Reflections on 1652 Country

Pendle Hill

This past June I headed to 1652 Country (once again) to see what questions might bubble up, whether any answers might be lurking, and to make new connections as I continue my journey… I have a hard time staying away.

"1652 Country" refers to an area in northwest England, specifically in Cumbria and Lancashire, associated with the early years of the Religious Society of Friends, also known as Quakers. It is the region where George Fox, experienced spiritual awakenings, tested his ideas, was challenged and punished, and gathered his first followers in 1652. 

1652 Country is a beautiful part of the United Kingdom which features narrow lanes, soaring mountains, babbling brooks, and endless flocks of Herdwick sheep. 

I traveled to this area of England with Friends Council on Education and Philadelphia Yearly Meeting as part of the Quaker Pilgrimage 2025. I have been before and I will hopefully go again. It is a powerful thing I do as an educator at a Quaker School, as a Quaker at Bethesda Friends Meeting, and as a human living this current timeline. You can read more about why this trip is so powerful to me here. In the past, this trip was made by Denise the teacher and by Denise the Quaker Education clerk at a Friends School. This time, the trip was simply made by me. That made it more than a trip, it was a true pilgrimage.

Each time I have made this trip, it has been powerful. I have filled my heart, brain, and soul with so much joy, power, love, inspiration, and learning. This was no different. Except that it was. I began this pilgrimage with so much weighing on my heart and brain after a difficult year. I put a whole lot of weight (too much?) onto what I might discover with and from my fellow travelers. What follows is a simplified account of what I received.

I gave myself some queries to guide my reflections during my journey. I’ll try to weave within some of those queries as the warp and weft of my tapestry (or embroidery;)).

What does pilgrimage mean to you? What draws you here?

A walk can be an opening. The earth beneath our feet, the clouds floating above, the “stuff” in between, perhaps the rain making us uncomfortable… I think that I must have felt nervous the first time I made this trip - not because of the actual rain. I’m just not a risk-taker. Solo traveling! 😳  It must have felt important at the time or I wouldn’t have taken the risk. I do recall that I returned fully energized as a teacher in a Quaker school with a list of teaching ideas. I seek a bit of that each time I sign up. But it’s the larger possibility of the opening that draws truly me back. 

Note: It’s tricky for me to define “opening” in words here. I know what I mean. However, for readers who need a little more, here is the Google definition: An opening is not a rational deduction but a spiritual experience where a truth is revealed. It might provide a sense of direction or a call to action.

As I travel along this journey, what am I noticing? What feels familiar? What is unexpected or surprising? What questions are bubbling up?

Colthouse Meeting House

I value the pace and pattern of this particular journey in June of 2025. Each day we travel by bus, chatting and connecting - these bus rides are simultaneously overly long and entirely essential. There are silent meetings, moments of silence, and periods of silent exhaustion (the good kind). There is a routine to our meals, toast on a little wire rack at breakfast, assembling a picnic lunch each morning, and sitting with fellow travelers to sustain ourselves with delicious food and laughter at dinner. There is the darkness of night that waits until the very last minute to fall. 

I am surprised at the learning that is offered during this particular trip. Our local guides are joyful, knowledgeable, and generous. We eat, sing, laugh, and learn. They led me to deeper understandings when I boldly thought I knew so much. A great reminder to remain open.

In what ways am I open to divine guidance, even when it challenges me?

This query is a good reminder to remain open to having my mind changed. I shouldn’t go forward with one right way in mind. There are so many possible right ways…

How am I connected to those who walked before me? In what ways do I sense the spiritual presence of others - past, present, and unseen?

Swarthmoor Hall

During one morning meeting, vocal ministry in the form of song - a beautiful voice singing into the silence - pulled me back and forth into the past and out to the future. I thought about hardships and violence that early Friends must have faced. The voice sings of determination. I think of the challenges and injustices that we are called to face / reckon with today. The voice sings of humanity and love. My heart wonders about the future. The voice sings of peace and action. I will never forget this meeting and this message. I keep this voice and this song as one of my favorite souvenirs. 

What seeds of peace am I gathering and planting as I walk cheerfully over the earth? What do I hope to grow? What unplanned growth might sprout?

This is where my path takes a turn. It’s time to make sure that I am acting on the journey. It’s not meant to be a vacation with pictures in an album. It’s a provocation…

I am a teacher. That makes me an activist. (After all, teaching is a form of political activism.) I plan to plant a new Quaker garden for and with my young learners. I’m reflecting on how to make our garden inclusive, hopeful, expansive, and full of action. I’m moved by the vocal ministry to gather songs of peace and justice. (Please send me recommendations!) I’m thinking about the ways a walk might be an opening. Should I / we be walking through the Quaker garden? What does that mean? Who pollinates the garden and how? Is there compost in a Quaker garden? What would it be? 

