Meeting Life
Quaker Learning
Peace and Social Concerns
Gun Violence Flag Project
Hands in Outreach
Worship with Attention to Business
Quaker Learning at Allen’s Neck Friends Meeting
Writing Group
The writing group has been meeting for the past 20 years. The point is not to write “properly” but to find a true voice.
Meeting for Learning
This group gathers before Meeting for Worship to explore writings about Quakerism and Quaker concerns in depth. There are small groups that meet for informal “threshing sessions” (opportunities to explore deeply a variety of concerns) and larger groups that gather to learn about the various seasoned Visiting Friends who come to spend time among us.
Quakerism 101
Allen’s Neck has developed its own Quakerism 101 program, a series of classes offered throughout the winter to explore Quaker history, faith, practices, and organizational structure that has proved very popular.
Peace and Social Concerns
Quakers have found many ways to express our faith, and do so, in part, by observing and practicing “testimonies.” These testimonies include Peace, Justice for all, Non-violence, Simplicity, Integrity, Community and Care of Creation, and they shape and inform the work of the Peace and Social Concerns Committee.
In 1656, an early Quaker, George Fox, wrote, “Be patterns, be examples in all countries, places, islands, nations, wherever to come… to walk cheerfully over the world.”
Beyond encouraging our members to love themselves and each other, we encourage them to support actions toward peace and justice in the world outside our meeting. We are actively involved in promoting gender equality in Nepal through girls’ education, ending gun violence, and local jail reform.
Gun Violence Flag Project
The Friends at Allen’s Neck began gathering fabrics, cutting, sewing, writing and painting the flags, reaching out to involve children and adults from surrounding communities. The flags have been flown in seven locations so far, representing love and honor to those affected by this horror. The flags represent healing and the hope that this violence will be curtailed.
Our mission is not over. Recently 153 flags are flying outside our Meeting House for the 153 children shot every week by guns in our United States. We will continue to ask where we should be led in our PeaceTestimony, in the hope of promoting change and the action required to stop gun violence.
Hands in Outreach
In an effort to promote gender equality, Allens Neck Friends Meeting helps sponsor the education of Namrata, a low-caste, hardworking young girl who lives in inner-city Kathmandu. In Nepal, girls are considered second-class citizens. Namrata’s sponsorship is organized by Hands in Outreach (HIO), a small, U.S. nonprofit founded in the late 1980’s that inspires marginalized girls and women in Nepal to lift themselves from deep-rooted poverty.
Namrata is the oldest of three girls in her family. She shares a tiny rented room with her sisters and parents. Like so many Nepali women, Namrata’s mother, Tara, didn’t have a chance to go to school as a young girl. She was 17 years old when she gave birth to Namrata, and she now works long days as a domestic. Tara feels fortunate that all three of her girls are sponsored by HIO and that she can attend HIO’s women’s empowerment classes herself.
In addition to sponsoring Namrata, Allen’s Neck Friends Meeting offers support to encourage HIO projects, such as donating books to HIO’s libraries and undergarments to especially vulnerable girls. Donations are hand-delivered by HIO’s co-director and ANFM member, Laura Hunt, during her annual visits to Nepal. See HIO’s website to learn more about their work.
Worship with Attention to Business