A Short History for A Long Legacy
Our meeting originated in 1790 as Centre Monthly Meeting, located in Halfmoon Township, and continued until 1933 when it was laid down. Centre Friends began attending the State College Meeting which was founded in1912 to meet the needs of the Quaker students and a few local residents. The first regular business meeting of the State College Friends Meeting took place in 1925. In 1927, a meetinghouse was built at 318 South Atherton Street (now the home of Out of the Cold Homeless Services); it was enlarged in 1948-50. The present meetinghouse with its adjacent education wing was completed in 1980.
The State College Friends School, founded in 1980 under the care with the meeting, provides students in K-8 grades with an education based on Quaker principles. Child Space, a preschool, is housed in the education wing of the meetinghouse and is independently operated from Friends Meeting.
Foxdale Village is a Quaker-directed retirement community founded by meeting members.
State College Friends Meeting is unusual in being part of two yearly meetings. In the early years, Friends from Baltimore Yearly Meeting and Philadelphia Yearly Meeting supported State College Friends Meeting. When State College Meeting became independent it retained affiliation with both Philadelphia and Baltimore, as a member of the Upper Susquehanna Quarter (PYM) and Centre Quarter (BYM).
Our ties to both PYM and BYM reflect our historic heritage and relationship to both yearly meetings. The earliest Friends in the area (BYM) settled in Halfmoon Township. One old meetinghouse exists near Stormstown today; it is used by the Grange. Friends Cemetary near Stormstown dates from the earliest days of Friends in Centre County. Another old meetinghouse and cemetery are located in Bellefonte.
A History of the Friends Meeting in Centre County, Pennsylvania, by Emily and Elwood Way, offers a full account of local Quaker history.
What We Believe
For Friends, God is a loving presence. Every soul is akin to the Divine and therefore every person may in some degree understand the Divine and respond to it. We gather in silence to seek together a fuller knowledge of God and an understanding of its practical implications for our lives.
The beliefs of Friends in general, and State College Friends in particular, are quite diverse. We have no set creed. Early Quakers were Christian and tried to recreate early, primitive Christianity. In our meeting, some of us consider ourselves orthodox Christians, some of us consider ourselves Christian in some broader sense, and some of us do not consider ourselves as Christians at all. Most of us became Friends as adults, and bring along parts of our religious heritage. The diversity of our beliefs is a strength we can all draw on.
Friends have no sacraments or rituals because all living is, to us, a sacrament. We have no paid ministers because each of us should share in the responsibility of ministry. We have no prepared prayers because our unspoken and spoken prayers are a direct communication with the Infinite. We worship in a living silence where dwells the eternal presence of God.
Friends have a long tradition of living testimony in the areas of simplicity, peace, integrity, equality, and social concerns. We express these concerns in our own actions, and through support of the American Friends Service Committee, Friends Committee on National Legislation, The Quaker UN Program, and Friends’ schools and colleges.
We welcome as members any who share our principles and convictions, and are pleased to accept membership applications from attenders who have taken time to consider their applications thoughtfully. The clerk, members of the Worship and Ministry Committee, or other members of the meeting will be glad to discuss Friends’ faith and practice with you and to recommend Quaker literature.