Brigflatts Meeting House

I’ve given myself this small big first step of re-versioning the Quaker garden in kindergarten. I’m intending for this to be the first step in my continuing journey. Stay tuned… (and send me feed-forward)

*I cannot recommend this pilgrimage strongly enough. Consider joining the 2027 Friends Council on Education (in cooperation with Philadelphia Yearly Meeting) Quaker Pilgrimage. Just do it.

Disruptive Art

 

At the start of the school year, we began our conversation about environmental stewardship by noticing that our school community, including us, was not taking care of our playgrounds. Every time we went outside to play or to go for a walk, we discovered lots of trash. We felt called to action. 

We had many discussions about this and about what we might do to change it.

"The playground should be green and brown and stuff, not papers.”“Stewardship is    important. It’s because this is our school.”“It’s a Quaker school.”“It’s also because this is our beautiful world.”“Yeah and we need to take care of it too. And my yard."

Teacher:“What might be some ways we can solve this problem?”

“We can pick it all up.”“Except for glass at the playground in the neighborhood.”“We should show everyone at school what we find! That’ll make them so shocked!”

We began to pick up the trash we found on the playground. In order to see how much of a problem we really had, we decided to collect the trash and measure the amount. After two weeks of collecting, we had two large bags full!

As we were noticing and collecting and measuring trash, we were (coincidentally) having conversations about how art tells a story. We looked at some pieces of art that told powerful stories about change or action. This led to a decision to use art to share our message about environmental stewardship with the larger school community. Disruptive art to disrupt ideas about our stewardship of our playgrounds…

Using sense of the meeting, a Quaker decision making process around unity rather than unanimity, we settled upon a plan for our artwork… We would paint a view of the earth as it should be, the greenest greens and the bluest blues and one perfect tree. We would cut a hole or pull back our perfect tree to reveal the truth that we had discovered: litter.

We began by gluing all of the trash we had collected onto a large board. Next, we painted our tree on a background of green and blue on a paper canvas. 

Finally, we explored several ideas for combining the two: draping the painting over the surface of the trash board, pulling back one corner of the painting, and rolling up the bottom of the painting. We eventually decided to cut out a part of the painting to reveal the trash behind. 

*Using the exact-o knife to cut out the tree and using the glue gun for the trash board were the only non student-led parts of this project.

To accompany our work, the students came up with some queries (driving questions):

How can we be kind to the earth?

How can we be mindful of our surroundings?

How can we be mindful about not throwing chalk and toys around the playground?

How can we be kind to others?

How can we make sure we are grateful for what we have?

How can we be mindful to not throw trash on the ground?

How can we take care of nature?

How can we make the school a better place?

We decided to install our artwork with a thinking routine and a message box to find out what our community thought as they interacted with our piece.

We asked:

What story do you see in our artwork?

What message might we be sharing?

We were thrilled to receive thinking from our friends at lower school!

“I can’t believe you saw this much trash!” Second grader

“It makes me feel that we can do better as community members of earth to cherish it more.” Fourth grader

“I think that this may be a message about the environment. I see a tree that could replace items that seem to be things that you might find in the trash. I love this and think this is a really neat piece.” Visitor to campus

“I see that there is so much pollution in the world and that you’re trying to stop it.” Third grader

“I see a lot of trash where a tree should be. If we had less trash, could we grow more trees?” Science Teacher
 

“It’s weird, cool and awesome!” Second grader 

“Our world is all tied together so we need to take care of it and love it like we would our family.” Fourth grader

One of the fourth-grade classes borrowed our art and spent some time thinking about its meaning. Using a combination of the See Think Wonder and Main Side Hidden Story Routines, their thoughts included:

“I think the story is that you can take something like trash and turn it into something amazing.”“I think that the tree is being hurt because a lot of people are littering and it’s hurting nature.”“I thought that the kindergarten art was showing how many things trees can make.” 

Our friends in prekindergarten also looked carefully at our disruptive art using the See Think Wonder routine.

Teacher:“Share something you notice or see.”

“I see paper all over it.”“I see a sticker.”“A plastic thing. A knife!”“I see a piece of a beach bucket.”“me too.”“They painted it.”“I see that there’s stuff inside the painting.”

Teacher:“How did this shape happen?”(the tree cut out)

“Maybe they cut it out.”“It’s a tree!”

Teacher:“What story do you see in the artwork?”

