2026 Annual Sessions

Table of Contents

“Faithfulness in the Storm”

Wednesday, June 17 through Sunday, June 21, 2025
Wittenberg University, Springfield, Ohio

Registration

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See this page for more details about registration and our host, Wittenberg University.

Schedule

Click here to download the full printable schedule for the adult program, including location info.

Daily Overview

Schedules for Other Age Groups:

Children
Youth
Young Adults

Plenary Sessions

Keith Runyan

Thursday June 18th
We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For

These words, first penned by June Jordan to commemorate resistance to South African apartheid, and echoed by Alice Walker and Hopi elders alike, remains a rallying call to our work in prophetic times. What would it look like if we Quakers faced the anxieties of our age not with shortcuts or escapism but with courage, unwavering faith, and submission to the call?

Keith Runyan is the General Secretary of Quaker Earthcare Witness, an activist, speaker, and father. With a background in education and public ministry, Keith first became widely known among Friends through a 12-day hunger strike calling the Quaker community into greater integrity with the climate crisis. Since 2024, he and his family have traveled in the ministry through QEW on the Road, encouraging prophetic, grounded action in response to planetary emergency. He now leads QEW’s efforts to build a global Quaker climate action network and local campaigns—strengthening relationships, mobilizing conscience, and working toward an Earth restored.

Joyce Ajlouny

Friday June 19th
In a Time of Fracture, We Persist Boldly from our Deepest Calling

The American Friends Service Committee, conceived in the storm of World War I, continues to be guided by the Quaker belief in the divine light of each person. For over a century, that conviction has driven AFSC to challenge unjust systems and promote lasting peace. Today, that mission continues with renewed urgency: to resist, to build, and to persist. General Secretary Joyce Ajlouny will speak to the work AFSC is doing to build peace with justice in 2026. She invites Friends to listen deeply for the call to witness—and to answer with collective action.

A Quaker leader who is committed to helping bring peace and justice to communities globally, Joyce Ajlouny has deep experience in international development and relief, education and non-profit management. Under her leadership, AFSC is entering its second century with a bold strategic revisioning and planning initiative for the next decade (2020-2030).

A Palestinian American, Joyce started her career in international development in Palestine. She served as country director for Palestine and Israel with Oxfam-Great Britain, chaired the Association of International Development Agencies there and took on leadership roles at the UNDP and UNFPA. Prior to joining AFSC, Joyce served as the director of the Ramallah Friends School, a leading K-12 Quaker school in Palestine, for 13 years, where she led a diverse staff to transform the school academically, physically and financially.

Joyce holds a master’s degree in Organizational Management and Development from Fielding Graduate University in California. She and her husband have three adult children.

Thursday Living Witness

Michael Birkel and Gwen Halsted

Clear Creek Monthly Meeting

Gwen Halsted found her calling as a family physician to the medically underserved. In retirement, her activities include co-clerking Clear Creek Monthly Meeting, coordinating the local FCNL Advocacy Team, and community environmental concerns. Michael Birkel taught at Earlham College and Earlham School of Religion. He has written on Quaker history and spirituality, and has been active in interfaith encounters for many years. Together, the two of them enjoy walking in the woods, music, and time with their granddaughter.

Workshops

Friday

Lewis Webb Jr. – On the Row and In the Light

Lewis is the U.S. Peacebuilding Director of AFSC. Together we will reflect upon how our faith shapes our individual and collective views on capital punishment and calls us to accompany the people sentenced to death across the states of Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky. We will learn their names and their stories. We will explore ways to walk with them through spiritual and emotional support including, if so led, writing to them in real-time. We will also explore methods and opportunities to advocate for healing over vengeance and restoration over revenge.

