Blacksburg

2005 has been a year of integration and increased activity. Our now medium-sized meeting is addressing the need --- spiritual and physical --- of its growing community. Attendance at Meeting for worship varies from 20-50 each Sunday. In addition, we experienced the joys and challenges of being the host site for Friends General Conference (FGC) in July, 2005. We were honored as a community to have been part of the process that brought “Eyes Wide Open” to rural Southwest Virginia as part of FGC.

Our meeting has maintained its healthy attendance and we have several new Members as well as attenders. Our newly formed committee structure is in place and is serving the Meeting in a more predictable way.

We are meeting the challenge of the physical needs of our growing meeting. In the fall, the Meeting was provided with a challenge to pay off the mortgage on our Meetinghouse property that had been purchased the previous year. We met the generous challenge and paid off the mortgage in December and joined in celebration at the home of long-time members. The Meetinghouse Committee has worked hard this past year and our special use permit to develop the land has been approved by the town, we have had several work parties to clear brush and plant trees, and plans for a driveway and picnic shelter are underway. Members held a land blessing in May to honor the sanctity of the land with approximately thirty adults and children in attendance.

We continue with our religious education efforts with both First Day School and the monthly adult education program. The Religious Education Committee made significant efforts to provide a teaching information packet to encourage more members of meeting to consider teaching First Day School. Attendance at First Day School has been steady and included approximately 15 children ages five through high school. We continue to provide child care services for our youngest attenders, enabling the parents of young children the opportunity to attend Adult Education, and Meeting for Business as well as Meeting for Worship. Once again, we celebrated the advent season with a Waldorf-inspired candle lighting ceremony. With a much-simplified ceremony, we enjoyed a truly unique experience of being in community with song, transformation, food, and conversation that spanned all generations. The adult education program included programs that reflected both the spiritual needs of the meeting as well as those reflecting a social consciousness. Adult Education invited Members who had attended workshops at FGC to share their experiences with the larger meeting. Attendance at adult education varied from approximately five to twenty-five.

The Hospitality and Outreach committee has been challenged to meet its goal of four outreach projects --- one in each of four categories: local need, feeding the hungry, peace and social justice, and AFSC relief effort. One additional project was the creation of a much-needed directory of our growing number of Members and attenders.

Our Meetings for Worship are occasionally silent although Friends seem increasingly comfortable sharing messages in Meeting. Many people find the silence to be spiritually nourishing.

Our Meetings for Worship with Attention to Business have not been silent. They have been well attended, and full of ideas.

We have created opportunities for our community to meet outside of meeting. We now have a Women’s group as well as a Youth group that meet monthly.

Our Adult Education program has responded to the growth in the meeting with an educational meeting on the worship sharing process. In addition, we have purchased materials for a Quakerism 101 experience to begin in 2006. Interest in the program has been almost universal throughout the meeting and includes our high school age youth. In response to last year’s concern that the Meeting seek a balance between an internal focus and an external focus on issues of importance locally, nationally, and globally, our peace and social justice committee works to bring issues of special importance to our attention, but it has been difficult to encapsulate and prioritize from all of the issues which are of critical importance. We continue our efforts to include peace and social justice activities into other activities, such as religious education topics. We continue to struggle with this balance and acknowledge that the different life stages of our diverse community positions each of us differently.

Additional activities include an "Alternatives to the Draft" project, of special interest to many in our community.

Finally, it is important to acknowledge the experience of having FGC here this past summer. As a Meeting, we worked together on a range of tasks from participating on the planning committee, collecting needed supplies, providing local arrangement support, staffing the nursing station, leading tours, providing housing, facilitating activities, and myriad other tasks. We found the workshops and FGC experience as well as the heightened experience of being in community nourishing. We move into the next year looking forward to both the challenges and opportunities that it may bring. We welcome visitors, and have experienced an increasing number of visitors from neighboring states as well as locally.

