The Annual Sessions 2020 workshop application proposals are now being accepted.
Please consider sharing your work and witness, as well as your gifts and skills with the yearly meeting at Annual Sessions.
Annual Sessions will be at The College of New Jersey from July 29 through August 2, 2020.
[Read more…] about Annual Sessions 2020 Workshop Proposals now being accepted
Inclusion and Anti-Racism:
Staff visits:
Find a letter below from the new PYM Ministry & Care Committee of Quaker Life Council. The letter went to our community on Tuesday, January 21, 2020, describing the value of Spiritual State of the Meeting Reports as the capstone to the spiritual self assessment process, and requesting engagement from all of the communities in our yearly meeting.
Friends are invited to submit state of the meeting reports by using an online form or by forwarding written reports to Zachary T. Dutton at zdutton@pym.org.
Dear Friends,
As one of its very first tasks, the new Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council has turned attention to the Spiritual State of the Meeting Reports. Friends may wonder why. We believe that the annual custom of conducting a spiritual self-assessment deepens and enriches our spiritual community.
These reports support monthly, quarterly and ultimately the yearly meeting in moving toward shared understanding of and greater obedience to Truth. Gifts and needs can be identified and shared through this process, both internally for each meeting and throughout the yearly meeting as a whole. Concerns expressed in the spiritual state of the meeting report can evoke support from and provide guidance to other meetings. With wider awareness of needs, more appropriate allocation of resources becomes possible at all levels.
Crafting a Spiritual State of the Meeting Report is a transformative opportunity for the meeting, and can serve to draw the community together more closely. Meeting members and attenders can profit from sharing their spiritual condition and relationship with the Divine and looking together at experiences that have enriched them throughout the year. Communication of felt needs allows meeting members and attenders to express their yearnings and learnings within the meeting community and to share them with the broader fellowship of the yearly meeting.
Issuing a Spiritual State of the Meeting Report detailing the process a meeting community undertook and the insights that resulted helps the wider Quaker community. When we see what others are celebrating, mourning, and witnessing across our yearly meeting, we can be inspired and moved in our spiritual development. We benefit when we learn we are not alone in our spiritual journey.
We continue to support the process outlined in 2018 by the Quaker Life Council for developing and sharing Spiritual State of the Meeting Reports:
• All monthly meetings are encouraged to craft a Spiritual State of the Meeting Report and forward it to their respective Quarterly Meetings.
• Quarterly Meetings are encouraged to craft their own Spiritual State of the Meeting Report and to forward it along with the reports of their monthly meetings to the Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council.
• Worship groups and any other communities that are part of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting may also submit a Spiritual State of the Meeting Report, forwarding it directly to the Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council.
• If desired, monthly and quarterly meetings can use this online form to submit their state of the meeting report, either by responding to the questions, or by inserting or appending your report to the form. Friends can also email their reports directly to the PYM office, or mail hardcopies to: Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council, c/o Zachary T. Dutton, Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, 1515 Cherry St, Philadelphia, PA 19102.
• The Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council will read every State of the Meeting Report that it receives and use the reports as a basis for its assessment of the state of the spiritual and religious life of our whole yearly meeting community.
• Based on these communications, The Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council will submit its own State of the Meeting report to QLC to be presented at the July 2020 Annual Sessions and then shared widely with Friends thereafter.
Friends may desire some direction in developing a Spiritual State of the Meeting Report. It may be helpful to consider the meeting’s journey in worship, religious education, witness in the world, preparation for worship and work, pastoral care, ministry, vocal ministry and also those operational processes which have been supports or stumbling blocks throughout the year. Meeting communities may also refer to the queries in our new Faith & Practice as a guide for conducting a spiritual self-assessment and for writing the state of the meeting report.
The Ministry and Care Committee of QLC is interested in the spiritual life of your meeting. In addition to the elements outlined above, we would be interested to learn of specific issues of concern your meeting has experienced in the past year. How has God led your meeting to face and address conflict and/or misunderstandings when they have arisen? How is your meeting community thinking about the purpose and importance of membership? Has the meeting undertaken any anti-racism work, large or small, that your meeting might be exploring? What are those learnings and yearnings particular to your meeting that you would be willing to share?
