1. In July 2021 PYM approved minutes of action to be taken on anti-racism and climate change. How has your meeting been called to address these issues? What other concerns and initiatives has your meeting been led to address this past year?
John 15: 12,16 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you…..You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last.
It is essential to us as Quakers, that we open ourselves to a Power greater than our own. We recognize that we cannot fix the evils that we see within us and around us by ourselves. As a Meeting, we continue to seek to know and be guided by a Power that can transform our hearts, to be changed from within, as well as continuing to work to be better educated in our minds. This is essential to us as a Community of Faith. We want to encourage all Friends to seek that Power, to learn to depend deeply on that Power, and to allow that Power to work within us and among us to bring about the change we all seek.
Members of our meeting were strongly called to address issues of racism and racial healing after the murder of George Floyd in May 2020. This deep calling came from Jesus’s command to love one another as He has loved us. From June 2020-April 2021, an ad hoc committee in our meeting diligently and persistently explored ways that our meeting could examine these issues. It was a refining time for those involved in this initial examination as there were difficult discussions, challenging each other on how our meeting should respond. This process itself became a laboratory for choosing love and trust instead of divisiveness. Finally after 10 months of discernment , the efforts bore fruit. The meeting held two sessions on racial healing at which we considered questions from the National Day of Healing Conversation Guide. This guide helped our meeting to begin a conversation in a safe space where people could be honest and vulnerable. Our hope is that this is a start in having more authentic conversations around race issues and their impact on all of us.
Genesis 1 God’s Creation
Environmental issues have long been a concern and a basis for action for certain individuals in our meeting. Recently, members in our meeting have joined Concord Quarter’s newly formed Climate Action Working Group. We are called by God to be caretakers and stewards of all God’s creation and as in anti-racism work we are called to love others as Christ has loved us by working to make the earth habitable for all living creatures.
Our meeting has completed an initial survey from the Climate Action Working Group dealing with our meeting’s carbon footprint and disaster preparation. Our meeting is looking forward to educating ourselves on these two areas , in particular on how we can be of service to our local community. In the future, we hope to educate ourselves in other aspects of working on Climate Action.
2. How has your meeting evolved as a spiritual community given the ongoing opportunities and challenges of the pandemic?
Our meeting has virtually enabled members/attenders, who would not otherwise be able to worship with us, to meet from a distance. We have remained sensitive to responding to concerns about either getting together virtually or in person. We have checked in on one another more frequently by phone calls, emails or texts. Our Christmas Social was held virtually this past year and was a blessed time of fellowship and sharing. The men’s group continues to meet every 2 weeks for fellowship and worship. The meeting’s Worship and Care Committee meets monthly to pray for our meeting and to respond to the the needs of our meeting members and attenders.
3. What practices and strategies are employed by your meeting to help members and attenders of all ages prepare for worship – whether in meeting for worship or in meeting for business?
Many faith communities have been challenged during our new era of virtual worship regarding expectations of decorum during virtual worship vs. in person worship. Our meeting adopted a minute regarding blended/hybrid worship. The following minute has had a positive impact on creating a worshipful environment.
Minute Regarding Blended Worship
The Worship and Care Committee asks that all virtual attenders of Meeting for Worship and Meeting for Business participate in the same manner as they would if they were participating in person, to the best of their ability. We also ask that any concerns related to the Meeting for Worship or Meeting for Business, virtual or in person, be immediately and directly sent to Worship and Care. Concerns can be brought to the attention of the clerk of Worship and Care.
4. What is most needed to strengthen the communal witness of the meeting to the local community and beyond?
Galatians 6:2 Carry each other’s burdens and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. Hebrews 10: 24-25 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.
Although our meeting is small in number, we are open to ways of supporting our community. This past year, in response to a concern expressed by an attender who is a resident of Lima Estates, a retirement community next to our meetinghouse, we embarked on a project to rehab the small schoolhouse on our property to be of service to the meeting community. We look forward to educating ourselves on ways to be of service to the broader community, i.e., disaster preparedness.
5. Is there a query or are there queries that your meeting would like to respond to that have not been included here? Please share it/them and your response.
In the coming year, our meeting plans to consider the following queries, and we hope to respond to these queries in the 2023 PYM Spiritual State of the Meeting Report:
- What did Jesus ask?
- Queries on deepening our faith from Faith and Practice.
- Where would we like to see our meeting a year from now?
