DOWNINGTOWN

As one of the largest and most active Meetings in the area, Downingtown Friends Meeting is a vibrant contributor to both the local Chester County community and regional faith organizations.

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• Downingtown Friends Meeting is a part of a regional Quaker community called Philadelphia Yearly Meeting (PYM) which gathers together Meetings in Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, and Maryland at least once a year to coordinate and discuss issues concerning all Meetings in the region. Downingtown Friends Meeting is a key participant in Caln Quarterly Meeting, a subdivision of PYM made up of a smaller group of Meetings which meets at least four times per year. Both PYM and Caln Quarterly Meeting are organizations that offer a variety of resources to our community, including courses for continuing adult education and access to Quaker gatherings for all ages.
   

• Our members are vibrant and active within the local Downingtown and Chester County communities. We help those in need locally by supporting the Lord’s Pantry in Downingtown and volunteering quarterly with Good Works, Inc. to assist with the construction and maintenance of homes in nearby Coatesville. We regularly make and provide food for Salvation Army dinners in an effort to fight food insecurity and hunger locally, and we also host food and financial support drives.
   

• We are also proud members of the Interfaith Action Community, which is a local group comprised of a variety of faith communities coming together to educate each other on our faith traditions, learn about our similarities, celebrate the differences, and to cooperate on religious action project such as on homelessness in our community, alleviating hunger and more. We meet regularly at one another's place of worship.
   

• Downingtown Friends Meeting is a member of POWER, an interfaith organization working for a just world made up of over 70 congregations in Southeastern and Central Pennsylvania. POWER concentrates on local and state issues with a focus on ending systemic racism.
   

We attend local events, fairs, anti-racism protests and marches, and even host our Friends Fall Festival, which has become a Downingtown tradition since the 1970s. We’ve also connected with Restore Our Roots, a grassroots organization that leads tours of John Hershey Trees found on our Meetinghouse property, and we continue to work with other groups in Downingtown and beyond.