History of Worship at Pendle Hill with Francisco Burgos

In this mini-episode, Francisco shares the inspiring journey of the Pendle Hill online worship community, which emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic to provide a spiritual connection and inclusion space. Beginning as a simple idea born out of necessity, Pendle Hill’s virtual daily worship grew into a thriving, radically inclusive online community.

Reflecting on nearly 94 years of daily worship at Pendle Hill, Francisco discusses the challenges and triumphs of transforming Pendle Hill’s worship into a global spiritual community through technology, the unique aspects of online worship, and its lasting impact on participants.

Whether physically or virtually, Friends gather during this worship in a meeting room rich in spirit and history, one that has been host to A.J. Muste, Bayard Rustin, Wendell Berry, and Martin Buber, among many, many others.

Visit Pendle Hill Online Worship and experience this community yourself! You can also join Dwight, host of The Seed, who will attend this worship on the last Friday of the month from 8:30 AM to 9:10 AM (Eastern Time).

Read more about this online worship community in Friends Journal.

Guest Bio

Francisco Burgos is the Executive Director at Pendle Hill. From 2012 to 2015, Francisco was the head of school at Monteverde Friends in Costa Rica. He has also served with the Organization of American States in Washington, DC, and the American Friends Service Committee in Baltimore, Maryland.

Francisco has a BS in Clinical Psychology from the National University Pedro Henríquez Ureña in the Dominican Republic, an MA in Sustainable Development from the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont, and a Doctor of Education from Universidad De La Salle in Costa Rica.

The transcript for this episode is available on https://pendlehillseed.buzzsprout.com/
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The Seed is a project of Pendle Hill, a Quaker center open to all for Spirit-led learning, retreat, and community. We’re located in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, on the traditional territory of the Lenni-Lenape people.

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Follow us @pendlehillseed on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and subscribe to The Seed wherever you get your podcasts to get episodes in your library as they're released. To learn more, visit pendlehill.org/podcast.

Online Quaker Worship with Dwight: Dwight will attend the Pendle Hill online Quaker worship on the last Friday of the month from 8:30 to 9:10 AM (Eastern Time). Visit Pendle Hill Online Worship for details.

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. & Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund.

Transcript

>> Francisco Burgos: 0:04

We have been worshipping here at Pendle Hill since September 24, 1930. We have a community trespassing the boundaries of geography and technology and so on. In the morning.

>> Dwight Dunstan: 0:30

You'Re listening to a mini episode of the Conversations for radical hope. In this Pendle Hill podcast, Quakers and other seekers come together to explore visions of the world growing through the cracks of our broken systems. I'm your host, Dwight Dunstan. Some of these shorter episodes feature parts of conversations never aired before. In others, I will share excerpts from previous seasons. This is season five of the seed, and we are exploring world building. It is easy to point out all that is wrong today, but what is the world we long to see and inhabit in this mini episode? Well, once again be joined by Francisco Burgos, executive director of Pendle Hill. A Quaker, Francisco attends Providence monthly meeting in Mediaev. He came to Pendle Hill from the center for Community Initiatives at the Monteverde Institute in Costa Rica. So, Francisco, one of the things that you were a part of building, helping to build, is now a couple of years old, and that's this Pendle Hill online worship community that, as I understand it and want to hear you share a little bit more came out of you, recognizing what was happening in the present, this need for connecting and being in worship with one another, and catalyzing, creating this space, this virtual online space that was accessible to friends and seekers all over the world. And it's been continuous, this community, this online worship community, and would love to just make a little bit of space here for you to share about the history of that daily worship. For those folks who might be listening to this podcast who haven't yet had the chance to attend the worship, maybe you can share a little bit also about what they might encounter if they were to attend that daily worship.

