Welcome back to GladdeningLight where mystery and the time-honored practice of stretching into new vistas of faith address the absence of certainty amid the beauty of art in the world.  Doubt does not necessarily hinder the truth; questions reveal to us the space between.  This represents spiritual nourishment for the pilgrim’s journey, the art of the possible, a measure of the infinite.

The theme Our One True Self may suffer from ambiguous tense, but there’s purpose in that.  We spend our entire lives searching – gleaning – proper purpose for our brief time on earth.  Yet this is not a solitary pursuit.  We do so in community, and our yearlong experience surrounding Covid-19 has taught us that being physically and consciously present with others is essential to the human condition, aiding our discernment for what God has in store for us.  Our One True Self.

Howard Thurman’s seminal 1949 treatise, Jesus and the Disinherited, is a clarion call to all oppressed peoples whose “backs are against the wall.”

A subsequent autobiographical book, With Head and Heart, addresses direct & personal experience that will serve to focus upon Thurman the avowed clairvoyant & mystic during our Symposium.  A native of nearby Daytona Beach, Thurman traveled to India for lectures and a meeting with Mahatma Gandhi in 1936 that paved the way for Dr. King’s principal message of non-violent African-American protest.  Thurman’s overarching message to “love your enemies where they are” is an abiding challenge to us all.

Our fulcrums – deliverance from trauma, contemplation, the head and heart as one in our common humanity – can serve to deepen the transcendent capacity of personal mystical experience for arrival on the loving doorstep of Our One True Self.  The center of our time together will key upon what Merton and Thurman practiced, a form of “ethical mysticism” that acts as a springboard to redeeming social change.  Through this window, we can enter into the action we are called to evoke in the world.

Welcome to returning musical guests Eugene Friesen and Owen & Moley Ó Súilleabháin who will frame the entire weekend with concert performances and atmospherics.

Schedule of Events

(ALL DATES & EVENTS CANCELLED)

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2022

6:00 pm – Reception hosted at the Rice Family Pavilion (additional $30 per person)
8:00 pm – Devotional service across Fairbanks Avenue from campus at All Saints Episcopal Church, 338 W Lyman at Interlachen Avenue with Owen & Moley Ó Súilleabháin, Eugene Friesen, James Finley and Lerita Coleman Brown

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2022

10:00 am – Opening program from Owen & Moley Ó Súilleabháin, Eugene Friesen and James Finley in Tiedtke Concert Hall
2:00 pm – Afternoon lecture from Eugene Sutton in Tiedtke Concert Hall with Eugene Friesen and Owen & Moley
4:00 pm – Book signing with James Finley, Lerita Coleman Brown; optional group discussion in KW Rollins Hall, Third Floor; Body Dialogues, mystery of the breath with Janice Stieber Rous in KW Rollins Hall, Room 320, all are welcome (yoga mat optional)
7:00 pm – Evening program with Eugene Friesen, Owen & Moley, Lerita Coleman Brown and James Finley in Tiedtke Concert Hall

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2022

Enjoy the Farmers’ Market in Downtown Winter Park, New York Avenue & Morse Boulevard, 7:00 – 1:00
8:30 am – Morning coffee, Knowles Classroom 1
9:30 am – Morning program from Owen & Moley, Eugene Friesen in Tiedtke Concert Hall
10:00 am – Morning lecture from Eugene Sutton in Tiedtke Concert Hall
2:00 pm – Afternoon lecture from James Finley in Tiedtke Concert Hall with Eugene Friesen and Owen & Moley
4:00 pm – Optional group discussion in KW Rollins Hall, Third Floor; Body Dialogues, mystery of the breath with Janice Stieber Rous in KW Rollins Hall, Room 320, all are welcome (yoga mat optional)
7:30 pm – Spiritual Spaces contemplative concert performance by the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park, Dr. John V. Sinclair conductor, Knowles Memorial Chapel

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2022

9:00 am – Worship service at Knowles Memorial Chapel, homily by Eugene Sutton, readings by James Finley and Lerita Coleman Brown, music from Eugene Friesen and Owen & Moley

Afternoon tours at leisure to Hannibal Square Heritage Center, the Cornell Fine Arts Museum, Morse Museum of American Art and the Albin Polasek Museum & Sculpture Gardens in Winter Park

Event Venues

Rollins College — Tiedtke Concert Hall, Rice Family Pavilion, KW Rollins Hall and Knowles Memorial Chapel

and All Saints Episcopal Church, 338 W Lyman at Interlachen Avenue, Winter Park

Hotel Partners

The Alfond Inn, Hilton Garden Inn, SpringHill Suites and the Park Plaza Hotel.  Reservations may be made by calling The Alfond Inn at (407) 998-8090 or online for the best available rate, the Hilton Garden Inn at $179 per night by using this link, the SpringHill Suites by using this link and the Park Plaza Hotel at $219 per night by calling (407) 647-1072, referencing the GladdeningLight discount.  Complimentary bus service at scheduled intervals from the Hilton Garden Inn/SpringHill Suites to & from the Rollins campus.  Note that hotel rate discounts expire on 12/31/2021.

Registration

Participate in the entire three-day weekend for $270 to include preferred seating for Saturday evening’s Spiritual Spaces contemplative concert in Knowles Memorial Chapel.  Rollins students/faculty/administration may attend free of charge (current valid i.d. and prior registration required).  Thursday evening devotional service and Sunday morning worship service free & open to the public (no registration required).  Attend the Thursday evening reception at the Rice Family Pavilion for an additional $30.  Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express accepted.  Cancellation policy: full refund for any reason until 12/31/21, no refunds thereafter.

Register by Phone at (407) 647-3963

We must’ve waited all our lives for this.