Here is a snapshot of “my story” of being a part of Friends General Conference’s Gathering as an important part of my spiritual journey.
I have attended the Gathering since 1994 when it was held at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, MA. And as a matter of history, 20 other members and attenders of Lehigh Valley Monthly Meeting also attended that year! Many of them brought their school-age and middle school children. The Gathering has excellent programming for children and youth from newborn through high school. Each adult person chooses a workshop, and that information is on the website registration.
My first workshop was entitled ” Finding the Goddess Within.” Women from all over the US created an altar with items relevant to each one’s spiritual practice. I put my copy of Faith and Practice there. We also washed each other’s feet in the pond on campus. It was magical and very empowering.
In 2012, I attended at the University of Rhode Island in Kingston, RI with my dear friend Fran Dreisbach as my travel companion and dorm room roommate. I shared a workshop with others including one woman from Atlanta, Georgia with whom I am still communicating. Fran and I got interviewed as part of an ongoing public relations strategy to hear from current, modern-day Quakers about their practices. Then Fran and I went to a seaside bar on the Narragansett Bay and had mudslides!
In 2014 the Gathering was in California, PA at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania, south of Pittsburgh. I took part in a social justice event. Picture three school bus loads of Quakers going to downtown Pittsburgh to stage silent worship circles in lobbies of PNC banks to protest mountaintop removal. PNC was funding companies in Appalachia who supported that way of mining coal. They stopped shortly after that non-violent protest! After we returned from the trip to Pittsburgh and a delicious whole foods meal we sang Broadway show tunes with George Lakey at the piano!
In 2021 when the Gathering was all virtual due to the pandemic, a request was made for each person entering the Zoom meeting to type in the chat the state where they lived and acknowledgement of the First Nations people whose land you now inhabit! Wow. I took a workshop called “Eating With Christ: Spiritual Embodiment.” I have continued to gather to this day (3 years later) in a weekly Zoom with five of those workshop attendees supporting each other with eating disorders to honor our physical bodies in a spiritual way.
So, I hope you are getting the idea that FGC Gathering can change your life and contribute to your memories of a great summer vacation! If you want profound spiritual experiences, an opportunity to speak out to social justice, make lifelong f/Friends, bring your children to their own Quaker learning and just enjoy other like-minded Quaker folks from everywhere, then won’t you please join me at FGC Gathering?
Nancy Johnston
Lehigh Valley Meeting