Reflections on a Retreat

Have you ever been on a retreat? Maybe it has been awhile since you have made a retreat.

From the first moments of this retreat, I knew it was going to be special. Maybe it was the beauty of the new fallen snow or the welcoming nature of the King’s House staff or maybe it was just my need to be on retreat.

I’ve been making the “silent” retreats at King’s House for 13 years now and I always feel renewed, refreshed and rejuvenated when I complete the retreats. I like that our men’s retreat is in the middle of winter because it is at this time when the earth is dormant that my spirit seems to need a jumpstart or a reawakening.

A quick word about “Silent” retreats - the entire retreat is not silent, but there is a good amount of time each day that allows for quiet solitude to contemplate, be at one with your thoughts and communicate with God.

Anyway, this retreat started off special with the opening challenge by Father David Kraus to reflect on “our God.” “What is God to you?” Father David and co-presenter Geri Boyer asked each of us for our descriptions of God. “All knowing”, “Compassionate”, “Forgiving”, “Unconditional love”, “Listening”, “Caring”, and on and on went the responses. God was something different for each of us on retreat. We were challenged to reflect even more on how we experience God in our lives.

David talked about how we try to take care of ourselves externally in order to live a long life – diet, physical exercise, mental exercises, socialization and medical sensibility – I believe is how he put it from an article he was reading. But then he added the most important part (though not in the article) – the internal or spiritual exercise – and that’s how we got to the reflections on what God means to us. What does God mean to you? How do you see God?

As the retreat continued we were asked to focus inward, looking for our essence…our true purpose. What are the qualities God has given me and how am I using them? I find this exercise very difficult because I believe that one of the hardest things for people to do is to evaluate or really look closer at our true selves. Part of the reason for that is that we are not really trained to do so and we may be afraid of what we may find out about ourselves when we do.

Do we really know who we are? What makes us tick? Father David talked about parishes like ours with Eucharistic Adoration and how that one hour of time in the presence of God is so important for many people, but he challenged us to recognize the special presence of God within us (and others) all day long. We need to learn to see with our heart and understand that we create our lives with our thoughts. We become what we think about.

This presentation made me think about who we talk to the most…ourselves. What type of self-talk do you have? Is it negative? Do you beat yourself up mentally? Or is it positive? Your life is in your hands. Your thoughts can add powerfully to the creation of the world. Your awareness of self will open the door to understanding and may help you to change the way you look at yourself. Don’t let the material world influence you, but make your decisions based on doing the will of God.

To me a retreat can be extremely challenging. That may be why more men and women stay at home. They may be afraid to face the challenges. One of the biggest challenges at the retreat is looking inward at yourself and forcing yourself to respond to the big questions:

• What qualities God has given me and how am I using them?

• How am I life giving to others?

• What is the loving or caring thing to say or do?

• What does God want of me?

• Am I my brother’s keeper?

Will my reflections on a retreat be the same as yours? Not likely. But I would challenge you to go on a retreat and find out for yourself. Give it a try. My guess is that you will grow in your faith. If you receive no other benefit, your retreat experience will have been worthwhile.     

Bob Vance - January, 2010