I’ve been hearing variations of the same conversation for years now. And It always starts the same way. Someone refers to facebook or a blog network or some other online social experience as a “community”. Immediately, someone from a church or a club or some other traditional social group becomes agitated and defensive for some reason. That person responds in a tone of righteous indignation.
“That’s not a community! You can’t have community unless you’re relating to people in person.”
If you’re lucky, that’s all you will hear. Occasionally though, this exchange will be followed by a lengthy diatribe on the nature of community, how essential it is to humanity, and how it definitely cannot happen online.
<Sigh>
I wish people would stop saying that. We who have found meaningful and even life-changing relationships online are only asking you to share the word “community.” Lots of words have shared meanings. I love my wife and I love cheeseburgers. The word love is flexible enough to hold both meanings. When we claim to have experienced online community, we aren’t claiming it is the same thing as more traditional communities. We’re only asking that you share your word so we can express something with it too.
And sharing is a good thing, right?
So now I’m going to ask you to share another word.
That word is “retreat.”
Many of us have been going to retreats all of our lives. I grew up in evangelical churches. Our retreats were high energy affairs with workshops and planned recreation and intense religious services, where we were encouraged to make life-changing decisions. You generally went home exhausted but also feeling a renewed spiritual commitment.
Some people take solitary retreats, getting away to spend time alone in prayer and meditation. I’ve done that once or twice and found it to be a powerful experience.
Lately I’ve been enjoying more contemplative, monasatic-type retreats with more silence and less action. We’ve been having these at our church for the last few years. These gentler retreats fit my personality better. Fortunately, the word retreat is flexible enough to hold many meanings.
A Big question: What would an online retreat look like?
It’s kind of hard to imagine, isn’t it? I mean, how would you have an online retreat? Apart from solitary retreats, most retreats include intense, intimate encounters with other people. Friendships are forged in retreat settings. Within hours you can feel like someone you just met is one of your best friends.
- Is such a thing possible in an online setting?
- How would it work?
- What kinds of technology would be involved?
I’m on a quest, and I need your help.
For the next couple of weeks, I’m searching for models of online retreats. Have you ever experienced an online retreat? Do you know of anyone who is using technology in creative ways to make that sort of thing possible?
Leave your suggestions, thoughts, and links in the comments. I’ll follow every lead. I’ll track down every resource.
I want to know if the word “retreat” is big enough and flexible enough to include something we might experience together online.
Gordon
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I like the idea of an online retreat quite a bit. I’m not sure exactly what one might look like, but two resources came to mind as I read. The first is The Idea Camp, which was (is still?) a free, open-source, in person and online conference that I attended last year. Some of what was happening was in person – speakers and idea generating sessions and workshops. All of that was broadcast live via internet, and people who were tuning in from home were able to watch and to interact through a chat room and through Twitter. Someone on site made sure that the online participants questions and comments were added to the conversation. http://theideacamp.ning.com/page/about-1
There is also the online candle lighting at gratefulness.org. One can light a random candle anytime, but there is also a page where webmasters can set up a group of candles for people from their site to light, and can personalize an entrance page for that group. http://www.gratefulness.org/candles/custom.cfm?l=eng
I’ll be interested to hear others’ ideas. I know that I’ve seen a site offering this recently, but it doesn’t come to mind right now. I also have wondered if I could successfully “retreat” online. For me, being online is such an active thing, that in someways it doesn’t feel like the kind of quiet, contemplative activity that I generally seek when on retreat. However, I’m definitely open to learning more.
Well, I’m ok with using the word community for online activities only inasmuch as it does not eliminate or minimize embodied interaction – such as those who *only* attend church online, or those (like a friend) who drop out of grad school because of a World of Warcraft addiction (sheesh…).
There have been churches that have used technology to do “virtual church.” Lifechurch.tv has even (ahem) “planted” a church in the game Second Life. Beyond this, there are a host of communication technologies wherein to do video conference calls (Skype being the most popular tool in this arsenal), or even set up private, invitation-only Facebook groups.
