of coming to meeting and certain things they noticed that made them feel uncomfortable. Worship and Ministry invited the fellows to come, meet and discuss their concerns, and later invited them for a picnic at a member’s home. While W&M thought the issue was resolved, in actuality, communication just stopped and the gap was not bridged. In 2018 the Fellows have been even less receptive to invitations from Germantown community members to participate in the life of the meeting. In April, a called meeting with Mike Huber, the Program Director at QVS, allowed for members and attenders to publicly address this dissatisfaction. The sense of the meeting was to move forward from a place of love and care, rather than expect a transactional relationship in which success is defined by reciprocal exchange and benefit.
Other concerns we have addressed in our Meeting include:
Concerns raised in connection with FCNL, including letter writing campaigns; several Adult Classes dedicated toward what we see as priorities
Minute on the moratorium on fracking in the Delaware river watershed
Minute on the prohibition of nuclear weapons
A called meeting on racism (further described under the query on anti-racism).
What anti-racism work has your community engaged in or explored in the past year?
The Meeting has incorporated anti-racism work as part of its basic identity. The identity is still being forged and is not sustained easily. Through the commitment of Meeting members, it has been built upon several years of external activities, public events, historical presentations, as well as ongoing and sometimes painful internal discussions and struggles.
That extended process within the Meeting has resulted in a foundational document, the Meeting’s Declaration on Racial Justice; an increase in connections with local community organizations; participation in city wide and national coalitions on racial and economic justice issues; and during the past year, approval of a minute, since supported by the Philadelphia Quarter, on the impact of racism in our country and our obligation as Friends to address it.
The Adult Class Committee has focused consistently on racism and related topics, and has invited speakers and sponsored book groups, including:
- A book group on Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome by Dr. Joy DeGruy
- Sa’ed Atshan, Palestinian Friend, on the topic of Joining the Struggles against Anti-Semitism, Christianophobia, and Islamophobia: Reflections from a Palestinian Quaker
- Pat Bass, board president of Johnson House, discussing its renewed local activities
- Rochelle Bilal, president of the Guardian Civic League, the association of African American Philadelphia police officers
- David Mosenkis, POWER, analyzing the racial bias in the funding of Pennsylvania’s public schools and the efforts to remedy it
- The Racial and Social Justice Committee (RSJC) functions within the Meeting to deal with issues of racism and social justice. Their work during the past year has included the following actions:
Facilitated the membership and participation of the Meeting in POWER (Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower and Renew), an ecumenical citywide, congregational based social justice coalition of over 40 religious bodies - Co-sponsored and provided committee resources for Uprooted, a photo exhibit of Japanese American internees who worked in labor camps during World War II; the exhibit was organized by GMM member Teresa Maebori
- Dispersed Corporate Giving funds, administered by RSJC, as strategic support to the Ujima Peace Center initiative of the Friends of African Descent; financial support was also given to the Crossroads Women’s Center in Germantown, and other Friends and community based initiatives
- Helped facilitate activities after a special called meeting in May 2017, on racism among Friends; those activities included communications with public officials on the police shooting of an African American parent of a Germantown Friends School student.
To what priorities does God call our Meeting? How do our annual budget, our Meeting’s standing committees and other aspects of the Meeting’s life reflect those priorities?
We are called to increase our membership, with special focus on young adults and young families. We may be doing a good job of sharing our values, but that doesn’t necessarily attract people to membership. Also, we are called to examine whether we are meeting the needs of those people who don’t come back, or don’t stay.
Recognizing that our school is the biggest outreach we have — and feeling led to help GFS be an even better member of the community — we are called to strengthen our connection to our school.
We are called to increase the level of social activism among our members and attenders.
We are called to provide a spiritual home and community so that Friends are grounded and can go out in the world and do the work they are called to do. An important part of “walking cheerfully” is to be a model of true community and to support each other in our individual and corporate work.
We are called to examine whether our current committee structure needs updating, and whether we can reduce the number of committees and positions while still doing the work of the Meeting with efficiency and care.
The Quaker Life Council has asked how our priorities are reflected in our budget. In reviewing our annual budget, we see that 92% of it is spent on four large areas: scholarship assistance for Quaker education, PYM giving, taking care of our Meetinghouse and grounds, and running our office. Together, corporate giving, PQM support and childcare make up roughly another 6%. Each year our Meeting struggles to reach its financial goals; though we use what we bring in wisely, it feels at times that we are trying to live up to our past, when our membership was both wealthier and larger.