>> Francisco Burgos: 2:40

Hmm. We have been worshipping here at Pendle Hill since September 24, 1930. That's the birthday of Pendle Hill. And since that day, the experience of worshipping together has been a core element of. Of the community that we want to recreate here. So almost 94 years, we will be welcoming and being in worship every single day here at Pendle Hill. But in 2020, in March 13, 2020, as, uh, Covid was hitting us, the government of Pennsylvania declared that non essential business should be closed, and that includes Pendle Hill as a retreat center. We can say that retreat centers are essential in many other aspects, but in the middle of a global pandemic, I think that we were asked, uh, to pause of the service that we offer, or many of the service that we offer, and that was the right thing to do. Yeah. But I remember having a conversation with who at, uh, that time was the interim director of Pendle Hill. Tracy, Jet Sullivan and Walter Sullivan were living here on campus and providing a great support that we need, needed during that transition time. And I remember one day after worship that Tracy and I were talking, and I said, well, we assume that we use for some board communication. Can we experiment with opening these for worship? And Tracy was very supportive and open to that idea. So I remember that I collected a little camera, tiny camera that has two digital mic on the side. We brought a tv card that we were running from place to place as we needed it at Pendle Hill, and a laptop. And, you know, we. We make an announcement on the website that, uh, we were going to invite friends to join us on this Zoom experiment for worship. And that happened in March 19 of 2020. So literally one week after non essential business were closed. And the first week we saw that there were five or six of us in the barn and 20 people online. And the first day and the second day, that number double, and the third day, that number triple. And by the end of March, we were welcoming 250 people online. And Tracy and I have another Conversation. And that Conversation was around, wow, we are creating something here that we didn't have any clue of how this was going to turn around. It was a great celebration, great blessing, but a minimalist structure needed to be provided. So we brainstormed a little bit between the people that were here at that moment. Eric Evans, Lloyd Winden. We brainstorm about how to create and keep moving forward with that hybrid experience of worship, because we knew early on that there were not a returning point. For many reason, I was so convinced that that was a way to exercise radical inclusion from people that were confined to their room. In many of the retirement community, people were receiving their meal at their door, they were not allowed to leave their room, other people that were just by themselves in their houses, or people that, yes, were ize their family. But the closer meeting for worship, the closer meeting to them was, you know, 2 hours away. So we started giving this a different lens, and I learned a lot at the same time that I was supporting and co creating these experimenting worship or experiment in the light, to use an old Quaker phrase, with Friends that were new to Quakerism, many of them with Friends that were coming from a long tradition of being admitting for worship in their own community, and with people that don't have any clue of what meeting for worship in the manner of Friends was. So it was interesting. So early on I said, well, we need to create some way of providing a soft education. And we, uh, started providing some quotes for reflection. We, uh, started providing an intro to meeting for worship every day that we share over chat and from time to time, verbally, again, to share and to build a common guideline that will help everybody that was participating in that experience. And four years had happened already. We are not in the numbers of 200 or 300 people, but every day 100 people, around 100 people show up for meeting for worship. Not just in the United States, but these are people joining us from around the globe. This morning there was somebody from Germany, Latvia, Spain, uh, Honduras, Canada, Mexico, and every single state here in the United States. So we have created a real global community. One way that we have found, and I have been dedicating some energy to that is the recognizing that we have a community, that we have created a community trespassing the boundaries of geography and technology and so on. Uh, twice a week we create some opportunity, 1520 minutes, sometimes half an hour, to explore one query after meeting for worship. And that happened on Wednesday and Saturday. And sometime that time is used for social time. Another things that we have done is to generate a directory for the people that attend worship. And this is a voluntary thing, but if you sign up for it, you will receive it. And the idea is that people can be in contact with one another. Uh, again, this is trying to be members to one another in the most simple way that we can find is like listening that somebody has a need. I have seen this. I, uh, witnessed this, this meeting experience. This meeting for worship experience has welcomed new birth. We have said goodbye as people transition from this life. And at the same time we have been able to hold one another in our, uh, blessings and challenges. This, for me, is a beautiful way, beautiful way to witness how this intuition of putting together a meaningful worship that serves our community global wise is working today. And I want to close this piece with a tiny example. You know, these are not just Quakers coming to meeting for worship online. There was one person that came to worship for several months and introduced herself after worship. We always call for introduction of new people, people that has been absent for a while and this young adulthood introduced herself on her mid twenties from Lima, Peru. She talked to a friend and expressed that she was in need of finding some platform that allowed her to explore her spirituality and to be grounded. And that friend, Noah Quaker, neither told her that she had heard from another friend that there is a place called Pendle Hill that is hosting every day a prayer opportunity in silence that people can join without any sign up, uh, and stuff like that. And she came, and she came out of curiosity. She searched for us on the Internet, found our website, found our information about worship, and she joined us next day. So many opportunities to be touching people's lives and at the same time, to expand our sense of community. This is just a tiny example. I don't know. It's something that I feel very passionate about as the seed, as the spring term, the hybrid meeting for worship that we host every day is one of those also projects that are very close to my heart.

>> Dwight Dunstan: 13:42

Yeah, thank you for making that space. And thank you for that history of Pendle Hill worship, too. Just so important for me. And I imagine for listeners to just know a little bit about how that world got built. That is the theme of this season, world building. Thank you for listening to this mini episode of the Sea Conversations for radical Hope. What spoke to you in this episode? How does this conversation fit into your journey? What would you like to add? Contact me directly by email, podcastendlehill.org. that's podcastendlehill.org. or share your thoughts on Instagram, Facebook, or X. Look Forindle Hill seed on these social media platforms once a month. You and I can also connect through Pendle Hill's online worship time. I attend this virtual quest Quaker meeting on the last Friday of the month, which

begins at 08: 14:48

30 a.m. eastern time. For login details, visit pendlehill.org explore worship that's pendlehill.org. explore worship. Our podcast is a project of Pendle Hill, a Quaker center open to all for spirit led learning, retreat and community. We're located in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, on the traditional territory of the Leni Lenape people. We host retreats, workshops, and lectures all year round. For a complete list of these upcoming education opportunities, visit pendlehill.org learn this mini episode of the seed was produced by Peterson Toscano, who also co hosts the Quakers Today podcast. Lucas Meyer Lee, a Quaker voluntary service fellow, provided other production assistants. Our theme music is the I rise project by Reverend Rhetta Morgan and Bennett Kuhn, produced by Astronautical Records.

>> Dwight Dunstan: 15:46

Our, um music today comes from epidemic sound. The Seed podcast is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. And Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund. Thank you. If you find these conversations meaningful, consider supporting our work financially. To do so, visit pendlehill.org donate these seeds could not be planted without you. Let's co create a world filled with cooperation, reciprocity, and love.