 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2003 (XXXXI 1) |
PYM’s Spiritual Formation Program is calling the 135 people (from 34 different Meetings) who have participated in the program since 1999 to a one-day retreat on Saturday, February 8, at Plymouth Meeting (PA).
The working group conveners, Margery Larrabee of Mount Holly Meeting (NJ), Carolyn Schodt of Chestnut Hill Meeting (PA), and Wade Wright of Millville Meeting (PA), describe four purposes for the participants at the retreat:
- to share their experiences of the inbreaking of the Spirit in their lives,
- to share about the spiritual condition of their meetings,
- to study an old/new way of naming spiritual gifts and ministries, and
- to discern prayerfully how they are led to participate in supporting this program.
Friends are asked to register by February 1 by calling or emailing Wade Wright at (570) 925-5262 or wadew@epix.net, Carolyn Schodt at (215) 242-5413 or carolynschodt@lycos.com, or Margery Larrabee at (609) 702-9209.
The conveners are recommending as optional preparation reading Lloyd Lee Wilson’s “Spiritual Gifts and the Faith Community” in Essays on the Quaker Vision of Gospel Order (Pendle Hill Publications, 1993). They also have been nourished as a working group by Richard Foster’s Prayer: Finding the Heart’s True Home (Harper, 1992).
Given the remarkable response over the previous three years, the Spiritual Formation Working Group was surprised by low enrollment for 2002-2003 in its nine-month program of spiritual discipline, mutual accountability groups, and study. They felt called to cancel the regular program for this year and use the space as a fallow year, to reflect and “prepare the soil for future harvest.” They have been able to respond to requests from individual meetings for a meeting-based spiritual formation program. They have begun an informal connection of Yearly Meeting spiritual formation program leaders across the United States, for cross-fertilization and nurture. Individual working group members have responded to requests from Meetings in San Antonio, Texas, and Tempe, Arizona, to lead opening retreats for spiritual formation programs.
Carolyn Schodt
Chestnut Hill Meeting (PA)
Spiritual Formation Program Working Group
Last modified: Wednesday, February 18, 2004 at 08:18 AM