Reports - Friends World Committee for Consultation Section of the Americas

FWCC joins consultation with organizations focused on Bolivia

FWCC participated in a consultation between organizations interested in Bolivia, convened by the Bolivian Quaker Education Fund (BQEF). Goals of this consultation were to 1) Gain a more thorough understanding of the work of Quaker or Quaker-affiliated organizations located in the Global North working in solidarity with Bolivian partners 2) Explore our responses to the evolving landscapes of solidarity work in Bolivia and reflect on deepening our faithful accompaniment with Bolivian Communities and Friends 3) Discover possibilities for further support and collaborations. We are very thankful to Rebecca Day Cutter of BQEF and Consultation and Intervisitation Program Group Clerk Milena Villca for their leadership in this initiative

Representatives from BQEF, United 4 Change (which has taken on the work of Quaker Bolivia Link), Waljok, Quaker Earthcare Witness, the American Friends Service Committee, Thee Quaker Podcast (through a videomaking project in partnership with Waljok), Friends Journal shared about their work and FWCC shared about our relationships with Friends and Yearly Meetings in Bolivia.

Outcomes of this meeting include multiple opportunities to engage and learn more about Bolivia, including an in person study tour lead by BQEF to Bolivia in January and a virtual tour organized by Waljok.

BQEF has just a few spots left for its Quaker Study Tour, January 7-20 2025, which will visit several of the projects described in the consultation. BQEF staff say that despite the fact that deadlines and information sessions listed on the tour page have past, you are still welcome to express interest.

Waljok is organizing a virtual study tour and released a preview of that opportunity, produced by Thee Quaker filmmaker Michael Candelori (who has also produced media for FWCC). Learn more about that tour at this link, and enjoy the preview below:

Hymn Contest Entries

We are deeply grateful for the many heartfelt entries we received for our hymn contest. Each song reflected a deep faith and sincere devotion, reminding us of the light and love that inspire our Quaker community around the world.

This year’s winning hymn comes from Sandra Elizabeth Espinoza of El Salvador, whose words and music beautifully capture the heart of Quaker worship. In her reflection on the song, Sandra shared that Quakers “worship modestly in silence, believing that God is with us and listens to us. The truth is not in vain words but in what comes from our hearts sincerely.” She described her hymn as expressing “a life guided by God and accompanied by peace, love, and steadfastness, and by committed action without hatred.”

Sandra composed the music through prayer and inspiration, giving thanks to God for the privilege of participating. Her work reminds us that the Spirit continues to speak through song, calling us to peace, humility, and service.

Congratulations to Sandra and to all who shared their gifts in this joyful celebration of faith and creativity.

Enjoy the videos of each of our hymn entries below:

Young Adult Friends Section Meeting Retreat Report

Young Adult Friends (YAFs, ages 18-35) serve a vital role in the health of the Quaker community. They carry the weighty responsibility of the future of Quakerism. They provide a bridge for Junior Friends to step into the larger Meeting. They bring energy and vibrance to gatherings. They steward what it means to be a Quaker.

Hosting opportunities for YAFs to be with one another builds a collective identity of Quakerism for this generation and becomes a foundation for what Quakerism will become. It also offers YAFs opportunities to engage with people going through similar experiences and learn to navigate those challenges from a place of inner light.

YAFs from across the Section of the Americas (SOA) were blessed with a unique and historic opportunity which was made possible by the Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC). In March, 18 YAFs from Canada, the United States, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Peru, and Bolivia gathered in Scottsdale, Arizona for three days leading up to the SOA Annual Section Meeting. This gathering was the first of its kind, and was inspired by the spirit of connection sparked at the YAF Gathering prior to the World Plenary last August. It marked a powerful moment of cross-cultural fellowship and spiritual deepening among young Friends.

YAFs were grounded in their shared belief of honoring the light within each of us while celebrating the unique facets of our local, regional, and national expressions of our faith. The first activity together was to establish the following intentions to aid the navigation of this diversity.

