My Confirmation II Retreat week-end on the Hill

This past week-end was both spiriually fulfilling and fun-filled... there were a few bumps here and there, but all-in-all it was a great time... I went out of town to help chaperone the Confirmation II retreat. We all had to meet at the church by 7:15. a.m. to get on the bus... Luckily the kids showed up early so we were able to leave a little ahead of schedule. We drove down to "the Hill" a.k.a. St. Meinrad Arch Abbey, where the retreat was held... Once we put our things in our rooms and headed over to the conference room. That day the talks were about the gifs of the Holy Spirit, and Theology of the Body. They were both very good talks that kept the kids attention. We had Adoration and confession that night, and it was very touching to see how some of the kids reacted to the retreat that night. After that part of the retreat we had break time where some kids hung out at the coffee shop and others went to a room set up for guitar hero.

One of my closest friends happens to be studying at St. Meinrad as a seminarian, and so throughout the retreat, he came and hung out with us. It was nice to see him, and after the kids all headed up for bed some of us college chaperones headed to St. Meinrad's little pub to hang out and talk. It was one of my favorite parts of the week-end... but afterwords I was very tired and so my friends thought it would be fun to have a pick-on Teresa night... actually to be honest, I felt the majority of the retreat was a pick-on Teresa time... Luckily for the most part I am a good sport with those types of things...

The next morning I woke up bright and early for morning prayer, which was nice, but forty-five minutes long... and for a person like me who is NOT a morning person, I was actually happy I didn't have to talk and could just listen. Later after breakfast we had Mass, and then another talk. The last talk was about how to hear and respond to God calling us. We then had lunch and immediately after went to pack our things into the bus for the two hour or so drive back home... most of which I slept through.

I am pretty sure that most of the kids enjoyed it, and so I consider it a success. :)