January 9-11
Radical Spirituality – Radical Simplicity
A weekend with Jim Merkel

Imagine you are first in line at a potluck buffet. The spread includes not just food and water, but all the materials needed for shelter, clothing, healthcare, and education. How do you know how much to take? How much is enough to leave for your neighbors behind you – not just the six and a half billion people, but the wildlife, and future generations? Many people feel the need to change their lifestyles to align with their spiritual values and transform our unsustainable culture. This workshop will offer practical suggestions to assist you on a customized journey toward a way of life that is not only enjoyable and filled with purpose but also equitable among all people, species, and future generations.

Jim Merkel is the author of Radical Simplicity and has worked as the sustainability coordinator at Dartmouth College . Formerly a military engineer and arms trader, Jim quit his job at the time of the Exxon Valdez disaster to devote himself to environmental service and world peace. He downsized his life and has lived on an equitable slice of annual global GNP ($5,000) for 16 years. Jim founded the Global Living Project (GLP) and initiated the GLP Summer Institute, where teams of researchers lived well on an equitable portion of the biosphere. See http://www.radicalsimplicity.org/ for more information.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

How do I register

Bill McKibben, author of The End of Nature said, “Jim Merkel offers a special mix of practicality and idealism: a workable mix. I defy you to read this book [Radical Simplicity] and not come away thinking of ways your life might change for the better.” Howard Zinn, author of A People's History of the United States wrote, “Jim Merkel has written the most persuasive argument I have yet seen for all of us to radically change the way we live day-to-day. Radical Simplicity joins the evidence of science to a fertile imagination. This is a profoundly important book.” This book is available from our bookstore

 

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January 16-18
Recording: Spiritual Discipline and Communal Gift
A weekend with Mario Cavallini and Sondra Ball

Our minutes are part of the distinctive nature of Quakerism – our need to live in integrity by doing business in a worshipful manner and worshiping through our conduct of business. However, being human, we may run into conflict and anxiety when we are asked to take, approve, or use minutes. Whether you are an experienced recording clerk or someone about to take up the service, you are invited to participate in a weekend focusing on the practical and spiritual dimensions of recording. Come prepared to share as well as to listen.

Mario Cavallini has written minutes and epistles for Quaker bodies ranging from clearness committees to annual sessions of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. He has learned much about the personal discipline and communal support needed to give voice to a meeting's discernment of divine will and temporal needs. He is a member of Mickleton Monthly Meeting (NJ).

Sondra Ball teaches classes in identifying spiritual gifts and writing poetry. She publishes an online poetry journal and currently serves as clerk of Salem Quarterly Meeting (Philadelphia Yearly Meeting). She is a member of Mickleton (NJ) Monthly Meeting.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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January 16-18
Qi Gong: Powerful, Simple Self-Care
A weekend with Kevin D. Greene

Learn simple self-care techniques that can be performed while seated, standing, or simply waiting. Regular Qi cultivation reduces pain and stress, enhances circulation, and empowers spirit. By learning to link our minds with our breath and movement, we melt away layers of blockage to our inner senses and outer experiences of joy. Qi Gong is compatible with any spiritual tradition that embraces the healing of body, mind, and spirit.

Kevin D. Greene is a priest of Obatala in the Lukumi Yoruba tradition, certified massage therapist of 18 years, diviner/reader, consultant, and facilitator. In 1996 he created the Alternative and Complementary Therapies Program at ActionAIDS, a Philadelphia nonprofit organization serving people with AIDS and HIV. A student of Qi Gong and Tai Chi since 1996, Kevin has cultivated a daily practice of Qi Gong and has been able to share his personal experience in surviving a life-threatening illness by incorporating this practice into a holistic health care program.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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January 23-25
Compassionate Communication
A weekend with Jane Connor and Pamela Freeman

We all encounter conflicts that threaten to disconnect us from each other. Based on the work of clinical psychologist Marshall Rosenberg, Ph.D., compassionate nonviolent communication helps us stay connected with one another in the face of anger, mistrust, and pain. Practical exercises will enhance our abilities to:

• Create and sustain fulfilling relationships;
• Remain open to others in the face of painful judgments and criticisms;
• Express our truth in a way that makes us most likely to be heard;
• Meet with compassion people whose actions support injustice, violence, and inequality; and
• Empathize with and not judge ourselves.

