The Friends General Conference (FGC) is a North American Quaker organization primarily serving the Quaker yearly and monthly meetings in the United States and Canada that choose to be members. The FGC was founded in 1900.

There are two other similar organizations within Quakerism, Friends United Meeting and Evangelical Friends International; each of these three organizations represent different branches within Quakerism, with the FUM occupying a more-or-less centrist theological viewpoint and the EFI representing an admixture of Quakerism and conservative evangelicalism. FGC-affiliated meetings are in the "unprogrammed" Quaker tradition, which means that such meetings take place without human pastoral leadership, or a prepared order of worship. Friends (Quakers) in FGC tend to be decidedly more socially and theologically liberal than Friends from other parts of Quakerism (and than the general U.S. population). In many respects, they are analogous to mainline Protestants who hold strongly progressive viewpoints on matters such as biblical authority, sexual mores, and attitudes toward public policy, with pacifism perhaps being the FGC's chief distinctive.

The FGC hosts an annual conference in early July for members of member organizations (although individual membership is not required to attend). It also operates a bookstore and a publishing house, and provides numerous resources for meetings and individual Friends.

The main offices for the FGC are in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Mission Statement

The Friends General Conference is a Quaker organization in the unprogrammed tradition of the Religious Society of Friends which primarily serves affiliated yearly and monthly meetings. The FGC proclaims that:

• faith is based on direct experience of God
• our lives witness this experience individually and corporately
• by answering that of God in everyone, we build and sustain inclusive community.

The FGC provides resources and opportunities that educate and invite members and attenders to experience, individually and corporately, what they believe to be God's living presence, and to discern and follow what they hold to be God's leadings. FGC reaches out to seekers and to other religious bodies inside and outside the wider Religious Society of Friends.

Structure

The FGC is overseen by a committee of 170 Friends, 112 of whom are appointed by affiliated yearly and monthly meetings. The work of the FGC is carried out by the staff and volunteer members of its program committees.

See also

• Conservative Friends
• Evangelical Friends International (EFI)
• Friends United Meeting (FUM)
• Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL)
• Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC)
• Nontheist Friends

References

External links

• Friends General Conference homepage
• Quakerbooks.org, the FGC Bookstore
• Quakerfinder.org, FGC's site for finding unprogramed Friends in the U.S. and Canada
• FGC's Gathering of Friends, held every year in early July
• FGC's Quaker Library, online pamphlets & articles on Quakerism
• QuakerYouth.org, online community for Young Friends and Young Adult Friends (ages 14-35)