Reserve your retreat for 2023!
"Welcome to GilChrist, a place where natural beauty strengthens our human capacity for compassion, gratitude, reverence, and creativity." So states our home page, which invites you to explore a
An App Helping to Build a More Loving World Through Meditation
One of the ways that people deal with the stress of their everyday lives is through meditation. Globally it is estimated that 200 – 500 million people engage in this practice. In the United States, more than 14% of adults have tried meditation at least once, and since 2012, the number of people that has embraced this practice has more than tripled.
Writing From the Body
“Imagination is evidence of the divine,” wrote poet and visionary William Blake more than 200 years ago. And yet we experience the world, imagine, and create through our very human bodies. In this retreat designed for artists and dreamers of every ilk, we will drop into the body and connect to the deepest parts of ourselves.
Just as You Are: Fall Yoga Retreat
Underneath the routine of doing and expectation, a gracious joy for simply being awaits. Fall is a glorious time to slow down and revel in the beauty of being enough, and GilChrist echoes that sentiment back to you. Open landscapes, cozy cabins, and sounds of nature are a balm to busy-ness, affirming that you are enough -- just as you are. With this retreat, you are invited to reflect and relax into who we are the hustle and bustle melt away. Poetry, nature, solitude, and togetherness will cocoon this special time of unwinding and unfolding layers to bask in your inner light.
Yin Yoga & Meditation Retreat: Supporting the Winter-Spring Transition [FULL]
This retreat is fully booked. To inquire about being added to the waiting list, please reach out to Kristin Fiore at kristin@downdogyogacenter.com.
September Practice: Noticing the Silent Lives Around Us
This month we share two practices that our social media community members found helpful in the early months of the pandemic. We return to these practices with the hope that they continue to be helpful to you as you help others in your life and work to savor the only moment we really have: now.
What’s Next for the Spiritual Care Providers Network?
This fall, the Chaplaincy Innovation Lab will release an online reader focused on the work of African American chaplains. The online reader is envisioned as a reference for chaplains, students, and educators interested in examining the interplay between race and the history of chaplaincy in the United States.
August Practice: Front Porch Drawing
Last June, in the early months of the pandemic, we asked you to share what practices you were finding particularly helpful during that time. We savored and shared your submissions and find them worth revisiting.
July Practice: Play at Work
Play touches and stimulates vitality, awakening the whole person—mind and body, intelligence and creativity, spontaneity and intuition. —Viola Spolin
Do you shy away from “play” as something frivolous--not to be part of your work life? In the video below, Bill Vendley, our senior advisor for world religions, reminds us of the importance of play, and this from someone who dedicated his life's work to conflict resolution!
May Practice: Through Dying We Learn to Live
Dying is a universal experience, yet we have such trouble talking about it, allowing for our own and others’ grief, and learning from this profound and mysterious passage. In the video below, Carla Fernandez, co-founder of The Dinner Party considers what we miss when we avoid the topic and the precious lessons it offers us.