Retreat — March 2011 —No. 1

     My spiritual director suggested last summer that I should go on another 8-day directed retreat similar to the one I had made in December, 2009. Hoping for nicer weather, I signed up for one from March 23-31, 2011. Being closer in time to it, I can probably provide a bit more detail about what it was like than I did with the first one.

     I went to the same retreat house, but had a different director. I posted some photos from the earlier retreat here. This time my room wasn't in the dormitory wing, but in the main house, in a wing which does not show in any of the pictures, but it was about as spartan as the one in the dormitory wing from 2009. My daily routine was similar to what I described under that heading in this post about 2009. In other words, retire around 11:00, rise between 6:00 and 6:30, breakfast at 7:00, meet with director at 10:30, lunch at noon, Mass at 5:00, dinner at 6:00.

     As was the case in 2009, the retreatants and directors gathered in the "Fireplace Room" after dinner for introductions and orientation. The one who was in charge explained the daily routine. One thing she said was that the first part of daily Mass (liturgy of the Word) would be in that room, then we would go to the central foyer for the liturgy of the Eucharist, and after Communion we would come back to our own seats in the fireplace room for the conclusion of the Mass. Afterwards, when the other directors were introducing themselves, one of them, Fr. Paul Sullivan, S.J. said that the remark about returning to our own seats reminded him of an incident when he was a young priest serving at Cheverus High School in Portland, Maine. One morning at breakfast, one of the priests got up to make himself some toast, leaving his unfinished breakfast behind. An old Jesuit arrived, saw the food on the table, sat down, ate it, got up, and went out of the room. Then the priest whose meal it was returned with his toast, saw the empty dishes, and said, "What the hell!??"

     Each director was assigned four or five retreatants; my director had four of us. We happened to have the same meeting room as I had had the previous time, and again I happened to have 10:30 as my time to meet with him. He gave us all a sheet listing some scripture passages, and said each of us should chose one and focus on it in our prayer between than and our first meeting with him the next day. We should think about two questions: "What happened in prayer (2 or 3 lines)," and"How do I feel about it?" He told us to pay attention to our feelings and desires.