2006 Epistle BYM Junior Young Friends

This week at Junior Young Friends was a time of newcomers and with them new ideas. We chose two first-timers,Matthew Bacon and Amy Heaton as our Clerk and Recording Clerk, respectively.. Although two of our conferences during the year were canceled due to lack of kids and FAPs (Friends Adult Presences), we had a good turnout at Annual Session. We are also thankful to the adults working at increasing the size and quality of our conferences.

We explored the theme of finding our voices through exploring Rachel Stacy’s [talk on what] is possible and then discussing it along with other topics including peacemaking, homosexuality, and reaching out to Quaker and other communities. We talked about Rachel’s question “What do you think is possible and what are you doing to make it happen?”

Eden and Jim Grace of Friends United Meeting African Ministries blessed us with their presence on Wednesday. They discussed issues they are working on in Kenya such as putting girls in schools and community development. Gary Gillespie visited us on Thursday and explained his peacemaking work at American Friends Service Committee. We then tried walking meditation. On Friday John Calvi showed us some energy and meditation work.

As our service project we played with little kids in the nursery. Also, several JYFs signed up as “Red Hats” [to help carry trays] at mealtimes. We made dream catchers, played Mafia, and hit ping pong balls off the walls.

At our sleepover we had tacos, sundaes (with extensive toppings), and sodas, which we relished. We watched Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and The Nightmare Before Christmas.

We will take home many memories and thoughts from our fellow JYFs. We hope to see all of them again.

Yours in the Light,
The Baltimore Yearly Meeting Junior Young Friends