Programs
Liberation Library
The Liberation Library at our Turning Point library is a collection of liberation-oriented books that can often be hard to find in local libraries and bookstores. Developed from our personal book collections and bridging justice-oriented secular and Christian resources, it will hopefully be a valuable resource for activists, movement leaders, pastors, and the local community. […]
Picket and Pray
Click this link to register Join Christians for a Free Palestine, Mennonite Action, Kirkridge Retreat and Study Center, and our partners for a weekly 30 minute Zoom call for shared action for a Free Palestine and spiritual practice rooted in the Christian tradition. As Israel’s U.S.-funded genocide has escalated, including forcibly starving millions of Palestinians […]
Berrigan’s Folly Organizer and Activist Respite Program
“The times are urgent; we must slow down.” –Bayo Akomolafe Are you an organizer or activist in need of rest and rejuvenation? Kirkridge Retreat Center is launching Berrigan’s Folly Organizer and Activist Respite program. We are offering no-cost week-long private retreats for movement organizers and activists in Daniel Berrigan’s Folly Cottage at Kirkridge Retreat Center. Located […]
Wild Church
Let's let church go a little wild! We gather at the beautiful Kirkridge Retreat Center every month, outside, on the first Wednesday, to listen together and in solitude for the voice of the Spirit that speaks through the more-than-human world. Most gatherings involve song, prayer and/or ritual, a time of wandering in the woods and […]
An Unexpected Birth: Advent in the Fascist Apocalypse
With Lynice Pinkard and Nichola Torbett
Years ago, following on a decade of terrible violence, the poet W. B. Yeats asked “What rough beast, its hour come round at last/ Slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?” This year, amidst so much state-sponsored violence and organized neglect, we might likewise ask what Advent could possibly mean? What uncanny birth can we possibly […]
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, […]
Winter Craft Fair Vendor Registration
We are excited to be hosting our 1st Annual Holiday Craft Fair at Kirkridge. We hope that this will be a beautiful, wintery gathering on the mountain. It will be a time for community, for celebrating artists, and for encouraging holiday shopping to come from our local craft-makers. We are looking for vendors! Do you […]
Winter Craft Fair
Join us for our 1st Annual Holiday Craft Fair!! Enjoy a beautiful wintery afternoon on the scenic overlook at Turning Point at Kirkridge Retreat Center. Let’s celebrate and support our local artists. Enjoy hot chocolate, snacks, music, and the gift of community. We will have artisan vendors selling holiday gifts- from pottery to poetry books […]
Wild Yoga
With Britt
Wild Yoga 2nd Wednesdays at 6:00pm Free community yoga Donations accepted, not required For all bodies, races, ages, genders, and faiths. BYOM - Bring Your Own Mat Registration welcome but not required. Description: Every 2nd Wednesday of the month, we come together to connect to our bodies and the true nature of our being through […]
Keening Workshop
With Annie Wilson
Keening was a practice of communal grieving practiced at wakes and funerals in the British Isles for thousands of years, until its erasure over the course of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Keening was led by elder women, often midwives: those who tended to the threshold between life and death. The full workshop […]
LGBTQ Social Events - December
Join us as we build local LGBTQ+ community! Our activities vary from month to month and can be found on our Facebook and Instagram pages, but unless otherwise specified, we gather at 7pm near the Farmhouse or Barn at 2281 Fox Gap Road, Bangor, PA 18013. Hope to meet you soon!
