Welcome to the Bon Secours Retreat & Conference Center’s blog! This blog will extend our retreat ministry by bringing prayers and reflections into your home ‘retreat.’ Many of our presenters and staff share their homilies, favorite prayers, and reflections through this medium. We encourage you to comment, pass it along to friends or simply take a moment to pray with us. We hope that this will serve as a moment during your day when you can ‘retreat with us.’
Poem by Mary Oliver Reflection by Lorie Conway On the outskirts of Jerusalem the donkey waited. Not especially brave, or filled with understanding, he stood and waited. How horses, turned out into the meadows, leap with delight! How doves, released from their cages, clatter away, splashed with sunlight! But the donkey, tied to a tree as usual, waited. Then he let himself be led away. Then he let the stranger mount. Never had he seen such…
By Gordon Creamer Ummh, do you smell that bread, baking in the kitchen? What kind of bread would you like your sandwich on? Isn’t that the best thing since sliced bread? Each of these questions and myriad others have woven their way into our everyday vernacular. They address ordinary instances that comprise our human experiences, and yet bread has numerous other connotations when our context of understanding expands to include the bread’s spiritual nature. Indeed, bread is something distinct and…
By Elaine Ireland “Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips” (Isaiah). “For I am …not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am” (St. Paul). “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man” (St. Peter). Isaiah, Paul, and Peter experience dramatic changes in their lives. Isaiah and…
A Lenten Journey of Compassion and Hope As we enter the sacred season of Lent, Ash Wednesday invites us to pause, reflect, and begin again. Marked with ashes, we are reminded of our humanity, our dependence on God, and our call to conversion. This is a season of renewal, a time to deepen our prayer, recommit to compassion, and open our hearts more fully to Christ’s transforming love. In that spirit, we offer this Lenten prayer as we journey together…
by Pamela Keyes Thresholds, doorways to the unknown, Markers of hospitality and welcome At journey’s end, or is it a beginning? Places of paradox, standing in the now, One foot in what was, one foot in the not yet. Is my body leaning forward or backward? Where is the pull coming from? Stones ‘neath my feet help me to dwell in the hope And possibility of space. How will I sing my song in this new land? When I sang…
By Amy Sorensen Kulesa In both the Hebrew and Christian scriptures, Divine encounters often begin with the utterance “Be not afraid” on the part of an angel of the Lord or by Jesus, Himself. This clues us in to an area of our hearts of which Heaven seems to be well-aware — that as human beings, we are well-acquainted with fear in our journey of life. I wonder whether we are as aware of this ever-present dynamic within us, or…
By Dr. Renee K. Harrison Sacred Worth I found the lost coin. When I arose searching, there we were all along. Sometimes our life strings—those visions we hold close to our hearts—dreams, hopes, gifts, goals, ambitions, and desires—are not lost over time. They are with us, waiting to be rediscovered and rekindled. -------------------------------- There is a seat waiting for you at Bon Secours on February 21, 2026, from 9:30 am to 4:00 pm, a moment away from it all, so…
By Sr. Elaine Davia January 24, 2026 marks 202 years since the founding of the Sisters of Bon Secours. We are profoundly grateful to the original Sisters, whose courageous vision took root in Paris, France in 1824. Their charism of compassion, healing, and presence with people in need continues to flourish today. A little over 200 years ago, France was in turmoil, having endured the long upheaval of the French Revolution. The Catholic Church was in disarray, the poor were…
Learning to Listen with Hildegard of Bingen In a time when the Earth’s wounds feel impossible to ignore—raging fires, polluted waters, vanishing species—many of us find ourselves asking: How do we respond without becoming overwhelmed or numb? Where do we begin? Centuries before climate science could name these crises, Hildegard of Bingen offered a wisdom that feels strikingly relevant today: “If we fall in love with creation deeper and deeper, we will respond to its endangerment with passion.” Hildegard, a…
By Sanyika Calloway A Prayer for Paying Attention There is a quiet transformation that begins the moment we choose to pause. Not the hurried pause we take while our minds continue racing ahead, but the deeper pause that invites us to soften, breathe, and become aware of the life unfolding right where we stand. In a world that asks so much of our attention, noticing becomes a spiritual practice. It reminds us that God is not only found…