Ellen Hodge – Caring for Each Other

Ellen is a member of Fall Creek Meeting. Since Quakerism is a ministry of all believers, it’s up to Friends to meet each other’s needs for comfort, support, and celebration. Our needs for this pastoral care can be especially acute in times of conflict and fear like those we are living through now. When many of us feel stressed and depleted, how do we find the motivation and spiritual energy to meet one another’s needs for emotional, spiritual, and sometimes even physical support? In this workshop, we’ll look at the basis for pastoral care and explore ways to provide it.

Peter Hardy – An Alternative Method of Discernment applied to Determining our Charitable Contributions

Peter is a member of Lexington Friends Meeting. Many monthly and yearly meetings contribute a portion of their annual budget as charitable donations. Meetings typically contribute to several Quaker organizations such as FGC, FCNL, and AFSC as well as non-Quaker organizations that work on issues of concern to Friends such as peace and non-violence. Deciding which organizations to contribute to and how much each should receive is difficult. Many more well-deserving organizations seek our attention than we can support. The consequence is that many meetings are paralyzed and unable to revise their list of organizations they have kept for decades. In this workshop we will use an experiential strategy to decide on the list of organizations and the amount each should receive. In Part I of the workshop participants will enter into discernment to name organizations they wish to consider as recipients of our charitable contributions without specifying the amount each would receive. In Part II, each participant will be given 500 units of Quaker play money to be distributed as they feel led among the organizations named in Part I. The final product of the workshop will be an ordered list of organizations and a fraction of a total budget that the participants believe each organization should receive. This list will be recommended to the OVYM budget and finance committee for their consideration in determining OVYM's charitable contributions. By participating in the workshop Friends will learn a different technique of discernment which could benefit the yearly meeting and their own monthly meeting.

Marti Matthews – Writing to Remember: What have I learned about "Faithfulness?"

We will pool our collective life experiences to mine for wisdom and guidance on our theme: Faithfulness in the Storm. Please bring your favorite writing implements to this workshop.

Saturday

Keith Runyan – We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For

Keith is the General Secretary of Quaker Earthcare Witness. In a time of breakdown – what would it look like for us to rise to this time not as one of Armageddon but prophecy? Through queries, silent reflection, partner dialogues and hymnals – we will experiment with this reframe – leaning in to ask what is ours to do to midwife a future where wisdom, justice, courage, and love overcome fear.

Sandy Felt and Rachel Ernst-Stahlhut – Spirit-Centered Faithfulness in the Storm

Please join Social Action Coordinator Sandy Felt and FGC Program Manager Rachel Ernst Stahlhut in a social action workshop! Everyone is welcome. We’ll learn from Quaker quotations, reflect on our leadings, and get creative. Let’s talk about spiritually grounding our worldly social action, framing the meaning of our social action with spirit, and finding a stable center from which to lift ourselves and one another up. Let’s find the calm eye of the storm together, and remember that storms can’t hurt the sky. Let’s create together and rediscover how faithfulness comes into play with every act of creation.

Steve Angell – James Nayler, George Fox, Martha Simmons and the 1656 Ride into Bristol: What Role Did Arguments Over Women's Religious Leadership Play in This Episode?

Steve Angell, author of "Martha Simmons: A Life" and co-editor of "Early Quakers and Their Theological Thought, 1647-1723" and "The Oxford Handbook of Quaker Studies," will invite workshop participants to reconsider James Nayler's horseback ride into Bristol, England, re-enacting Jesus's triumphal entry into Jerusalem, and the terrible consequences that followed, on the occasion of the 370th anniversary of the ride. Particular attention will be paid to Nayler's, George Fox's, and Martha Simmons's views on women ministries and the way that differences between them on that subject may have made the Quakers and Nayler more vulnerable to outward attack.

Tim Morand – Standing Still In the Light

Tim is a member of Yellow Springs Friends Meeting. A spiritual practice of George Fox by the same name as the workshop will be explored as an introduction to a primal form of QiGong that begins with standing. Opportunities will also be given for exploring a few musical instruments and a visual exercise to lift a peaceful ambiance. As George Fox said, "the first step of peace is to stand still in the Light."