Jane Connor, Ph.D., is an award-winning teacher of Compassionate Communication, Multicultural Psychology, and Human Development at SUNY-Binghamton and co-author of Connecting Across Differences: A Guide to Compassionate Nonviolent Communication.

 

 

Pamela Freeman is a psychotherapist and long-time social activist who currently works for Spirit in Action as a trainer/organizer. She is a co-founder of Playback for Change, an improvisational theater company that focuses on race, class, and the stories that do not get told. She is a graduate of the Bay Nonviolent Communication (NVC) North American Leadership Training Program.

 

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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January 25-29
Prayer: No Strings Attached
A short course with Chris Ravndal

We will engage in a series of experiments with the hypothesis that God is present and active in response to prayer. We will learn and practice in class a variety of approaches to prayer and contemplation within the western tradition. Learning Centering Prayer, an updating of a traditional Christian approach to contemplation, will provide practical help in the use of Silence, as well as a way to practice the Presence throughout the day. Other approaches to prayer will include Meeting for Worship, lectio divina, visualization and guided meditation, petition and intercession, unceasing prayer, body prayer, healing prayer, and receptive journaling.

Chris Ravndal taught for 15 years at Pendle Hill and for 25 years in Friends schools. A certified teacher of Centering Prayer, he has led workshops at Friends General Conference gatherings, Powell House, Quaker Center at Ben Lomond , Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, Canadian Yearly Meeting, and numerous other Quaker meetings around the country. His goal in teaching is to engage the group’s potential to bring its members to their Inner Teacher.

 

$490/shared room; $585/private room; $375/commuter

This course qualifies for our Bring a Friend Discount. Learn more here

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January 30-February 1
On Being Gathered: A Workshop on Meeting Growth and Revitalization
A weekend with Deborah Haines
Co-sponsored by the Advancement and Outreach Committee of Friends General Conference

Will the seekers who come to our meetings be welcomed into a deep spiritual fellowship? Are we truly open to those from a variety of backgrounds? How can we recapture the dynamic energy of early Friends? In this workshop we will look at outreach and meeting growth as extensions of gathered worship, and the invisible threads that knit us together when we attend to the Inward Teacher.

Deborah Haines is a member of Alexandria Meeting (VA, Baltimore Yearly Meeting [BYM]) and serves as clerk of the BYM Advancement and Outreach Committee, as well as recording clerk for BYM annual sessions. She was formerly clerk of the Advancement and Outreach Committee of Friends General Conference (2000-2006) and coordinated the FGC Centennial observances in 2000. Trained as an historian, Deborah was part of the “New Swarthmoor” revitalization movement of the 1970s. She travels widely among Friends offering workshops on the power of early Quakerism, Quaker process, and spiritual hospitality.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 1-5
Singing Our Souls
A short course with Niyonu D. Spann

This popular course is an opportunity to open our hearts and join in building a singing community.  Through sharing our voices in spontaneous creation as well as structured part singing, we will experience the give and take essential within our testimony of community.  We will sing songs of transformation – spirituals, gospel, jazz, folk, and our own originals.  We will worship together both in song and silence.  Journaling, small group discussions, drumming, and some movement will also play a part.  This will be a co-created community based on what you bring with you into this sacred space.  Even if you don’t think of yourself as a “singer,” this experience will release the singer in you!

Niyonu D. Spann was dean of Pendle Hill from 2004 through 2007. She founded TrV Consulting and the performance group, Tribe 1. Niyonu studied at the Oberlin Conservatory and received her B.A./B.M. in vocal performance. She organizes and directs Pendle Hill’s Gospel Choir.

 

 

“It was energizing, spiritual, uplifting. Empowering, community building, fun. Niyonu is remarkable in her abilities to work with music and with people.” 2007 participant

$490/shared room; $585/private room; $375/commuter

This course qualifies for our Bring a Friend Discount. Learn more here

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February 6-8
Clerking
A weekend with Deborah Fisch and Bill Deutsch

This is an opportunity for Friends to explore together how clerks can help meetings faithfully consider the business before them in a centered and worshipful manner.  We plan to have opportunities in both small and large group settings to consider:

• How to make our meetings for business more truly meetings for worship;
• The fundamentals of a Quaker meeting for worship with attention to business;
• Discerning the “sense of the meeting”;
• Recording the sense of the meeting and the varying practices among Friends;
• Setting agendas;
• Distinguishing between political and spiritual statements; and
• Ways to deal with humanly difficult questions, issues, and decisions.

