Dear Friends,
Geneva is my favorite city. This may come as no surprise to those of you familiar with my fondness for John Calvin and the history of the Reformation, but there was a decade (between 2001 and 2011) during which I visited Geneva six times. Two of those visits were intentional pilgrimages, when I sought to engage myself spiritually, not just with the Calvinist reformation, but also with the pre-Christian paganism that marked the place before Christianity arrived, and with the modern Ecumenical movement centered in Geneva, which, I hope, will define the future of our faith.
I want to go back to Geneva, and I want to take folks from Montclair Presbyterian Church with me. I’ve long wanted to lead a group of progressive spiritual pilgrims on a pilgrimage similar to the personal pilgrimages I have made, and it seems that this congregation just might be the right group from which to draw those fellow travelers.
I’m thinking of something simple, relatively inexpensive, and short. I would be your teacher and tour guide, we would stay in the simple accommodations of a retreat center outside of Geneva, and the trip would be short enough to be combined with other travels in Europe, but not so short that it could not be used as a stand-alone trip.
If you are interested in exploring the possibility of joining me for such a journey (and if you’d like to give some input into the trip’s design), please consider joining me for an informational/organizational meeting on Saturday, February 6 at 10am in the Thornhill Room. If that day doesn’t work for you, but you are still interested in the trip, that’s fine–we’ll have other meetings. If you do think you can make it, please let me know so I can make sure that we have enough coffee.
Let’s do Geneva!
Ben