In 1999 the Baltimore Yearly Meeting Spiritual Formation Program was brought to Philadelphia Yearly Meeting by a Friend who learned about it at Companions Along the Way, a religious education conference sponsored by PYM. This nine-month program of spiritual deepening and community building has been offered at PYM ever since. The Spiritual Formation Working Group of eleven Friends who organized this program has become the Spiritual Formation Program Collaborative and is excited about its continuing work.
Through these years many dozens of Meetings and hundreds of Friends have been impacted by the Spiritual Formation Program. A new energy and life have come to the program, as dialogue with BYM is encouraging new creativity and flexibility in the ways that the program is being thought of and organized. The Collaborative is hoping this new energy will invite many PYM Friends to take on new leadership roles in this work.
Mission
Our mission is to offer programs that enable PYM Friends to deepen and strengthen their personal and corporate spiritual lives, and build more intimate Spirit-led community within their Meetings.
What We Do
Our collaborative meets regularly to oversee making this program available to Monthly and Quarterly Meeting groups of Friends and to gathered Yearly Meeting Friends. In our work, we have always tried our best to let God be in charge and to discern at the moment how we can stay true to that desire. We form small teams of trainers who plan and lead the workshops of the program.
Who We Are
- Richard Alonso, Abington MM
- John Brady, Abington MM
- Jane Cadwallader Keller, Lancaster MM
- Lynne Graham, Wellsboro MM
- Katherine Johnson, Third Haven MM
- Diane Kesler, Patuxent MM
- Dale Myrtetus, Middletown (Bucks) MM
- Charles Randall, Media MM
- Carolyn Schodt, Chestnut Hill MM
- Susan Thompson, Newtown MM, co-clerk
- Wanda Wyffels, Abington MM, webmaster
- Wade Wright, Lancaster MM, co-clerk
Our email addresses and phone numbers are on the “Interested in SF?” page.
When We Meet
We usually have meetings every other month on a Saturday, and often at Plymouth Monthly Meeting, from 10 AM to 2 PM. See Schedule (in right menu) for dates of our meetings and our Spiritual Formation Programs.
Our new direction, modeled on the way that Baltimore Yearly Meeting’s program has evolved, possibly will involve two Yearly Meeting retreats a year that invite anyone who has the desire, or who has participated in Spiritual Formation to come together for renewal and leadership development. These Friends will hopefully leave these retreats inspired and transformed and will return to their home communities ready to lead in this work and help it spread in our Yearly Meeting.