Monthly meeting
None
In the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), a monthly meeting or area meeting [1] is the basic governing body, a congregation which holds regular meetings for business for Quakers in a given area. The monthly meeting is responsible for the administration of its congregants, including membership and marriages , and for the meeting's property. A monthly meeting can be a grouping of multiple smaller meetings, usually called preparative meetings , coming together for administrative purposes, while for others it is a single institution. In most countries, multiple monthly meetings form a quarterly meeting , which in turn form yearly meetings . [2] Programmed Quakers may refer to their congregation as a church . [2]
Management
Among Quakers, affairs are managed at a particular kind of meeting for worship , called a meeting for business, where all members are invited to attend. Decisions are made as a form of worship, where each individual sits in contemplative silence until moved to speak on a subject. [3] At these meetings, Quakers attempt to reach unity on a subject, in a form of religious consensus decision-making , to find "the sense of the meeting". [2] [4] A monthly meeting is so called because it traditionally holds these meetings once a month, separate from the normal weekly meeting for worship.
Each meeting usually nominates members to serve in certain volunteer positions to facilitate administration, including: [1]
- a clerk and assistant clerk or clerks
- a treasurer
- a registering officer
- a nominations committee
- a body of trustees
- a custodian of records or a committee for the purpose
A monthly meeting is usually associated with a particular place of worship; in many cases, the associated meeting house has a distinctive style of architecture and interior design, to represent the Quaker testimony of Simplicity . [5] Some meeting houses in the United States are among the earliest remaining religious structures in the country , and the oldest meeting house is likely the Third Haven Meeting House in Talbot County, Maryland , built between 1682 and 1684. [6]
Notes
- 1 2 "Area meetings and local meetings" . Quaker Faith and Practice: The book of Christian discipline of the Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Britain (Fifth ed.). Britain Yearly Meeting . 2014.
- 1 2 3 "FAQs about Quakers" . Friends General Conference . Retrieved 19 April 2019 .
- ↑ Hamm, Thomas D. (2002). "The Divergent Paths of Iowa Quakers in the Nineteenth Century" . The Annals of Iowa . 61 (2): 125–150. doi : 10.17077/0003-4827.10564 . Retrieved 19 April 2019 .
- ↑ Molina-Markham, Elizabeth (2014). "Finding the "Sense of the Meeting": Decision Making Through Silence Among Quakers". Western Journal of Communication . 78 (2): 155–174. doi : 10.1080/10570314.2013.809474 .
- ↑ Homan, Roger (2007). "The Aesthetics of Friends' Meeting Houses" . Quaker Studies . 11 (1): 115–128 . Retrieved 19 April 2019 .
- ↑ Esperdy, Gabrielle; Kingsley, Karen, eds. (2012). "Old Third Haven Meeting House" . SAH Archipedia . Society of Architectural Historians . Retrieved 19 April 2019 .
See also
External links
- QuakerMaps : a resource for finding monthly meetings from across the spectrum of Quakerism, powered by Google Maps.
- Quakerfinder : a resource for finding FGC monthly meetings in the United States.
- Find a Quaker Meeting in England, Wales or Scotland .