Observations While Working at a Retreat Center

I am in the room during a prayer service, looking in on community and devotion through the sacristy’s stained glass window.

The priest just walked in. It feels intimate sitting here while he dons his alb and prepares his notes.

This retreat group is from St. Monica, a local Chinese parish. They are speaking Mandarin, I think, and it seems a sort of privacy from me. That makes me glad for them. I enjoy wonder and curiosity as I witness a precious moment without any clues as to its nature.

. . .

It has warmed my heart to see how at home these retreatants have made themselves this past week. Often overnight retreatants appear timid — their eyes and shoulders suggesting fear of being resented — as though their presence is a nuisance. The spirit and body cannot heal or expand when restricted or ashamed. Life wants to move life water and air, to root and take up space like trees in the earth, and to be seen like fire’s bright light. Shrinking ourselves away puts our life out of sorts. These retreatants stand firmly wherever they are. Fully and gently — not imposing, but not hiding.

We often perform shame to gain permission to occupy space, as though we are too burdensome unless we are apologetic. St. Monica’s group has shown me what it looks like to truly be present where you are. As they walk the grounds, as they pray in the chapel, as we cross paths at mealtimes or in-transit, they always smile back at me warmly without a hint of concern that they are in the way. I see them soaking up their weeklong experience with a fullness that I don’t usually see, and it is gorgeous.

How can we be grateful when we believe we are unwanted? How can we process, heal, enjoy, and expand while walking on eggshells? Shame keeps us anxiously preoccupied so much that we do not have enough attention left to appreciate, to experience, or to notice our belonging. The worries that tell us to shrink also crowd out beauty, growth, and connection.

. . .

The group’s service is now drawing to a close on this final day of their retreat. I wonder what each person holds in their heart as this special time winds down. Whatever mysteries are taking root within the people here, I trust that their deep presence — their unashamed Fully Here presence — has made room within and between them for these mysteries to unfold.

. . .

Maybe we can learn something from these retreatants. Maybe we can pause here and there to notice our bodies — whether we are holding tension, shrinking — and our minds — whether we’re ruminating in what others think or paying attention to our own experience, to the gifts around us.

I want each of us to settle into each moment and to know that it is very good that we are here — that we are at all — and to encounter the movement, spaciousness, gifts, and peace that come with unapologetically embracing our own presence. Let’s release the eggshells. Let’s release the fearful narrative that we are in the way, a burden, resented. Let’s really Be Here. It’s a beautiful thing.

. . .

Laughter is erupting from St. Monica’s retreat group. I can’t help but smile too. This gift is awaiting us, as well. I’m ready to receive it. Are you?