The Ministry and Care Committee of QLC plans to review state of the meeting reports in late May 2020; in order that the committee may provide a summary report to QLC in time for their June meeting, please submit your report by May 15, 2020. Meetings who have not responded to this invitation by that date may also receive direct inquiries from the Ministry and Care Committee of QLC in order that the experience of as many meetings as possible can be reflected in the Spiritual State of the Yearly Meeting Report. We acknowledge that every monthly and quarterly meeting has their own way of writing and managing their State of the Meeting Reports, and ask to receive whatever commentary best reflects the current spiritual state of your meeting at this time using the suggestions in this email as guidance where you find them useful.
Jean-Marie Prestwidge Barch, Clerk
on behalf of the PYM Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council
New staff! The Youth Programs team is delighted to announce that Crystal Hershey has agreed to serve as the Children and Families Program Assistant. While Crystal is a new addition to our team, she is a familiar face in youth programs and the PYM community.
[Read more…] about Youth Programs Team Updates: New Staff and An Invitation
Inclusion and Anti-Racism:
Staff visits:
Minutes prepared by Recording Clerk, Kri Burkander and approved in Sessions
PYM Continuing Sessions, November 2, 2019
We gathered back together in worship after our morning program, which grounded us in an appreciation for our gifts and our community, and nourishing fellowship over lunch.
[Read more…] about Afternoon Minutes from Meeting for Business at Fall 2019 Continuing Sessions
Continuing Sessions reporting is broken into two reports. This web story on the activities of the morning, and the full minutes of Meeting for Business, taken by Recording Clerk, Kri Burkander, with accompanying reports, all in PDF format.
Our day began with a short period of worship and an acknowledgement, given by Boone Murphy, that the Arch Street Meeting House land upon which we gathered is the ancestral homeland of the Lenape People. Amy Taylor Brooks, Clerk of Quaker Life Council, then welcomed Friends to Fall Continuing Sessions.
Zachary Dutton, Associate Secretary for Program and Religious Life, opened the morning session with Melinda Wenner Bradley, Youth Religious Life Coordinator, who led Friends in a Faith & Play story. The story was centered on the gifts that we bring to our meeting communities and how we are embraced by circles of self, our meetings, our Quarters, and our Yearly Meeting. We have other, overlapping circles, of family, community, friendships, and neighbors.
To tell the story, Melinda broke it into ten sections, which a multi-age group of volunteers read out loud. As is common with Faith & Play storytelling, hearing the words made them resonate more deeply, and a feeling of listening fell upon the community.
While pieces of the story were read, Melinda built a picture using pieces of colored felt and graphic representations of people to create a “big” version of the story on an easel for everyone to see.
As the narrative concluded, Friends felt its Truth.
Melinda broke the assembled multi-generational body into conversational groups of two and three asking them to share with each other those parts of the story that resonated.
Participants were then given an exercise – to draw or write about the Query – “What gifts do you have to share with your family, your friends, and your meeting community?”
People formed groups of five to eight people, and one by one, talked about their individual gifts. Some gifts mentioned were; service, music and singing, love, optimism, humor, gratitude, listening, truth telling, empathy, stewardship, writing, discerning, unconditional love, cooking, and recording.
As individuals in community, Friends were asked; “What gifts have you discovered and what gifts have you been given in your meeting?”
Stories emerged in conversations. One Friend told about how the leak of a meeting’s heating system, and the destruction of the floor, led to an investment that allowed them to rebuild the kitchen in addition to repairing the heating and the floor. It was an example of the gifts of community in solving the problem by creating a center of ‘oneness’ and acting together – from that center. Another Friend noted that their Monthly Meeting’s placement of them on a committee led to very meaningful work across all of the local churches.
As the morning exercise continued, Friends reformed in wider groups to consider queries related to gifts in their quarters, collaboratives, and within the Yearly Meeting body.
One Friend shared how she had been allowed to have dual membership – in both her original monthly meeting (now at a distance) and the one she was currently living next to. That same Friend noted how she brought the gift of the pre-retreat concept to our Yearly Meeting from her prior yearly meeting. Being embraced in two Friends communities allowed her a powerful sharing of good ideas from one to the other. A different Friend noted how the gifts of others had helped him move beyond his own status quo with respect to non-violent action. A fifth said she’d benefited from being part of a multi-generational community that allowed her to see how people could deal with aging throughout a long and rich life. She felt that being part of meeting members’ life journeys helped her to better understand how she should move forward in facing those same challenges.
