The Gathering of Friends is a week of Quaker community, open to everyone: Friends, their families, and newcomers!
Friends come together from across North America (and sometimes further) to deepen connection to one another and the Spirit. The Gathering is typically held on a college campus in late June through early July, and location changes from year to year.
All are welcome to attend the Gathering of Friends. Gathering attenders range from newborns to elders in their nineties and include both long-time Friends (mostly from the unprogrammed, liberal tradition), and those newer to the Quaker faith. In structure, it’s part conference and part family camp. In content, it provides an abundance of opportunities to learn about Quakerism, foster spiritual life, and to have fun.
I love going and meeting up with new and old f(F)riends from all across North America, learning new things, being spiritually nurtured and having fun. The six degrees of connection often end up being one or two, as I sit down with a new person and discover that we have someone in common.
Lynne Piersol, Swarthmore Friends Meeting
The next Gathering will happen in 2027!
Worshipping multiple times each day, in community or by myself, opened up my heart afresh to the movement of the spirit. I talked, sang, ate, and even danced with other seekers from all over North America, finding that, in essence, their spiritual journeys were not so very different from my own.
Michelle Bellows
Read more about the history of The Gathering in the QuakerPress title A Gathering of Spirits: The Friends General Conferences 1896-1950.
Page last updated July 12, 2026.