This past weekend, my mom, sisters and I were blessed to attend a moms' retreat run by some fantastic Dominican Sisters.
This is my forth year attending and their first. I love this retreat and wanted to share the experience with them.
We got to the retreat center, an elementary school run by the Sisters, and chose the classroom where we would be bunking down for the night. We were in the 6th grade room and ended up having the room all to ourselves even though there were over 150 moms on the retreat. Pretty sweet.
Being in the sixth grade room meant that our Adoration hour was at 6 a.m. I'm an early bird so this was perfect for me.
The main content of our retreat was given by a priest who edited a translation of St. Augustine's "Confessions". He was very knowledgeable about Augustine and his mother, St. Monica. He was also quite witty and fun to listen to.
After a dinner of noodles and chicken (yummy, but I don't know what the sauce was so I can't tell the name of the dish), we played a white elephant game and I won a copy of Scott and Kimberly Hahn's "Rome Sweet Home", a book I've been wanting to read for a number of years.
The retreatants then prayed night prayer with the Sisters and we went to bed.
I was having a hard time sleeping, being on the floor and all, but sleep was the least of my concerns by 2:30 a.m. My mom, who had been walking in the halls, heard sobbing coming from the ladies room.
A young mom, 17 weeks pregnant, had just suffered a miscarriage and my mom came to wake me up to help. Yikes! Not at all what I was expecting to do this weekend.
I went see her and asked one of the moms who had also been alerted by the crying, to call 911.
By the time the paramedics arrived, I was privileged to have seen little Benedict, born too soon, but perfectly formed. His little head, his tiny arms and legs, fingers, toes, mouth, nose and ears. He was probably all of 8 inches long from his head to his bottom. So beautiful! And so sad for his dear mother. She named him and baptized him. Such presence of mind for one so young.
The rest of the retreat, though wonderful, passed in kind of a blur. We sang and attended Mass at the Mother house, which is BEAUTIFUL! We delved more into "Confessions". By the time is was over, I was so tired, but talking about going back for more next year.
Please send up a prayer for this young mom and her family. Thanks.
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