Back in the fall of 2020, two gatherings took place – one for monthly meeting leaders and another for quarterly meeting leaders. Worship during the pandemic was a big topic of discussion, so we had a follow up meeting on January 26, 2121 wherein we asked monthly and quarterly meetings to let us know who in their communities had experience with virtual and hybrid meetings. These are the notes from that meeting. [Read more…] about About Hybrid Meetings: How They Work
Dearest Friends in PYM Monthly and Quarterly Meetings and other PYM Quaker Groups,
We trust this finds you seeking to be grounded in Spirit and in your community of faith. 2020 has certainly been a year filled with both opportunities and challenges! The Ministry and Care Committee of Quaker Life Council is once again asking for your help as we look to better understand the spiritual state of our yearly meeting through this past year.
To accomplish this, we are asking meetings to consider responding to the following queries: [Read more…] about Share Your Meeting’s Spiritual Self-Assessment
The Quaker Traditions Series is a set of articles on the Quaker faith. In his role as Associate Secretary for Religious Life, Zachary Dutton has listened deeply to Friends in the community. Working with the PYM staff community engagement team he has provided answers to framing questions for this four-part series. The answers are reflective as opposed to definitive.
The gift of the Quaker faith is that it is one of continuing revelation, so the article speaks to the ‘here and now’ of our faith even as it is tied to, and reflects, our history and tradition. If you have thoughts on these questions, please share them with Zachary – his email is at the end of this article. He is always looking for new ways to be in relationship with our wider Quaker community.
[Read more…] about Quaker Traditions Series: Part I – Spiritual Practice
As the pandemic continues, and this week our nation struggles once more against the legacy of racial injustice and violence, our children look on.
Children and teens are experiencing the continued uncertainty of Covid and its impact on school, peer relationships, and future plans. Additionally, the events in Washington D.C. on January 6 were deeply disturbing and young people may feel anxiety, confusion, fear, sadness, or anger, and have questions about what they see and hear in the media and from friends. As parents, we’re holding space for our children’s feelings alongside our own anxiety, fury, and questions about moving forward. What follows are resources specifically for children, youth, and families.*
I was reminded by a Friend that worry dolls are a simple way to acknowledge children’s concerns and help them to find a place to put them. Sitting with a child while they share their worries, fears, and questions with the small doll and put it under their pillow at bedtime may not resolve the feelings, but it models healthy sharing and perspective.
Children need us to hear their concerns, and we can provide reassurance even if we do not have answers. Offering up our concerns in prayer is another way to acknowledge and place them in a larger “container” of our faith. This set of coloring pages “Prayers For When You Feel Anxious” includes both suggested prayers and three different sets of images for mindful coloring.
Young children cannot always articulate their feelings, and they may show us how they are feeling through play or behaviors. Sadness may look like: anger, tiredness, boredom, numbing out (often on screens), displaced frustration, resisting direction from adults. Their anxiety may show up as: anger, negativity, difficulty sleeping (particularly falling asleep), defiance, avoidance, lack of focus, over-planning, and chandeliering (“flying off the handle”).
In her article, Five Things Kids Need in Order to Learn and Thrive During this Pandemic Year (linked below), Stephanie Malia Krauss names children’s need to:
Resources for Adults Supporting Children:
How To Talk To Kids About The Riots At The U.S. Capitol
Spiritual Practices for Use During a Traumatic News Event from Traci Smith
Five Things Kids Need in Order to Learn and Thrive During this Pandemic Year.
A Kids Book About Anxiety by Ross Szabo from the “A Kids Book About” series. The inside covers suggests, ”This book is best read together, grownup and kid.”
It’s Not Just Adults Who Are Stressed. Kids Are, Too. — Identifying your child’s emotional and behavioral reactions to stress is crucial, experts say, especially when anxieties are high.
COVID-19 Quarantine: an Emotional Tipping Point for Teens
“It’s okay to just be sad” from Courtney Martin and her blog, “the examined family.”
“Coping with COVID-19: A Work Book for Kids and Teens” Designed to help children and teens communicate and cope with their feelings and emotions regarding the global Covid 19 pandemic. Includes writing and drawing prompts to help create a therapeutic experience and provide an opportunity to have open conversations. A good resource for pastoral care for young people (this resource does not touch on death or bereavement).
There may be times in coming days when, in our experience as a meeting, or as a family, or as friends and neighbors, there is a child or young person dealing with loss. A research study published by Penn State University last summer concluded that every Covid-19 death leaves an average of nine survivors who have lost a grandparent, parent, sibling, spouse or child. Millions of Americans are in mourning for friends and relatives, co-workers and community members.