To learn and respect the differences between our cultures and worship / Para aprender y respetar las diferencias entre nuestras culturas y adoración
Speak on behalf of yourself – use ‘I’ statements / Habla en nombre de ti mismo – usa declaraciones ‘Yo’
Seek unity in our diversity / Buscar unidad en nuestra diversidad
We’re learning from God through each other / Estamos aprendiendo de Dios el uno a través del otro
Every experience is unique and valued / Cada experiencia es única y valorada
Enjoy being in each other’s presence / Disfruta de estar en presencia del otro
In building trust with one another, we learn how to share our light / Al construir confianza entre nosotros, aprendemos a compartir nuestra luz

YAFs deepened their spiritual bonds through a rich tapestry of shared experiences. Throughout the gathering, YAFs stepped into roles of leadership by guiding workshops, facilitating worship, and greeting the day together on peaceful sunrise hikes. A memorable excursion to the Desert Botanical Garden, led by two gracious friends from Phoenix Monthly Meeting, offered a space for reflection and connection with the natural world. With open hearts and willing hands, YAFs also gave back to the Phoenix Meeting community, providing much-needed yard care for its smaller, aging congregation. YAFs led the entire community in worship on the final day of the Section Meeting—an experience many described as spiritually moving and left a lasting impression on all who were present.

What young Friends do now shapes the future of Quakerism. Opportunities for YAFs to connect amongst themselves are crucial for the discernment of their identity and emboldens the brilliance of Quakerism for generations to come. This event is just one instance of the commitment that FWCC has in supporting YAFs around the world to honor their presence, engagement, and visibility.

Inspired by the depth of connection and shared spirit they experienced, YAFs left the gathering with a renewed commitment to strengthening their bonds and expanding their presence within the wider Quaker community across the Section of the Americas. While this may have been the first event of its kind, it is clear it will not be the last. The seeds planted in Scottsdale are already taking root, and are nurturing a growing movement of young Friends ready to walk together in faith, friendship, and service.

Meg Cody

Loving our Neighbours across the 49th Parallel: Conversation with Friends across our Common Border

As a part of Canadian Yearly Meeting sessions, Glenn Morison of Winnipeg Monthly Meeting and Co-Clerk of the Representative Engagement Program Group of the Friends World Committee for Consultation, Section of the Americas, organized an online Special Interest Group on June 13, 2025 called:

“Loving our Neighbours across the 49th Parallel: Conversation with Friends across our Common Border“

After a Welcome from Glenn and an explanation of the gathering by Glenn, Evan Welkin, FWCC Americas Executive Secretary (North Pacific Yearly Meeting), offered a reflection on the work of FWCC to build bridges and cross cultures among Friends, including through the initiative of World Quaker Day which takes place the 1st Sunday of October every year. This year, October 5, 2025, World Quaker Day’s theme is on Galatians 5:14: “Love your neighbour as yourself” There are resources to host WQD events in your meeting here and a further reflection from FWCC General Secretary Tim Gee on the theme here in this month’s issue of Friends Journal.

Glenn Morison then shared a bit more about his motivation for hosting this event as a frequent traveler to and from the United States from Canada, and how the current political situation has deeply affected him. He referenced an experience at the recent FWCC Section of the Americas meeting in which he felt called to minister about the relationship between the US and Canada and an Executive Committee member from FWCC said a delegation might come to Canadian Yearly Meeting to speak to this concern.

Chuck Schobert, a Friend from Madison, Wisconsin and member of the FWCC Americas Executive Committee, spoke about his experience of making apologies as a US citizen travelling abroad, and offered his apologies to those gathered during the gathering. He spoke of the need to resist unjust policies and also of reaching out directly to offer a different message.

After some Introduction of queries for consideration in our breakout rooms, Friends divided into mixed groups with US and Canadians to consider:

What is your name, where do you live and what is your special interest in being here?

Given the reality that Canada – USA relations are the worst they have been since the Pig War of 1859, what is on your heart? What are your fears and hopes? How does this impact you at your deepest levels?

