Renewed by the Spirit 2026 Annual Conference Meets at Camp McDowell, Alabama

Community of Hope International gathered at Camp McDowell, Alabama, for the annual conference May 21-24. Participants drove, flew, and Zoomed in from around the country to participate in our own style of Benedictine “ora et labora” (pray and work).

We prayed Morning Prayer on the front deck of our lodge while listening to the soft, gentle rain through the tall pines, participated in evening Taizé service Saturday night, and celebrated the Feast of Pentecost Sunday morning in the beautiful St. Francis Chapel.

Each of our meetings began with songs led by Julie Chalk from Canyon Lake, TX, with vocal backup from Craig Wilson from Smyrna, GA.

Our work consisted of studying the renewed curriculum for training new pastoral caregivers. Our President, Sarah Roberts (Buford, GA) and the Rt. Rev. Brian Prior (Ret.) (Home - Brian Prior) facilitated an intensive walk-through of the study of Community of Hope in three parts – Formation, Circle of Care, and Pastoral Care.

We learned that our pastoral caregiver training modules each have amazing new videos to accompany them; we were even able to preview the videos which are still being edited to include highlighted quotes and introductions.

We explored creative, new ways to engage with the modules including storytelling, art reflection, journaling, connecting to The Rule, and a renewed debriefing format woven throughout all the modules.

Aimée Bostwick, our CoHI Curriculum and Charism Chair and Senior Advisor for Program Innovation at Kanuga Conference Center, walked us through a Forest Bathing experience as a part of our renewed Prayer and Christian Meditation Module.

In addition to the prayer and work, the group enjoyed some self-care in community with a reception provided by Regional Representatives in attendance Pam Piedfort (West/Northwest, Gulf Coast, Heartland, Atlantic, and Southwest), Tricia Jones (West Texas and Heritage West), Craig Wilson (Southeast), Amy Stillwell (Southeast), and Lynnae Schatz (Heritage).

The gracious hospitality of Camp McDowell offered other opportunities for self-care as some visited the famous suspension bridge in lower camp via golf cart ride from Bishop Brian, some enjoyed quiet walks along the wooded lanes, and others enjoyed early morning cups of coffee listening to the birds. Camp McDowell is home to a farm school and a folk school, as well, and we were blessed one evening during dinner to hear from the director of the farm school about his vocational call and work leading the farm school at Camp McDowell.

For our participants joining us by Zoom, the dedicated work of Abel Betances from the Diocese of Atlanta helped ensure that people could join us from here, there, and everywhere.

We are truly a Community of Hope. As we look to next year and years to come, we recognize that renewing ourselves is vital to our ministry. Having come together at Camp McDowell, we are renewed by the Spirit, not just because we met on the Feast of the Pentecost, but because we prayed, played, and worked together for the good of ourselves, the community, and the world. We hope you’ll join us next year!

(Special thanks to Tricia Jones and Pam Piedfort for contributing photographs)

Reflections on the Rule - June 2026

June, 2026

DR. BRANDON BECK

LAY CHAPLAIN, COHI

MONK, THE OOOW

CHURCH OF RECONCILIATION, SAN ANTONIO, TX

THEOLOGY STUDENT, BRITE DIVINITY SCHOOL

We’ve recently come through a section of The Rule wherein Benedict teaches what have come to be known as “Tools for Good Works” (See especially Chapter 4, May 19-22) and its subsequent section wherein we learn to listen to our community in discernment about how and when to use our “Tools” (see especially Chapter 5, May 23-24). We gathered at Camp McDowell in Alabama for our Annual Conference to renew our Spirit for the Good Work of Community of Hope May 19-24, discussing our very own Spiritual Gifts (“Tools for Good Works”), to listen to each other’s stories, and to learn and grow in community as we worked together to form ourselves, form our community, and be better able to care for others.

