Barnegat Monthly Meeting Religious Society of Friends
614 East Bay Avenue, P.O. Box 32 Barnegat, NJ 08005-0032
2024 Spiritual State of the Meeting Report, due April 15, 2025 Responding to PYM questions:
How has your meeting been changing?
For years we have been concerned about decreased membership and attendance. While that concern continues, there has been a slight increase in regular attenders. Two of the newer regular attenders have become involved in the Meeting beyond Sunday Meeting for Worship.
In an attempt to grow the Meeting, we started an intensive outreach program in December 2020. As this was during the pandemic when the meetinghouse was closed, we focused on getting the Meeting known by hosting speakers and performers monthly via Zoom. When social distancing restrictions started to ease in early 2022, we began to host these events in the meetinghouse. We added the monthly activities of an evening needlecraft club and open house breakfasts.
Due to the small number of individuals active in the Meeting, we transitioned in 2024 to the primary outreach activity being a monthly open house after Sunday worship. These consisted of breakfast and a program. Our monthly open houses attract many one-time visitors. During 2024 we hosted six Open Houses with a Quakerism 101 theme, another five with programs exploring the Quaker SPICES, and one during which a community organization’s representative shared information. In 2024, the only ‘large’ events of the previous Barnegat Meeting type were a Zoom presentation by Ben Pink Dandelion and an abbreviated Alternatives to Violence workshop.
We created a welcome committee in 2024. We encourage visitors to provide an email address in our guest/sign-in book. We send an email through which we welcome them, encourage them to return, and share information about Barnegat Friends Meeting.
Despite extensive effort, the Meeting continues to be very small, and we continue to examine and explore ways to attract and retain new attenders and members.
Where are you headed in the next few years?
There are 25 individuals listed in our Meeting directory. However, if every active member and regular attender were at the same Meeting for Worship, we would have 10 or fewer people in attendance. Typical Sunday worship attendance ranges from 4-7 individuals. There is only one couple, and there are no family groups. The continued viability of the Meeting is a continual concern.
We will continue to encourage members outside of our regular community to join us for worship and participate in events we hold. These efforts are made to interact with our community, to increase awareness of Quakerism, and to attract more people to become regular attenders and members. We plan to continue monthly Open Houses in 2025 but will have a program every other month while the unprogrammed Open Houses will provide more time for socializing with each other and with visitors.
Over the next few years our meeting will continue to provide financial support to local and regional charities, environmental groups, and social justice causes. This support is possible due to the generous endowment bequeathed by former members. Our current income is low, not even sufficient to cover the Meeting’s regular operating expenses.
Please share any triumphs or troubles you have had regarding the climate witness:
While individual members and attenders have concerns and have taken actions related to climate change, the Meeting as a group has not committed to specific actions. The small number of members and attenders makes it difficult to attend to every issue of concern as a group.
Given where you are headed, might Ministry and Care help you find resources?
Support for intervisitation: We appreciate opportunities to interact with members of other Friends meetings and organizations. We have some regular worship visitors whose relatives live in retirement communities in Barnegat.
Some Barnegat Meeting members participate in activities of multiple Friends organizations, such as Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, Pendle Hill, Friends General Conference, and the Earlham School of Religion Quaker Leadership Center. We hope that PYM leadership will visit and worship with us and share insights with us in person.
Other: The most pressing resources our Meeting needs relate to growing our membership
