PYM Quakers seek to experience God within ourselves and in our relationships with others.
We believe that the Divine spirit continues to reveal new truths to us.
We are a community of meetings, members and seekers who support each other in faith, practice and witness.
PYM Quakers are committed to living lives that outwardly attest to our inward spiritual experience.
We express our faith in action and work for a better world through pioneering, inspiring programs and services.
Everything we do is founded in our testimonies of peace, integrity, equality, simplicity and community.
A comprehensive listing of all the collaboratives and sprints who are doing the work of our yearly meeting community.
PYM Quakers seek to create and steward resources to help individuals, communities and the world.
We provide spiritual and tangible assistance to those in need.
All our resources stem from our desire to bring light to the world and implement our testimony to the power of the Divine spirit.
PYM is undergoing a structural change.
Read about how this affects the PYM website.
Philadelphia Yearly Meeting is both a Faith Community and an Organization.
PYM is one of the oldest yearly meetings of the Religious Society of Friends in the United States.
Meetings, members, seekers and staff work together to nurture Quaker faith and practice in today’s world.
PYM Quakers share experience, leadings and witness with one another and the world.
We have a long tradition of expressing our shared divinity by working to be in community with one another.
We invite you to bookmark this page and come back often to stay up to date with conversations and activities in our faith community.
"We contribute to the Annual Fund because we value the way PYM connects us to a wider Quaker fellowship and supports our beliefs and actions."
Cathy Gumlock, Lehigh Valley Meeting
We experience the Spirit within and among us. Our lives, our witness, our connection to spirit is what makes up the yearly meeting. Here are the latest stories of this community in action.
Date for Memorial–Saturday, July 21 at 10:00 A memorial service for Penny will be held Saturday, July 21 at Germantown Monthly Meeting, 47 W. Coulter Street, Philadelphia, PA 19144. The service will begin at 10 AM. Contributions in her name can be made to the Kelly School Library Fund; c/o Germantown Monthly Meeting; 47 W. Coulter Str. Phila. PA 19144. Contributions may …
“Can we go home this summer?” “What do you mean?” “Can we go to PYM Sessions?” This was the conversation I had with my then-10 year old, a few summers ago after our family moved to New York. Going to PYM Annual Sessions felt, for him, like going home — being in a community where he was welcomed, cared for, …
Something significant & sobering is happening in Montgomery, Alabama (MGM). PYM can participate in the reckoning MGM is going through. Montgomery was a hub for warehousing & auctioning of enslaved persons. It is now recognizing that history with the Legacy Museum: Enslavement to Mass Incarceration, & a ten minute walk away, The National Memorial for Justice & Peace, a collection …
Dear Friends, We are sad to report that our beloved clerk, Penny Colgan-Davis, passed away quietly in her sleep, last night. Penny has been many places and done many things in a life of service to others as she followed divine leadings. A mentor, career teacher, school director, principal, head of school, faithful Friend in Germantown Meeting, and within PYM, …
If we are proud of our heritage of opposition to slavery, we have no choice but to take a stand on mass incarceration. Last spring Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting passed a minute in opposition to mass incarceration. As one step in bringing that minute to life, to test the role of outside observers in the effort to end cash bail, …
Members and attenders of Westtown and other Monthly Meetings joined several hundred in West Chester on June 9th to publicly witness on behalf of our neighbors facing the dangers of new pipelines snaking their way through Chester and Delaware counties designed to carry high risk liquefied gas pipelines. The Mariner East Rally for Community Safety speakers painted a grim picture …
The 39th Annual Nanticoke Lenape Powwow held on the Salem County Fairgrounds June 9th and 10th may now enter into history. Pow-Wow, from the Wampanoag Indian word “pauwau,” refers to a gathering, conducted by a holy man/ medicine man, to heal the souls and bodies for his people. In western states and Canada, it is a time for hunting, feasting, …
On May 16, 2018, Fran Sheldon (Providence Meeting) and Paul Sheldon (Lansdowne Meeting) participated in a Demand the Ban action in Philadelphia to demand that Senator Toomey co-sponsor Senate Bill 2095 that bans the sale of assault weapons. As part of a group of thirty-three individuals who had previously received training in Gandhian nonviolent direct action, they were prepared to …
