Living Mindfully

 honoring the soul’s need for reflection

Many of us experience a restless longing that we can’t always name.  The saints and poets name it well when they speak of this yearning as a homesickness for God.  We all have within us a place of communion  where, if we slow down for deep listening, we will hear God breathing in us.   There is a way that the soul can get crowded out of our day.  She is a bit shy and does not demand center stage. 

This silent retreat is an invitation to honor your soul’s needs by listening to God breathing in you.   Using themes from a book she is currently working on, Sister Macrina will lead  you contemplatively through the seasons of the day.  In this retreat we will be doing Lectio Divina with the original monastic hours of the day.   These seven sacred pauses are moments of the day that the church has always held sacred: pre-dawn, dawn, mid-morning, noon, mid-afternoon, evening and night.  It is the spirit and theme of each hour that we will be contemplating.

Sister Macrina invites you to a feast of  scripture, poetry, story, prayer, song, ritual, silence, soul listening and sacred journaling.

Drawing from her Benedictine spirituality, Sister Macrina sees as an important part of her ministry leading seekers on a contemplative path away from wordiness, into the space between the words where silence and solitude make their home.  She encourages her readers and retreatants to listen to their heart’s deepest desires and to tap into the wealth of their own creativity recognizing that everyone is a song of God.  She believes that a retreat is not so much a time to learn new things as an opportunity to reflect on the deep truths that many of us have forgotten due to the busyness of our lives.

Our speaker

Having lived monastic life for more than forty years, Sister Macrina Wiederkehr makes her home with the Sisters of St. Scholastica in Fort Smith, Arkansas.  Benedictine spirituality has had a great influence in her writing and retreat ministry.   She loves to write and has authored six books: Seasons of Your Heart, A Tree Full of Angels,  The Song of the Seed, published by HarperCollins;  Gold in Your Memories and Behold Your Life by Ave Maria   Her latest book, coauthored with Joyce Rupp, is The Circle of Life, Sorin Books.    Visit her web site at www.MacrinaWiederkehr.com

Although her academic background is in elementary and religious education she claims that her best learning flows from  the wisdom school of daily life.  Her finest teachers are her daily companions and the larger global community.  She  also meets teachers in the pages of the books she read.   She has drunk liberally from the springs of creation and finds healing in  the seasons that pass through our lives and over our fields.   Her deep country roots and childhood memories of working in the vineyards on her family  farm in Altus, Arkansas have had a lasting impact on her life.

Fee:  $425 resident; $350 commuter.  Deposit $100

Register today by calling (317) 788-7581.  Deadline:  May 11, 2007