You may have noticed that I sound slightly skeptical (Yes, I’m one of those diatribe people you mentioned). I don’t doubt that it will work and be in some sense fruitful. And, in today’s technology-driven culture, it will almost certainly reach people. Rather than feel like I’m critiquing you, I’d like to hear more about the goals of such a project.
Chris,
Man, I’m with you. I’m not a person who thinks online should take the place of real life. For example, I don’t like the idea of online church. Never have. But if I heard that someone was having a spiritual experience inside of a Second Life Church (and there are a number of them), would I be able to say, “Who is not against us is for us” in this?
What I’m asking here is purely exploratory. I’m wondering what is out there. I’m wondering if there are some online tools that might allow a group of people who are separated by great distances to experience some part of retreat. Maybe not as nice as being in person, but perhaps something.
I’m completely honest in this: I’m curious. I’m not advocating or denying. I’m exploring.
I’ve done a couple online seminars that because of the charisma of the leader and students involved felt much like a retreat… those were both connected by phone and internet… skyping is a great idea, however would leave parents like me who won’t open the door of an active web cam in the house with a teen age daughter. The internet is enough to try to control…
so looks like real time connection,
quality resource material
like minded people
and charismatic leader?
I’m interested in this, if you wouldn’t mind keeping me informed. : )
I’m with you. I don’t think online communities should or could replace face-to-face but they can certainly enhance physical communities and lives. As for an online retreat, that’s an interesting but really tough question. I honestly can’t quite envision it for the reasons you mention above (my experiences of a what a retreat means cloud it). I’ll keep thinking and if I come up with something I’ll be back.
Well, part of on-line retreat might actually include off-line activity. Like an agreement to “fast” from technology throughout one particular day and then a “meeting” in the evening.
Sometimes when I’ve gone on retreat it has worked this way– silent, sometimes guided by a question or theme–time alone and then coming back together to share.
One of the biggest issues with on-line life is our difficulty disconnecting. I think that’s partly because we’re not sure when we’ll get to reconnect if we step out. I can say that on @tspoetry party days I actually am able to disconnect more easily for the day, knowing I will definitely be reconnecting in the evening (see http://tweetspeakpoetry.com/blog for explanation of the how the evening parties work).
Okay, that’s my first thought.
Gordon, I have no idea what it would look like. I wish I did. I’m just not imaginative enough, and brainstorm badly. But, that said, please follow the leads. I’d love to see what would come of such a thing.
I look forward to hearing more.
I like the idea of an online retreat, but I don’t know if I could manage it.
A retreat (for me…) should be a movement away from the distractions of daily life — and I’m sitting in front of the biggest distraction there is.
I can imagine commiting to stay away from all my other internet hangouts – maybe the organizers could arrange temporary email accounts – or a temporary forum? – that would persist only for the duration of the retreat.
Hmmm… I really would like to try this.
On-line retreats could also be followed up with in-person retreats later in a year (and announced ahead of time so people could plan well in advance), extending what was begun on-line. Not everyone would want to or be able to attend, and those who couldn’t might be allowed to “listen in” through live-streaming.
A little off-topic (maybe) to start, but I don’t think the technology is the hard thing. The first things that leap to mind for me are more personal or management related.
One difficulty for an online retreat is that the person attending the retreat hasn’t left his/her natural setting. I’ve attended a number of online conferences and while I can find them very valuable and engaging, it can be terribly difficult to not let normal life get in the way. Office or home, someone or something is always beckoning.
Managing together time and alone time for achieving the retreat’s purposes will need some forethought as well. (And probably clearly articulated)
Leaders of the together times, or small group times, in the retreat will need to be comfortable with the technology and be good at eliciting or teasing out responses in discussion/sharing times (especially if people don’t know each other beforehand) and in not getting nerve wracked when things get quiet (because people are processing their thoughts).
That said, for pre-produced presentation of retreat materials, you can use:
- slideshare.net to post PowerPoint/slides how type presentations, and sync audio podcasts to the slides.