“Imagination stuff”“That our environment is important. Because there’s a tree.”“That it’s not good to leave trash on the ground.”“You shouldn’t leave trash around because it might ruin the trees.”

Teacher:“Is there anything you wonder about?”

“I wonder why they made… why they picked a tree.”“How long did they make the trash stay?”“Maybe they glued it on?”“I am wondering what is that piece of silver thing and I am wondering how they didn’t run out of glue?”“Why didn’t they cut the whole thing out?”

After we read the ideas from our lower school friends, we thought about our connections:

What was in line with our thinking?

What was surprising?

What next?

We were surprised that some of the fourth-graders thought different things than we did. We were really glad that so many people seemed to think that our disruptive art had an important message. We wondered what would happen if we put our piece somewhere else? Would different people see it and what would they think? We were inspired to make more disruptive art and to find other ways to "teach" about big ideas.

Lunar New Year 20 - Interfaith Practice

 We are in the midst of the Lunar New Year!

Happy Year of the dragon! 

photo by Rutpratheep Nilpechr on unsplash

Did you know that Lunar New Year is not just celebrated in China? Countries that celebrate Lunar New Year include Vietnam, Korea, Tibet, Mongolia, China, Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, and the Okinawan community  in Japan. It is called Seollal (Korea), Tet (Vietnam), Losar (Tibet), and Tsangaan Sar (Mongolia).

As a lower school community, we embrace the opportunity to learn about this celebration.

My hope for my students is that they learn to approach every new opportunity with curiosity and openness. Rather than notice differences or ideas of shock or strangeness, imagine holding space for wonder! 

As a way to encourage this approach, I have created an extended thinking routine of sorts. It is our interfaith dialog and education thinking routine. We use this routine throughout the year with each new observance or tradition, each new opportunity for interfaith exploration and wonder. Teachers are free to adapt, simplify, or chunk the thinking moves in the routine in any way that makes sense for their learners. Our hope is that teachers will settle on a version that they can use again and again, making this interfaith routine, routine.

We often begin with a story. It may be a story that is read by a member of the community or the teacher. It may be a story that a member of our community shares from their own personal history or identity.

You might use this story Bringing in the New Year by Grace Lin

:

Grace Lin

Exploring the Lunar New Year, a thinking routine:

As you reflect upon the Lunar New Year story…

What is important to know about the Lunar New Year?

What feels familiar?

What surprises you? What is unexpected?

 

Further thinking about a point of view and the connectedness to our Quaker identity/the faith or non-faith based elements of our community’s identity:

Whose perspectives are being represented? How do you know? 

Whose perspective might be missing? 

In what ways might this connect to Quaker ideas or practices?

In what ways might this connect to your own story?

Further thinking about the relevance of all of this in the larger community or in our world:

Why might hearing these stories or learning about these traditions be important?

What role do these ideas play in our families? In our community? In our world? (Why might learning about this be important?)

 

Always great questions to ask:

What connections can you make?

What do you wonder?

How does the idea of light connect to the Lunar New Year? To our Quaker identity? To each of us?

What do you do with this thinking routine? Some options...

• use the queries to guide a conversation
• write about your thinking in response to the queries
• paint or draw or create an artful representation in response to these queries (painted reflection journals)
• use a query as a chalk talk prompt

Want to learn more?

• Read about thinking routines.
• Read about interfaith dialogs/education.
• I highly recommend reading Out of Many Faiths by Eboo Patel.

This interfaith thinking routine is adapted from the See Familiar Surprise Wonder routine.

Reflection on my pilgrimage to 1652 Country

The view from Pendle Hill

“Why do you make this trip?” 

Friends Council Quaker Pilgrimage: One Educator’s Reflection 

By Denise Coffin

Earlier this summer, I traveled to the north western part of England, often called 1652 Country, to learn more about the beginnings of Quakerism. I met up with a group of people who I would join on this pilgrimage, and the first thing one of my fellow pilgrims asked was, “Why do you make this trip?” 

We began by boarding a bus at the Manchester airport and heading north to a small town between lakes and mountains called Grasmere. As we drove on, the cities became smaller, the roads turned from highways to roads to narrow little lanes, lined with hedgerows and stone walls, and the landscape opened up. The green fields somehow grew greener, sheep were scattered on the hillsides, mountains became the background, the sky became bluer, and the clouds were enormous and fluffy. We left “today” behind and entered yesterday’s small villages of stone buildings and old shop fronts. This first “step” in our pilgrimage might have been a metaphor for the journey we were taking. Grasmere, apart from the hikers with telescoping walking sticks and waterproof gear, is a village back in time. We could envision early seekers going about their own journey here.

