A contemplative retreat: "In God’s Womb: A Journey with Yourself and God"

There are times when I shudder at the world around me, shaken by the fear, the mistrust, the deadly and dysfunctional conflict, and I wonder where God is as chaos happens. My recent diagnosis of malignant breast cancer has reminded me that this chaos happens within me as well, unexpectedly turning my world upside down and forcing me to confront my own sense of control over life events and my future. Peter Senge reminds us that cell division without attention and care for surrounding cells threatens life within the whole organism and we call it cancer. Surely as we look at our earth, we can see the same irresponsible pattern of human behavior. What does it mean to feel God’s presence in the midst of these threats to life, both internally and externally? What new life can be alive in us in the midst of this chaos?

Edwina Gateley, poet, author, theologian, artist, writer, lay minister, modern day mystic, prophet and a single Mom, has words of comfort for us about personal and global transformation. The Church Times has said of Edwina that she is “An essential voice…a modern Dorothy Day”. The language she speaks is the language of the Heart assisting us to become aware of our experience of God in our daily lives. Through her writings and workshops, she helps us identify the God who is already here, as she says, “Waiting to be found, soaked in my reality.” She calls us to “the transformative experience of real faith” at those heart breaking points in life when we “know that God is with us and that new life is possible even in the midst of despair.”

The Spiritual Ministries Network of the Sisters of St. Joseph in Canada and Associates, London Site, is pleased to present and welcome you to a day of slowing down, paying attention and encountering what is Real. Together we will discover who we are and who God is for us and with us. Please join us on this journey as we each find again what brings life to us and to our world.

In God’s Womb: A Journey with Yourself and God is a contemplative retreat with poetry, music, visuals, reflection and contemporary prayer 

Saturday, May 30^th, 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM (Retreat program begins at 9:30 a.m.)

Box Lunch at Noon

REGISTRATION FEE: $60.00

Bessie Labatt Hall, King’s University College, Western University Campus

266 Epworth Avenue London, ON  N6A 2M3

For more information:  Mary Shamley, Spiritual Ministries Network

Click HERE for a brochure in PDF

TEL: 519-432-3781 ext. 567 / E-mail:  mshamley@csjcanada.org

Another opportunity to be engaged with EDWINA GATELEY:

Beginning May 18^th and concluding June 5^th, Monasteries of the Heart, a web site, as described and created by Joan Chittister, that, “brings the Rule of Benedict, the person, and the community together to do again in our own time what is needed to revive our spiritual energy, our recognition of common values, and a sense of vibrant and effective human community” will be offering an on-line e-retreat with Edwina:

Tracing Your Spiritual Autobiography: A Retreat with Edwina Gateley.

  

A Retreat : Seeing With New Eyes

“It is the Fire in our midst….. the Spirit of God deep within….. an invitation into a new vision that will transform and energize us.” (Barbara Fiand) Sister Barbara Fiand, SNDdeN, will invite and guide retreat participants into Seeing with New Eyes…Embracing Our Faith in Times of Transition during a time of reflection from Friday, May 2, 2014-Wednesday, May 7, 2014. Retreatants will gather at Holy Family Retreat House, Oxley, Ontario on Lake Erie’s North Shore.

What to Expect? “It’s hard to say, but I know this much, Barbara has a way of engaging everyone in the conversation whether you have an extensive theology background or perhaps one or two courses. Her style is invitational and she leaves one with the desire to plumb the issue further whether it be the reality of Hell, A Theology of Eucharist or Seeing the Universe as Expanding in all Directions. Through her passion and depth of personal prayer, qualities which are manifest by her mastery of the material and the sincerity of her words, Barbara is able to stir one’s intellectual abilities and penetrate one’s soul. You will be free to ask questions in her presentations and Barbara may even have open sessions for participants’ questions only.

I have made two retreats with Barbara and because of the soul stretching I experienced on these occasions, Sister Jackie Janisse and I invited her to come to Canada. This is a wonderful opportunity to engage your mind, heart and soul as you listen to Barbara and to the urgings of God’s spirit in your soul.

The environment at Holy Family Retreat House, Oxley Ontario, which is extremely peaceful is conducive to contemplative prayer in a milieu of God’s natural beauty of trees, flowers, Lake Erie, birds and other little fur babies running around the property.

Sign up now! You will return home invigorated, renewed, relaxed and profoundly grateful.

For brochure click HERE. For a flyer click HERE.

Pat Hogan CSJ”

Introducing an Online Retreat Opportunity

As we prepare to enter into the great Easter season of fifty days, we invite you to make this time especially rich by taking time each day to stop, even for a few moments, to bring God’s new life into the ordinary moments of your day. We are calling this an Online Retreat. 

We invite you to reflect on the Sunday readings during the Easter season, and to hopefully find in them a source to link your faith and your daily living. Each Wednesday following Easter, there will be a reflection and a few questions for your prayer. You can participate by yourself, or gather with a few others during the week to help each other notice how God is at work in your lives. Author Barbara Kingsolver offers us a clue on how to do this, when she says that “God is in the details, the completely unnecessary miracles sometimes tossed to us as stars to guide us.” We can often help each other see those stars.

So much of our interaction with the world is shaped by our own perspective, or point of view, as we interpret experience. Much of what we read calls us to reflect on the large historical events that are unfolding around us. Some of that can lead us to despair and at other times, by some people’s determination and strength, call us to hope. This very practice may tempt us to dismiss the modest efforts each of us make to respond to life unfolding around us daily. But if we take time to notice, we can begin to find hope, as we see how God is revealed in the very small details and familiar people and events of each day. After all, if the disciples who walked with the risen Jesus on the road to Emmaus didn’t recognize him immediately, then we can be encouraged to stay open to surprise awaiting us when we stop to “break bread” with each other. May this Easter season open for us the gift of noticing the small and humble ways God is with us. This will truly be a cause for hope and celebration. Please consider joining us during this Easter season.