- YouTube to host videos.
- Audacity (audacity.sourceforge.net) is free audio recording software that can be used to record audio. It still has to be hosted online somewhere for download. Or use GarageBand on a Mac.
- A wiki (mediawiki.org or pbworks.com) (or Google Docs or Zoho.com) for online documents.
For managing and organization (as well as document hosting), I’d suggest a wiki.
For collaboration:
- again with the wiki – for text based collaboration, over a period of time, you could use a wiki.
- if retreat attendees were to work synchronously in groups of 3 (small group/breakout work), Elluminate has a three-for-free deal where groups of 3 people can use Elluminate for free and work together in a collaborative space that allows for webcams, audio, chatroom, and whiteboard space. It is a very nice deal.
- Skype, as mentioned above.
For a large group meeting with a main presenter, you might try Ustream.tv. You’re broadcasting video and audio and people can discuss/respond through chat.
The Buddhists over at Tricycle (tricycle.com) have online retreats – they have print or video presentations by a teacher or teachers, and opportunities to ask questions – I don’t know what else; haven’t participated.
Long ago, before the Web, in the beginning of the Internet, I was in an online email group that was more of a community and a church to me than my physical church. We discussed philosophy, theology, and real life. What does a community consist of other than words of one sort or another? Sharing food and physical help with new babies, during sickness, death, and other troubles, perhaps, but even much of the value of those is the thoughtful, not the physical, presence.
It seems to me that a retreat is a withdrawal from everyday activities to concentrate on the spiritual. While a special place might make this easier, it seems to me a commitment to concentrate and an arrangement with whoever you share your home with should make doing this at home possible – just as some of us have home altars for worship or special spaces for meditation. An additional element of many retreats is guidance or lessons from a spiritual leader, and that could certainly be online, in print, audio, or video – and questions or discussion the same way. Email, online chat, phone (Skype would enable free audio or video discussions) are all slightly different from each other, and from face-to-face, but all enable real discussion.
I think worship and community can both be achieved online – the key is enabling people to participate and to be aware of others – a podcast or video of a worship service or a lesson is not the same.
My wife already thinks I do too much “retreating” online.
What’s been occupying my thoughts is the idea of a retreat — but perhaps more of the monastic kind. I’m not sure what that might look like; possibly some place to just get away and think, with a few people to talk with informally but more deeply than a 140-character exchange on Twitter, and some time to write. I’ve been reading Scott Cairns’ “Short Trip to the Edge” and finding myself incredibly jealous of the time he spends on Mt. Athos.
LL, I was also thinking that an online retreat would likely have some offline activities or activities that are done alone but online. Picture the following:
1. A person signs up for a retreat. They are given a user name and password to a private site.
2. When they go the first time, they fill out some information, upload a pic, etc. There is an activity which could involve watching a video or looking at a work of art or reading something. The person does this alone and is free to leave written or even a video comment. The next person who comes sees the same stuff but also the feedback left from the first person.
3. When everyone has interacted in this way, prayerfully engaging the site and – if they desire – engaging others in comments, a second exercise is made available.
Maybe everyone doing the retreat makes an agreement to do one exercise a day for a period of time. People are free to come back to the pages as many times as they like to see what others have left behind.
4. Afterward there is some kind of get together. Perhaps a video conference time to chat. Or maybe even an in person retreat at the end of a year.
If those involved really engaged the site and interacted with the limited tools available, imagine how wonderful it would be when they got together in person. In that scenario, we’d be using online tools to prepare ourselves deeply for a very engaging time at the retreat. With most retreats you have meet everyone and get to know them rather quickly. These people would have a shared history already.
Gordon,
What a fascinating question. I won’t touch the ‘whole essence of community’ discussion, but I thought I’d comment on the idea of online retreat perhaps from a diffrent perspective that one might not expect. I often consider my time spent online as a retreat, particularly the blogs of a few of our high calling bloggers like Ann Voskamp, L.L.’s “Love Notes to Yawheh” and the poetic Laura. I’ve often used the visual presentation coupled with their words to sort of ‘find the quiet’ in the midst of five kids’ chaotic noise.
