2025 Annual Sessions Information
We look forward to seeing you at Sessions 2025!
This page contains links you need for Sessions—including registration for attendance at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst (UMass Amherst) or on Zoom—in the tiles at the bottom of the page. Our theme for this year’s Sessions is "Streams in the Desert," referenced many times in the book of Isaiah. In literary tradition, deserts and wildernesses often represent challenging places in life, while streams and waters are symbols of God's presence, life-giving, and renewal.
This Year's Sessions at a Glance:
Dates: Friday, August 1 through Wednesday, August 6
Location: University of Massachusetts in Amherst
Sunday Plenary: Gretchen Baker-Smith, Westport (MA) Friends Meeting
Bible Half Hours: Kirenia Criado Pérez, Cuba Yearly Meeting
Monday Night Plenary: Kim Moberg, award-winning singer/songwriter
You can read more about each of these speakers below.
From the Presiding Clerk and the Clerk of Sessions Planning
We will gather for the 365th Annual Sessions of New England Yearly Meeting of Friends, August 1 through 6 in a new location—the University of Massachusetts Amherst campus!
All of us are looking forward to welcoming Friends, newcomers and oft-comers, adults, children, youth, and their families.
Our theme for this year’s Sessions arose from the sense among Friends on the Theme and Speakers Working Group that we need to acknowledge where we are; this is a tough time. Grieving needs to happen as does healing. We settled on the theme Streams in the Desert, as referenced multiple times in Isaiah.
Gretchen Baker-Smith will be our Sunday afternoon plenary speaker. Gretchen's experience of call has led her on a wandering journey of ministry, mostly but not entirely among Friends, nurturing children, teens, adults, those who nurture young people, those in crisis or seeking the Light, local meetings, and anyone open to the spiritual wonder and teaching of bread making. She and her husband Buddy are members of Westport Monthly Meeting (MA).
Kirenia Criado Pérez will present the Bible half hours. Kirenia is pastor at Havana Friends Church and professor of New Testament and Greek at Matanzas Theological Seminary. She is well known to many of us and and considers our Yearly Meeting as her Quaker home in North America. We are hoping that she will be with us in person, but contingency plans are in place if there is need for a virtual mode for sharing her message to us. Please pray for her as she attempts the journey to join us.
Kim Moberg will offer us an all-ages musical plenary event on Monday night with audience participation and dancing.
We are grateful to the many Friends who do the work of planning for the several-day event in-person and on Zoom. Together we are moving forward thanks to the efforts of these many dedicated Friends. There's more news to come—stay tuned!
Rebecca Leuchak, Presiding Clerk, [email protected]
Kristin Wilson, Clerk of Sessions Planning, [email protected]
For Those New to Sessions
Below in the "Downloads" section is information for first-time attenders and details about our practice of "Pay-as-Led."