THE BLOG OF THE BON SECOURS RETREAT & CONFERENCE CENTER
Retreat with Us
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.’
By Gordon Creamer Caring for our own selves is in a constant conversation with the pressing intersections of providing something for others and the thankless act of prioritizing a multitude of often competing needs, requirements, and demands. To this end, the act of honoring oneself and the presence of diverse, even conflicting emotions becomes quite onerous. And, REST can become a passing, yet aching thought, while respite for one’s body and spirit boldly become a luxury. Subsequently, if some type…
By Lorie Conway I had walked labyrinths for years, drawn by their quiet invitation to move my body, slow down, and listen more deeply. Wanting to learn more about this ancient practice, I signed up for a training program on facilitating labyrinth walks. Photographer, artist, author, retreat leader, and soul care guide Catherine Anderson was my trainer that weekend. While I was just expecting a little history and some tips for walking the labyrinth with a group, Catherine and Spirit…
By Leah Rampy We watch as she dons her shades-of-blue jacket, tucks her long black hair under her helmet, and hoists her gleaming red kayak off the top of her vehicle. I am impressed with the determination with which this young woman approaches the roiling river. Even though I am merely a spectator, the river’s intensity takes my breath away. Caught within high cliffs and giant boulders, the river rushes down from the towering Andes as boiling rapids, powerful currents,…
Easter is the heart of our faith, a powerful reminder that love conquers death and hope is alive in Jesus Christ. Through His sacrifice on the cross, we are shown a love that knows no limits, and through His resurrection, we are given the promise of new life. On the cross, Jesus gave everything. He entered fully into human suffering—pain, betrayal, abandonment, and even death itself. Not because He had to, but because He chose to. He chose love. In…
By Pastor Terrye Moore Reflecting on the early days after losing my husband, I can still hear the therapist’s words so clearly: “So, what does your new normal look like?” Her question felt like a verbal assault on my already fragile psyche. I remember thinking, Lady, I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t plan for this—even though I repeated the words “’til death do us part” at the altar. In losing my husband, I came to understand the depth of emotion…
Dear Friends, and Members of the Bon Secours Family, We, Sisters of Bon Secours in the United States feel impelled to speak out about the events happening in our own country. Our social structures and mores are breaking down, and human dignity is being assaulted on multiple fronts. Regardless of our political persuasions, we are all people of faith, called to love, forgive, and live as women and men of peace. We want to share a part of our Chapter…
By Fr. Phil Cover & Sr. Carole Rybicki Following Jesus from the Upper Room to the Empty Tomb The question “Were you there?” generally connotes an experience of the past. However, during the 2026 Triduum Retreat, the question is addressed timelessly to our hearts. Through reflective presentations, We Will Be There with Jesus as his friends and followers who feel the depths of loss, remorse, abandonment, pain, and anguish. We accompany him on his journey from the Upper Room, through…
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…
