Spirit Center Retreats

Spirit Center facilitated group retreat offerings.

Looking Forward to Easter

With Tim Oberholzer

February 28 - March 2, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude
Does your life need a reset? A nudge to get everything back in balance? Where "everything" means physically, emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually. In Looking Forward to Easter we will use Chapter 49: The Observance of Lent from the Rule of St. Benedict as a guide for self-reflection and transformation. We will consider what should be washed away, what should be added, and what should be offered as we "look forward to holy Easter with joy and spiritual longing."

A Watercolor Journey

With Pearl Maxner

March 11 - 13, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude
Explore watercolor painting with step-by-step instructions on the use of color and light and capturing mood and emotion. Paint with confidence and trust God in the flowing of color in your life.

Centering Prayer Intensive

With Donna Kreiensieck and Marti Taylor

March 17 - 23, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude
Enhance your contemplative prayer life and expand the fundamentals of your Centering Prayer practice through this intensive weeklong retreat in a quiet, transformative setting.

The Passion of the Earth: Living into the New Creation Story

With Wendy Weiger

April 25 - 27, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude
We humans are part of a vast web of creation that sustains all life. But we’re unraveling the web. We are standing on a cusp. The choices we make will determine the course of our planet for thousands—even millions—of years to come. What will we choose? Will we join in God’s dance of hope, healing, and new creation? Or will we continue down our current path of destruction? We will consider these questions through the lens of the Passion of the Earth, a project of artwork and poetry that integrates scientific and Biblical understanding of the story of our universe. And on the springtime grounds of the monastery, we will rejoice in the miracles of nature that surround us, practicing mindfulness techniques that engage all our senses, deepening our personal connection with the Earth.

Journaling: The Sanctuary of the Heart

With Cheryl Johnson and Tim Oberholzer

May 19 - 23, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude
The Center for Benedictine Life at the Monastery of St. Gertrude welcomes the monastery of your heart.  Here, the quest within and the world without join hands.  Prompts of the Spirit and their counterparts in key moments, find a voice in the sanctuary of your journal, the sanctuary of the heart.  Journaling, Joan Chittister says, is an “x-ray of your soul.”  It gets beneath our facades to the bone, blood, tissue, and the spiritual depths they house.  Journals are intimate explorings of the pain and beauty hidden in our exterior and interior landscapes.

Come to the Quiet

With Spirituality Ministry Team

May 30 - June 6, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

Come away for a silent, individually directed retreat with optional faith sharing, creative expression, body prayer, and ritual. Relax in God's presence, surrounded by natural beauty and supported by a praying community.

Mappa Divina

With Heather Berndt

June 20 - 22, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

The Gift of Nature

With Sr. Carlotta Fontes, OSB

June 26 - 29, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

A Sip of Silence

With Spirituality Ministry Team

July 25 - 27, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

For those unsure about drinking a full cup of silence or not able to schedule a longer time, this retreat provides a shorter version of our "Come to the Quiet" retreats. A dipper of silence may deepen your thirst for more.

Yoga as a Tool to Invite Ourselves Into the Gifts of Summer

With Kay Totten

July 25 - 27, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

We will explore the unique gifts of summer (light, growth, arrival, flow, and balance) through the practice of yoga.  Yoga is a form of body prayer rich with possibilities that are far beyond the physical realm.  All levels welcome.

Emotional Healing Through Forgiveness

With Terese Luikens

August 22 - 24, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude's

Has a person or an event emotionally shattered you?  A liberal dose of forgiveness is what our wounds need.  Where there is forgiveness, there is healing.  In truth, when someone hurts you, forgiveness helps you to heal.  In this retreat we will explore anger, resentment, bitterness, defensiveness, grudges, unforgiveness, and misnomers surrounding forgiveness.

Living as a Monk in Everyday Life: A Benedictine Spirituality Cohort

With Sr. Teresa Jackson, OSB

August 25 - 31, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

Many people today are discovering a deep hunger for God at their core.  The ancient Benedictine monastic tradition is a way of life designed to help people live a life focused on God. In this nine-month program, we will focus on how ordinary people can integrate Benedictine monastic prayer, values and structures into their lives […]

Deepening Our Spirituality with MIndfulness

With Gail Stearns

September 5 - 7, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

Are you feeling fatigue from personal or societal ills, loneliness, overwhelmed?  Or would you simply love to develop more resilience and centeredness for daily life and the work you are passionately engaged in?  Ancient spiritual wisdom and current science are showing we can actually shift the way our brains work, to experience less reactivity toward […]

A Watercolor Journey II

With Pearl Maxner

September 23 - 25, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

Take the next step toward becoming a confident watercolorist. Revisit the techniques learned in "A Watercolor Journey" and move forward to new skills. Any beginner class will serve as a prerequisite for this retreat. All materials provided.

Iconography II

With Kara Gillette

September 25 - October 1, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude
"Holy icons direct us toward the Divine." Fr. Damian Higgins is an iconographer whose works are featured around the world. Don't miss this encounter with sacred Christian art using traditional egg tempera. Materials provided; no experience is necessary.

Introduction to Centering Prayer

With Donna Kreiensieck and Marti Taylor

September 26 - 28, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

Experience a contemplative prayer form that has the potential to transform your spiritual life. This introductory retreat will provide the background and fundamentals of Centering Prayer and teach how to develop a continuing practice.

Redefining Retirement: A Spiritual Practice

With Sr. Barbara Jean Glodowski, OSB

October 21 - 23, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

Whether already retired or preparing for retirement, you can redefine the way you live into the second half of your life through an examination of the wisdom of Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and Richard Johnson and the values of Benedictine spirituality. Explore the challenge with others on the journey.

An Attitude of Gratitude Yoga Retreat

With Kay Totten

November 11 - 13, 2025
Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude

November is a month when we naturally think of GRATITUDE as we near the time of Thanksgiving and the culmination of our summer and fall season activities.  This Yoga retreat will focus on our deep inner need to begin each day with an ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE using the key themes of:  LIGHT, WARMTH, ENDINGS, RESILIENCE, […]