Minneapolis Friends Meeting is engaged in a long-term process to envision and plan for the future of the Meeting. Documents and information about this process will be posted on this page.
The following set of vision statements was approved at our meeting for business on November 8, 2015. Some of these words already describe us. In the coming months and years we will strive to make decisions and take actions that move us further toward this vision.
We envision a Minneapolis Friends Meeting that is:
1) ROOTED SECURELY IN QUAKER FAITH AND PRACTICE
We are a Quaker community who together deepen our Quaker understanding and nurture spiritual depth. We rely on God’s leading in making decisions in Meeting for Business. Our divinely-led collective worship makes room for a range of beliefs and worship practices.
2) SHARING AND DEVELOPING LEADERSHIP AND MINISTRY
Our community has a secure future supported by genuine connections among generations. We intentionally share knowledge, skills, and energy intergenerationally, nurturing the leadership of young adults. We offer grounding and support for the spiritual development of children.
3) A WELCOMING PLACE FOR SANCTUARY AND RENEWAL
Our meeting is a place of refuge, renewal, prayer and growth for people of all ages and for families of all configurations. We strive to let those who come feel they can share their hearts and experience belonging. The meeting is infused with joy and hope. We demonstrate care for one another and, together, have a vitality that counters difficulties and brokenness. We welcome newcomers, visitors, and strangers. New attenders are attracted by what the meeting offers: being active in the world, seeking to understand answers to the big questions, providing quiet community in a loud world, and offering both temporary and long-term sanctuary.
4) INTEGRATING FAITH AND ACTION
Meeting worship and spiritual life deepen our outward engagement and are, in turn, deepened by that engagement. We engage with one another on issues of privilege and race. We act, love, and serve in the world, individually and corporately, in response to callings of the Spirit. We support one another in leading lives in which action is consistent with word.
5) MAKING AN ACTIVE WITNESS BEYOND THE MEETINGHOUSE WALLS
With a strong commitment to diversity and not bound by space and location, Friends are a visible presence in the community, actively engaged and reaching out, partnering with other communities of faith. Members contribute to Quaker organizations and to the wider Quaker community.
6) HONORING THE HOLINESS OF THE EARTH
Our meeting is committed to the well-being of the earth and, therefore, strives to benefit instead of harm the natural environment. We are meeting the challenge of new global conditions and finding ways to foster sustainability.
7) A LONG-TERM PRESENCE
We are good stewards of our physical, financial, and human resources. People in the meeting contribute time, talents, and money to the meeting according to their ability. We are flexible and courageously adapt Quaker practice in the context of a changing world.
Download Vision Statements as a PDF
Download Vision Statements as a Word document
Planning Process
View a text version of this chart
In the above chart, “SWOR” stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, & Risks.
In later versions “Weaknesses” was renamed “Challenges”.
Process to date:
June 2014 – January 2015: A small team met three times from June 2014 through January 2015 to develop a process and timeline so that meeting members and attenders could consider and care for the future of the Meeting. This process and tentative timeline was shared with and approved by Monthly Meeting in January 2015.
April 2015 – June 2015: Two meetings were held in the adult program time slot in April and May of 2015. At the first meeting, those present brainstormed a list of current conditions and future risks and opportunities facing the Meeting. The second meeting was dedicated to considering what seemed most important to consider in preparing to care for the future of the meeting.
Lists of the current strengths and challenges/weaknesses of the meeting, and the opportunities and risks facing us as we move forward, as developed in the brainstorming sessions, are in the documents linked below. The first 10 or so in each list were identified as the “most important to consider” at the May meeting. The risks are organized in a set of themes.
Prioritized issues we should most take into account in our planning
Earlier brainstormed lists from which the prioritized issues were chosen:
Strengths • Challenges • Opportunities • Risks
Brainstorming and Visioning Session, Aug 1, 2015
On August 1, 2015, a brainstorming and visioning session open to all people from the meeting was held. The session consisted of two activities. The first activity was to review the lists of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Challenges generated in previous sessions, and based on those lists, draw conclusions and make note of tensions between possibly conflicting ideas. The results of this activity are here:
In the second activity, people were asked to to generate ideas in response to these questions:
- What do I feel this Meeting is led to be in the next 5 to 15 years?
- What might that Meeting look like?
Each person wrote several brief answers to these questions. Then similar or related responses were grouped together, and descriptive headings were created for each group. The grouped responses are here:
Results of August 1 Visioning Session
Vision Statements
In August, the members of the committee leading this process drafted a set of vision statements based on the ideas generated at the visioning session, and asked people to read and comment on the statements. On September 9 the committee revised the vision statements based on the comments received. On Sunday, Sept. 13, the vision statements were submitted to monthly meeting for business. There was a lively discussion with many comments and suggestions offered by those present. On October 1 the committee further revised the vision statements based on those comments.
See the original version of the Vision Statements drafted in August
Read the revised Vision Statements (October 1 draft)
On October 10 at Fall Camp, the most recent revision of the statements was presented. This was an opportunity for people to personally reflect on the vision and draw images of how this vision might look when put into practice.
On November 8, 2015, the vision statements were approved at our meeting for business.
Possible Actions
On February 27, 2016, Jeannette Raymond led a Saturday morning session open to all members and attenders of the meeting. Participants were asked to suggest specific actions the meeting might take that could move us toward the future described in the vision statements we have created. These suggestions were grouped into categories. Then each person was given three stickers, to be placed on the three categories they felt were most important.
See the list of suggested actions
What’s Next?
During 2016, each of the meeting’s standing committees should consider what role they can play in supporting the meeting’s vision for the future. Please see 2016 Committee Considerations in regard to Care of the Future.
Committee Responses to Vision Statements
Committee Members
The members of the committee are Jeannette Raymond, Pat Jones, Gayle McJunkin, Ranae Hanson, and David Woolley.