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Pendle Hill's Resident Study Program is unique. Pendle Hill is not a university - although there are excellent courses. It's not a seminary - although people come to deepen their spiritual lives and learn more about religion. It's not a spa or a resort - although many people find refreshment and renewal for their lives. And it's not a social service agency - although service is central to our purpose and daily living.

Through daily community practices of Quaker worship, work, study, and service, Pendle Hill’s Resident Program offers opportunities for spiritual deepening to those of all faiths who seek personal and social transformation. You are encouraged to step back from your everyday life and reflect on what matters most in your work and service. Here is a community-supported time to open your heart and mind for deep listening, guided learning, and Spirit-led discerning.

Pendle Hill takes seriously the body as well as the mind and spirit; the prophetic and the contemplative; the world around us as well as the inner life. Our curriculum focuses on the whole person as an engaged participant in the world.

Students, teachers, and staff live together in community – a precious living laboratory for recognizing and reflecting that of God in one another. We support each other in many ways: with caring, wisdom, wide-ranging experience, conversation, challenges, prayers, and more. Life-long friendships are formed among us.

The regular Resident Program runs from late September to early June and enrolls about twenty adult participants for one or more terms. Many students come for the entire academic year. The shorter summer term runs from late June through early August.

Term dates are:

2008-2009

September 26-December 13, 2008 Fall Term

January 4-March 14, 2009 Winter Term

March 27-June 6, 2009 Spring Term

June 19-August 1, 2009 Summer Term

Each student has a private room on Pendle Hill's beautiful 23-acre campus in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, 12 miles southwest of Philadelphia. Classes are held in comfortable rooms like our sun-filled library, art studio and conference center. 

Worship

Life at Pendle Hill is centered in our daily Quaker meeting for worship. This half-hour silent gathering may be enriched by spoken ministry, prayer, and song as the Spirit moves those present. In this expectant listening for God, people of diverse faiths often find the Divine Presence which binds all life together. This daily shared practice helps us bring worship and prayer into all aspects of our community life.

Work

At Pendle Hill everyone shares in the work of the household, particularly work that makes our community meals possible. Shared work expresses our commitment to the community as a whole as well as to each other. Members of the Resident Program are responsible for meal setup or cleanup, care for public living spaces, and group projects during our regular Wednesday Work Morning. Work, assigned appropriately for individual abilities, requires about eight or nine hours per week for all students. Some residents may work additional hours as part of a financial assistance arrangement.

Study

Courses at Pendle Hill create a space for spiritual deepening, intellectual stimulation, and the possibility of genuine personal transformation. Classes are “meetings for learning,” where students and teacher seek to be guided by the Inner Teacher and help to build an engaged learning community.

The curriculum consists not only of courses, but also of daily meeting for worship, our shared work, individual spiritual nurture, reflection groups, social witness opportunities, and community life itself. We affirm the profound link between contemplation and action, between body and soul, between deep engagement in the world and care for the life of the Spirit.

While Pendle Hill does not give grades or confer credentials, some schools may give credit for work done here if the student desires and pursues that option.

Service

Worship and study find expression in service and social witness. Pendle Hill’s educational program supports a “contemplative/active” community where we strive to live the Quaker testimonies concerning peace, integrity, equality, and simplicity. We recognize that service is reciprocal – those who seek to serve others often find that they are the ones who receive the most.

Community

The creation of community lies at the core of the Pendle Hill resident experience. This is a joy as well as an opportunity to grow, requiring mindfulness and discernment. The process begins during orientation, a full week at the start of each term when practical information is shared, relationships begin, and specific courses and schedules are chosen. Throughout the term, the formal schedule of work, worship, and study is supplemented by additional activities – both planned and spontaneous, many initiated and led by students.

In this rich environment, each student needs to seek an appropriate balance between community engagement and solitude, activity and contemplation, conversation and silence, while meeting responsibilities to the group as a whole.

Three to four times each term the resident community gathers for Community Meeting, an opportunity to discuss issues of common concern, build relationships, share information, and make corporate decisions.

Festival Week

The final week of each term is a time to share the fruits of our work and celebrate the bonds of community. Presentations by individual students and groups take many forms: papers or other written work, craft exhibits, and presentations in music, dance, poetry, and drama.

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