Kirkridge Retreat & Study Center

Kirkridge Retreat & Study Center Kirkridge is a place to be, and to become a people of hope, compassion, justice, and service.

Since 1942 Kirkridge has always welcomed persons seeking spiritual, personal and social transformation. Kirkridge offers you rest and opportunities for spiritual renewal, a haven from the whirling world. For a fresh perspective, or quiet withdrawal, come to our retreat place on the mountain. Kirkridge offers in-house programs year round, as well as rents its facilities for groups to come to the mo

untain to host their own retreats. For more information about Kirkridge Retreat Center, please visit our website at www.kirkridge.org

This year's Summons to Radical Discipleship, held over Memorial Day Weekend, bore the theme "Come to the Water," and wit...
06/23/2026

This year's Summons to Radical Discipleship, held over Memorial Day Weekend, bore the theme "Come to the Water," and with a theme like that, I suppose we should have expected the lovely, persistent rain that came to us all weekend long. Forty-five people answered the Summons, including several children. In the mornings, we went deep in five different bible study groups, and in the afternoons, we gathered for workshops and plenaries, including an intergenerational fishbowl of organizers and an afternoon of song and storytelling about water led by Lenape and Mohican people.

In fact, singing and stories wove all throughout the time as elders shared lifetimes of wisdom and children reminded us how to play together.

If this sounds like fun to you, plan to join us next Memorial Day Weekend, when radical disciples will gather again on the mountain. We hope to see you there!

Special thanks to Valerie Jean for these beautiful photos!

06/23/2026

wrote this mourning song in the Lenape language and shared it with us at the Lenape and Celtic Grief Practices retreat this past weekend.

You are hearing the refrain here:

kweteli chich - together once more
kweteli chich - together once more
xu kpemeskahena - we will walk
kweteli chich - together once more

Contact Krista if you are interested in learning or using this song.

Copyright Krista Nelson All rights reserved

It is hard to imagine winter from these early days of summer sunshine and croaking bullrogs, but eventually, December wi...
06/18/2026

It is hard to imagine winter from these early days of summer sunshine and croaking bullrogs, but eventually, December will come, and you will want to be at our cozy Winter Craft Retreat.

On these cold December nights, we will have a fire burning and hot chocolate on the stove. Bring your knitting needles, quilting squares, paint brushes, wrapping paper, or whittling knife and gather in the warmth and stillness of the season.

This retreat will have no facilitator or agenda. There will be delicious food, good company, and lots of time to craft and share stories.

On Sunday afternoon following the retreat, there will be a Craft Fair at Kirkridge with local artists. Retreat participants are welcome to have a table if you have crafts you would like to sell. Or stop by on your way out of town to do some last-minute holiday shopping.

Register here: https://kirkridge.org/programs-container/1267/winter-craft-retreat-2/

06/17/2026

Rev. Lacey Hunter, Director of Formation and Programs at Kirkridge Retreat Center, delivered the invocation at last Saturday's Slate Belt Pride in Pen Argyl, PA.

How do we practice toward a world where everyone has the opportunity to flourish without police, prisons and borders? Wh...
06/16/2026

How do we practice toward a world where everyone has the opportunity to flourish without police, prisons and borders? Who do we need to become in order to live into that world? In early May, fifteen abolitionist organizers and social change workers gathered with Andrea Ritchie, author of PRACTICING NEW WORLDS, and Nichola Torbett, longtime abolitionist organizer, to discuss, sing, play, and write toward answers to those questions. It was so generative that we are already planning to host Andrea again next year!

By all accounts, the June Trans Sanctuary was a much-needed time of rest, music-making, and rejuvenation. If you (or you...
06/15/2026

By all accounts, the June Trans Sanctuary was a much-needed time of rest, music-making, and rejuvenation. If you (or your trans, nonbinary, or genderq***r bestie, nibbling, or unctie) missed it, do not despair! There will be another Trans Sanctuary retreat in November!

We will explore themes of:
Sanctuary: What kind of sanctuary do we need in this time? How we can provide sanctuary for ourselves and each other in this sacred gathering? How might we strengthen our webs of community now and in the days ahead

Grounding – What supports us in grounding in our bodies, the earth, and that which is greater in our lives

Trans Joy – What brings us joy? What are the unique gifts we experience as trans people? How might we find this joy together?

Our time together will include gently facilitated conversations and sharing, invitations to reflect and journal, workshops, and spacious breaks. All program offerings are optional, and there will be ample time for music and art making, writing, reading, sleep, conversation, silence, contemplation, and connecting with the land.

Past attendees have included people from a range of spiritual and religious backgrounds, agnostics, atheists, people in their 20s to 70s, people who have been out as trans for decades, folks who are just coming into their trans identities, trans women, trans men, and non-binary folks, BIPOC folks, white folks, disabled folks, and people of varying class backgrounds.

In a spirit of radical inclusion and care, this retreat will be observing additional covid risk protocols. All attendees will be required to take a rapid covid test within 24 hours of attending, we will hold many activities outdoors (weather permitting,) and we will be observing indoor masking.

Scholarships are available. (If you can donate to our scholarship fund for this event, please do so here (https://kirkridge.org/give/) and put Trans Sanctuary in the gift message field. Thank you!)

