By Mary Farrell & diane leutgeb munson
e concept of “retreat” has been a long-standing and valued tradition. Dorothy Day herself spent regular time at the Catholic Worker farm outside of New York City in order to reflect and re-energize herself. In our community here in Winona we cherish our times of retreat because they give us a chance to think and talk about the guiding vision and philosophies behind our work and the challenges we face in living them out at a personal level. We realize the luxury that we have in our ability to step back from the pressing needs of our day to day work in order to think and talk about what is fulfilling to us, what makes us happy, and what inspires us.
As a community we recently had the opportunity for a full day retreat, our goals for which were to hear from one another how hospitality, community and life in general were going as well as to look ahead to the coming months. We utilized a reading by Jean Vanier, the French philosopher and founder of the L’arche community, about the challenges of community: “There is no real security except pilgrims know where they are going: the holy place.”
Our retreat was a time of deep listening and understanding. We truly took the time to learn more about one another and, in doing so, came away with many topics for further discussion. It quickly became clear that this would be the first of many conversations together over the coming months and that we were being led toward a process of re-visioning the work of this community. We see that this will be a difficult and thoughtful process that we do not want to rush and yet are eager to embark on.
We have acknowledged the fact, as a community, that the mission and vision of this the Winona Catholic Worker, when it began in 1992, was beautiful and important and fruitful. We have also noticed that it may be time to re-imagine what it is that we have to offer to the wider Winona community. We find ourselves heading in a new and unknown direction as we acknowledge the changing face of hospitality (please see article by Eileen Hanson, page 1), and the ever-changing face of our community.
As we pray and reflect together on what it is we are called to do, we realize that our biggest asset is also one of our key challenges- the make-up of our community. We are a community of people who live both inside and outside of our houses of hospitality, we are composed of people who have been a part of each stage of the life of this community (from its inception to as recently as last year), and also cover an age span of nearly twenty-five years. Thus, as we dream of what is on the horizon for us, we are also often tempted to hold on to what was.
What we do know is that our re-visioning is marked by the changing composition of our community. John Heid will be moving on in early January, toward the Southwest where he will work with immigrants. Also, Mike and Diane will be moving out of the house by early Spring, though will be remaining in Winona. As always, our hope is to have new people join our community as others leave, though at this point we do not know when we will have such blessing. We are left with the knowledge that Eileen and Becky will continue the work of this community as live-ins and that they will be supported by a core community, as has always been the case. Our work will undoubtedly be affected by these changes but we are not yet sure in what ways.
Know that we are yet again in a place of transition, and we are doing our very best to be attentive to what that means for us as individuals and for the work that we share. We welcome your input and your involvement in our community. We are actively seeking new live-in community members. We are also continuing to offer both overnight and open meal hospitality to those in need. Please keep us in your prayers as we attempt to discern, communally, what it is that we are being called to and how to best follow that call.