Kirkridge / Columcille Spirit of the Earth Book Group - December
December 2025 Spirit of the Earth Book Group Meeting Join us online for our book group! This will be a great opportunity for heartfelt, stimulating conversation and for building community. This month, December 15, @ 6:30 pm ET, the book is TBA. Email us for details kirkridge@kirkridge.org. To attend online by zoom, please register in […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Read This When Things Fall Apart
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
White Antiracist Practice Group Series 11 (Somatic Antifascist Edition)
With Nicole Bauman
Six weekly sessions on Wednesdays, noon-1:30pm ET, with this next session running January 14-February 18 and focusing on a rigorous practice of relational somatics and collective healing, to support us to resist fascism and honor life, following the arc of Eliana Rubin’s recently published book, Taking the State Out of the Body: A Guide To […]
One year of bird omens: a winter writing retreat
With Lydia Wylie-Kellermann and Lacey Hunter
Join us for a cozy weekend in the mountains to focus on your writing life. Trust that there will be roaring fires, snowy trails, hot chocolate, candlelight, good food, and lots of quiet. We will offer some brief prompts and rituals throughout the days to nudge the imagination and then offer spacious hours for your […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Damned Whiteness
The memory of the long civil rights movement often celebrates white Christians who drew on their religious faith to support Black demands for racial justice. However, the visions and actions of these leaders and their organizations often conflicted with those of Black leadership. While Black activists fought for a broad vision of freedom, white allies […]
A Weekend Celebrating The Many Blessings of Brigid and Imbolc
With Denise Crawn
On the Celtic Wheel of the Year, Imbolc marks the midway point between winter solstice and spring equinox. With its arrival we find ourselves at a threshold in Nature. Here in the northern hemisphere, as we continue our annual cyclical spiral away from the cold, dark months of winter towards the returning light and warmth […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Practicing New Worlds
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Damned Whiteness: How White Christian Allies Failed the Black Freedom Movement and How We Can Do Better
With David Evans
The phrase “damned whiteness” comes from a 1961 poem by white Christian missionary Ralph Templin, who recognized his own whiteness as a “frightening disease” that kept him from showing up in true solidarity with Black freedom fighters. In a new book that takes Templin’s phrase as its title, historian David F. Evans explores how white […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Undoing Conquest
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Trans Sanctuary
With Kerr Mesner
This weekend is an opportunity for trans, nonbinary, and gender expansive people* to gather in community together. In these challenging times, we invite you into a space of sanctuary, refuge, and an honoring of our glorious gender diversity. We will explore themes of: Sanctuary: What kind of sanctuary do we need in this time? How […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Rebellious Mourning
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
The Clearing: Black Queer and Trans Healing Retreat
With Lynice Pinkard
Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, and transgender people face the triple threat of white supremacy, misogynoir, and homophobia. Even the Church–long a refuge for Black people in the United States–is too often a site of trauma for us. That is why we now invite Black queer and trans people to The Clearing. Named for a […]
Allies in Recovery: A Weekend Workshop for Sexual Abuse Survivors and their Partners
With Mike Lew and Thom Harrigan
It is required that all participants be fully vaccinated. The long-term and often painful process of recovery from sexual abuse has profound effects on relationships. Partners and survivors experience a parallel process of understanding the nature of abuse, its effects on the survivor and the couple, and the requirements of healing. Lack of information and […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Original Sins
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Practicing New Worlds
With Andrea Ritchie and Nichola Torbett
What are you practicing? This retreat is for anyone who knows in their bones that another world is possible beyond militarized borders, policing, and prisons, even if we can’t quite perceive the details from here, and who wants to be practicing toward that world. We’ll be exploring ways we can be doing that even right […]
Trans Sanctuary
With Kerr Mesner
This weekend is an opportunity for trans, nonbinary, and gender expansive people* to gather in community together. In these challenging times, we invite you into a space of sanctuary, refuge, and an honoring of our glorious gender diversity. We will explore themes of: Sanctuary: What kind of sanctuary do we need in this time? How […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Taking the State Out of the Body
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Searching for New Suns: Engaging the Prophetic Wisdom and Imagination of Octavia E. Butler
With Naomi Washington-Leapheart
Award-winning science fiction and speculative fiction writer Octavia Estelle Butler said, "There is nothing new under the sun, but there are new suns." Butler's stories, grounded in human vulnerability and human agency, anticipated the current chaos of our time. During this retreat, we will explore what Butler's words can teach us about identity, survival, community, […]
New Suns Cohort
With Naomi Washington-Leapheart
“There is nothing new under the sun, but there are new suns." -- Octavia Estelle Butler In this in-depth, year-long program based on Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents, we will apprentice ourselves to Butler’s main character, the brilliant visionary organizer Lauren Olamina. Together, we will plumb these prophetic novels […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Everything for Everyone
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - The Future Is Disabled
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Weaving our Iona Connections: A Walking Awake Pilgrimage
With Denise Crawn
A Walking Awake pilgrimage to the Isle of Iona, Scotland with Columcille Megalith Park and Kirkridge Retreat Center (registration is open to all). After experiencing a wonderfully memorable shared pilgrimage to Iona in 2024, Columcille Megalith Park, Kirkridge Retreat Center and Walking Awake are excited to announce that we've decided to offer another in August, 2026! If you are […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Rehearsals for Living
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - Enemy Feminisms
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
With the land: remember, relationship, repair
With Susan Raffo
The land where we rest, grieve, and celebrate is the only thing we have in common with those around us. Our bodies are created of and are part of the land. When we die, we fold back into the land’s cycle of life. Our breath, the sea water that is beneath our skin, and the […]
Apocalyptic Reading Group - We Will Be Jaguars
Apocalypse means “revelation.” Certainly we are living through apocalyptic times, but what exactly is being revealed? If the systems of US empire are collapsing, and it seems they are, what will we build in the gaps that empire leaves behind? How will we avoid replicating harmful ways, when those are all many of us […]
Trans Sanctuary
With Kerr Mesner
This weekend is an opportunity for trans, nonbinary, and gender expansive people* to gather in community together. In these challenging times, we invite you into a space of sanctuary, refuge, and an honoring of our glorious gender diversity. We will explore themes of: Sanctuary: What kind of sanctuary do we need in this time? How […]