On both sides of the border there have been people who have reported that the current climate has impacted the usual relations between Friends who tend towards a quietest approach and those who lean towards a more activist expression in their life and meeting. Is your meeting impacted by the current political climate? If so, in which ways? And how can we uphold one another in such a situation?

Considering the strained relations between Canada and the USA, what are your thoughts, fears, and hopes? Kazu Haga, a practitioner of Kingian Nonviolence and restorative justice, reminds us that “human beings are not the problem. It is the actions we take, shaped by our life experiences, which are influenced by our culture and larger systems beyond our control. We need to fight the structures and mechanisms that perpetuate harm. To change them, we must understand individual stories and the systems influencing them.” How can we listen to our neighbours’ stories and understand the systems that affect them?

bell hooks, a feminist teacher and theorist, states, “beloved community is formed not by eradicating differences, but by affirming them, by each of us claiming the identities and cultural legacies that shape who we are and how we live in the world.” How can we work towards creating a beloved community in our daily lives?

We closed the gathering with some brief reflections on the experience and an overall sense of thanks for the opportunity to have the conversation.

Dialogue Peace

Building the Future as Way Opens: Reflecting on our 2025 Section Meeting

Gathering of Friends from the 2025 Section Meeting

From March 20–23, 2025, 145 Friends gathered in Scottsdale, Arizona and 30 more connected online for the FWCC Section of the Americas Meeting. We came from all across the Americas and beyond, including the largest Latin America delegation in recent memory. Friends traveled from their homes in Bolivia, Canada, Jamaica, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Peru, the United Kingdom, and the United States—to be together in the Spirit and celebrate our diversity in fellowship. The theme of our gathering, “Building the Future as Way Opens,” was drawn from Isaiah 43:19: “Look, I am doing something new! Now it emerges; can you not see it? Yes, I am making a road in the desert and rivers in the wasteland.”

And we truly saw something new emerge among us.

Throughout our time together, worship set the heartbeat of our days. Each morning began with early worship—quiet, grounded, Spirit-led. We experienced rich and diverse forms of worship led by Latin American Friends, Conservative Friends, and Young Adult Friends. Each voice, each style, was a reminder of how our varied spiritual practices all seek and serve the same Divine source.

Bible study sessions opened the scriptures in new ways, inviting us to listen with fresh ears and softened hearts. Home groups offered a space to reflect, laugh, and share stories across languages and backgrounds. In these small circles, we grew in our understanding of one another—not just intellectually, but spiritually and as members of a greater community.

In addition to worship and fellowship, we came together in workshops and business sessions, exploring how FWCC can live more deeply into its calling. After a successful campaign “Becoming the Quakers the World Needs”, we feel some fatigue on committees and in our fundraising efforts as transition, new programs and reorganization require more new energy.

We saw progress on new programming made possible by the campaign. We shared a beta version of our Digital Quaker Glossary, an evolution of a collaborative tool for making Quaker terms and vocabulary accessible to all in English and Spanish. We look forward to the next phase of this project, supporting our active Bilingual Services team to develop a certified interpretation and translation program. We also announced new partnerships on our digital map, offering a single source to find Friends’ projects as well as meetings, churches and worship groups around the world. Our Quaker Connect program launched in the days leading up to the Section Meeting and apprentices from meetings across the Section joined our gathering for the first time with new perspective and enthusiasm for what is possible in the Society of Friends. To witness their excitement and growing connection was to witness the future unfolding before our eyes.

Young Adult Friends brought great energy to the gathering, not only in their worship leadership but also in their fellowship. They explored the desert gardens together, shared meals and laughter, and took part in a service project for a local Friends meeting—offering their hands and hearts in service as part of a first-of-its-kind pre-conference gathering for young people across the Section.

