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Weekly Quaker Meetings for Worship are an essential part of the educational experience for all at Westtown, including our youngest students. “Meeting,” as it is often known, is a deceptively simple experience. Community members are welcomed into the Meeting House — a building with no religious symbols or decoration — in silence. In Lower School, older students have “Meeting buddies” who act as elders, walk younger students to the Meeting House, and model for them the importance of silence in this experience.
As students and teachers settle into quiet reflection, they discover an oasis away from the noise and motion of life. There is no pastor nor sermon, as Quakers believe that individuals do not need an intermediary between themselves and the Divine, and that all have direct access to God and to Truth. Children sit in quiet and wait for the still, small voice inside them and, if moved to share it with the group, they rise and speak. It can be a powerful moment when a Lower School student stands to share their thoughts.
Thinking and reflection are habits that must be nurtured and practiced, and Meeting for Worship creates a time and space for children to reflect in silence. Through this quiet reflection, they come to profound understandings about themselves, their friends, their school, and their world.