The past year has been one of rumblings, growth, energy, and change. Our attendance at Meeting for worship has grown steadily as did attendance at Meeting for business. This continued growth brought with it a need to acknowledge our new identity as a medium-sized meeting rather than the small meeting that we have been for so long. We continue many of the programs that were set in place as a small meeting, have formalized and added to our committee structure, and have taken a major step toward a meeting house of our own with the December 12, 2004 purchase of a 2.4 acre plot of land within the Town of Blacksburg.

Following serious discussions last fall, the Meeting acknowledged the need to formalize its committee structure and membership. A Nominating Committee was formed and assumed the task and querying Member and attender interests. A full four-member Ministry and Oversight committee was formed, a Stewardship and Finance committee was formed, as we now had some money, and membership on each of the other committees was clarified. Interest in this process was high with unprecedented attendance at Meeting for business.

We continue with our religious education efforts with both First Day School and a monthly adult education program. The Religious Education Committee made significant efforts to provide a teaching information packet to encourage more members of meeting to consider teaching First Day School. Attendance at First Day School has been steady and included approximately 15 children ages five through high school. We continue to provide child care services for our youngest attenders, enabling the parents of young children the opportunity to attend Adult Education, and Meeting for Business as well as Meeting for Worship. Once again, we celebrated the advent season with a Waldorf-inspired candle lighting ceremony. With a much-simplified ceremony, we enjoyed a truly unique experience of being in community with song, transformation, food, and conversation that spanned all generations. The adult education program included programs that reflected both the spiritual needs of the meeting as well as those reflecting a social consciousness. Attendance at adult education varied from approximately five to twenty-five.

The Hospitality and Outreach committee has been consistently implementing its goal of four outreach projects --- one in each of four categories: local need, feeding the hungry, peace and social justice, and AFSC relief effort. Projects for this past year include a local home repair project, a collection for the local food pantry, and knitted hats for AFSC and the local Christmas Store. One additional project was the creation of a much-needed directory of our growing number of Members and attenders.

Our serious pursuit of a new space for our rapidly growing Meeting in the last year has raised some difficult financial questions for our members and attenders. Several meetings to discuss possible options for new space revealed a community committed spiritually and financially to the pursuit of a meetinghouse. Following an unsuccessful offer on one property, our offer to purchase a plot of land suitable for our needs was accepted. We more than met the financial challenge and completed the transaction with a modest mortgage. The Meeting is meeting the financial challenge of this mortgage and has begun plans for the Special Use Permit required by the Town of Blacksburg, for a driveway providing access to the property and construction of a small picnic shelter. Additionally, the Meeting felt it was important to honor the sanctity of our plot of land with a ceremonial Land Blessing held this past spring.

The excitement of the prospective meetinghouse has led to discussions and concerns that the Meeting seek a balance between this internal focus and the need to focus externally on the issues of importance locally, nationally, and globally. We continue to struggle with this balance and acknowledge that the different life stages of our diverse community positions each of us differently. Our peace and social justice committee works to bring issues of special importance to our attention, but it has been difficult to encapsulate and prioritize from all of the issues which are of critical importance. We continue our efforts to include peace and social justice activities into other activities, such as religious education topics.

Our Meetings for Worship are often silent but less often than in the past. Friends seem increasingly comfortable sharing messages in Meeting. Vocal ministry is encouraged, and many people find the silence to be spiritually nourishing.

Our Meetings for Worship with Attention to Business have not been silent. They have been well attended, and full of ideas.

We held a one-day retreat in the fall that included a service home repair project and a late afternoon worship sharing focused on the spiritual state of the Meeting followed by a shared meal and drumming. All who attended found it a meaningful experience.

Additional activities include an "Alternatives to the Draft" project, of special interest to many in our community, and the preparations for the return of FGC to Blacksburg this coming July.

We move into the next year looking forward to both the challenges and opportunities that it may bring. We welcome visitors, and indeed, we anticipate many visitors with the return of FGC.