Evan Welkin, our new Executive Secretary, introduced himself and set his personal experience within our gathering theme and what is unfolding in the Section. Joined by FWCC General Secretary Tim Gee, they both invited us to trust God and in each other as an unknown path unfolds before us in a time of uncertainty and great possibility. Our plenary speakers, Ana Gabriela Castañeda Aguilera and Debbie Humphries, built on this theme and reminded us of examples from scripture and our own lives when we are invited to do new things: how do we respond? We are excited that Ana and Debbie’s remarks will be printed for distribution soon.

We are, as ever, a community of Friends seeking unity across languages, cultures, and traditions. This gathering gave us the opportunity to treasure our diversity and to celebrate our shared commitment to God’s leading among us. There were long conversations over meals, joyful singing in multiple languages, and celebration over the work we are doing throughout the Section. Embracing Friends from across the globe, not just physically but spiritually, helped us find new ways to speak, to listen, to walk forward together.

The Spirit is doing something new among us. We came away from this gathering excited about projects that inspire and unite us, energized by the possibilities that lie ahead. We are also clear-eyed about the clear and present challenges in the world around us today. As we return to our home countries and meetings, may we continue to walk forward in faith, trusting that the road will open, and rivers will flow, even in the wasteland.

As Ana Gabriela shared powerfully with us during her evening plenaries: “Sometimes, it’s the very act of stepping into the unknown that prepares us in ways we never imagined.” Like the road in the desert or the river in the wasteland, this gathering reminded us that new paths are revealed when we walk forward in faith, trusting the unknown. We are all grateful for every person who made this gathering possible and for each Friend who took that leap. Together, we are building the future—as way opens.

Hubs for the FWCC World Plenary Meeting 2024

The 2024 World Plenary Meeting (WPM) will take place on site in South Africa and online. (See more general information about the WPM and register here) Some Friends will join the WPM online as individuals, and others in groups. We are describing groups of people joining the WPM (and the locations they are joining from) as hubs. Everyone who plans to attend your hub should be encouraged to register so they have access to advance materials here: Registration

A hub is any group of Friends joining the World Plenary Meeting online from another location, from a single internet connection. The group size could be from 3 to 300+, but in many cases will be about 10 or 20 people. They may participate in the complete WPM from August 5-12, 2024 or just in some sessions. You can register to become a hub here

What is needed to be a hub?

Firstly, a hub needs more than two people wanting to join the World Plenary Meeting from another place or country. On registration, we will ask for at least one person to be named as a facilitator/elder for the hub, and a second to be the tech lead. There will be a ‘tech rehearsal’ for tech leads prior to the World Plenary Meeting, and regular check-ins to see how it is going.For larger groups of people, we recommend that a hub has access to:

a projector, large screen or monitor
a laptop, or tablet
a reliable internet, WiFi or data connection
a reliable supply of electricity
speakers
a web camera
a microphone

A group of up to about five people could gather around a computer or tablet. They could use the computer screen, microphone, camera and speaker. For the best experience of the WPM, a larger group would need a larger screen, external speakers and an external microphone.

How can I receive support as a Hub?

Limited technical support, for example on connectivity issues, will be provided to hubs through by the World Plenary Meeting Tech Working Group. The contact information for support persons will be provided after your registration as a hub is approved.

If you require interpretation for you event, be aware that the World Plenary Meeting official languages include Spanish and Swahili. If you need interpretation in another language, we do recommend finding a local person able to attend your hub and participate in simultaneous interpretation during the event

A Midwest Regional Gathering

by Luanne Hagee

Friends, if there is one thing I have learned the last two and a half years is that I must be patient (near impossible for me) and that patience pays off.

It was way back in March of 2019 during the FWCC-SOA Section Meeting near Kansas City, Missouri members of the Midwest Region (Illinois YM, Indiana YM, Ohio Valley YM, Western YM, the New Association of Friends and Central YM) began a discussion of a possible event/gathering in our Region before the next Section Meeting in 2021. It was suggested that we might hold such a gathering in mid-2020 in conjunction with the annual sessions of one of our Yearly Meetings . . . and then COVID struck, but COVID could not and did not stop us from continuing conversations and planning for a Midwest Regional event/gathering. Lots of emails were sent/received and virtual gatherings were held within the Section.

