The WCCM International School Retreat 2017, led by Laurence Freeman OSB will be held in Fara Sabina, Italy (1 – 8 October 2017) at the Poor Clare convent about an hour from Rome. A ‘School Retreat’ is a more intensive retreat and provides a rare opportunity to benefit from the sustained silence and stillness of meditation over an extended period. It is the fifth stage of the WCM School of Meditation. Participants already have a regular meditation practice and are familiar with the Essential Teaching of the Community.
A ‘School Retreat’ is an opportunity to grow in the silence and stillness of meditation over a week. Participants come to the whole week. They do not arrive late or leave early as this disrupts the group. It is a deep and transforming time with long-term benefits.
Each day there are seven sitting meditation sessions, without readings or music, with contemplative walking sessions between them. A short teaching in the morning and a contemplative Eucharist help the silence reach its full potential. Participants also have a daily fifteen minute one-to-one meeting with one of the retreat team. Insight into our relationship with Christ deepens and we see how this lived in commitment to the community.
This is a rare opportunity to go significantly deeper in the work of silence. It is not a time for study or extensive reading. Participants practice a ‘digital fast’ and do not use phones, emails or computers, so that we can be fully present and undistracted together. (There is an emergency number by which we can be contacted.)
To apply for one of the limited places please send some details about why you would like t o attend, together with some details about your involvement in WCCM to Jacqueline Russell.
