Here I Am

(This retreat will be recorded and a playback link shared for later access by retreatants.)

To be contemplative is not to be relieved of our humanity. We are instead called to integrate our humanity with the divine potentialities that contemplation awakens within us. This integration yields mêtis, the term that Cynthia Bourgeault uses to describe the capacity to take skilful action in the moment.

Want an example of mêtis? Think Solomon and the baby. Think Judith and Holofernes. Think Jesus and the temple tax. Think Mary and the Archangel Gabriel! In each of these situations, the central actor needed to let go of their fear, go beyond the analytical mind to the wisdom of the heart, and to be ready and willing to step into the well-timed, skillful response which the Holy invites.

Advent is the season for active waiting, the season to wake up and pay attention to what is and what is coming. In this Advent retreat, we’ll consider mêtis as a practice modeled on the deep attentiveness, bold questioning, and clear assent of Mary. We’ll renew our commitment to those contemplative practices that would hone our readiness to be available for skillful action. We’ll consider the time-honored virtues of chastity, poverty, and obedience, and how they ready the body, the mind and the heart for mêtis. We’ll learn about the ways that other worldviews define and support the practice of mêtis, and how to use these resources. We’ll consider mêtis as a communal capacity. And inevitably, we will talk about what happens when we fail, and how humility and persistence make mêtis an ongoing practice rather than an isolated event.

Your retreat teachers/facilitators:

Therese DesCamp is a writer, spiritual director, and minister living in New Denver, B.C., Canada. Her most recent book is Hands Like Roots: Notes from an Entangled Contemplative Life. Lorie Martin is the vicar at St. Thomas Anglican Church in Chilliwack, B.C., Canada, the director of the inter-parish The Centre for Spiritual Renewal, and a contemplative retreat leader. Milla McLachlan is a coach, facilitator and poet who lives in Portland, Oregon, USA. Each also serves as a The Contemplative Society board member.

Accesible registration fee:

$45 or pay-from-the-heart.