In April we finally had a location and date secured along with a speaker and a field trip! David Edinger and I discussed options for lunch. In July registration opened and I saw that we had two speakers and a field trip! After I registered I began watching as Friends began to register – it was exciting to see which Friends were going to be attending and anticipating seeing them in person for the first time since the 2019 Section Meeting.

Patience finally paid off . . . and on Saturday, September 24^th, 2022, in Plainfield, Indiana over 40 Friends gathered at the Plainfield Friends Meeting on U.S. 40 for the first “post COVID” hybrid FWCC-SOA gathering.

The afternoon began with a brief gathering in the Plainfield Friends Meeting Room then Friends were dismissed to the basement where a variety of box lunches from McAlister’s were available along with lemonade and ice tea. As Friends returned to the Meeting Room they were welcomed with Tom Roberts (Western YM) playing the piano. After a brief welcome to those in attendance both in the Meeting Room and virtually by our Midwest Regional Coordinator, David Edinger, Tom played a couple more tunes for us followed by a period of waiting worship.

We then heard from two dynamic speakers – Shawn McConaughey, the new Western Yearly Meeting Superintendent, who had been serving on staff with Friends United Meeting in East Africa and Robin Mohr, Executive Secretary of FWCC-SOA. Shawn shared about the work he did while working on staff with Friends United Meeting serving in East Africa and Robin shared the ongoing work of FWCC around the world.

Tom Hamm, archivist at Earlham College, shared with Friends the history of the historic Sugar Grove Friends Meeting House. Sugar Grove Meeting House is currently used by local Friends for Easter Sunrise Service and a group currently meets there once a month on Sunday afternoon for worship in the manner of Friends – unprogrammed worship. The Meetinghouse still has the wooden panels that separated the men and women during Meeting for Worship. Twenty-nine Friends visited the Sugar Grove Meetinghouse where they heard a bit more about the history and how the Meetinghouse is being used today.

I enjoyed seeing so many of my FWCC Friends in person and having the opportunity to have conversations with them face-to-face and not virtually and getting a few hugs as well.

Thanks to Plainfield Friends for sharing their facilities with us, Pastor Cathy Harris, Bill Clendening and Tom Roberts for helping.

The afternoon program speakers and music were recorded and can be viewed at: FWCC Midwest Regional Gathering – 2022 – YouTube

Planning for this gathering began three and a half years ago and was over in the blink of an eye . . . but it was so worth the wait!

FWCC Census of Friends Shows Declines, but More Research is Needed

The Friends World Committee for Consultation collects membership data from yearly meetings around the world. Initial research from the most recent 2021 census suggests a decline of 24% in the number of Friends meetings and churches in the United States between 2010 and 2020. In addition, in that 10 year period there was a 12% decline in individual members and attenders, and an undocumented rise in Meetings that have no physical location and are held virtually.

Every ten years, FWCC Section of the Americas assists the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB) to conduct the US Religion Census. This is separate from the federal government’s population census, yet aims to be just as comprehensive in its reporting on religious congregations in the United States. Due to the pandemic, the data collection for the 2020 US Religion Census extended into early 2022.

From November 2021 until January 2022, FWCC gathered data on Friends of all branches throughout the United States. When possible, we received data on local congregations from the Yearly Meeting to which they belong. When that proved difficult, we contacted the local meetings themselves. Among the data we requested were counts of members and attenders. Some meetings reported both of these figures; some only reported one or the other. Some meetings didn’t report any figures at all.

So, here are the important things to keep in mind as we look at this data:

While we did our best to contact Friends, there may be congregations that were not counted.
Much of the data we collected came from Yearly Meeting offices. In some cases, local congregations hadn’t submitted updated counts to those offices for a year or two.
Among some Yearly Meetings that have split in the past ten years, we encountered some confusion about who was keeping track of membership data. We noticed that some meetings we know still exist weren’t reported at all.
FWCC plans to continue this research and analysis in the coming year.