On Saturday, May 19, Abington Friends juniors, Margaret Silbaugh and Lily Ehsani, dressed in the clothes of a Quaker bride and groom circa 1850. In the Merion Friends meetinghouse, they repeated their vows to each other before a congregation of visitors in modern dress. The wedding of Leonard Brenton and Hannah Roberts was just one of the activities at the …
Green Street Meeting’s Quaker Social Change Ministry group in support of EMIR Healing Center is having a “Fill a Bookbag” drive to gather school supplies for 85 children participating in the center’s programs this year. EMIR stands for “Every Murder is Real.” The center, in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia, was founded by Green Street member Victoria Greene, after her …
Over the past several years, three monthly meetings in Philadelphia–Monthly Meeting of Friends of Philadelphia (Arch Street), Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting, and now Germantown Monthly Meeting–have joined a broad-based interfaith coalition founded in 2011 under the name Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower, and Rebuild, or POWER. POWER, affiliated at the national level with the PICO Network, aimed then (and still …
By Doug Humes Quaker Buildings and Programs Granting Group We grantmakers (at least for “bricks and sticks” – building and renovation projects) participate in the project at the beginning and in the middle, but typically we never see “the end”. At the beginning, we receive an application that describes the project, a new roof, a bathroom, in addition, an energy …
On April 27-29, the Young Adult Friends community gathered at Green St Monthly Meeting for our annual spring retreat. In business, the body approved by consensus the nomination of Carl Stanton as Pastoral Care Committee co-clerk. The body also approved the following minute of appreciation for outgoing clerk/YAF, Janaki Spickard-Keeler. The Young Adult Friend Community of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting minutes …
Three years ago, Abington Friends Meeting member and caretaker Dave Wermeling noticed a tall professorial-looking figure wandering in the meeting burial ground. It was the historian Marcus Rediker doing research for a book he was writing on the 18th century Quaker abolitionist Benjamin Lay. Dave confirmed for Marcus that Benjamin and his wife Sarah were buried at Abington but the …
On April 24 at the Watershed Institute in Pennington, NJ, Friends joined a gathering of over 75 in support of clean water and the environment. Led by tribal elders, scientists, children, and museum representatives, the occasion was the opening ceremony for the “Kwel’ Hoy: We Draw the Line” traveling exhibition which is to remain at the Institute until the end …
With deep gratitude, the PYM community acknowledges the many gifts of Young Friends Program Co-Facilitators Hannah Mayer and Kody Hersh as they each enter new stages of their lives and ministries, and move on from the Young Friends program. For many years they have anchored the Youth Program team with both administrative and program work, and also modeled for us deeply …
The magnolia buds are slower to bloom this year but the sight of them means it is time for the PYM Annual Grant Makers potluck at Arch Street Meeting. The PYM Granting Committee sponsors two annual gatherings for the many Friends who are led to support the yearly meeting by being stewards of our grant funds. The fall Grant Makers …
I received a mailing from Friends Journal, which describes its goal today “to serve the Quaker community and the wider community of spiritual seekers through the publication of articles, poetry, letters, art, and news that convey the contemporary experience of Friends.” I signed up for the one-year subscription, and in today’s world of instant gratification, I immediately became able to …
Dear Friends, After March Continuing Sessions Presiding Clerk Penny Colgan-Davis communicated with Melissa Rycroft, Clerk of Nominating Council that, due to health concerns, she was stepping down immediately as Clerk of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. Penny simultaneously shared this news with the Clerks of Administrative and Quaker Life Councils, the PYM Treasurer, and our General Secretary, and then with our three …
Beth Popelka has followed a leading about theatre as a transformative practice that connects communities to the sacred since early in her adult life. For the past twenty years, she has worked to continue the legacy of Augusto Boal and other innovators to create dramatic group experiences that open communities to hidden sources of healing and wholeness. “The exploration of …
