This message traditionally invites the reader to attend the Baltimore Yearly Meeting annual session. Since the Yearly Meetings consolidated in 1968, we have traveled to Western Maryland College (now McDaniel), Shenandoah College and Conservatory of Music (now Shenandoah University), Wilson College, Randolph Macon College, and James Madison University. This year, for the first time, we venture to Frostburg State University, in Frostburg, Maryland. We will all be newcomers.

Change seems to be a constant; at one point, the Yearly Meeting sessions alternated between West River and Third Haven (in Easton). It did meet in Baltimore long enough to justify our name. Through all those years of traveling— horseback, in a buggy or wagon, on a train, on a bus, or in a car—we always gathered with anticipation.

This year our theme is “Nurturing the Seeds of Hope.” Upon reflection, I believe we nourish hope within the Yearly Meeting by having Junior Yearly Meeting, Young Friends, and Young Adult Friends among us. In my travels among Friends, I have learned that we nurture hope by listening. Often nurturing occurs during the conversations we have when we eat together or sit and “just talk” in our time during the session.

The theme was a suggestion of our outgoing Clerk, Lauri Perman, who is now the Executive Director at Pendle Hill. It appears she will be able to join us this summer. Come be with us and let us nourish the seeds of hope. Howard Fullerton

Howard Fullerton