Friends General Conference shares the following yearly meeting announcements that may be of interest to Friends in the United States and Canada:

North Pacific Yearly Meeting

Registration is now open for North Pacific Yearly Meeting’s 2023 Annual Session. Our theme is Connecting and Reconnecting: Building the Beloved Community. We recommend that you review this information before beginning your registration, then click here when you are ready to get started. Registration is open through June 25th.

Quaker Earthcare Witness (QEW)

On Tuesday, March 21, 2023, thousands of people across North America—led by older Americans who are Third Act supporters—gathered inside and outside branches of big banks and at climate-impacted sites as part of Third Act’s 3.21.23 Day of Action to demand that banks stop financing the expansion of fossil fuels. Read more.

In other news, join Quaker minister Brent Bill in sharing Ploughshares Farmon Monday, June 12 at 7pm Eastern/4 pm Pacific. In 2002, Brent and Nancy Bill acquired fifty acres of her father’s farmland to build a house across the road from him. Brent will share how and why this land was transformed into a wildlife habitat and protected forest and how he was transformed as well. Register here.

Philadelphia Yearly Meeting

Annual Sessions Registration is Open! We invite you to join us for a weekend of worship, meetings for business, workshops, and presentations by invited keynote speakers. Annual Sessions takes place at the College of New Jersey, July 26-30! We are delighted to offer options for both online and onsite fellowship experiences. Programs for children and youth during the weekend at TCNJ will focus on being neighbors and building community! Register Now

The onsite gathering will be at the College of New Jersey from Friday – Sunday and include programs for children and youth. ​​​​​This year’s theme is “Living with our neighbors, growing into beloved community.”

Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL)

FCNL partner Jennifer Long, who runs a migrant shelter in Texas, recently shared the importance of federal funding for humanitarian relief networks:

“Asylum seekers come to our border full of hope that the United States really stands for justice and fairness. However, when they arrive, they find that they aren’t eligible for any help: no housing, no food, no legal services, and no work permit… We need federal funding to encourage more organizations to take on the very human and very needed work of hospitality that makes all the difference in the lives of asylum seekers.”

One of our greatest moral callings as a society is to protect the vulnerable. Urge Congress to invest in humane, community-based migration management options.

Baltimore Yearly Meeting

Interim Meeting is Saturday, June 10th at Tandem Friends School in Charlottesville and online via Zoom. Some supporting documents are now available online, and others will be added early next week. It’s not too late to sign up! Click here for the Agenda, Advance Documents, and Registration. Several important items are up for discussion or consideration, including:

• A first reading of the 2024 budget
• Revisions to Faith & Practice to be considered at Annual Session
• The formation of a new Working Group
• The relocation of Opequon Quaker Camp to the Rolling Ridge Conservancy

Also, Friends of all ages will gather together as a Yearly Meeting, the wider body of Friends in our region, for the 351st Annual Session of Baltimore Yearly Meeting from July 31 – August 6, 2023 at Hood College in Frederick, MD.  Register here.

Illinois Yearly Meeting

2023 Annual Sessions is June 21-25. Registration is open and detailed information has been posted at ilym.org. Please register by June 4 so sufficient food and materials can be purchased. Advance Documents will be posted by June 8 at ilym.org and on the app. Workshop descriptions have been posted at ilym.org on the Annual Sessions page.  Scroll down to the Workshops section.

Dakota 38 – The Creating Faithful Action in the Face of Settler Colonialism workshop workshop at the Annual Sessions is a three day workshop. The first day is watching the film Dakota 38, which you should watch before participating in the other two days. You are welcome to join the workshop on the second or third day as long as you have seen the movie before coming. You can view it for free online.

New York Yearly Meeting

• Summer Sessions 2023: Information about NYYM’s Summer Sessions, the first to be held at Oakwood Friends School and over Zoom, is now online. The theme is Re-Building Faith in Changing Times. Registration is not open yet but will open soon and will be widely announced. For now, please save the date: July 22-27, from Saturday morning to Thursday lunch. The planning team is building a creative and spirit-led program designed to form a blessed community of Friends. Come spend time with other Quakers!
  
• Read the minutes and reports from the business sessions held at Spring Sessions, April 14-16, 2023. Highlights include discernment on the preliminary report from the Task Group on Financial Sustainability. Read more here.

Quaker Spring

Quaker Spring Gathering will be online & in-person in Barnesville, OH, June 13-17. Since 2007, Quaker Spring has been holding radically unprogrammed gatherings where we listen together for God’s living Spirit at work among us. The mid-day Zoom program will feature worship, meetings for discernment, and Bible reading. For those gathered in-person, there will also be time for quiet refreshment, fellowship, singing, field trips, and supporting individuals seeking clearness or support for their ministries.

All fees are “pay as led.’ All are welcome! Info and registration are available online.

Canada Yearly Meeting

Find information and links to online and in-person registration (which are on two different platforms, so please double check you are applying for the right one) on the Canadian Yearly Meeting gathering website. We invite you to register as soon as possible, particularly if you are planning to attend in person. To attend in person, please regiter by June 26th. 

CYM’s Education and Outreach Committee is pleased to announce the extension of the deadline to June 26^th for small grants for the 2023 Gathering. Small grants are being offered to support in-person and online attendance at the Annual Gathering (CYM In-Session). For those who only want to attend online, grants can cover up to 75% of the registration cost!

To find out more information and apply for Education and Outreach grants and other CYM grants, click here. 

New England Yearly Meeting

Quakers in New England will gather in August for the 363rd year—for worship, spiritual nurture, fellowship, and discernment of our shared calling. This year there are two ways to attend Sessions: in-person at Castleton University and via Zoom. We encourage Friends to read the details on the Yearly Meeting website before registering. Register here.
 

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