Register here: https://kirkridge.org/programs-container/1221/trans-sanctuary-2/

Calling all lovers of the wild! Join us June 17 for a Wild Church service. Wild Church is a time to listen for the Spiri...
06/13/2026

Calling all lovers of the wild! Join us June 17 for a Wild Church service. Wild Church is a time to listen for the Spirit as it moves through the trees and pulses in the earth. It is a time to come back into right relationship with the more-than-human world and to advocate for its thriving.

Wednesday, June 17
Service at 5:30pm
Potluck at 6:30
2881 Fox Gap Road, Bangor, PA

We are LGBTQ+ affirming and often LGBTQ+ led.

Please bring something for the potluck if you can, and also, don't let that be a barrier to coming.

Access notes: We typically gather outside, usually between 100 and 400 feet from the parking lot. If it is raining hard or extremely cold, we will meet inside, often in the barn, which is free of hay. A variety of different kinds of seating are available, and you're welcome to bring a chair that works well for you. There are all-gender, single-stall bathrooms available in the Farmhouse, usually 100-200 feet away from our service. There will be time for solo wandering at your own pace in the woods and meadows, but you are always welcome to remain seated or take a chair with you. If you have more questions about accessibility, feel free to reach out.

Japanese kintsugi involves taking something that has been broken, specifically pottery, and practicing repair in ways th...
06/11/2026

Japanese kintsugi involves taking something that has been broken, specifically pottery, and practicing repair in ways that highlight or accentuate the site of brokenness, by highlighting and accentuating the seams where the pottery was damaged. My art practice and writing pushes kintsugi processes further, taking older artworks I have created, hymns, and scriptures to create new works by ripping them apart and putting them together in collage. In writing, I excavate untold histories and retell well-worn ones to rip them apart, to discover what’s there that remains to be conveyed to us.

Ripping and Repair is a workshop in which participants will engage in deep meditative, self-reflexive and reflective processes by making things from things they will, with me, rip up, and repair. Participants are encouraged to bring scriptures or other sacred texts they find meaningful, pictures or images of comfort and care, and other ephemera with them to Kirkridge. Collectively, we will rip them up. Collectively, we will repair to create something otherwise. This is a spiritual practice and process.

About the facilitator: Ashon Crawley is professor of religious studies and African American studies at the University of Virginia. He is the author of three books including From Infinite World: the Sound of the Hammond Organ and the Tragedy of AIDS in the Black Church (2026). An artist, his art has been featured at the California African American Museum and the National Mall in Washington DC. All his work is about otherwise possibility. Headshot by Kori Price (2025).

Register here: https://kirkridge.org/programs-container/1126/ripping-and-repair/

Scholarships are available!

Join us for a discussion of a speculative novel described as "uncompromising, anticolonial, profoundly q***r and trans, ...
06/10/2026

Join us for a discussion of a speculative novel described as "uncompromising, anticolonial, profoundly q***r and trans, buoying, addictive, and wholly original" by BOMB Magazine. EVERYTHING FOR EVERYONE: AN ORAL HISTORY OF THE NEW YORK COMMUNE 2052-2072 uses an interview format to tell the story of a fictive global collapse and the revolution that followed in the voices of those who made the revolution happen--nurses, s*x workers, organizers, antifascist militants, and survivors of all stripes. Their stories, delivered in deeply human fashion, together outline how ordinary people's efforts to survive in the face of crisis contain the seeds of a new world.

If you are looking for a possible map to a more liberated future, you won't want to miss this one!

We will gather on Zoom Sunday, July 5, from 4-5:30pm . Register here for the link: https://kirkridge.org/programs-container/1239/apocalyptic-reading-group-july/

You can order the book here: https://bookshop.org/a/105320/9781942173588

The Clearing is a three-day gathering for Black q***r and trans people who carry the deep wound of a world that denies o...
06/08/2026

The Clearing is a three-day gathering for Black q***r and trans people who carry the deep wound of a world that denies our belovedness. Here, we return to the river that has always healed us—our music, our breath, our way of seeing against the grain and walking against the current. We will draw on the power of Spirituals, Blues, Jazz, Gospel, and Hip Hop—our lament, our gutbucket truth, our improvisation, our embodied hope, our healing rage—to reclaim our stories and free what domination tried to drown. Through song, ritual, dance, silence, and shared tenderness, we lay down the mask, lift up our names, celebrate our bodies, and let our souls be retrieved and re-membered. If you are longing for a place where the hurt is honored and the healing is real, come to The Clearing—where we are called beloved at last.

About the facilitator: Rev. Lynice Pinkard is a Black writer, teacher, healer, pastor, recovering addict, and public intellectual operating at the intersection of Christianity, economics, and social change. Her current work is dedicated to decolonizing the human spirit and freeing people from what she calls “empire affective disorder.” Her commitment is to inspire and nurture a new generation of Spirit-filled servant leaders dedicated to the remediation of day-to-day suffering, the building of collective resilience for transformative change, and the pursuit of structural and systemic justice in the world. Lynice currently serves as the pastor of the United Church of Christ East Goshen in West Chester, Pennsylvania.

Register here: https://kirkridge.org/programs-container/1270/the-clearing-healing-music-retreat/

Scholarships are available!

And if you would like to donate to support this vital healing work, please donate here and put "The Clearing" in the "gift message" field: https://kirkridge.org/give/

Address

2495 Fox Gap Road
Bangor, PA
18013

Telephone

+16105881793

Website

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