Yearly Meeting 2023: Session 7 - Our all-age community, closing session

4 May 2023 | by Rebecca Hardy, Elinor Smallman, Joseph Jones

‘We have had a really fun weekend full of happiness and truthfulness with some tiredness.’

Session Seven, YM’s last, contained quite a lot of required business. But some of it was ‘really lovely’, said Fred Langridge, assistant clerk. It would deal with the YM epistle (see page 15) and hear from younger people attending in the relevant age groups. After a round of thanks, the Meeting welcomed New Shoots (aged nought to two), who had been ‘enjoying the theme of truth and joy through sensory exploration’.

The Fox Cubs (aged two to five) had ‘had a wonderful time building love and taking care of each other’. The Light Explorers (six to eight) read their own contribution: ‘In our epilogues we danced like circles in the night’.

‘Quakers do more than just sitting down’ said the Spiritual Adventurers (aged nine to eleven). ‘We have had a really fun weekend full of happiness and truthfulness with some tiredness’, they said, adding a smiley-face emoji – one wonders if it will be the first to appear in YM minutes.

The epistle from Junior Yearly Meeting had contained part of its minute: ‘To speak truth to power is as much about knowing when to use our voice as it is to use our silence’.

With that, all that was left was the reading of the epistle. But of course it was only ‘goodbye for now’, said Adwoa Burnley, clerk. The extra July session now had quite a lot of unexpected business, and details were yet to be finalised. Friends were aware that the hoped-for discernment on how to deal with the ‘existential crises’ facing Friends, not least the decline in their numbers, was important.

The work done this YM was not always exciting, but it was done to make excitement possible. There is much left to do.

Yearly Meeting minutes can be found at www.quaker.org.uk/ym/documents. Next week: Special interest groups, epilogues and the Salter Lecture.

Read the rest of our full coverage of Yearly Meeting here:

You need to login to read subscriber-only content and/or comment on articles.