Why do I make this trip? I am drawn to the story of Quakerism. I am curious about the people who were so sure about their faith and the way to access it, at great risk to themselves. I am a teacher, and I feel called to learn about those people and the events that led up to and played a large role in this story. I make this trip so that I can take the story back and share it as a spark for my young learners and the part they’ll play in their own journeys. The trip itinerary provided us with the opportunity to do just that. 

Pendle Hill

We began by hiking Pendle Hill. I have hiked this hill before and George Fox is right in describing the walk up as “so very difficult.” To me, that’s an important detail, one that I connected with more on this year’s climb than on my past climbs. We were dropped off near a farmhouse at the base of the steep part of Pendle Hill. For Fox, the climb would have begun farther down the hill. For me, the climb began with a swift pace. The group initially climbed together with some pilgrims opting to stop at an early plateau to take in the views. The rest of us continued towards the top. 

It’s difficult to hike straight up. I found my pattern of climbing for a bit, stopping to look up at the distance I had yet to climb, and then turning around to gasp at the incredibly beautiful view! Squares of green fields outlined by tiny stone walls, dotted by tiny sheep, mountains rising and dipping, all of it surrounded by the biggest sky. I did eventually summit (last) and joined the waiting group where we took seats along a stone wall for a brief and spontaneous Meeting for Worship. How could we not?! The wind was fierce and invigorating. The sun shone. We were joyful and amazed. For George Fox, this was a tough hike. He was drawn to Pendle Hill for some reason that we may speculate about but do not know the real reason why. He tells us that reaching the top is a bit of a transformative experience. He tells us that what he needs to do next is revealed to him on Pendle Hill. I feel similarly inspired. The beauty is remarkable, and the terrain is green brush and grass, rough stone paths, and the driest, dustiest dirt. In the past, I always looked out at the view, but on this trip I also looked down as I walked. There were wild blueberries growing, and, at the advice of a fellow pilgrim, a few of us hiking together ate a handful “for our health.” Another pilgrim picked up trash on her way down. A few of us stopped just feet away from a sheep who looked up at us with the sheepiest of smiles. I held a rock in my hand and noticed that it was jagged and dusty and warm. You can feel history here. For me, Pendle Hill was magical, the best way to launch our journey. 

Brigflatts Meeting House

One of my favorite parts of this trip was visiting many local meetinghouses. At every meeting, local Quakers shared the history of their meetings, of their meetinghouses, of their members and membership. As a teacher of young children, I get to share the practice of Meeting for Worship with them and their families each year. Many grown ups believe that it must be difficult for young children to sit quietly for such a long period of time. The truth, however, is that I find the younger students much more able to sit and listen to their still small voices than the older children and than their grown ups! My kindergarteners and I have Meeting for Worship in a variety of places, and we often try to notice the character of the silence. Is it a fidgeting, moving of legs, breathing kind of silence? Is it an outside kind of silence with birds, passing cars, wind? Is it a very still silence with barely a noise at all? We reflect on what kind of silence suits the emergence of what kinds of messages. We check in with our hearts, bodies, and brains around which silence works best for each of us as we hear our inner voice (however we define that in our respective faiths) and let those messages settle in for our growth. 

Experiencing the silence of each of these meetinghouses, some new, some old, some very old, was powerful for me. At Brigflatts Meeting, the silence had already begun as we entered. The meeting room at Brigflatts Meeting is incredible. Old wooden floors, windows set in deep stone walls, wooden benches, some with cushions and some without, a second level balcony. The elder benches are on a riser between the windows and the door. Early members brought their dogs when the meetinghouse was first built in 1675, and there was a place for them to wait while their people worshiped. A table in the center stood with a beautiful vase of flowers. George Fox had come here. Everything was old, dark wood, stone, worn with time, uneven, beautiful. The silence was somehow old, too. It was impossibly still. The messages were beautiful. They were full of the joy of the large gathering of Friends. There was a connection to the troublemaking that early Quakers were known for and the need to make good trouble again for the sake of today and the future. Why do I make this trip? I make this trip because the intersection of joy and social justice and action and community are so important for and needed today. I traveled to England in order to bring that back for my own community, for my students, and for myself. So that I can reflect upon what that might look like for a group of elementary students at a Quaker school. 

