Retreats

Registration is now open. The registration form can be completed online.

February 21 – 24, 2024 (February 21st – 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm; 22nd – 23rd – 8:30 am – 4:00 pm; 24th – 8:30 am – 3:00 pm)

September 25 – 28, 2024 (September 25th – 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm; 26th – 27th – 8:30 am – 4:00 pm; 28th – 8:30 am – 3:00 pm)

We are happy to invite you to learn and practice a way to sustain your awareness of God’s grace in ordinary life.

This commitment would be a most worthwhile experience if you have an interest in ongoing spiritual formation. Also, please help us spread the word to friends who you know have an active life of prayer and desire to continue learning on their journey of faith.

The purpose of the retreat days is to break open the content of sustained Lectio Divina in light of our personal experience and to invite the participants to an awareness of this teaching on prayer. The staff is made up of Diocesan priests, Benedictines and laity who practice this way of prayer in their own lives. There is no commitment to a continuing group experience as this teaching is to enrich your personal prayer practice. All retreats and the Benedictine Oblates of St. Joseph Monastery are open to Christians of all denominations.

You may have heard or read material on the practice of lectio. It abounds in books and articles. The monastic teaching is of “sustained” lectio. It encompasses not a prayer method with the scriptures as much as an understanding of following our desire to know God through the grace of the Holy Spirit and to discern our life choices/daily actions and attitudes from that relationship of grace. It is a relationship that is always ongoing and life giving as we focus on the grace of God through a revelatory text. St. Benedict reminds us—“we are always beginners in the spiritual life.”

The retreat includes: an introduction to the context of the teaching from the early Christian teachers; an invitation of prayer to the Holy Spirit; an understanding of the obstacles to prayer that arise from within and from outside of us; teachings on the revelatory texts that lead us in our desire to know God more intimately; introduction to a variety of prayer tools; the practice of discernment and the spiritual gifts that accompany this way of prayer.

Part of the inspiration and training for the retreats comes from the writings of Sister Meg Funk, OSB. Sister Meg has written several books about the Christian contemplative tradition, including: Thoughts Matter, Tools Matter, Humility Matters, Lectio Matters: Before the Burning Bush, and Discernment Matters. We recommend reading Lectio Matters ahead of the retreat.

You are welcome to contact us for further information: lectio@stjosephmonastery.org.