The exercise closed with the reminder that gifts from others open us up to the vast diversity of life.
We bring to this work a willingness to listen, and by listening, know we are all part of something much bigger. When Friends go deep like this, they arrive at a ‘different place’ and individual differences tend to fade away.
Friends who participated in the morning’s activities noticed there is always a feeling of conflict between staying with the warmth and local connection of home meetings, versus heading to monthly, quarterly, or yearly meeting gatherings elsewhere and missing meeting for worship at home. Having the possibility of belonging to a bigger gathering makes the broader ‘Quaker meeting’ feel real. A Friend noted that she makes it a practice every August to visit other meetings, by worshiping with them, she can “feel the spirit” around the yearly meeting. She finds this very enriching.
Zachary Dutton drew the morning’s activities to a close by thanking Melinda for her work. He asked the group to help carry the deep and grounded feelings of the morning forward and to use the morning’s work to hold the “spiritual center” of our community during meeting for Business. We then entered into a period of worship during which several messages were shared. We then broke for lunch, during which families reunited, Friends mingled at tables and Bridge Contacts from about 25 meetings met to connect with each other and provide feedback to Olivia Brangan, Community Engagement Coordinator.
Meeting for Business convened after lunch–minutes taken by recording Clerk Kri Burkander and all written reports are available on the PYM website.
We closed our day with presentations from Middle School and Young Friends who’d spent the afternoon working with the query: “Who are we as Quakers.” They lifted up their own self-portraits—drawn on rolls of brown paper—and shared them with all assembled.
PYM’s youth, who attend Fall, Spring and Annual Sessions, are at the heart of the future of our Faith, and their self portraits are an example of sharing we hope that meetings across the yearly meeting will follow. So far, we’ve received two self-portraits from meeting communities; they are posted on our website. We hope there will be many more.
Friends then said goodbye to one another, checking in, sharing hugs and farewells. Early Friends used to ask: “How does the Truth fare with thee?”, and as we head into fall and winter holidays we hope that we continue to hear from Quaker communities who are counting numbers of Friends in worship ‘on the benches’ each Sunday, and offering more self-portraits posted to the PYM website. We also hope that more Friends will come to our Sessions, so that we have a center of strength and unity as we engage in our Faith and its practice.
Friends built contemplative spaces like labyrinths so that others can grow spiritually by interacting with it. Like the stones that shape this path, build a meetinghouse, or form a wall, gifts build our Faith community. Your gifts to PYM and your monthly meeting are necessary to Quakerism’s capacity to grow.
Quaker giving supports the human talent and infrastructure that make us function as a community. Covenant and annual fund giving translates to Quaker space at Friends Center, accounting that ensures fiscal wholeness, grant work, youth programs, Sessions, care and aging work, web management, and communications.
There is no right amount to give; gifts come in all amounts. An average first time gift is $91. The average PYM annual fund gift is $380 per year, (that is $95 per quarter or about $32 per month).
Analysis of monthly on-line giving through the PYM website (for Monthly Meetings) shows that people who make a one-time gift to their meeting will give about $400, but this rises to something like $700 if they make a gift in 12 monthly installments.
56% of the PYM’s annual fund comes from about 50 people; 44% comes from about 850 donors. Both are important.
People give as they are led. And all gifts support vitality in our Faith. Any amount helps.
Of course that is not all we do, just follow Melinda Wenner Bradley and her team for deep dive into Youth Religious Life Programs and see how many young Quaker hearts we touch. Watch this faith and play story from Annual Sessions and feel the power of Quaker story telling.
Supporting PYM’s appeal: Supporting your Meeting
Friends and Attenders can give to PYM’s annual fund through the PYM website at www.pym.org/nurture. Many can also choose to make an additional gift to their own meeting through a second drop down box that lists those meetings who opt in to PYM’s online gift support.
Checks can be mailed to: PYM Annual Fund – 1515 Cherry Street, Philadelphia PA 19102
Update your contact & Meeting information at pym.org/updates