What also comes to mind is that one artist here on HC (whose name escapes me at the moment) who posted her artistic meditations (and little else) during Easter/Lent and Advent last year. I would often purposely abstain from all other media (print or online) and use that few minutes clicking to her site as a retreat of sorts.
I don’t know if that is what you are looking for; these instances immeadiately came to mind when I read your post.
I do think it’s interesting to consider Chris’s question of “what are the goals”? I’m hearing Gordon say one goal is shared history. Most of us already have that here, big time. (Okay, move directly to scheduling in-person retreat!
Glynn is looking for solitude in nature. That’s not going to happen on-line. But it could be requested as part of a person’s participation.
So. What kinds of goals seem reasonable for an on-line retreat? What are the goals for an in-person retreat? Do the two converge? Diverge? Should they, and why?
The first thing that comes to mind for me, Gordon, is the day that the pirates took over your chatroom for prayer regarding Katrina and the disaster that hurricane left in its wake. There were two of us who took turns hanging out acting as facilitators and moderators, filling people in if they arrived not knowing what was happening, and keeping the discussion focused.
It was an exhausting day for me, since I was one of the mods, but it was also one of the best days in the life of your chatroom.
Spidey, there was also the day that my middle daughter had a terrible thing happen. I went to the rlp chatroom and was cared for by those present. Yeah. I’m seriously considering redoing the chatroom at rlp. I’m going to be doing a major renovation there soon and be back to blogging more. I’ll talk to you more about it later.
For those listening in, I used to have a chatroom at my blog. And there was a time when a group of regulars were in there all the time. These people became VERY close. Still are. But in time, the room kind of died. Sometimes things like this have a season when they work and then not so much. So just planning an online retreate might or might not work. Who knows how or why the Spirit moves?
Hey Gordon,
I really like this notion, and while I’m not sure if or how it would work – it feels to me like you’re on the right sort of track with your proposed private site and flow of interaction over several days.
One thing that I thought of was the opportunity to share, and how the courage to really open up can often only come after spending time together. I’m not sure how you recreate that online but one idea I had was to perhaps begin with people sharing their “retreat” places.
I have some places in the nearby mountains that to me are sacred places where I go, sit and meditate. Sharing those sorts of places with photos, or written descriptions or podcasts etc., could be a neat way to introduce the participants to each other and begin the process of connecting.
Another thought – Google Wave seems like a potentially good forum/easy to access platform for communal activities. Depending on how you used it of course. I think it could be especially good for a Quaker style meeting.
Quiet waiting, say something when moved…
As an Episcopalian I might be predisposed to like this kind of thing, but I kind of think of fixed-hour prayer in roughly the same way — the idea of having people all over the place praying/meditating/whatever-it-is-they-do at the same time, paired with a private community, gets pretty close to what I would call a retreat experience.
The retreats I’ve attended in real life, while including a lot of time to oneself, often have a directionality to them arranged by the organizers. One of the goals would definitely be a focus for the time spent in retreat. What about a retreat about, say, a particular spiritual discipline? Participants could share what they have learned while trying it, as well as having accountability.
The RevGalBlogPals have done a couple of “virtual” retreats, where the prompts are posted on the blog and then we all either comment or blog ourselves and link back. Look for Advent Virtual Retreats, which are the most memorable for me.
I really appreciate the thoughts and ideas. I’m gathering them all up in my mind. Sharing our places of retreat through uploaded photos, synchronized times of prayer – though not together everyone is together in some discipline, etc. Teri, I will take a look at the Virtual retreats.
And I’m going to spend some time searching the internet this week as well.
Perhaps we’ll have some more ideas in the comments.
THANKS!
