We all encounter conflict in our public lives – in our workplaces, our congregations or meetings, and in our social change organizations. Leaning into conflict, instead of avoiding it, can be the courageous key to making our work environment more productive, our worship communities deeper and more mutually accountable, and our social change organizations more dynamic and effective. We know we are called to be just peacemakers, but often we just don’t know how.

This 18-day residential institute at Pendle Hill will help you to overcome your own inhibitions about facing conflicts, to engage conflicts confidently, and to transform them creatively with new insights, skills, and tools you will hone through practice. In this Institute, we will concentrate on developing and strengthening leadership skills to work through conflict in our public lives. Concentrating less on interpersonal conflict, and focusing more on conflict in our organizations, our workplace, and our meetings, we will pay particular attention to the processes that Quakers have developed to navigate the tension between “speaking truth to power” and “answering that of God in everyone.” Truth-telling and compassion are both needed to transform conflict.

The curriculum will include:

• Conflict engagement vs. conflict avoidance;
• The inner work of conflict transformation;
• Conflict analysis and assessment;
• Compassionate Listening and Compassionate Communication – getting at the “heart” of the matter through empathetic listening and effective communication of needs and interests;
• Negotiation skills;
• Forgiveness and reconciliation;
• Peacemaking circles and restorative practices;
• Love and nonviolence as “forces” more powerful – exposing systemic injustice and engaging the powers through strategic nonviolent direct action.

There will be some lectures, films, large and small group discussions, and a lot of experiential learning through doing and reflecting, role-playing, and practice sessions.

Fees include tuition and meals starting with dinner on Wednesday, July 13, and ending with lunch on Sunday, July 31. Commuter, $1,365. To stay on campus in a private room, the fee is $2,780. Some financial assistance is available.

If you are interested in participating in this summer’s Institute for Conflict Transformation, please complete and submit the Application to Participate in Institute for Conflict Transformation.

If you will need financial assistance in order to participate in the Institute, please complete and submit the Financial Aid Application.

Please contact John Meyer for more information: [email protected], or 610-566-4507, ext. 129.