It's OK

Retreat: A Reflection from Pastors, Priests, and Guides

I woke up around 5:30 a.m.

Groggy and puffy-eyed, my brain fuzzy, as if last night’s bourbon lingered too long. I hadn't had too much. I've simply reached that time in life where my body reminds me of its age more often than not. And this morning was a sharp reminder.

Our family of five had never been as spread apart as we were this week. Jessica, Endy, and Phoenix were heading back to Columbus from Texas for baseball games, Jude was staying in Texas to spend solo time with grandparents, and I was headed from home (Columbus) to Chicago for the Pastors, Priests, and Guides retreat at the Bellarmine Jesuit Retreat House.

As I packed for my trip the day before, I realized that we had no remaining overnight bags, so I stuffed a few too-small duffles with clothes and threw the rest of what I might need in the back of the Jeep. I wasn't entirely sure what to bring, so being someone who likes options (control issues? 😬), I packed accordingly.

I've never been a 'car guy', as they say. I've been content over the last 11 years driving a reliable small sedan. Mazda for a while, then a Nissan. Neither had a good stereo, so audiobooks via AirPods became my commuting habit. One way I'd categorize my 30s is as the decade-of-leadership-consumption-while-driving. I'm an artist, but a musician first. And I simply didn't listen to music for a long time. It was a weird decade.

Our vehicles have consistently been stories of blessing. This year, Jessica and I both had significant car upgrades. Jessica went from a gas-guzzling Nissan Armada to a brand new, fully electric Nissan Ariya. And I upgraded to a Jeep Wrangler with an impressive audio system.

I listen to music again.

This was the first road trip in my new Jeep. Some things of note:

• After some 20-odd years of roadtripping and traveling, sunflower seeds are still the greatest antidote to falling asleep at the wheel.

• When driving above 65 mph in a Jeep Wrangler, two hands on the wheel are a necessity. With the rugged suspension and big tires, a small divot feels more like a small canyon than a pothole.

• Indiana roads truly are awful. Like weirdly horrible.

• My playlist was an eclectic mixture of heavy, girl-pop, and classical music. Somehow, it worked perfectly.

The last 30 minutes or so of my drive was roof back, window open, Olafur Arnalds listening. The northwest side of Chicago was a perfect 65 degrees. Arriving just before 1 p.m., I felt transported back to high school.

Jessica pointed me toward the Pastors, Priests, and Guides retreat a few months ago. She's about a year deep in her training for Spiritual Direction, and a lot of ‘her people’ are deeply integrated in the retreat.

I felt the need to represent her well, I felt like I was representing a church that many of the other attendees were trying to run from, and as mentioned, I felt like I was back in high school because I was on the outside looking in—cautious of revealing myself, and simply unsure. Because who knew if I could trust these people?

I really didn't want this to be a networking event, or a ‘how big is your church’ church conference, or a ‘5 Ways To Grow Your Attendance’ seminar.

I quickly realized none of that mattered.

In all honesty, it took me until my drive home on Wednesday to fully arrive. But just as this post comes a few weeks late, so did my vulnerability take its time to fully present itself.

Our few days together were marked by much, but I've tried to categorize them a little bit below. My Enneagram 1 identifying self needs to tell you that these are in no particular order.

Ancient Meets Present
We sang hymns and new songs, observed the Daily Office (for those unfamiliar: it's like a spiritual check-in at specific times of day...structured prayers to help you pause and realign), recited verses of Scripture aloud together, and worked through other spiritual practices that followers of Jesus have practiced for centuries. It was another reminder that the foundations laid by literal saints before me have paved the way for church today. It reminded me that while many's gut reaction is to run from the past, there's immense beauty in honoring it, and so much that we can learn from it.