Deborah Fisch has been the clerk of Iowa Yearly Meeting Conservative since 1998. A member of Paullina Monthly Meeting (IA), she lives in Des Moines (IA), and works as the Associate Secretary for Programs & Traveling Ministries for Friends General Conference. She frequently travels in the ministry.

Bill Deutsch, a member of Decorah Friends Meeting in Iowa Yearly Meeting, Conservative, and former yearly meeting clerk, will serve as a companion in ministry with Deborah.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 6-8
The Sacred Compass: The Way of Spiritual Discernment
A weekend with J. Brent Bill

A compass makes a good metaphor for our spiritual lives and the work of discerning God ’s will for us. The divine compass points us to the mind and love of God. Keeping our soul ’s eyes on the sacred compass leads us to the discovery that we can move through life with purpose and promise, even when we may not sense with certainty what that purpose and promise are. In a grace-filled way, our compass invites us into a life of continuous experiences of God and of spiritual transformation. This workshop, based on Brent’s book Sacred Compass, will be an interactive opportunity to see where God has led and is leading us. We’ll use experiences such as drawing Life Maps, charting the call of the Divine in our lives, and more.

J. Brent Bill is a Quaker minister, writer, and retreat leader. He grew up in the Evangelical Friends Church-Eastern Region. He is the author or co-author of many spiritual works, including Mind the Light: Learning to See with Spiritual Eyes, Holy Places: Matching Sacred Space with Mission and Message, and Holy Silence: The Gift of Quaker Spirituality, in addition to more than 100 short stories and non-fiction articles. His most recent work is Sacred Compass: The Way of Spiritual Discernment, published in April 2008.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 13-15
Relationships that Sustain Us: A Retreat for Couples
With Patricia McBee and Brad Sheeks

How do our relationships support us in attuning ourselves to the Spirit, responding to our leadings, and achieving our dreams? In this weekend workshop we will celebrate the ways our relationships sustain us and explore how they can support us more fully. There will be opportunities for worship, sharing reflections privately with your partner, group sharing, and practice time for improving communication skills. For any two people in a committed relationship, this workshop has as its goal the deepening of our relationships, not therapy. Couples only.

Brad Sheeks and Patricia McBee have led couple retreats for Friends since 1975.  They are parents and grandparents and are grateful for the support and sustenance they receive from one another. They are both members of Central Philadelphia Monthly Meeting (PA), and travel in the ministry.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 13-15
Living in Intentional Community - Quaker Style

A weekend with Peggy O’Neill and Don Miller from Ashland Vineyard Community
and Janett Forte from The Cliffs Community

Living in a Quaker intentional community lets our lives testify to our values and principles on a daily basis. Mutual support and cooperative living also let us live more gently in harmony with the earth and its limited resources. Members and residents of two intentional Quaker-oriented communities in Virginia will share the principles, tools, models, gifts, and challenges of living in community, and help you envision how living in intentional community might enrich your life.

Peggy O’Neill, MSW , is a skilled instructor and group facilitator who has been teaching and leading workshops with adults and youth for over two decades. She and her husband are founding members of Ashland Vineyards (VA), a Quaker-oriented intentional community, where they have lived for over 20 years and raised their two grown sons. Peggy directs continuing education programs in the Schools of Social Work and Education at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU).

Don Miller, Ph.D., is emeritus professor of management at VCU School of Business. A former Clerk of Richmond Friends Meeting (VA), Don and his wife are founding members of Ashland Vineyard Community, where they lived and raised their two sons from 1985 to 2005. Now retired and living in Richmond , he and his wife continue to participate in the activities of the community.

