Do you know about Kirkridge Retreat and Study Center?

With a long, storied activist history (Dan and Phillip Berrigan had a favorite room and frequently led retreats and organized actions there) and an 80-year history of supporting LGBTQI Christians, it’s the kind of place radical disciples should know about. We have a number of retreats coming up that your communities might be interested in attending:

Birthing and Earthing Love: A Lenten Journey with the Gospel of John with Sue Ferguson Johnson & Wes Howard-Brook
Tuesday, February 20 – Thursday, February 22
In this Lenten retreat rooted in the gospel of John, we’ll hear the gospel call to be born anew as “inspired earth” with our identities rooted in God rather than…something else. Join us as we remember what it means when “Love becomes flesh.”

Òrìshà: The Gift of Failure, the Promise of the Monstrous with Báyò Akómoláfé

Friday, March 8 – Sunday, March 10

Drawing on Yoruba indigenous insights, Dr. Báyò Akómoláfé imagines emancipation through the topography of failure. By treating failure, disability, and the destabilizing syncopations visited upon white stability as a form of generative incapacitation, Dr. Akómoláfé invites us to convene at the sites of our greatest vulnerabilities – for it is there that we might take on new shapes. 

Recovery from the Dominant Culture? with Lynice Pinkard and Nichola Torbett 

Friday, March 15 – Sunday, March 17

So many of us are suffering from anxiety, depression, overwhelm, PTSD, addictions, and various other kinds of dis-ease in these times. While conventional 12-step recovery programs and mental health models identify these as personal or at most familial struggles, we are living within a larger context of oppression, extraction, and violence that clearly impacts our so-called personal lives. Let’s come together to put a larger frame around our struggles and imagine what recovery might look like in this context.

For BIPOC LGBTQ+ Women: Healing the Heart through Writing with Juanita Kirton
Dates: Friday, March 22-Sunday, March 24, 2024
Open to LGBTQ+ Black, Indigenous, and Women of Color writers of all levels of experience, this non-clinical workshop uses writing and art as tools to explore trauma in a safe space. Space is limited.

Integration and Disintegration: Shaping Change with Marcia Lee and en sawyer

Friday, April 5 – Sunday, April 7

Explore the edges of integration and disintegration in your own life and in our social context through embodied movement, mushroom cultivation, and space to pause and reflect.

Allies in Recovery: For Sexual Abuse Survivors and Their Partners with Mike Lew and Thom Harrigan

Friday, April 12 – Sunday, April 14

Recovery from sexual abuse has profound effects on relationships for both survivors and their partners. This workshop will offer time for couples to work together and individually toward healing in a safe and supportive environment. Couples of all sexual orientations are welcome.

Humility and Dignity: White People Unlearning White Supremacy with Nichola Torbett

Friday, April 19 – Sunday, April 21

Join other like-minded white people who long for an end to white supremacy as we practice showing up with both humility and full dignity. We’ll explore embodied practices, ancestral lineage healing, and spiritual tools that will help you work effectively in multiracial coalition toward a world of equitable, collective flourishing.

Foraging and Macrobiotic Food Ways with Stephen Hoog

Friday, April 19 – Sunday, April 21

Cosponsored with Sync Recovery Foundation, this retreat will have us out walking the trails looking for edible plants; in the kitchen preparing delicious meals; and learning how to incorporate healthy local food into our diets.

All My Eyes See: Living Theology in Images and Icons with Bill McNichols and Bill Wylie-Kellerman
Friday, April 26 – Sunday, April 28

In this contemplative retreat, Catholic priest and iconographer Bill McNichols will invite us into our own practice and process of prayer, using both classic saints and more contemporary figures.

The Gospel of Peace: Reading Matthew, Mark and Luke from the Perspective of Nonviolence with John Dear
Friday, May 3 – Sunday, May 5
Longtime activist, author, and Nobel peace prize nominee, Rev. John Dear, will walk us through the Synoptic Gospels pointing out Jesus’ practice and teachings of nonviolence and invite us to become practitioners of creative nonviolence, based on his new commentary, The Gospel of Peace.

Re-Connecting Soil and Soul: Exploring Your Inner Self and the Outer World with Dianne Baker and Megan LeBoutillier
Friday, May 10 – Sunday, May 12
Using the principles and practice of Circle of Trust®, we will explore the question: “How does one participate intimately in a given landscape?” Participants will have time for quiet self-reflection, sharing in community, experiencing Clearness Committee, and time upon the land.

The Just Kitchen: Connecting with God, Neighbor, and Self Through Food with Derrick Weston

Wednesday, May 22 – Friday, May 24

The ways we grow, source, buy, prepare, serve, and eat food all have the potential to build community or break it down. This retreat will explore the ways that food invites us to consider our relationships.

Singing Creation: Exploring your Full Voice through Song, Art-play, and Care for the Earth with Dianne Baker & Barbara McAfee
Dates:  Friday, May 24 –  Monday, May 27
What would it be like to open your voice from the soles of your feet and the seat of your soul? What gifts does your voice hold for you and for the world? Through vocal play, silence, oral tradition, community singing, movement, art-making, and reflection, participants will explore the wild and wide nature of our voices and the things that impede us from using our full voice in the world.

Putting Money in Its Place with Andy Loving, Susan Taylor, and Mike Little
Friday, May 31 – Sunday, June 2

Money is a failed god, and the evidence is all around us. In this brief retreat, we will look within ourselves by better understanding our messy, conflicted feelings about money. Then we can bring that understanding to our immediate spheres of influence by daily engaging in the economy in ways that help repair relationships, build community, narrow the wealth gap, and move toward environmental sustainability.

Return to the Earth: A Contemplative Clay Experience with Marjory Zoet Bankson

Tuesday, June 4 – Thursday June 6

In our time, as people move away from embalming toward more natural practices around death, there is new interest in making biodegradable urns by hand. This mid-week workshop will offer you a contemplative experience of making an unfired burial urn or simply using clay as a meditative practice. No special tools or prior experience are needed.

Gay Magic: Writing Down Our Queer and Trans Lives with Jacks McNamara

Friday, June 7 – Sunday, June 9

In this workshop we will read and write all the brilliance and beauty of what we have survived and what we are building, making space for the fierce, radiant, sexy, disastrous, sacred and profane facets of our truths as queer and gender-fabulous folks navigating a mad mad world. No matter your writing experience, let this retreat be your permission to play, work, and risk.