SPIRITUAL STATE OF THE MEETING REPORT - 2003

The past year has brought with it many changes, but still much remains the same. Our attendance seems to be slightly reduced, but steady. We continue to offer religious education for both adults and children. Our peace and social justice efforts are in need of same more organization: Our meetings for worship with attention to business have been well attended and there is a lot of energy present in the Meetings.

We continue to seek for new Meeting space. Our serious pursuit of space in the last year has raised some difficult financial questions for our members and attenders. Our existing budget does not have room for a substantial rent payment or a mortgage. We have asked ourselves to reach deeper in our contributions to the Meeting in order to build a more robust Meetinghouse Fund and to assure any potential lenders and ourselves that we have the commitment to buy or build and maintain a spiritual home. The concrete consideration of a specific property has been helpful in understanding the local government's zoning regulations for, our needs from, and our unity in, seeking a Meeting space. Our existing space continues to serve us adequately.

Events around the world and in our own country have placed heavy burdens on our collective conscience. Our peace and social justice committee works to bring issues of especial importance to our attention, but it has been difficult to encapsulate and prioritize from all of the issues which are of critical importance. While recognizing these issues as important, we have also found that many of our members and attenders already have full lives outside of peace and social justice issues. We are trying to find ways to include peace and social justice activities into other activities, such as religious education topics. Still, we need to consider haw to better organize our work in this area. It is essential to our continued health to find ways for us to contribute "enough" to peace and social justice causes. The needs appear to be sufficient to absorb anything that we can contribute.

One effort that we are making in this direction comes from our Hospitality and Outreach committee, which has proposed undertaking four projects each year - one in each of four categories: local need, feeding the hungry, peace and social justice, and AFSC relief effort. The first project was a local service project to help feed the hungry, undertaken by the First Day School, collecting food for a local pantry. It was a great success, and since the children enjoyed it so much, it has inspired the Religious Education committee to plan four youth-group-type events for this year, as well as more participation in these service projects within First Day School. We have begun our AFSC relief project.

We continue to provide childcare during business meeting and adult education sessions, freeing up some of the parents for more participation. The Religious Education committee has struggled some to provide meaningful and differentiated programs for children of different ages and to support its members during more stressful times. Toddlers and young children are a challenge because it seems that the parents are often left with the responsibility for taking care of them - leaving the parents somewhat disengaged from the rest of the Meeting. As a result, the committee has decided to provide a paid caregiver during First Day School. The committee is also creating a teaching information packet to encourage more members of meeting to consider teaching First Day School. Once again, we celebrated the advent season with a Waldorf-inspired spiral path. We celebrated as a Meeting with song, transformation, and food together. Individuals showed innovation in adapting the ceremony at the last minute to compensate for new fire regulations.

Our Meetings for Worship are generally silent, but out of the silence we hear messages of poignancy and relevance. Vocal ministry is encouraged, and many people find the silence to be spiritually nourishing.

Our Meetings for Worship with Attention to Business have not been silent. They have been well attended, and full of ideas. In some cases, we have found that ideas are difficult to bring to fruition, but several committees have been quite active and we continue to seek new ideas and opportunities. In what is still a relatively small Meeting, we struggle with finding the energy to handle all of the tasks that we would like to see handled.

We held a retreat for the Meeting last autumn and all who attended enjoyed it immensely. We hope to continue to have a retreat annually as it provided the opportunity for us to share fellowship outside of the normal meeting times and grow together as a group in new ways.

As we noted last year, we need to improve in our attention to the people who don't make it in to Meeting regularly. While people have busy lives, we need to discern if there is more that we can do as a Meeting to fill the spiritual needs of those who choose to not attend for one reason or another.

We move into 2004 looking forward to both the challenges and opportunities that it may bring. We welcome visitors, and indeed, we hope for them as the preparations get underway for next year's return of FGC to Blacksburg.