Archive for category: Regional Gatherings

Friends were invited to respond, over the weekend, to some queries posted in the dining room.  Here are the responses:

1.  How would you describe your Quaker Community?

• International
• Nurturing
• A safe place to practice being who I want to be
• Inspiring
• Challenging
• Rejuvenating
• Stimulating
• Sometimes frustrating
• Wide-spread
• Beloved
• Deeply connected
• Small
• Rewarding
• My spiritual home

2.  How do you experience the responsibilities of Membership?

• Affirming, exciting, satisfying to be of service, to build together
• Learning to withhold judgement and comment
• Feeling that I am contributing
• An active community
• 20 hour work weeks

3.  What does it mean to you to belong?

• Being fully human
• Hard work
• Joyous
• Engenders gratitude
• Having meaningful relationships with others in the group
• not being alone

4.  What’s it like to be part of this combined Half Yearly Meeting?

• Delightful
• Thrilling
• Exciting
• Fun
• Renews connections
• Happy to see so many F/friends I love
• Loud, but wonderful
• I love seeing all ya and heck PHY can sing!!!
• Absolutely topping!  Let’s do it again!  And again!…

About 100 Friends met at Camp Neekaunis from Friday evening, June 1 to Sunday Afternoon, June 3. This was the first time Pelham Half Yearly and Yonge Street Half Yearly had held a joint meeting, and there was in the air, joyful anticipation…and a little trepidation about numbers.  In the end, we counted 12 Young Adult Friends and 12 Young Friends…and there were definitely a few 70+, a mix of ages over 3 generations. The ambiance was beautifully green, wet, and a little cool. This view is from the Meeting Room looking out over the lake.

Friends were grateful to gather in Nelson Hall (Dining Hall), and the Meeting Room with its huge stone fireplace.

Gathering in the Dining Hall

Meeting Room

 The registrars were active from 3:00 Friday on, and Friends found time to re-connect while making sure the toilets/outhouses were equipped, unpacking, and wiping down the tables in preparation for dinner.

Who’s on the list?	Is there a resemblance here?	Reconnecting
Self-Care and Shared Responsibilities – qualities of camp life	Unpacking	Table Prep

After supper, we gathered in the Meeting Room for a listening session on Membership.  We began with a semi-rousing game of  ‘A Big Wind Blows’ (too many people to stand in a circle, so Katrina McQuail, Youth Secretary improvised and moderated).  Then we invited Friends to self-organize into groups where they would imagine themselves in a particular role and we encouraged them to find a group with a role where they might be less comfortable.  We asked the groups to consider the following queries about Young Friends holding transitional membership in a Half Yearly Meeting or at Camp Neekaunis.  We encouraged them to IMAGINE, to think of this not as discernment, nor even as threshing, but as scattering wildflower seeds and seeing what might come of it.

QUERIES:

1. What might be the gifts of such a relationship?
2. What might be the responsibilities of the Half Yearly Meeting or Camp to the Member?
3. What might be the responsibilities of the member to the Half Yearly Meeting or to Camp?

If you click on each of the roles below, you will be able to view the responses of each group

Young Friend (teen), Young Adult Friend (early stages – university or wandering), Young Adult Friend (later stages – settling or perhaps starting a family), Monthly Meeting, Camp Neekaunis, Half Yearly Meeting, CYM, Ministry and Counsel and Friends General Conference.

 The Groups shared what was most important to them from their conversations, and we closed with worship.