Companion’s Mission Statement: Companions on the Inner Way offers a safe communal place to explore our deep longings for the Holy. Grounded in the Christian tradition, our contemplative retreats incorporate body, mind, and soul through presentations, dialogue, spiritual practices, art, music, movement, and worship with Eucharist. We strive to create an environment that is theologically curious, radically welcoming, and liturgically vibrant.
Winter 2017 — Retreat Information
Dates: February 25 – March 2, 2018
Location: Serra Retreat Center, Malibu, California (overlooking the Pacific Ocean)
Theme: “Living Our Authentic Selves in Beloved Community”
Description: Our identity and relationships are often characterized by our work, roles, and personal and cultural histories. However, answering the question Who am I? involves more than describing responsibilities and interactions with persons. A clearer understanding of the authentic self results from our embrace of spiritual practices that illuminate and empower the true self. These practices also guide us in answering: Who am I becoming? Living as our authentic selves is vital to our contributing to experiences of beloved community. This retreat will focus on a spirituality that empowers the authentic Self to come forth in our bodies, relationships, and activism for beloved community.
Presenters: HELEN BRUCH PEARSON SMITH, a minister in the United Church of Christ, has been a frequent guest speaker, lecturer, preacher, and minister at conferences, workshops, and retreats for laypersons and clergy internationally. Until she retired as Emerita Professor of Theology at Candler School of Theology of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia she was dean for community life, acting director of the program for women in theology and ministry and taught in the area of Christian spiritual formation. She has authored and published many articles and resources for congregational life. Popular published books are Do What You Have the Power to Do: Studies of Six New Testament Women, and Mother Roots: The Female Ancestors of Jesus. Writing and teaching in the areas of spirituality, individual and group spiritual formation and growth, and the integration of liturgy, music, and the arts are areas of current concentration.
LUTHER E. SMITH, JR. is Professor Emeritus of Church and Community at the Candler School of Theology of Emory University. He writes, teaches, and speaks extensively on issues of church and society, interfaith cooperation, child advocacy, congregational renewal, Christian spirituality, and the thought of Howard Thurman. He is the author of Howard Thurman: The Mystic as Prophet, Intimacy and Mission: Intentional Community as Crucible for Radical Discipleship, and editor of Howard Thurman: Essential Writings. He is Senior Consulting Editor for the four-volume publication of the Howard Thurman Papers Project. He is an ordained minister of the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, cofounder of the Interfaith Childrens Movement, and Coordinator for the Pan-Methodist Campaign for Children in Poverty.
Visit www.cotiway.org for complete event and registration information.
Contact Information:
Carolyn Foster, Director
[email protected]
510.484.3078
Mailing Address:
1329 Seventh Avenue
San Francisco CA 94122-2507