You might check out Lynn Viehl’s Paperback Writer blog (pbwriter.blogspot.com). She has run an online writer’s workshop the last few years called “Left Behind and Loving It.” The archives are on her website… look under the Freebies section. She might have some other ideas, and is probably RLP friendly (though it appears at the moment she’s trying to stomp a manuscript deadline to death).
I’m not sure how they work, only that there were several blogs involved and all did special “activities” for the week of the workshop.
I really like the idea of using Google Wave for collaboration.
check out ustream as a video conference tool
No Longer Quivering is a website started by a woman who used to belong to one of those “patriarchy” churches — believing that women should obey their husbands in all things and bare as many children as possible and shouldn’t vote. Anyway, she had something she called a “blog carnival” the other week. Basically the idea was to invite a bunch of the commenters on her message boards to tell their own stories, and have enough pre-written essays that something new was going up every few hours. I have to say, it kept me glued to the computer screen. She did it partly as a fundraiser, but since she’s now a single mom with seven kids, I don’t think you can blame her for trying to use her successful blog to try to make ends meet.
In that case, the forums are a pretty tightly knit community already, especially since many of the women there have been in some way abused, and have mostly gone through the same wrenching spiritual experience. Since I lurk there sometimes, I already sort of knew the people who were writing these guest blog pieces, and appreciated the opportunity to get to know their stories better. I was pretty much glued to the site all day for a few days, reading the pieces as they went up in real time. It was a pretty intense “listening” experience.
Uh “bear children” not “bare children.” Wouldn’t want to give anyone the wrong impression…
I will follow along to see how this develops, Gordon. Thanks for doing this.
Hey Gordon,
I’ll echo the thought entender made up above. My first thought at hearing of the prospect of an online retreat was, “Finally! A potential use for Google Wave!”
I scored an invite to Wave a couple months ago, and it has sat stagnant the entire time because I’ve simply had no use for it. I don’t, frankly, even know what features it all has, nor the extent of its capabilites, but I do think it would be a good tool for this sort of endeavour.
I do know it can serve as a live chat room for all participants, in the same manner as your erstwhile RLP chat. You can also share multimedia through it — in real time. Imagine a long chat thread between multiple users, and then one user wants to bolster a claim or a sentiment by linking a YouTube video. That video can play directly in the chat window as soon as it is linked and it becomes part of the thread history, so users can go back and re-watch it in the same way they can scroll up and re-read previous comments.
Each collaborative thread (or Wave, as Google wants them to be known) is saved in the same way a standard email is saved. So chat threads are not lost, and can be kept open, re-opened, saved, and archived the same as emails.
Imagine spending several hours chatting in a Wave (posting videos or pictures as part of that thread), saving it, closing it, and then everybody coming back to it the next morning and picking up exactly where it left off. That’s sort of like a real, live retreat, only minus the real, live face time, right?
So there’s my food for thought on that. I have Google Wave, and I also have 25 “invites” to get others hooked up. If this is an option you’d like to explore, please consider all of those 25 invites as being currently reserved for members of a future retreat. I have nothing else to do with them, and would love to see them put to as good a use as I see this being. Potentially. Given the distance between me and San Antonio, it’s the only way I would really be able to participate in any sort of retreat with all y’all, and the prospect is certainly appealing to me!
Simon
I think people may be jumping to conclusions about how this would work due to their preconceived notions of what is a “retreat.” I suggest not even using that label, but instead, start with some goals for what you want to happen, for example is it a study on a particular topic? (Not all “retreats” have to be spiritual>)
Another thing to consider is how using online tools can enable you to do things that otherwise may be more difficult with tradtional “retreats.” For example, most retreats are bound by time. With online tools this can be done over longer periods of time, or even be ongoing.
What if the core of the event was online, augmented by meetups in communities throughout the country? (Eg. Many retreats have speakers and speakers can be broadcast on the Internet, meetups then could occur for deeper discussion amongst a smaller group)
Very nice thought here. Multiple in person sites.
My favorite part of a retreat is the accelerated relationship-building, partially because it is a weekend of not-normal life (no responsibilities, away from home, etc.). This tends to happen in small groups or groups of roommates. Online, perhaps there could be small groups interacting with the same few, and then getting together as a large group later on.