In Summary
Despite the drop in attendance and many other challenges we face, what we continue to witness is a vitality among the membership and committees to continue as a strong and vibrant community.
All total there are 25 committees and 13 individual appointments. There is no way that we can give justice to all the work that has been undertaken, beyond those committees mentioned above we would like to at least recognize them.
CARE AND VISITING for the pastoral care of our community
CHILDCARE, 1ST DAY SCHOOL, YOUNG FRIENDS for taking care of our youngest members and attenders
FELLOWSHIP and RETREAT COMMITTEES for their continuing efforts to build our community
PROPERTY COMMITTEE for stewardship of our physical home
MARRIAGE AND FUNERAL ARRANGEMENT COMMITTEES for guiding us through some of life’s transitions.
There is also the quiet behind the scenes work of ASSISTANCE COMMITTEE, BURIAL GROUNDS, COMMUNICATIONS WORKING GROUP AND SCHOLARSHIP.
OFFICE AND RECORDS for the daily running of our Meeting.
SCHOOL COM ITTEE for their service and guidance to the School
FISCAL, FUNDRAISING, TRUSTEES for managing all of our financial matters.
Special thanks to the individual appointments; for our Clerk, Recording Secretary, Treasurer, Custodians of Records, Coordinator for Refreshments and Closers and the many other appointments to Quarterly and Yearly Meeting.
2018 Frankford State of the Meeting Report
- What is the name of the person submitting this report? Jesse White
- In what role does the person submitting this report serve in their community? Clerk
- What is the email address of the person submitting this report? pigeonarts01@gmail.com
- What is the date that this report was submitted? 05/02/2018
What practices and strategies are employed by our meeting to help members and attenders of all ages prepare for worship—whether in meeting for worship or in meeting for business?
Frankford Monthly Meeting has strong leadership in our Clerk, who offers helpful reminders, queries, readings at the beginning of each Meeting for Worship with Attention to Business. For worship, we provide written information to newcomers about Quakerism and about what to expect in worship. We offer adult educational opportunities through Quakerism 101, informal dialogue, and spiritual discernment sessions on second Sundays. We greet visitors, attenders and members and model how to remain centered in worship. Children have a vibrant First Day School program each week.
What are the challenges to and opportunities for enhancing the worship of our meeting, and what are we doing to address these?
Our Meeting’s challenges involve: our small size – we often set unrealistic expectations of what we can accomplish together. We also have difficulty with keeping track of our commitments and protocols. Our opportunities for enhanced worship involve greater education for Meeting members and attenders. (Quakerism 101, coaching, welcome packets, and First Day School are examples.)
What opportunities are provided to address topics important to deepening both personal spiritual journeys of members and the spiritual life of the meeting?
Our opportunities to deepen spiritual journeys for members include: adult religious education through the promotion of Pendle Hill programs, our spiritual discussion group, Quakerism 101, sharing our afterthoughts following worship, and fellowship with refreshments together. We could be better at sharing information around meeting news and sharing copies of Faith & Practice.
What is most needed to strengthen the communal witness of the meeting to the local community and beyond?
We feel a general sense that we are not doing enough to strengthen our relationship with the local community. Some members feel a great sense of overwhelm by our school/Meeting commitments which affects our ability to be more engaged with the local community. Others have a great desire to do more towards this effort, and have suggested ideas around our public presence, but these hopes feel insurmountable at this time.
To what priorities does God call our meeting? How do our annual budget, our meeting’s standing committees and other aspects of the meeting’s life reflect those priorities?
God calls our Meeting primarily to foster the care relationship with Frankford Friends School. We are in a process of clarifying our current care relationship and defining our hoped-for care relationship. As a small Meeting, many members feel called to this vital work, while many others feel overwhelmed with the responsibility. Our budget reflects our support of the school, providing tuition support and funding for Quaker Life educational programs. We have made commitments to pay for quality religious education for children and adults. We see opportunities for growth in our standing committee structure (our small numbers has made our standing committees pretty ineffective, and more often, individual members take on tasks and responsibilities as they are led), hosting events on our property for local community groups, and better supporting personal ministries/callings of Meeting members.
What specific issues of concern has your community experienced in the past year?
