Your Thoughts on Women’s Theology Conference

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The 2022 Pacific NW Quaker Women's Theology Conference Planning Committee wants to hear from you! Safety concerns over the covid pandemic sadly led us to postpone the bi-annual conference first in 2020 and again in 2021. We are now looking toward summer of 2022.

The Conference has been a life-giving experience for hundreds of women for more than 25 years. Our objective is to continue the vital opportunity the conference provides for connecting, listening, learning and loving across different branches of Quakerism.

Your input and ideas will help inspire us. The planning committee is working toward discerning the theme, shape and format of next summer’s conference. We have many challenging questions and eagerly invite your thoughts.

First, here are some of the factors we are wrestling with:

• Last year we reserved Cascades Camp in Yelm, Washington for an in-person conference next summer on July 9-13, 2022. We had selected that site for the 2021 conference, but we had to postpone it.
• However, the camp has just told us that it will increase its prices by approximately 60% over 2021. Our per-person cost just for the camp will rise from $198 to more than $300.  There will be other costs for registration, etc.
• The increase will greatly impact our ability to attract an economically diverse group of women. Indeed we had hoped to offer a “pay-as-led” plan for the next conference. The increase in cost may impact this plan.
• The Menucha Conference Center, where we held the conference before, is booked solid for the summer of 2022.

The Cascades Camp option is still on the table, but because of the increase in costs, we’ve been brainstorming alternatives. Here are a few possibilities:

• Gathering in regional groups at meeting houses or churches  while presenters join by Zoom. That would give attendees an option to join with local Friends for an in-person experience OR remain at home and join by Zoom. This would create new challenging (exciting?) coordination and tech questions. It might solve the affordability problem.
• Another idea is to meet in one central location, say in Portland, in a large church or meetinghouse. Meals would be provided, and then each person would find their own place to stay, or volunteers could host attenders in their own homes. This would offer planning flexibility and affordability.
• Alternatively, perhaps there’s a better time of year than mid-summer, or a shorter conference?

No one knows what the summer of 2022 will look like, and we are NOT asking you to predict the future. But we would like to get a “snapshot” of how you are thinking about the conference at this time.

If you need ideas about what to cover in your response, you could consider writing about how important a whole-group in-person gathering is to you at this time. Are there other formats that might also work in this time of social-distancing, varying levels of vaccination and comfort levels? How well do virtual meetings and other kinds of gatherings work for you?  What do you long for in themes, topics? What to learn about?

Your heartfelt input will bring us light and life to move forward in our work together. Thank you for your faithfulness to be part of our discernment.

Please click here to write your reply to us.

Your input is needed, valuable and appreciated.

from Judy Maurer, Conference Planning Committee (9/30/2021)