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This month’s issue includes thought-starters from two people who will be serving as session leaders at our Fall Workshop on October 3, a personal meditation on this September 11 anniversary, information about an upcoming weekend retreat that will focus on the teachings of Teresa of Avila, a reminder about “Silent Saturdays” at Healing Gardens, insights from Henry David Thoreau, Rowan Williams, and Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, and a link to the very educational and interesting website of the Center for Action and Contemplation.

We hope you’ll enjoy it and invite your participation. Please use the e-mail address at the end to send your feedback. 

Fall Workshop Thought-Starters

 

Contemplative Outreach Chicago’s fourth annual Fall Workshop is only three weeks away! It will take place Saturday October 3, 2015 at St. John of the Cross in Western Springs, Illinois. (Full details and registration here.)

Below, Al Krema and Nancy Sylvester, two of our Fall Workshop session leaders, offer some initial thoughts on the ideas they plan to explore on October 3.

[Read more…] about Spirit Journal – September 2015

Preview

This month’s issue offers a profile of St. Benedict’s Abbey and its Benet Lake Retreat Center, a personal reflection on the transformative impact of Centering Prayer, a reminder about the upcoming Annual Fall Workshop in Western Springs, insights from Huston Smith, Carl Jung, the Rig Veda, and Alec Wilkinson, and a guest column reflecting on the topic of death and duty.

We hope you’ll enjoy this issue. Please use the link at the end to send your feedback.

Regional Resource: St. Benedict’s Abbey/Benet Lake Retreat Center

 

 

Saint Benedict’s Abbey is a community of Benedictine monks in a beautiful, peaceful location on Benet Lake, near the state border of Wisconsin and Illinois. The abbey serves both the Milwaukee and Chicago areas. The monks of St. Benedict’s focus on a ministry of prayer, with the celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours and daily Mass. They gather six times a day to sing and offer praise to God.

Another important and major focus of the Abbey is its welcoming Benet Lake Retreat Center. Retreats at the Abbey provide an opportunity for a time of quiet and spiritual reflection. The abbey has been the site for many individuals and groups to find a path closer to God. [Read more…] about Spirit Journal – July 2015

Preview

This month’s issue includes information on local and national resources, upcoming workshops and retreats, a website recommendation, and insights from Thomas Merton and Richard Rohr – all to help support your contemplative practice.

We hope you’ll enjoy it, and invite your feedback.

The Center for Action and Contemplation’s “Living School” Program

by Al Krema

The Living School is a two-year study of the Christian contemplative tradition and its integration into modern daily life. The Living School is presented by the Center for Action and Contemplation (CAC) in Albuquerque NM, the institute founded by Franciscan Richard Rohr.

The program is an in-depth study of Christian mystics such as Bonaventure, St. John of the Cross, Theresa of Avila, and many more. In addition to reading and studying the works of these saints, much emphasis is given to interpreting and living these teachings in daily life. Students are asked to form a method and practice that provides both individual contemplative development as well as engaging in contemplative action in our community. [Read more…] about Spirit Journal – June 2015

Beginnings

Contemplative Outreach, Chicago, is launching this online publication – Spirit Journal – in an attempt to create a supportive online community for Chicago-area contemplatives. We hope to be able to point readers like you toward activities, resources, information and inspiration that will support your spiritual journey. At the same time, we hope that you will share your knowledge and thoughts with us and with other readers.

Please let us know what you think of this issue and to start your side of the conversation by emailing the newsletter editor at jack.lloyd@earthlink.net. We look forward to hearing from you.

News

Midsummer Retreats at the Port: Intensive and Post-Intensive

The Practice of the Presence of God

by Ted Curtis

At one of the national meetings of Contemplative Outreach held in Chicago over the past two decades Thomas Keating stood up, after some 800 people had prayed in silence for 20 minutes, and said he was going to tell us what each of us could do for Contemplative Outreach.  I reached for my pen, smoothed out the paper on my lap, and prepared to take notes. [Read more…] about Spirit Journal – May 2015