Monthly meeting
In the Religious Society of Friends, a monthly meeting, area meeting, or regional meeting is the basic governing body, a congregation which holds regular meetings for business for Quakers in a given area. The meeting is responsible for the administration of its congregants, including membership and marriages, and for the meeting's property. A meeting can be a grouping of multiple smaller meetings, usually called preparative meetings, coming together for administrative purposes, while for others it is a single institution. In most countries, multiple monthly or area meetings form a quarterly or general meeting, which in turn form yearly meetings. Programmed Quakers may refer to their congregation as a church.
Management
Among Quakers, affairs are managed at a particular kind of meeting for worship, called a meeting for business, where all members are invited to attend. Decisions are made as a form of worship, where each individual sits in contemplative silence until moved to speak on a subject. At these meetings, Quakers attempt to reach unity on a subject, in a form of religious consensus decision-making, to find "the sense of the meeting". A monthly meeting is so called because it traditionally holds these meetings once a month, separate from the normal weekly meeting for worship.Each meeting usually nominates members to serve in certain volunteer positions to facilitate administration, including:
- a clerk and assistant clerk or clerks
- a treasurer
- a registering officer
- a nominations committee
- a body of trustees
- a custodian of records or a committee for the purpose