Home again . . .

Back home again after a really good weekend retreat.

We had all the essential ingredients for a successful retreat as far as our Team is concerned:

A very comfortable retreat centre run by excellent staff who couldn't do enough for us;

Delicious food and plenty of it -

important so that we can concentrate on the 'higher things of life' :-) ;

Some spiritual 'input' from a chaplain;

Plenty of time for personal prayer and reflection plus time together as a couple;

Mass each day and Prayer of the Church as a group;

The opportunity for Confession;

Some time to socialise as a group;

Time for a walk and reasonable weather plus good walks nearby;

This year's retreat was at a very relaxed pace which was good for everyone as we all needed time to wind down, some of us more than others.

As Saturday was the Feast of St Benedict we decided to take this as our theme for the retreat and Fr Richard Lear, chaplain at The Emmaus Centre, gave us a very interesting talk on Benedictine Spirituality including recommending some further reading. We had also all taken along a copy of Abbot Christopher Jamison's latest book, Finding Happiness' for our own personal reading and group discussion.

The centre has a well-stocked library and also some books for sale so there was no shortage of reading matter.

We were lucky with the weather too and most of us managed to have a good walk on Saturday morning after Mass.

Home again after lunch today to pick up the threads of life at home, with work and families, but definitely refreshed to tackle everything with new vigour . . . and we have already begun thinking about next year's retreat.