Historic Newtown Friends Meeting on Court Street is beginning its fall season of First Day Classes (Sunday School) for children and adults with an opening brunch at 9:30 a.m. on First Day (Sunday), September 11.
At 9:30 a.m., finger food, juice, and coffee will be served on the Meeting House grounds, after which children will meet with their teachers to get to know them and discuss the year’s program schedule. Many of the volunteer teachers are parents and/or from the faculty of the Meeting’s elementary school, Newtown Friends School, and/or George School, the Quaker boarding school (9-12) in Newtown.
Nancy Martin of Newtown, Clerk of the Children’s Religious Education committee, said “This year, the children will be studying Quaker spirituality and practice, and how to put these Quaker values into practice in their own lives. The teen class, composed of Young Friends, grades 6 through 12, will be exploring the concept of role models, through interviews and getting to know the adult members of Newtown meeting on a more personal level. This year’s service project will focus on stewardship of the environment.”
Marguerite Chandler of Newtown, Clerk of the Adult Class Committee, said “The adult class this year plans to feature Spiritual Journeys by Meeting members and other contemporary Quakers and programs on Quaker practice and principles on current topics like immigration and refugees and other social and environmental justice topics.”
The speaker at the opening session of the adult class on September 18 at 9:45 a.m. will be “Lucretia Mott,” as re-enacted by Kim Hanley of the American Historical Theatre. Lucretia Mott was a Quaker born on Nantucket in 1793 who became a historic women’s rights activist, abolitionist and religious reformer.
Newtown Friends Meeting co-founded by “Peaceable Kingdom” painter and Quaker minister, Edward Hicks, in 1815, is open to all who wish to attend. Regular First Day Education classes (Sunday School) for all ages begin at 9:45 a.m. and Meeting for Worship begins at 11 a.m.