As I reflect on the large part that St Beuno’s has played in my life, I am reminded of the special places where I have encountered God on so many retreats.
Just as I recall with great affection the special places where I first met my wife Diana, and where we began to fall in love, so I can pinpoint, with great accuracy, those places at Beuno’s where God and I have had intimate encounters over the last 20 years.
Such places include a bench at the end of the upper garden terrace, an apple tree on the slope, the gate overlooking the Rock Chapel, and the walk along the lower wooded garden with its view over the Clwyd Valley.
I often re-visit these special places when I am at Beuno’s on retreat and acknowledge with great delight in my prayer to the Lord that ‘we have history!’ Just as Moses had his burning bush, Elijah had his furze tree and Solomon his fragrant garden, so these are ‘our special places’.
Though I might not always physically be able to return as often as I like, through the Ignatian ‘prayer of repetition’ and ‘composition of place’, I find I am able to sit or walk in these places again and again in my imagination whenever I choose and always find the Lord there.
Shared memories indeed. AMDG.