Contemplative Outreach of Connecticut

Mike Smoolca, Chapter Coordinator, Contemplative Outreach of Connecticut

Welcome to the Contemplative Outreach of Connecticut Chapter website!

Our Mission is to support, grow and share the Contemplative Outreach Prayer Practices as well as to foster and enhance the Christian Contemplative Community in the Connecticut area.

Our Vision is to align with the latest practices and principles of Contemplative Outreach, Ltd. and to endorse a comprehensive view of the Keating legacy. Please see our Information Page for more details.

We welcome you to our online presence! Please browse our site, sign up to be on our email list (below), register your Centering Prayer Group with us (below) and request an Introductory Workshop, other Program for your Parish or Group as well as additional information or assistance on our Contact Page (found under Resources).
- Mike Smoolca, Contemplative Outreach of CT Chapter Coordinator.

Meet our Leadership Team.

Latest News

12/17/2018

We're developing a tribute page to Fr. Keating's last year including first-hand reflections from those who attended his Funeral Service at St Joseph's Abbey in Spencer, MA.
We expect to post a link to this tribute shortly in the New Year.

Registration has opened for Cynthia Bourgeault's November 8 - 14, 2019 Retreat at Holy Family Retreat Center in West Hartford

The Christian Contemplative Experience at Holy Family is pleased to welcome The Rev. Cynthia Bourgeault, one of the great contemplative guides of our times, as presenter for a retreat next year, from November 8 – 14, 2019.

We expect this retreat will fill quickly and wanted to give you the opportunity to register early.

This silent retreat provides a sacred opportunity for our community of contemplatives to gather as a healing presence to the world and to one another. Individually you’ll deepen your Centering Prayer practice as Cynthia unpacks some of the key ideas in her highly acclaimed book The Heart of Centering Prayer: Nondual Christianity in Theory and Practice.

Each day will include wisdom teaching with Cynthia, movement practice, Contemplative Eucharist, chanting, and multiple Centering Prayer periods led by Cynthia and other Contemplative leaders.

All levels are welcome, though an established centering prayer or meditation practice is helpful. For those who cannot attend the full week, we welcome participants to join us for the weekend of November 8-10.

A Special Video Greeting for
CO-CT!

Recorded by Grace Padilla on a visit with Fr. Keating in September 2017!

Become familiar with two CT Contemplative Outreach Chapter Leaders by listening to the following interview of Mike Smoolca and Grace Padilla. Mike speaks first about his connection with Thomas Merton and Father Thomas Keating and then Grace shares about her deeply personal experiences with Centering Prayer through acquaintance with Father Basil Pennington and Father Keating.

Thought for Winter!

" God created us knowing that we would be a work in progress aimed at becoming fully human and capable of becoming participants in the divine nature.”

Thomas Keating

Registration for the Living Flame 1 Contemplative Formation Program has closed as of September 30, 2018. Please pray for the Contemplative Formation and the Community Enrichment of those attending: https://www.holyfamilyretreat.org/cce/livingflame

Updates have been made to our list of Prayer Groups: http://www.co-ct.org/prayer-groups.html
We would like to list your Prayer Group on our page, please fill out the form on the previously linked page to provide us information about your group and we'll list so others will know how to find you.

Updates have been made to Leadership Team information.
If you have an interest in becoming more actively involved in serving the Contemplative Outreach of CT Chapter please contact Mike Smoolca at: msmoolca@hotmail.com

Click here to view the CO-CT September 2018 Quarterly Update!

