Abstract
Christian retreat centres occupy an interesting place within Britain’s shifting religious landscape. In brief terms, these centres provide an environment in which people can (a) achieve some distance from the immediate demands of work and home and (b) engage in personal and spiritual reflection to a greater degree than would normally be possible. Here I examine two such places in southern England. Both supported guests to engage in spiritual exploration and reflection, albeit within certain structures and expectations. Drawing on interviews, participant observation and questionnaires undertaken at each site, I suggest that these retreat centres can be understood as places that lie somewhere between ‘religion’ (in the sense of obligation to external authorities and traditions) and ‘spirituality’ (in the sense of a subjective quest for meaning and connection).
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Notes
- 1.
This shift in religious practice is not, of course, a global phenomenon. Whilst fewer people in western European nations now identify with Judaeo-Christian belief and practice than was previously the case, the opposite situation exists in some areas of the Global South.
- 2.
The spiritual experiences some people report whilst visiting architecturally inspiring cathedrals and chapels are an important exception to this statement. But such visits tend to be occasional and in the capacity of an observer, rather than as a participating member of the faith community most directly associated with the sites.
- 3.
In the Church of England, for example, the term ‘fresh expressions’ describes efforts to develop new ways of doing and being church (Croft and Mosby 2009; Milbank 2008). A good number of these initiatives emphasise contemplative, immanent and sacramental forms of Christian belief which, at least at face value, bear some relation to subjective-life spirituality. Where they retain reference to an externally located transcendental God, however, they might be more accurately described as ‘life-as spirituality’ (Heelas and Woodhead 2005).
- 4.
Excerpt from the Othona website (www.othona-bb.org.uk)
- 5.
For further information, see www.worthabbey.net
- 6.
For further information, see http://www.benedictines.org.uk and http://www.osb.org/intl/confed/confed.html
- 7.
Questionnaire respondents were drawn from a number of weekend and day retreats at each site, rather than the specific retreat at which participant observation took place. All of the retreats nevertheless shared an emphasis on the cultivation of stillness through prayer, meditation and other contemplative techniques.
- 8.
Given the relatively small numbers and the non-random sampling strategy, these figures cannot be considered representative. Nevertheless, the religious and spiritual characteristics of the participants are broadly in line with how staff at each centre described their guests in general.
- 9.
- 10.
One of the staff members at Othona nevertheless commented that, at any given retreat, there would sometimes be guests who found it ‘too Christian’ for their preferences, whilst others would declare the same retreat ‘not Christian enough’. Such comments reflected the dynamic between retreatant preferences and retreat characteristics.
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Acknowledgements
I am grateful to the editors for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this chapter, to the British Academy for financially supporting the research (SG44-237), and to the staff and guests at Othona and Worth Abbey who participated in the study.
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Conradson, D. (2013). Somewhere Between Religion and Spirituality? Places of Retreat in Contemporary Britain. In: Hopkins, P., Kong, L., Olson, E. (eds) Religion and Place. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4685-5_11
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