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’.
When this is over, may we never again take for granted; A handshake with a stranger, Full shelves at the store, Conversations with neighbors, A crowded theater, Friday night out, The taste of communion, A routine checkup, The school rush each morning, Coffee with a friend, The stadium roaring, Each deep breath! A boring Tuesday. Life itself. When this ends, may we find that we have become more like the people we wanted to be, we were called to be,…
Today’s post is a helpful reflection, exercise and meditation from retreat presenters Susan Boruff and Kathy Anderson. They will be at our Center June 17-21 to present, “Healing Our World One Person at a Time: Discovering How God’s Love Transforms Ourselves, Our Families, Our Communities and Our World”. To learn more about the retreat and these presenters, please click here. Emotional Rescue I’ll come to you, so silent in the night So stealthy, so animal quiet I'll be your savior,…
Fr. Michael Schleupner came across this special prayer and shares it with us today. It is certainly something that will resonate with many of us. We look forward to welcoming Fr. Michael back to the Center for our August Directed Retreat late this summer. Let's take a quiet moment now to pray together... Prayer for a Pandemic “May we who are merely inconvenienced Remember those whose lives are at stake. May we who have no risk factors Remember those most…
We are thrilled to be able to host author Mary DeTurris Poust at our Center for a special weekend retreat next summer! (The retreat will be posted on our website soon.) A gifted writer, Mary offers eloquent spiritual inspiration and shares her recent blog post with us today. To learn more about her and read other posts on her blog, click here. Pausing Fear, Choosing Joy The past month has been a dance of gratitude and fear. Gratitude that, so…
Linda Mastro provided another insightful reflection for our blog today. She is a retreat presenter at our Center and will be guiding, “Seeing with the Eyes of the Heart”, a women’s retreat next January. Click here to read more about the retreat. Thank you, Linda! When I Get to Heaven I have many spiritual teachers and guides. Henri Nouwen, Richard Rohr, Cynthia Bourgeault, Joyce Rupp, and Thomas Keating top the list. I recently added John Prine, the folk song writer…
Fr. Michael Schleupner is a presenter at our Center and will be with us this summer for our August Directed Retreat. You can click here to learn more. He shares spiritual insights through weekly eNewsletters and graciously shares those with our audience too. Here, he reflects about recent thoughts from Pope Francis and how we can use lessons from scripture to recognize community members during the pandemic. Living Through This These were from an address which the Holy Father directed…
Today's post is another great reflection and meditation from retreat presenters Susan Boruff and Kathy Anderson. They will be at our Center June 17-21 to present, “Healing Our World One Person at a Time: Discovering How God’s Love Transforms Ourselves, Our Families, Our Communities and Our World”. To learn more about the retreat and these presenters, please click here. Let’s read Susan’s perspective on how the pandemic aligns with the classic movie, "Groundhog Day". Don't miss the meditation at the…
Mickey Reed provides today's inspiring reflection. She is a trained facilitator of Joyce Rupp’s Boundless Compassion program and will be presenting a Boundless Compassion retreat at our Center this fall. You can click here to read more about it and to learn about Mickey too. Hand Washing Blessings Scrolling through my Facebook feed, I was struck by both the beautiful harmony and the bittersweet humor of four Episcopalian acolytes singing the traditional Anglican doxology as they timed their carefully choreographed…
Fr. Phil Cover is a longtime friend of Bon Secours and has presented many retreats, as well as facilitated many group conferences at the Center. Fr. Phil will be with us this summer for a directed retreat and we look forward to seeing him then! Let's take a quiet moment to reflect on Fr. Phil's point of view during the pandemic... Being Moved Beyond Where We Are The Coronavirus pandemic has in many respects turned our world upside down and…
In addition to presenting many creative contemplative retreats at our Center, Debra Donnelly-Barton is the Executive Director of the Center for Spiritual Development and she is also a Spiritual Director. Debra shared the reflection below from the blog on her site. You can click here to explore her website too. Peace Be with You When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked…