But how to do the part about getting away for not-normal life?
interesting that you first speak of community.
because for me, just communing or relating with people of like mind can be like a retreat to me.
i see community as communing and relationship as relating…the here and now of it.
it exist as it happens. if one is communing or relating, then they are in community or relationship. that is where it exists.
sometimes i have the tiny bit of understanding, that place of time-stand-still kind of awareness in my head space, that what i am doing is part of a bigger picture and takes place within life and relating with God and others in love…but, to think of that while i am actually doing those things is even better.
i wonder if retreat can also be that sad but hazy grin, i Love you God, breath that fills my chest and head hold it for a moment to let it out slowly, closed eye ball stretching, stare into the distance, kind of place in time.
retreat i suppose it can happen anywhere, as long as it happens in our heart and mind where the Spirit can speak to our spirit.
I think the discussion has been fair; I’m pleased how many have advocated some type of *non*-online component as a necessary measure. I think this is key. The technology exists to put this together, and in a few years who knows what it could look like, technologically speaking. I still think the key question is how to incorporate embodied community with disembodied community.
Monica, you asked, “But how to do the part about getting away for not-normal life?” I could envision shutting myself in my apartment for a weekend, just me and my computer interacting with others who also have set time aside to retreat. Since I already have an internet connection, there wouldn’t be anything to pay for unless there was some required reading that involved purchasing materials. With other retreats, one usual barrier for many people is finances.
A couple of things come to mind – they’re thoughts that aren’t very organized but I’ll just toss them out there and see if they make sense.
1) I think an online retreat is definitely possible. Or at least, an online mini-retreat. Like little bite-sized retreat moments that you can dip into anytime during your day. I don’t know, maybe that’s not what you’re talking about or looking for, but one of the things that’s great about the internet is the way you can pop in and out of it at any time. That characteristic is, in a way, the opposite of the way a retreat feels in person — but it would be very appealing to have a way to take a retreat moment online in the middle of the day.
2) There is a group on twitter who “worship” together on Sunday. The hashtag is #tworship. It is not intended to replace in-person worship. It runs all day Sunday from 9am Eastern to 9pm Pacific. There is a facilitator who tweets a call to worship and a closing, and in between people tweet prayers, readings, confessions, sign of the peace, reflections, etc. I find it a nice way to focus on a prayerful frame of mind, and feel support and the presence of the Spirit, throughout the day on Sunday: at 9:15 am as I’m preparing for Sunday school, after church when I’m tired and drained of energy, in the afternoon after resting while getting ready for evening activities, etc. Strangely, it can be hard to be mindful and prayerful on Sundays, with all the activities I’m rushing between and responsible for. I like tworship as a bite-sized way of reminding me to focus on God, and the Spirit’s presence in the community of believers, which is larger than those in your building.
3) I don’t know that the main focus has to be people interacting in real time. I think the idea of coming to something that is an ongoing stream of interaction is appealing. Of course, this could be paired with real-time interactions as well. You can set a time for people to be online together in a lot of different formats. I’m not very tech-oriented so I don’t know what all the options are. I’ve seen it happen on twitter, and there are chat rooms and other things too of course.
4) It seems like responding to images would be a really great way to spark the reflection and interaction. Images are so evocative. Even the photo you used at the top of this post made me feel “retreat-ish” just by seeing it.
Sorry this is so long! I will be interested to hear what you come up with!
I like this idea a lot! I recently read a book by Brennan Manning called The Ragamuffin Gospel. In the back of the book are short devotionals–just great, back-to-basics thoughts on Christ and grace and God’s love for us. I felt like I was having a mini-retreat, not only with the devotionals but reading the entire book. So, I guess a “retreat” can happen alone or in a group, through a book or online community. I would love to see an online retreat. But how to make it differ from all the other devotional blogs out there? That’s the question, I guess. Okay, so I don’t have any clever tips, but maybe you should check out Manning’s books; you might find some inspiration there.