Some of the more difficult conversations I’ve had in the past months with my own children have been about death. My college-aged child remarked during a conversation one day, “Death feels closer,”and has expressed anxiety about family and friends getting sick. A younger sibling has shown up at my bedside unable to sleep, and shared their deep uneasiness about the inevitability of death. “Darn existential questions!,” he tried to joke through tears.
As a parent, I hold my children close and provide what comfort I can. I’m glad for the Godly Play stories they heard and wondered about as younger children, which gave them images and language for big questions about the Divine and created spaces to come close to existential questions we all face about death and aloneness.
Thinking about how we talk about death and helping children develop a vocabulary for loss and grief is pastoral care preparation we can also do across ages in meeting communities. There are excellent resources for children through adolescents for talking about death and dying, that could be recommended to a family in need of support. In addition to this list of books about grief for young children through teens, the titles below are highly recommended.
Suggested Books about Death and Grief:
Giants by A.E. McIntyre, illustrated by ElisaBeth Steines. A gentle treatment of a child’s grief story, written by a parent who lost their own parent as a young child. Website for the book.
The Pear Tree A folktale retold by Luli Gray and illustrated by Madelyn Goodnight. Probably better for older children, the message is that death is a reality of life, but there is always hope.
Death Is Stupid by Anastasia Higginbotham is part of the “Ordinary Terrible Things” series. A realistic and moving read-along for a child and adult.
The Memory Tree by Britta Teckentrup is a story about remembering and letting go, and what remains — the forest animals lead the way.
A Little Blue Bottle by Jennifer Grant, illustrated by Gillian Whiting. Thinking about the sadness of losing a neighbor, and what our grief means to God. Includes a page, “Best Practices for When a Child Is Grieving.”
A Kids Book About Death by Taryn Schuelke from the “A Kids Book About” series. The inside covers suggests, ”This book is best read together, grownup and kid.”
*Pastoral Care for our Community during the COVID-19 Outbreak is another resource by my colleague George Schaefer, Care & Aging Coordinator. Adults seeking support can also reach out to the Friends Counseling Service.
Melinda Wenner Bradley, Youth Religious Life Coordinator mwennerbradley@pym.org. (My children gave their permission to be quoted in this piece.)
PYM’s Committee on Friends Education reminds families that monthly meeting members’ children attending or applying to Friends Schools are eligible to apply for educational support for the 2021-22 school year. Funding for all grants comes from the National Friends Education Fund and Philadelphia Yearly Meeting endowment income from the Jonathan Rhoads Fund and other PYM education endowments. [Read more…] about Tuition Aid for Friends Children in PYM Friends Schools
George Schaefer serves Philadelphia Yearly Meeting as the Care and Aging Coordinator. He works with meetings, aging Friends, and individuals to support PYM’s spiritual growth, pastoral care, and community wholeness. This essay is his response to the burdens we may be carrying today and in the coming weeks. Tea with George is always perfect. Please sit with these thoughts and have a favorite cup of tea close to hand. [Read more…] about In These Times: A Pastoral Message
As we look ahead to election week we’ve assembled resources for Friends concerning care for community, crisis response planning, buddy systems, worship sharing, alternatives to calling the police, plus state-specific websites and some democracy organizations. We know that different communities have different needs and interests so have provided a range of alternatives. [Read more…] about Preparing for Election Week
Karen Tibbals uses her background in market research and Quaker religious studies to help people understand how others–on opposing political sides and with different ethical frameworks–make decisions. This work, like the graphic image above, draws groups with differing opinions into relationship (pink and blue become purple!) Her book can help liberals and conservatives identify the truths they share, and it explains the success of modern societal accomplishments like gay marriage and outlines why guns feel safe to conservatives and scary to liberals. Here we interview her about who she is, and how she came to publish the very helpful books she writes.
As part of our Runway to Annual Sessions we’ve been featuring more than two dozen workshops, plenary, or wellness events. Shelly Xia is a young professional who works with PYM on organizing membership information in our new database. In addition to being knowledgeable about data and excel sheets, she is passionate about bridging people from different parts of the world to work together on protecting the environment and addressing climate change. She enjoys martial arts, photography, and Argentine tango in her spare time.
Many people come to Quakerism without growing up in the faith. We wondered what it might be like for someone to experience Annual Sessions programming for the first time, so we asked Shelly if she’d be interested in describing her ‘first time’ experience of a PYM workshop for our web readers. [Read more…] about What Do We Talk About, When We Talk About God? – Personal Reflection on a Workshop
Dear Friends,
This is a check-in to see how you and your meeting are doing in these unique times. The physical distancing required by the Covid-19 pandemic has created unexpected opportunities for discerning how to feel connected when physical contact is not possible. Some meetings are also struggling with how to complete their Spiritual State of the Meeting Report given the challenges of Covid-19. We offer some guidance here. [Read more…] about Ministry & Care Letter to Our Meetings