 

Janett Forte, MSW , LCSW, is an assistant professor of psychiatry at VCU and serves as program director for the VCU Institute for Women’s Health National Center of Excellence. A single parent attending Richmond Meeting in the nineties, Janett explored living in intentional community with a Friendly Eights group and decided to purchase land and build a home at The Cliffs, a Quaker community in Hanover (VA). For more than 12 years, the community provided support, continuity, friendship, and connection for Janett and her son.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 20-27
Standing Firm in Our Being: A Mindfulness Meditation Retreat
A seven-day retreat with Mary Grace Orr

Mindfulness meditation is a simple technique offered by the Buddha for awakening the mind and heart. This retreat will be a time of silence, with periods of sitting and walking practice, opportunities to talk about your own practice, and formal presentations. It will be suitable for both beginners and experienced meditators.

Mary Grace Orr is a meditation practitioner and teacher. She is senior teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Marin County (CA) and the guiding teacher of Vipassana Santa Cruz. She has studied with Jack Kornfield, A.H. Almaas, and many other meditation teachers. She has led retreats at Pendle Hill for more than ten years and particularly enjoys working with those who follow both Buddhist and Quaker paths.

$840/shared room; $985/private room; $590/commuter

This course qualifies for our Bring a Friend Discount. Learn more here

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February 20-22
Moved by the Spirit: Simple Chant and Movement
A weekend with Isabella Bates

In this weekend workshop, we will dive into the power of the song of few words, chant. When we strip away verbal content, chant draws us into vocal vibration itself and carries us forward on a journey of opening to spirit. We will have time to chant, move our bodies while chanting, sit in the silence, and reflect personally and together. No prior experience with singing or chant is needed. The body movement can be adapted for everyone. Come refresh yourself with song, movement, silence, and sharing.

Isabella Bates is a singer, voice and piano teacher, and meditation leader. She has been the cantor at the Taizé Service at The Washington National Cathedral for 18 years and has produced two CDs of original chant. She serves on the staff of the Center for Integrative Medicine at George Washington University, where she teaches meditation classes. She is a member of Langley Hill Meeting (VA).

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 22-26
Listening for God, Finding the Path
A short course with Mary Lord

Friends believe we are led by the Spirit, but how do we respond, and how do we know it is God and not our own will or imagination? Together, in small groups, and through individual reflection we will examine ways of listening for the Spirit; testing corporate and personal leadings; preparing for and following a leading; and knowing when to lay down a concern and rest.

Mary Lord has offered workshops and presentations on spiritual discernment at yearly and monthly meetings and Friends organizations.  Her workshops on discernment grew from Friends’ requests for help with clearness on personal and corporate response to Friends testimonies. Mary has worked for the Friends Committee on National Legislation, the American Friends Service Committee, and other Friends organizations, principally on peace and justice. 

 

$490/shared room; $585/private room; $375/commuter

This course qualifies for our Bring a Friend Discount. Learn more here

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February 27-March 1
Transformative Narrative Portrait™
A weekend with Yvette A. Hyater-Adams

Ready to try something creative and new? Yvette Hyater-Adams, pioneer in the Transformative Language Arts movement, is offering a literary arts-based approach to personal development with Transformative Narrative Portrait™. Be guided to write and revise short autobiographical and imaginative narratives. Experience what writers and poets have known for centuries – the transformative power of story. Retelling the past and visualizing future narratives puts into context today’s here and now stories. The process increases self-awareness, uncovers personal and universal truths, and helps individuals make intentional choices for meaningful change. The result is a documented journey of pivotal stories that take on a new meaning for transcending the past into daily acts of purposeful living. Workshop participants support each other in sharing written work as a way to witness to each person’s powerful story for change.

Participants will:

• compile a collection of past, present, and future stories;

• use autobiographical content to write real and imaginative stories that make meaning

out of life experiences;

• explore identity through social, relational, and personal narratives;

• track patterns of choices and decisions across stories;

• unpack current situation stories;

• reframe problem language narratives into positive voiced stories;

• clarify goals;

• build scenario-based stories as a guide for future living.

Yvette Hyater-Adams, MA-TLA, pioneer in the Transformative Language Arts movement runs Prime Directive Consulting Group™ and Renaissance Muse where she uses reflective writing, storytelling, poem-making, creative writing, and dialogue as tools for personal and institutional change.

 

 

Comments from past participants: “[Yvette Hyater-Adams] stretched my creativity, developed my voice, strengthened my confidence” “Yvette is wonderful! Her humor and acceptance [are] great. Safety and trust were real. My creativity has been jumpstarted, I feel opened up and sparkling!” “Yvette is wonderful, a fabulous resource and facilitator. She held and sculpted the space gently and powerfully.”

