[Dialogue] Spirit Journey Retreat (RS-1)

[Beret Griffith]

Hello Mary,

The team dinner was an opportunity for the team to meet John and 
Lynda and welcome them and for John and Lynda to get to know the team 
a bit. We did some talking about the retreat participants.

Once the weekend began there was so much going on there wasn't a lot 
of time for conversation. We went to the site to do fine tuning of 
the set-up at about 2:00 pm Friday and started with dinner at 6:00 pm 
that evening.

Actually if there are more events around the country I think it would 
be good to have the evening meal for retreat leadership and team 
become a standard part of the retreat. It add a gracious feel and 
creates a connection between the people most directly involved in 
putting on and setting up the event.

About the construct. I have everything yet feel this is John's baby 
and I would appreciated it if you address content questions to him.

Take care,
Beret

At 07:33 PM 2/21/2007, you wrote:

>Wow.
>
>Was Thursday night team dinner a prelude to divining in or diving 
>into the weekend or both?
>
>Thanks for the report.  I'd be interested to see a construct.
>
>Grace and Peace,
>
>Love and Light,
>
>mary hampton
>-------------- Original message from Beret Griffith 
><beretgriffith at charter.net>: --------------
>
>
> > Dear Colleagues on the Journey,
> >
> > Here in Minnesota where the snow is melting we just completed a
> > forty-four hour weekend with forty people. The pastor at the United
> > Methodist Church in Northfield is an Academy graduate and last
> > winter, about this time, he pushed hard to offer an Ecumenical
> > Institute course for the congregation. He asked me to talk to the
> > Adult Education Committee to see if there would be interest in
> > sponsoring a retreat. I'd heard that John Cock had taught an RS-1 in
> > Hilton Head and had done some rewriting for the course. John and I
> > talked. He was interested. I briefed the committee, and got the
> > go-ahead to form a team to move forward.
> >
> > A team of fi ve worked for the next year to pull it off. We first
> > wanted it in the fall of 2006. The Mount Olivet Retreat and
> > Conference Center where we wanted to hold the retreat books at least
> > a year out and was not available. We then reserved space there for
> > the weekend of February 16-18, 2007. It is about thirty miles south
> > of Minneapolis.
> >
> > The Spirit Journey Retreat: Empowering Our Faith (RS-1) was
> > outstanding. There were forty people including John and Lynda Cock.
> > John led the WHOLE weekend. With his additions to the weekend of
> > small group work (we even had a Grace Huddle - a highlight for nearly
> > everyone), reflection time on Saturday afternoon, songs, rituals and
> > spirit exercises, it even had a slightly spacious feel. We did start
> > at 7:00 am on Saturday and Sunday and nearly everyone showed up first
> > thing in the morning. It reaffirmed our understanding of the
>&
>
>gt; contentlessness of the story and its relevance to current time.
> > John's leadership was outstanding and must have been exhausting,
> > recalling the days when four people taught the weekend. Lynda worked
> > with me on practics and took care of selling John's books. Work on
> > the space created a fine container for spirit work.
> >
> > About a third of the folks were from outside the congregation and
> > included four people who are experienced ToP trainers and
> > consultants. One works for a consulting firm and another for a large
> > foundation that does leadership training throughout the area. The
> > profiles of participants were interesting and ranged from
> > conservative to liberal, evangelical to progressive, somewhat
> > educated to highly educated. Several people who teach and work in
> > business had theological backgrounds. Discussions were animated, deep
> > and grounded.
> >
> > Th e G.O.D. rock (petrified tree), owned by Sue and Stefan Laxdal and
> > present at all RS-1 courses ever done in Minneapolis, proudly took
> > its place at the center of the room during the last session. It was
> > preceded by a dinosaur bone, a very large crystal and a large fossil.
> > The earth flag hung at the front of the room. We used a portable wall
> > designed by ToP trainer Cheryl Kartes' husband Patrick. It was
> > designed for the ToP crew and creates twelve feet of free standing
> > wall. It was the best wall ever. We used six feet of the wall,
> > covered it with a sticky wall and put four flip chart pages up for
> > every session. John had never had such a blackboard.
> >
> > Sleeping in a motel type room at the conference center with an
> > abundance of food at meals was good. It did make me a little
> > nostalgic for spaghetti on Friday and the sound of mice roaming the
> > pantry while sleeping a mong the food stores in a church basement - on
> > an army cot.
> >
> > Spending time with John and Lynda, with whom we had never formally
> > worked, was a time not to be missed. Ron and I had a dinner on
> > Thursday so they could both meet the team and get properly welcomed
> > before divining into the intensity of the weekend. Afterwards we
> > managed some celebratory eating, drinking and great conversation.
> >
> > Thank you to John and Lynda and to all who have gone before on this
> > journey. Those folks who had the original vision, the nerve and
> > persistence to create the RS-1 course and then to gather a body of
> > people who were insistent on getting it out to people are to be
> > remembered. Cyber hugs all around dear colleagues.
> >
> > Beret and Ron Griffith
> > on behalf of our local team: Faye Caskey, head of Adult Education at
> > the church (her husband Carl hired Vance Englema n in Oaklahoma); Clay
> > Oglesbee, Pastor (Academy grad); Ron Griffith (first took RS-1 in
> > 1968), Bill Ostrem (environmental activist in Northfield).
> >
> >
> >
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