Once again, thanks everyone. Next week I’ll be trying to make a list of the main ideas here and do some further thinking. Look for a post on Thursday.
So many good ideas here. I’m coming in late on the discussion and do not have anything any more original to add. I will say I smiled when I read L.L.’s comment because the first thing I thought of was the twitter poetry partying that goes on from time to time. I’ve only participated in one, but I think I was glowing after. That’s what renewed is about.
I like the idea of a shared teaching seminar, or shared reflection topics and then a communal time to discuss. Sounds like a lot of other people have the same idea.
This is an interesting topic, Gordon. Will we get to try out the fruit?
Possibly a useful example of spiritually focused online retreats:
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/ecourses/subscriptions.php?id=9
I just found this one while flapping around, and thought of you.
http://www.comfortretreats.com/
actually i agree with l.l. and laura b. about the twitter poetry party at tweet speak poetry.
i think that it is a most wonderful retreat.
i have never taken part in anything like it before.
anyone that takes part in it could tell you that it is an hour of words intermingling in a most unusual way, it feels quite like a gathering and a binding together as the words are assembled into poetry.
you may want to take part and experience it. and of course, as you probably can guess, i do encourage you to do just that.
The only retreat I’ve ever gone away to was at a convent where silence was expected and it was very intentionally designed to take people through steps to spiritual growth. I’d be interested in an online retreat. I would not be interested in meeting in person or larger group. That’s just my initial gut reaction. The fact is we all journey differently. I think the best idea is not to attempt to make everyone happy. I can’t wait to see what you come up with.
Here is a link to an online resource I will be using during Lent: http://abbeyofthearts.com/teaching/lenten-e-course-benedictine-spiritual-practices/
This may be a method for one-half of an online retreat. I could see some type of chat room led by a retreat “director” to which participants could log on and chime in over the course of the retreat time period. Maybe a couple of gathering times throughout the retreat period.
And the online format provides lots of opportunity for continuing the community through follow up posts on an agreed upon network site like a private group on FB.
I’m such a novice on all the technology and online tools, these are just some that seem doable to me while still maintaining some sense of “retreat.”
Blessings to you Gordon!
Pam
Gordon,
Not sure if you’re still looking for leads, but I discovered an online version of the Busy Persons Retreat (St. Ignatius) a year ago. I’ve led a live version of it for college students a number of times and even used this site for resources, but I’ve never tried it online.
http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/cmo-retreat.html
Late chiming in, but I think an online retreat is a great idea. What would the focus be? Spiritual growth? Writing? Spiritual growth through writing? Maybe you could have virtual “speakers” that post a written piece or a video or even a photo gallery at certain times during the week, and during that time people could read or watch and then use a chat feature to discuss it. Maybe you could then respond to this on your blog the next day, and the original article or video could link back to everyone’s blog posts. People attending the retreat could commit to certain hours of praying, writing or responding in some way (art, music, poetry, prose) to what they’ve read/heard while away from the computer and then reconvene later to share their thoughts.
Gordon, I don’t know if you or any of your coworkers reads French, but if so…
the Dominicans of Lille in France have offered an on-line Lenten retreat for several years. It’s called “Retreat in the City:” http://www.retraitedanslaville.org/ . Participants get an e-mail every day with a meditation on the lesson for the day, plus there’s a weekly video. This year they’re offering a weekly comic strip illustrating the Gospel, plus a blog. Reading the comments from all over the world has given me a great sense of community with other French-speaking Christians. I teach French at a Christian school and I’ve shared the videos with my students.
Can we have an online hammock?
Actually, this raises a good point. The fun side of relaxation—hammocks, canoes, games, fireplaces, hikes, cookies and coffee—all of that is part of what makes Laity Lodge work.
“Your comment is awaiting moderation.”
Indeed, my life is awaiting moderation.
Oh! So glad to find you here, Mark. And making me laugh. I do believe that is a form of hammock. When you find a good life moderator, let me know.