SPRING 2004Phil Anthony
(856) 769-0066 (voice)
(856) 769-1416 (fax)
salemqtr@verizon.net
hat's so special about “extended worship”? Does worshipping for two or three hours really give you so much more than the usual hour, 45 minutes, or half hour that we experience in our monthly meetings every First-day?
Last June Pendle Hill published Marcelle Martin’s pamphlet Invitation to a Deeper Communion. It’s a reflection on extended worship, and especially on the Gatherings for Worship, Ministry & Eldering that have been held at different meetings around Philadelphia Yearly Meeting over the past seven or so years. Two of them have taken place in Salem Quarter: at Woodstown and Woodbury MMs.
MARCH QUARTERLY MEETING
Woodstown Monthly Meeting
Sunday, 14 March 20049:00 am Gather 9:30 am Program: Lucy Duncan — Story Telling (Intergenerational) 10:30 am Worship 11:30 am Performance: Friends School Fine & Performing Arts 12:00 m Brown-bag lunch: bread, soup, and dessert provided by Woodstown MM 1:00 pm Meeting for worship for business Child care provided The format of those gatherings has changed since they were first held. Now the entire morning is devoted to worship. Following lunch, the group turns to worship sharing on whatever theme or issues may have arisen in the morning—the hunger for God, the challenges of becoming loving elders, the healing power of the Presence.
As Marcelle writes, there’s often a sense of restlessness that comes after the first hour. Over the years I’ve learned not to ignore it, but to acknowledge it and continue anyway. Soon it passes, and the worship grows deeper ... one begins to be suspicious of messages that come any sooner than an hour and a half into worship. And when it closes, people often say: “Has it been three hours already? I felt as if it was just beginning!”
The most recent gathering was held at Mount Holly MM in January. During lunch, as usual, the planning group responsible for the gatherings met to discern what the afternoon worship sharing should focus on. Try as they would, they couldn’t find a theme that connected the eight or nine messages over our three hours of worship. And so they proposed that we consider for ourselves what the morning had “been about.”
It wasn’t until I was on my way home that I learned what our worship had actually “been about.” A friend with whom I’d car-pooled told me what she’d learned about being attentive to God’s promptings before giving ministry ... and I thought of how I had come to a clearer understanding of what was required of me to hold my fellow worshippers in the Light ... and others too seemed to have been working to deepen their own particular gifts under the Spirit’s guidance.
So I don’t know what you’ll find if you join us at Seaville MM on Saturday, 3 April, for our own extended worship under the care of Salem Quarter’s Worship & Ministry Committee (see their report on pp. 16–17 and the Calendar on p. 2). Maybe the adventure will be finding out.
Before then there will be PYM Annual Sessions, at Arch Street once more this year. Special effort has been made to introduce more worship into the sessions, and to sprinkle workshops to help us with our Quaker life throughout the four days, 25–28 March. Full information may be found at your meetings, or at the PYM Website, www.pym.org. Please think about coming.
And before that, on Sunday, 14 March, we’ll have our own Quarterly Meeting at Woodstown MM. This time our program is intergenerational — stories for people of all ages by Lucy Duncan of Friends General Conference. Lucy’s an experienced professional story-teller as well as director of FGCBooks, and we look forward to a memorable experience.
We’ll gather at 9:00 am, with the program beginning at 9:30 — see above for the full schedule. As a special treat, we’ll have students from the Fine & Performing Arts program at Friends School to perform for us between worship and lunch. And speaking of lunch, once again Woodstown MM will provide soup, bread, and desserts for our dining pleasure. Our business meeting is expected to include consideration of what the Quarter wants from the coordinator program. Your views and ideas are welcome, and I’ll look forward to seeing you there.
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