With those things in mind, here is a comparison of the 2010 and 2020 counts for Meetings:

FWCC is raising funds to further this work, identify trends, and build new online resources for Friends. In order to promote healthy growth in the future, Quakers need to understand our truth today.

A version of this article will appear in New York Yearly Meeting’s Spark to be released in September.

FWCC-COAL Report on Working with Right Sharing of World Resources

by Karen Gregorio de Calderon, Coordinator for COAL-FWCC

Right Sharing of World Resources (RSWR), a Quaker nonprofit, came to Guatemala from May 23-29, 2022 to investigate the potential for doing projects in Latin America and using Guatemala as a pilot project. For FWCC-COAL, it was beneficial for us to be a part of the working process for this visit because one of our objectives is to work on joint projects with a community improvement focus with Quaker organizations that wish to do this work in Latin American countries.

RSWR was for many years a program of the Friends World Committee for Consultation, but has now been an independent organization for over 20 years. RSWR works with marginalized women, offering them seed capital so that they can start their own businesses and become productive women, thus changing the lives of themselves and their families. This project would bring great benefits to the people of Guatemala.

How would work be done in Guatemala?

RSWR would work in conjunction with the COOSAJO Savings and Credit Cooperative located in Esquipulas, Chiquimula in eastern Guatemala. With this institution, the pilot project could be executed in the eastern region of the country. The staff of the Cooperative had the opportunity to learn who Quakers are worldwide and the work that Quakers do.

It is important to emphasize that the cooperative already carries out community work in the region with women, the pilot project would be a further development of their work. Two field technicians would be hired, who would form and train the women’s groups and accompany them in their training process, which is similar to RSWR’s work in Sierra Leone and India.

What activities were carried out during the visit?

Meetings with the management of the Guatemalan institution COOSAJO, to learn more about its work, its achievements and its values.
Meeting with the middle managers of the institution to share information about the projects and both organizations.
Meeting with the COOSAJO Board of Directors. We introduced FWCC and RSWR.
Meetings with leading employees of the institution: To learn about their testimony, their achievements and how the institution has been part of the change in their lives with the value of inclusion of women.
Field visits to the villages, where we were able to share with women who need to be taken into account and be benefited.
Meeting with young women leaders: to learn about the work COOSAJO has done with them, providing study scholarships, scholarships to study English, etc.

What did COAL-FWCC contribute during the RSWR visit to Guatemala?

Lodging
Food for two people.
General orientation on the region to be worked in (Statistical data and cultural information)
General information on Quakers in Guatemala, how they are organized and where they are most concentrated in the country and how Quakers work in this area.
Review of the information in PowerPoint and translation of the same, to present it in Spanish to the organization. Focus on the objectives with correct Spanish vocabulary.
Intervention in meetings, when it was necessary to make the idea of RSWR clear.
Support in decision-making processes when help was required.
Clarification of ideas
Accompany RSWR in each planned meeting, to support them in these processes (with the language, with small translations, synthesize the information, etc.)
Lead and facilitate scheduled meetings, to obtain the necessary information from each group.
Work meetings (RSWR-FWCC-COAL) at the end of the day to draw conclusions and learn from each scheduled activity.
Coordinate and manage meetings with Quakers in the region
Coordinate visits to the churches in the region
Coordinate a visit to the largest Friends campus in the Region. National Friends Church.
And the most important thing is that due to the support that can be provided by COAL and the Quakers in the region, Guatemala is a potential country for RSWR to start a pilot project in Latin America and that could later be extended to other countries.

What benefit do local Quakers have with this project?

Job opportunity: One of the benefits is that they will be considered in the process of hiring field facilitators. In other words, when the call to hire people is launched, it will also be sent to the Quakers in the region so that they can apply.
Opportunity for the women of our churches: The women of our Friends Churches will also have the opportunity to be taken into account, to provide them with seed capital, according to the RSWR processes.