Retreat: A Rest, Reset, and Refill
This wasn't a conference. It was a retreat. When I think of a retreat (outside of my SBC youth group images of smelly and hot campgrounds where adolescents were sent off for a week to either find Jesus or their latest camp crush) I think of solace. Of solitude and silence, beaches and mountains, new cities and woodlands. The space created for rest was woven into each moment. Most of the retreat attendees spend their lives pouring into others. Pastors, artists, leaders all giving continuously to their communities. Instead of being the givers this time, we were there to receive. Freely.

A People With Purpose
I have this thing about me that no matter where I find myself, I feel like an outsider. It's kind of my party trick. Yes I know that it's a me problem, and I've made strides in my 40th year of life. While here I was different, I wasn’t an outsider. Each of us there embodied diverse Christian traditions that were still moving the same direction. Our retreat guides, spiritual directors, and retreat attendees were Methodist clergy, progressive church planters, megachurch evangelical church pastors, musicians, writers, artists, Catholic Jesuits, leaders, and followers—but overall we were all seekers with purpose. We were individuals from every corner of the church landscape, yet we shared a quiet and collective longing to grow, to question, and to explore how best to do this in each of our own communities.

Spiritual Direction
I've enjoyed asking Spiritual Directors over the last year or so to define what they do. One has been Jessica as she goes through her studies, one has been my Spiritual Director, Dan, who I have had the privilege of meeting with for the last 6 months, and then one was Archie, a Jesuit from Poland completing 12 years of study, largely focused on Spiritual Direction. I won't do their answers justice, but at its core a Spiritual Director is someone to walk beside you as you take steps on your spiritual journey. It's not pastoral care, it's not therapy, it's not counseling, but it probably involves pieces from all of those, with the overall goal to help you recognize the movement of God in your life. I had the opportunity to be in the room with a Spiritual Director who is years beyond me in age, and it was a special time of digging and inner discernment.

Affirmation and Validation
That ole party trick of mine? Creates some pretty isolating times where I find myself asking so often ‘What are we (the Church) doing?’. The retreat gave me some needed validation, that my thoughts and feelings about life and spirituality aren't new or foreign. It confirmed that the tension I feel as a 'professional Christian' is real. It reassured me that frustrations, worries, and hangups in our spiritual lives aren't negative, but contemplative questions worth exploring. It reminded me that all of the times I said ‘I'll figure it out’ and felt left to fend for myself, did in fact feel terrible, but I was still seen by Jesus. And I was seen at this retreat. Not fixed.

It's OK
A good picture to represent where my mind and spirit have been over the last year and a half came out of a spiritual exercise Father J. Michael Sparough led us in during our first session. It's me, on a dry desert road that resembled a scene from Breaking Bad. I mean not a drug or violent scene, just desolation and a hot, orange hue overlaying the image. You could see the heat waves rising from the earth, the road expanding in both directions further than the eye could see, and there was no sign of comfort in any direction. Nighttime was near. I was alone and frustrated, very disoriented, and felt like I had been here before.

Amidst the angst and irritation, I heard deep within the words 'It's OK' , and I've held onto them ever since. 'It's OK' is a lot different being said to me, than me saying to myself that 'I will be fine' or ‘I’ll figure it out’, which has become my default responses. In the midst of mess, I say that I'll be fine, but that's really me pulling back and feeling like no one else is with me, so I'll just have to figure it out alone. Instead, I heard that it's OK that I'm frustrated, or angry at that person, or that I don’t trust them, or that I don’t remember which way I was coming from nor which way to go now, or want more for my family, or…

‘It’s OK’ means I’m not needing to be fixed in order to be loved. I am being seen and loved, despite.

There's so much more to unpack from this, and I've done a lot of that with Jessica, my family, some close friends, and my Spiritual Director. The retreat was not about reaching answers but about living in the tension of questions.

I'm still there, and IT'S OK.

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There’s many I will miss, but here’s a few people worth following tied to this retreat:

Pastors Priests & Guides

Aaron Niequist

Julian Davis Reid

Jonathan Merritt

Nina Barnes

Kristen LaValley