The Ujima Friends Peace Center is worshipping Quaker community in North Philadelphia. The work of the Ujima Friends Peace Center is to reduce violence and provide a safe haven with educational, cultural and recreational opportunities for adults and young people. The Center is a separately incorporated federally tax-exempt organization. It began in 2016 as a ministry of the Fellowship of Friends of African Descent. The rationale and inspiration for the Center’s creation is set forth in its formative document the Fellowship Minute on State Sanctioned Violence.
The foundational activity of the Peace Center is its meeting for worship. Members of the Peace Center met weekly at the Center every First Day (Sunday) afternoon for worship.
The Center met for worship online during the Covid 19 pandemic which greatly expanded the geographical scope of its participants. In May of 2021, its members decided to form a separate monthly meeting known as the Ujima Friends Meeting.
The Ujima Friends Peace Center, the Ujima Friends Meeting and the Fellowship of Friends of African Descent, though legally distinct and structurally independent, continue to work and worship together with overlapping memberships. The Peace Center does service work in the North Philadelphia community, the Fellowship continues to focus on its annual Gathering, and the Ujima Friends Meeting worships weekly in an online community without borders. With a common heritage and purpose, together they expand and continue the commitments and traditions of an African centered spiritual experience of the Divine within the Religious Society of Friends. (Adapted from the Statement of Clarity and Unity.)
The Peace Center is located in the North Philadelphia community at 1701 West Lehigh Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19132-2123
Correspondence can be sent to
Ujima Friends Peace Center
PO Box 50647
Philadelphia, PA 19132
or
friends@ujimafriends.org