Our primary concern is the need to clarify and strengthen our membership application process. Also, our Meeting demographics have changed in the past 5-10 years and we have very few active elders in our community. We have a need for Meeting guidance and are considering asking for help from a wider Quaker community. Additionally, we need to practice how to speak our truths with respect and compassion for one another. Finally, we are actively considering our care relationship with Frankford Friends School, and if separately incorporating the school feels right at this time.
What threshing, dialogue and/or discernment has your community recently experienced regarding the purpose and importance of membership?
We have a great deal of work to do in the area of membership. Recent applications for membership were met with an unclear and extended process, and this resulted in rifts within our community. We hope to begin a dialogue around membership after we have sat with our concerns around our care relationship with the school, and after we have discerned if separate incorporation for the school is the right way forward.
What anti-racism work has your community engaged in or explored in the past year?
We have had limited anti-racism dialogue/training/work in our Meeting. We did have a called meeting in response to a request from PQM. At that meeting, we committed to educating ourselves further about anti-racism work but so far, have only had one discussion. We are aware that there are other resources in the Quarter that we could tap. We might also engage in some work with our local community which is quite diverse racially, ethnically, and religiously.
2018 Birmingham State of the Meeting Report
- Six Friends met to Worship Share around 3 queries, considered one at a time.
- Half were female and half male, representing points of view of young people, new Friends and attenders (4 years or less), and long time members (more than 20 years at Birmingham).
- Query 1: What practices does our meeting provide to improve or help us prepare for worship?
Ministry
- There was appreciation expressed for opening exercises, both the music and the ministry from various members and attenders of the meeting. The fact that everyone is welcome to give opening exercises and tell about their thoughts and experiences is something that draws the meeting together. It’s good to hear the queries and notice how responses may change over time. The silence beforehand prepares us to hear the queries.
- Singing helps settle the group, creating a common experience and connecting us in the worship that follows.
- There is an intention that Friends come to worship, which is important to the quality of worship. Some Friends come and settle early to prepare the space for worship as others gather. This helps set the tone for the worship that is to follow. We come into a space where it’s easier to settle.
- There is an openness and calmness to the silence that helps us to let go of our work and worries and to help us center. There is a feeling of connection with each other, rather on individual thoughts.
- Worship and Ministry Committee has been intent on keeping the meeting room as a space for worship. They have helped deepen our worship and remove distractions by encouraging us to end Meeting for Business 15 min before worship begins. They also have moved the Greeter’s table away from the door to the meeting room and into the hall, where the initial socializing doesn’t interfere with preparation for worship.
- Query 2: What could the meeting do better to improve our worship and the spiritual life of the meeting?
Ministry
- There is a desire for more adult education and discussion. Worship and Ministry has organized some discussions around videos or pamphlets, but there needs to be more of these opportunities. Hearing different points of view in discussions help push us out of our own comfort zone and expands our understanding.
- More intergenerational opportunities would give both young and old to learn from each other. There is much to learn from our young people.
- There was a desire by young and old to learn more about the Bible and the specifics of the stories. There was once a Sunday evening Bible Study that is missed, including the conversations and bonding that went on during that time. The youth did express appreciation for activities like the plays that reinforce the Bible and Quaker stories.
- There was a desire for the children to spend more time in worship. Fifteen minutes is not sufficient time for them to get the full experience of worship and the messages.
- Query 3: How does God call our meeting to witness to the needs of the world? What could we do better?
Ministry
- Birmingham Meeting as a meeting gives to local groups such as Friends Association as well as national Friends organizations. We hold two dinners each year where the proceeds go to charities. We do other fundraising and activities such as gardening at the Barclay Friends’ garden. Children participate in gardening, raising money for UNICEF with pennies for pumpkins, and activities that lead to donations for the children at Friends Association.
- Many individual members and attenders and groups within the meeting have leadings that help people in need, such as work with the homeless, the food banks, refugee support and prison work. These Friends provide inspiration and volunteer opportunities for others within the meeting and the wider community. Many Friends raise our awareness to ways we can become involved in letter writing, marches, and local action. The meeting is a touchstone to access information about these actions.
- We recognize that Quakerism is more than a religion, but a way of life. It leads to a desire to help the world, community and people in need.
- How could we do better? Some members and attenders who live at a distance would like to know more about local charities, centered in the West Chester community. Our meeting may want to focus our engagement in a single issue by discussion and witness. For instance, race relations is a topic that the wider Quaker community is focusing on. This would add another layer to our witness in the world.