Let Peace Be Your Aim: Spiritual Strategies for Resolving Conflict at Home & at Work
With Thanksgiving exactly two weeks a way we recognize that the entire holiday season may be particularly stressful for many of us. Beyond finagling schedules and recipes, there’s the desire to be together with our family and friends and to breaking bread together. There’s also the reality that for many, this is difficult due to past hurts or anticipated conversations that quickly digress into arguments and verbal attacks. This online retreat, prepared and presented by author and Benedictine Oblate Judith Valente, creates solidarity with and articulates spiritual strategies for those desirous of resolving (or avoiding) conflicts both at home and at work which become prevalent this time of year.
Peace I give you, my peace I leave with you…
Perhaps someone says something offensive or hurtful, perhaps they intended to throw a verbal bomb or perhaps they didn’t realize how cutting their words were. How can we respond with love rather than an eye-for-an-eye? Is it possible to turn our own personal swords into plowshares and replace hatred with grace, or anger into peace? Scripture and the Christian Tradition remind us that we each posses spiritual gifts. In this retreat we will look at both the gifts of the spirit available to us, to draw upon in times of conflict, and we will assess (perhaps remember) our own spiritual gifts and how we might honor and utilize those in the holidays ahead.
When: Thursday November 10, 2022
Duration: 2-hours (1:00 PM – 2:00 PM Central)
Format: Online
Recorded: No
ABOUT THE FACILITATOR:
Judith Valente covered faith and values for many years on the national PBS-TV news program Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly. She is also a former staff writer for The Wall Street Journal, having worked in that paper’s Chicago and London bureaus, and is a former reporter for the National Public Radio affiliates in both Chicago and central Illinois, where she currently lives.
Judith is the author of several spirituality titles including, “How To Live: What the Rule St. Benedict Teaches Us About Happiness, Meaning and Community” and “The Art of Pausing: Meditations for the Overworked and Overwhelmed” as well as two collections of poetry, and a memoir about her time with the Benedictine sisters in Atchison Kansas, titled, “Atchison Blue: A Search for Silence, a Spiritual Home and a Living Faith.”
She is a popular speaker and retreat leader on the theme of living a more contemplative life in the secular world, and is a board member of the International Thomas Merton Society. She served previously on the board of the Chicago Cenacle.