What did COAL achieve during the RSWR visit?

First, connecting the affiliated and non-affiliated yearly meetings.

During RSWR’s visit, representatives and leaders from our affiliated and unaffiliated Yearly Meetings were invited to a meeting. At the meeting, the work of FWCC, the work of COAL, the future plans and an invitation to work together were announced. In addition, the RSWR project was presented to them, as a fulfillment of the mission and objectives of FWCC, making our slogan a reality: Connecting friends, crossing cultures and changing lives. This meeting was fruitful; we were together in harmony sharing the love of God that unites us.

Among attendees were:

Ambassadors Friends Monthly Meeting, represented by Susy Ramirez
Holiness Friends Yearly Meeting: With the participation of two representatives to FWCC, Teresa de Hernandez and Abner Garcia. In addition, 4 women leaders from the different churches of the yearly meeting participated.
National Friends Church: It was represented by its president Rigoberto Vargas and by 3 more members of one of the churches. That they are also part of the Shalom Jiréh Organization, who distributed the funds that FWCC collected, for the victims of Hurricanes Eta and Iota
We also achieved the participation of two disabled women entrepreneurs, who have not been supported by other organizations.
Total, we achieved attendance of 16 people.

All attendees were pleased and grateful for having been invited to the meeting and expressed their desire to be taken into account in the process of this project or others that we can work together as a region and as a church through FWCC.

What potential do we have after the RSWR visit to develop other projects with the Guatemalan institution COOSAJO for the benefit of local Quakers and society in general?

The institution has community development programs, with established processes.
Provide entrepreneurship training
They carry out projects to take care of the environment
They design training processes according to the needs of the projects to be worked on.
Provide scholarships to people with limited resources.
They have an agreement with the US embassy for young people who want to study English in a free program. This with the purpose of curbing migration, since Chiquimula is a department bordering Honduras and El Salvador vulnerable to the formation of migrant caravans. There are many bilingual youth who benefited from these programs.
Recruit new interpreter volunteers who already have command of the English language and who serve as interpreters among the international cooperatives.

Conclusions:

FWCC has the opportunity to start a closer relationship with this institution and manage benefits that are possible for our Quaker community. In this way, achieve that the yearly meetings have something in common and gradually break down the communication barrier between them.
An important point to emphasize is that the yearly meetings are interested in working together on projects for the benefit of the community.

[Translation by Diane Zappas and Robin Mohr]

Update on U.S. Religion Census

By Gilbert George,
Operations Manager

Every 10 years the American Association of Religious Statisticians takes a census of all the religious bodies in the United States. FWCC collects data on Quaker Meetings and Friends’ churches so that our presence, in all its multifaceted beauty, can be accurately included in the religious landscape.

We want to thank all of the Yearly Meeting, Monthly Meeting, and Church staff and volunteers who provided us with data. We deeply appreciate your cooperation and commitment. Because of your participation we delivered data on location and membership numbers in late February, and you will have access to the full US Religions Census report in early summer of 2022.

In early October, we created a project plan and hired Keenan Lorenzato of Pacific Yearly Meeting and Philip Maurer of New England Yearly Meeting to collect the data as quickly and accurately as possible. To all the Friends who were praying for our discernment process, Thank You! These two Friends collected membership and attendance numbers from almost the entirety of Friends in the US in less than 3 months. They also helped reestablish contact with Yearly Meetings, individual meetings, and churches we had not been in contact with since before the pandemic.

The last decade has seen seismic shifts across the religious landscape in the United States, and our Society has not been immune from the cultural and economic pressures bearing down on the World. Over 1,000 Friends Meetings and Quaker Churches in the United States remain active, shining their Light in the unique way their location and call to faithfulness requires of them. If you would like to see where they are, check out FWCC Section of the Americas’ “Find Friends” page. My hope is that with your support we can extend this directory to cover our entire Section, and maybe even the World, so that we can find each other when traveling and seekers can find a meeting near them.