Posted January 01, 2016 in Press Releases
Dear Friend of Jesuit Retreat House,
We begin this year inspired by the Jubilee Year of Mercy proclaimed by Pope Francis on December 8 to call us to bring God’s love and mercy more fully into our world. Our retreats and programs this year will reflect the theme of Living Mercy in Our World, building upon the gift of Ignatian spirituality and striving to serve people in ways that are ever-relevant to their lives. We have much hope for a time of new life and growth at JRH in the coming year.
We share together in a remarkable legacy of 118 years as the first and longest continuing place in the United States providing retreats for the laity. Each week we are blessed to see and hear about inspiring moments in how people are touched and formed by God’s grace on our sacred grounds. Words that say: “I cherished every moment” to “This changed my life.”
Since the turn of this century, JRH has had a vision and a dream to better serve more people. To build this dream for our time, we began a ‘silent’ capital campaign in 2014 framed in the words from Pope Francis first homily: “To journey, to build, to profess.” Our plan is to build a new wing, the first new construction in 60 years, and to make needed improvements to our existing building. This expansion and renovation will allow us to serve multiple retreat groups at the same time, offer easy accessibility for handicapped and elderly persons, provide more overnight accommodations and rooms for meetings and spiritual direction, and make enhancements to our beautiful grounds. We are very grateful for the generous support we have received towards our goal since launching our capital campaign a year ago. We look forward to sharing more details with you in the coming months.
There are countless stories of God’s grace and blessings at JRH that bond us together – our personal stories, stories of our parents and grandparents, our children and grandchildren, our friends and loved ones. We want to hear more of the stories that inspire you – memories of a retreat moment or an ongoing relationship to JRH. We invite you to share with us “A Story of Grace at JRH.” Please send a paragraph or a page, with your name or anonymously, by mail, email, or on our website. We will also find ways to share these stories with our JRH community. Contact us with any questions about sharing your stories.
We continue to build new opportunities for collaborating with our JRH friends and the wider community in creating retreats, programs and conversations that truly lead to “finding God in all things.” Please feel free to contact me or our staff with your ideas and possibilities in this hope-filled new time for JRH.
God be with you,
Richard S. Krivanka, Executive Director
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