FGC Friends Southeastern Yearly Meeting

Southeastern Yearly Meeting is a community of 23 Meetings and Worship Groups in Florida, southeastern Georgia, coastal South Carolina, and Managua, Nicaragua. In 2014, we celebrated our 50th anniversary.

Friendly Facts:

  • Ÿ Our big news is the anticipated hiring of a Field Secretary for Earthcare to visit our Meetings and Worship Groups and help them discern way forward in addressing Climate Change and other environmental concerns.
  • Ÿ Our Yearly Meeting Gathering, held the Wednesday through Sunday of Easter week, is five days of blessed community in worship, workshops, plenary sessions, intergenerational dance and games, a Youth program. For our 2017 Gathering, we are excited about Peterson Toscano leading the Walton Retreat & Lecture. Join us!
  • Ÿ There are other SEYM annual events. The Michener Lecture & Seminars is held the Sunday before the Martin Luther King Holiday, at the Orlando meetinghouse. Half-Yearly Meeting, held over Thanksgiving weekend, is a time for getting out in nature at Wekiwa Springs State Park, Florida. It is 4 days of serendipity— a time to enjoy canoeing, nature hikes, games, workshops and just being among Friends. Our Fall Interim Business Meeting is held in October, and our Winter Interim Business Meeting is held the Saturday before the Michener Lecture in Orlando.
  • Ÿ ProNica, a Quaker organization in solidarity with the people of Nicaragua, was founded by SEYM in 1987, then grew to be its own non-profit organization. ProNica partners with grassroots projects in Nicaragua to address urgent needs and social injustice, empower the disadvantaged, and foster social, economic, and environmental sustainability. They also offer Friends Witness Tours for groups—Quakers, college classes, churches, and others—to experience Nicaragua’s culture and natural beauty, and to visit their partner organizations. Quaker House, in Managua, serves as a base for their directors in Nicaragua, Managua Worship Group, and the Witness Tours. ProNica maintains its Quaker identity and close ties with SEYM; most of its Board are SEYM representatives, and the stateside office is housed at St. Petersburg Meeting.
  • Ÿ Our Youth continue to be actively engaged in concerns for Farmworkers’ rights and Earthcare. They’ve done more in recent years than we can list in one paragraph! They’ve been on immersion visits with the Immokalee Farmworkers, led us in joining actions for the Fair Food Campaign, and are continuing to work with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. They also led SEYM Meetings and Friends in holding non-violent direct actions as part of EQAT’s protest of mountain top removal mining. More recently, two of our teens, a YAQ (Young Adult Quaker), and some SEYM adults attended a Toxic Prisons Convergence. Youth and Friends are also connecting with AFSC-Miami, with a concern for immigration issues.
  • Ÿ SEYM Friends and Meetings work on Peace & Social Concerns in many different ways. Recent actions include: bringing AVP to communities, connecting with Veterans for Peace and the work of Quaker House of Fayetteville, serving on Friends Peace Teams, lobbying with FCNL, forming FCNL Advocacy Teams, and taking action to counter Islamophobia and gun violence.
  •  SEYM Publications offers over 50 titles in print, including most of our Walton and Michener Lectures, as well as our 2014 Faith & Practice. Recent lectures are also available in eBook form. Visit our Publications page.
SEYM

Photo by Davida Johns

Stay in touch with SEYM news and events by visiting our website, www.seymquakers.org

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