Upcoming area events of local interest for the Winter:

January 2019:
Saturday, January 19, 2019 Living Flame Program- The Human Condition with Steve Standiford, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

Saturday, January 26, 2019 8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. - The Core of Wisdom Christianity: A new way of Seeing and Being, Rev. Bill Redfield,  Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

February 2019:
Saturday, February 2, 2017 9:00 A.M - 3:00 P.M. (Doors open at 8:30) -  Lectio Divina Introductory Workshop , Mike Smoolca and Nancy Stimac, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

Saturday, February 23, 2019 Living Flame Program - Divine Therapy with Rickey Cotton, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

March 2019:
Saturday, March 9, 2019 8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. - Integrating Wisdom Christianity into Life: How will the results be embodied in our lives?, Rev. Bill Redfield,  Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

Saturday, March 16, 2019 Living Flame Program - The Dark Night of Sense with Susan Komis, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

Saturday, March 16, 2019 Contemplative Outreach United Day of Prayer, Caritas Christi Center, 295 Benham Street, Hamden, CT

Saturday, March 30, 2018 9:00 A.M - 12:30 P.M. (Doors open at 8:30) -  Centering Prayer Introductory Workshop , Nancy Stimac, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

April 2019:
Saturday, April 6, 2019 9:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. - A Day of Prayer with Fr. Bill Sheehan, Caritas Christi Center, 295 Benham Street, Hamden, CT

Saturday, April 13, 2019 Living Flame Program - Welcoming Prayer with Cherry Haisten, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road West Hartford, CT 06107

Please check our Current Events Page for additional events!

Contemplative Outreach of CT has developed a new flyer as a way of concisely describing who we are. We invite you to download the flyer and share it with your Prayer Group and others.

Contemplative Outreach of CT and the Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center's Christian Contemplative Experience Program is offering the Living Flame Contemplative Formation Program beginning in Fall 2018

The Living Flame Program consists of two one-year Contemplative Formation experiences that has been offered by Contemplative Outreach since 1993. Living Flame I and II were last offered the Central Connecticut area between 2014 - 2016, We were graced to have over 40 participants completing one or both years of this program from various parts of Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island at that time. We are now working in conjunction with the Holy Family Christian Contemplative Experience Program to offer the Living Flame Program once again beginning in the Fall of 2018.

This Contemplative Formation program includes seven full-day Saturday sessions offering in-depth spiritual study presented by commissioned presenters from the various Contemplative Outreach Service Teams located around the United States. Designed to teach the vital conceptual background needed to support a faithful practice of Centering Prayer, the program also:
offers encouragement and support in a small community setting;

heightens the awareness of the purification process;
helps discern when psychological skills can be helpful tools;
and provides the opportunity to give and receive spiritual companionship

To Find out more about this program please visit the Holy Family Christian Contemplative Experience Living Flame page: https://www.holyfamilyretreat.org/cce/livingflame

The Christian Contemplative Experience at Holy Family Retreat Center enters it's third Retreat Season in 2018-2019!

After years of offering Contemplative Programming and working closely with local Christian Contemplative Prayer Community Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, 303 Tunxis Road, West Hartford, CT formally began to offer a structured program and community-building effort around Christian contemplative prayer during its 2016-17 retreat season. From introductory workshops to daylong immersions to weekend intensives, the multi-tiered curriculum offers those curious about the topic and those more experienced many opportunities to meet, share and explore the contemplative tradition together. This program, known as the Christian Contemplative Experience is entering it's third year at Holy Family.

Informed by the teachings of Contemplative Outreach, Ltd, founded by Fr. Thomas Keating in 1984, the Christian Contemplative Experience at Holy Family will consist of six facets: a contemplative prayer group, annual day of reflection, introductory workshops, contemplative enrichment days, weekend retreats and intensives, and a Living Flame formation.

By embracing the Christian Contemplative Tradition, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center seeks to affirm the oneness of all Christians and to transcend our outward differences by joining together in silent prayer. It seeks to provide a space where Christians can meet, share and pray together in the unity of the contemplative tradition.

For further details visit: http://www.holyfamilyretreat.org/cce 

Register with us

If you're not already on the Contemplative Outreach of Connecticut email list or if your Centering Prayer group is not listed in our list of Prayer Groups please provide us with your information below.

For Introductory Workshops, Programs and other requests please use our Contacts page.