Every afternoon, we gathered as we wished for afternoon tea and shared our impressions on the day’s experiences. We connected, laughed, shared, supported, asked questions, and became friends. This pilgrimage is more than a tour of Quaker history. It is the group that makes the pilgrimage as much as the places we visit; maybe more so. We stood in the churchyard in Sedbergh and heard the story of George Fox preaching to a gathered group while being encouraged to go into the church because “that is where the preaching happens.” Fox replied that “church is in the people, not the buildings.” It was perhaps a necessary belief for Quakers who did not and could not have buildings. For me, that idea was even more meaningful as my fellow pilgrims quickly became my teachers, guides, supporters, and friends. Notifications from our shared text chat group continue to pop up on my phone throughout the day as a friend shares a resource, an idea, a message, some photos. Messages that my new friends shared at Meetings, along with ideas that were talked about during our bus rides, fill my journal. We were a group of seekers. We might have each answered the question, why do you make this trip? differently, and that is what made the trip even more valuable to me.

Firbank Fell

Why do I make this trip? Our group was able to meet and hear from local Quakers at each of our stops. We heard about what life was like in that part of the world at the beginning of Quakerism from Ben Pink Dandelion and Wendy Hampton at Clitheroe Meeting. We met David Boulton, the author of a fascinating history of Quakerism at Brigflatts Meeting where a Friend shared a bit more about George Fox and the early seekers as they traipsed across the fields and headed to Firbank Fell. We heard from an amateur/expert embroiderer at Kendal Meeting where we learned of a special Quaker stitch created by Anne Wynn-Wilson for the tapestries that are on display there at the Quaker Tapestry Museum. During our visit with Lancaster Meeting, a local Quaker shared her research around the role of Quakers in the history of enslaved people and the truth about whether and how Meetings might have benefited. The ideas and history that she presented, along with her driving mission of providing reparations, became a call to action for all of us. In what other ways have Quakers participated in or benefited from such harmful practices? How can I/we repair relationships, provide reparations, and change systems that continue to reinforce these inequities and injustices? I make this trip to hear from Friends about what is being revealed to them and how they are continuing to answer these questions and take action. 

Quaker Tapestry

I am still marveling at the ways in which this trip tended my brain, body, spirit, and heart. My brain is full with stories, new friends, and action-provoking ideas. My body is stronger (and a bit wearier) from hiking, walking, and carrying my gear. My spirit is grateful for the opportunity to travel as a seeker, not completely sure of what I was looking for, but now knowing that I found so much. My heart is happy to have found a new community, to have been given the gift of this pilgrimage. I feel a renewed call to the Quaker education and identity of my school. That is why I make this trip.

Read the full story here on the Friends Council on Education website.

A Query from the kindergarteners...

At our school, classes take turns writing queries to share with the larger community. We write queries to illuminate issues that bubble up as we learn and grow together. It may that we are personally experiencing something that sparks an idea for a query or it may be that inspiration comes from outside - from what might be happening in our neighbors, cities, or the world.

To begin the year, my kindergartners (the Marigolds and Dandelions) brought the idea for our first query. Here is a brief description of that process...

We took on a large job to end our week and wrote the first Query of the school year. I shared with the Marigolds & Dandelions that I was in need of a class to volunteer to write the first query of the year. A query is a Quaker kind of a question. It gives us something to think about and use as a tool to help us as we seek ways that we might grow, help each other, or help our community. I told them that I was listening last week as they shared ideas about our stories, played with each, and worked to solve a difference in opinion around a block building. I noticed some interesting and beautiful ideas that felt like the beginning of a query to me. A few friends in the block corner were working together and I heard one Marigold say, “If we work together, we could do it better.” During a read aloud, another Marigold shared her idea about cooperation and said, “We can do it on our own and we can do it together.” This line between being independent and being capable despite our small physical size and being able and open to someone else's ideas is one that we will "walk" all year long in our kindergarten journey. 

I wrote their words on the white board. Friends added their own thoughts and ideas. The trend towards being able to do stuff for ourselves but also exploring working together kept going. I told the Marigolds & Dandelions that if I rearranged their words so that they ask a question, we might have a pretty good query. I wrote “Even though we can do it on our own, what might happen if we do it together?” The children thought about whether we should ask what might happen vs. what could happen. The difference in words was briefly debated. 

We considered whether or not this was a query that we would feel good about sharing with the whole school community. (We do.) The children immediately began to come up with answers to this big question which suggested it might be just right. And that is how the Marigolds & Dandelions wrote the first Lower School Query of 2023-24!

Query for September 15, 2023

Even though we can do it on our own, what might happen if we do it together?

Marigolds & Dandelions

An added note about our Lower School queries: Classes and groups of children/adults will write queries for the community throughout the year. During this process, the children share their thinking through brainstorming, connecting, being inspired by each other’s ideas, and (in our case) allowing me to sum up, rephrase, and offer some vocabulary advice. Each class has their own process, however there are many similarities, varying by age and developmental phases.