 

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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February 27-March 1
Forgiveness as a Spiritual Practice
A weekend with Sue Regen

We all experience anger, hurt, guilt, and pain. What we do with these is up to each individual. Choosing to practice forgiveness can move us toward inner peace, renew our relationship with self and others, and restore our right relationship with Spirit. We will focus on the tools and techniques for doing forgiveness work, not on therapy. The workshop will include presentations, guided meditation, quiet worship, practicing techniques, and group and individual time.

Sue Regen travels in the ministry encouraging Friends to practice forgiveness as a spiritual discipline. Her concern originated in and has profoundly affected her personal life. Since 2002 Sue has offered workshops on forgiveness to monthly meetings and Attica Prison Worship Group, and at gatherings of Friends General Conference and Friends Conference on Religion and Psychology. Sue is a member of Rochester Monthly Meeting (NY), which holds her ministry under its care.

$285/shared room; $360/private room; $200/commuter

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March 13-15
Introducing Quaker Quest!
A weekend with Elaine Crauderueff and Rubye Howard Braye
Co-sponsored by the Advancement and Outreach Committee of Friends General Conference

Do you believe that Quakerism is “a spiritual path for our time” and want to share it? Quaker Quest (QQ) is a dynamic monthly meeting-based outreach program that has proven successful in engaging seekers in the Quaker way all across England for the past six years. Conducting a QQ program, meetings have experienced new vitality and a deeper community. This weekend will introduce you to Quaker Quest. Experience a QQ workshop, engage in activities that help you to articulate your faith and build community, and come away knowing what is involved for your meeting to undertake QQ. (Note that further mentoring is needed for QQ workshop leadership). QQ is a project of Friends General Conference in the United States and Canada . Visit quakerquestfgc.org for more information.

Elaine Crauderueff is program coordinator for the Advancement and Outreach Committee of Friends General Conference. She led Inquirers’ Weekends and taught a course on Quaker Journals at Pendle Hill. She has co-led QQ workshops across the country, including with one of the founders of QQ at the 2008 FGC Gathering.

Rubye Howard Braye is an executive coach and organizational consultant specializing in human and organizational development. A gifted co-leader of several QQ workshops, Rubye is a member of Wilmington Friends Meeting (NCYM-C), the Friends General Conference Board, and the Pendle Hill Board of Trustees.

$200/shared room; $240/private room; $120/commuter

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March 20-22
Coming Back Home
A Working Retreat at Pendle Hill

Many of us know Pendle Hill as a place we can return to, knowing that being back is a way of coming home to our deeper selves. The staff and property committee of the board will be here to welcome you back to Pendle Hill for a weekend of fun, fellowship, and service. As always, home needs some help from loving hands. Our service projects will be weather dependent and may include clearing brush, maintaining our wood-chip path, and preparing the meadow and garden beds for spring, along with work of the household. There will be work for all levels of strength and ability. Invite a friend from your time at Pendle Hill and enjoy a mini-reunion.

$75/shared room, private room, or commuter (will cover the cost of room and board).

Limited to 15.

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March 22-27
Created by God Moment by Moment:
A Retreat in the Ignatian Way with Elizabeth Ellis

Based on the work of Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuits, this workshop will combine individual silent retreat in the Ignatian Way with daily communal prayer and brief presentations on Ignatian themes, styles of prayer, and the discernment of spirits. Often called activist contemplation, this spiritual way is practiced in a wide variety of faith communities. Apart from the presentations and communal prayer, the retreat will be in silence to allow deeper movement into prayer. One-on-one meetings with a spiritual director will be available.

Elizabeth Ellis is a spiritual director in the Ignatian way. She trained at the Jesuit School of Weston in Cambridge (MA) and the Jesuit Center for Spiritual Growth at Wernersville (PA). Elizabeth was director of the Chester program and Spiritual Witness director at Pendle Hill. A clergywoman with the Unitarian Universalist church and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), she served for 23 years as a leader of a community-based ministry in low-income communities in Boston .

$610/shared room; $730/private room; $470/commuter

This course qualifies for our Bring a Friend Discount. Learn more here

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