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To Pray and Live into Our Current Times: A One Day Retreat
March 14 @ 9:30 am - 4:00 pm
Judith Valente will lead us into ways in which we can practice “Esteem the Silence,” and “Maintain a Contemplative Calm in a Chaotic World,” the two themes of her presentation. Based on her decades’ long engagement with writings of Thomas Merton and her immersion into monastic life as a laywoman as well as her broad experience of the slower lifestyle in Italy, she will invite us into contemplative joy and peace even in these tumultuous times.
As Judy has pointed out in one of her books, a monastery can be more than a physical structure, it is a state of mind. A state of mind propelled by the timeless monastic values of listening, community, hospitality, simplicity, work, prayer, praise — and silence. Of all of those values, silence might be the hardest to come by in our modern industrial, technological world.
We can enter sacred places of silence wherever we are and bring ourselves to know God in a way that affects all of our relationships. Many mystics and contemplative teachers have gone before us and invite us to seek stillness and calm even in times of tumult.
Please join us for a beautiful day of community prayer and sharing. We will share in communal silence of centering prayer as well as a delightful presentation by Judy.
March 14th, 9:30 AM – 4 PM CST
Registration fee: $25
Lunch will be served.
Lunch will be served.
Location: Dominican University
7900 Division St, River Forest, IL 60305
7900 Division St, River Forest, IL 60305
Registration for Dominican University staff and faculty: To Pray and Live into Our Current Times | Dominican University
Judith Valente is the author of six spirituality titles, most of them about how to live a more contemplative life in the secular world. Those books include “The Art of Pausing;” “How to Live: What the Rule of St. Benedict Teaches Us About Happiness Meaning and Community;” “How to Be;” and most recently, “The Italian Soul: How to Savor the Full Joys of Life.” She is a former staff writer for The Wall Street Journal and covered faith and values for national PBS-TV and Chicago Public Radio for many years. She was twice a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in journalism, is the author of three collections of poetry, and is president emeritus of the International Thomas Merton Society.