As I was outside using my string mower this afternoon, I found myself thinking back both to our time at Camp McDowell and to Benedict’s “Tools for Good Works.” I use my string mower for two distinct purposes: 1) to edge precise lines along the sidewalks and driveway and 2) to clear stalky weeds from the middle of the yard. The list of behaviors Benedict outlines in Chapter 4 from that sort of edge and precise line around our moral character and our inner being that helps us know where and how to grow. Sister Sutera, in her commentary, says, “This compilation of scriptural instructions will be the foundation for a harmonious community, as elaborated upon in the rest of the rule, and for inner harmony as well.” (St. Benedict’s Rule: An Inclusive Translation and Daily Commentary, Judith Sutera, OSB, Liturgical Press, Collegeville, MN, 2021, p. 50)

While we were gathered at Camp McDowell, we reviewed the many “tools” available to us as Community of Hope, International, members. We celebrated the “good works” we are doing all over the country and refined our edges while encouraging the green, growing life of our community to flourish in all the ways the very natural beauty of Camp McDowell around us embodied.

What connections to your life and work draw you closer to The Rule today?

How is your own Circle of Care reminding you to develop your “Tools of Good Works?”

When you review Chapters 4 and 5, what is God asking you to let go of?

Reflections on the Rule - March 2026

March 18, 2026

Dr. Brandon Beck

Lay Chaplain, COHI

Monk, The OOOW

Church of reconciliation, san antonio, TX

Theology Student, Brite Divinity School

In Education for Ministry, I learned about the metaphor of “the empty chair.” The mentor with whom I first trained years ago always brought a tiny, pewter chair to class with her and set it in the middle of our discussion table. Her message with “the empty chair” metaphor was simple and powerful at the same time: What perspective might we be forgetting? Whose voice in the world have we left out?

My theology professor, Dr. Natalya Cherry at Brite Divinity School, teaches a similar concept to that of “the empty chair;” she says, “Going with Jesus means going to those most marginalized, no matter how marginalized you are, especially when someone else is more marginalized.”

As Community of Hope pastoral caregivers, we follow Jesus into that work of caring for others in that deep, Baptismal Covenant way–that way that resists injustice and respects the dignity of every human being–even when those human beings don’t agree with us or even rub us the wrong way.

“The empty chair” reminds us to pause and wonder, “What might that person need, think, believe, or wonder?” Dr. Cherry’s philosophy calls us to reach out to others remembering they also are created in God’s image.

None of this is news to those of us in Community of Hope because we are steeped in Benedictine tradition and rooted in a framework of humility and hospitality. In the Rule of Benedict, as we begin again and again to read the words the early monastics read in order to live well together, we find this sage advice for our work as pastoral caregivers leaning into our commitment to justice:

You must relieve the lot of the poor, clothe the naked, visit the sick, and bury the dead. Go to help the troubled and console the sorrowing. Your way of acting should be different from the world’s way; the love of Christ must come before all else. You are not to act in anger or nurse a grudge. Rid your heart of all deceit. Never give a hollow greeting of peace or turn away when someone needs your love. Bind yourself to no oath lest it prove false, but speak the truth with heart and tongue. Do not repay one bad turn with another. Do not injure anyone, but bear injuries patiently. Love your enemies. If people curse you, do not curse them back but bless them instead. Endure persecution for the sake of justice. (RSB Chapter 4, lines 14-33, Timothy Fry OSB, Editor, 1980)

That section is part of Chapter 4 which has come to be known as “Tools for Good Works;” since Jesus was said to have been a carpenter, I love that Benedict gave us tools to use to do the work Jesus left us to do. Even if that work seems difficult–difficult like loving your enemies and enduring persecution.

Imagining the thoughts of that person represented by “the empty chair” and always moving toward the other sounds great, but sometimes we need a little more to sustain ourselves in this ministry to which we are called.

“Reflections from Christian Meditators” offers this suggestion for getting closer to God while using our “Tools for Good Works:”

In community we learn that nuances of perception and reality can be subtle, so much so that we confuse them without knowing it. We come together with our own ideas and understanding, our own trauma, our own colourings of people and the world. And while our perceptions of a happening, a circumstance, a person, might be close to the real, what could be the consequences of us acting on our perceptions? Is it, in that instance, loving another? Is it loving ourselves?

Too many times our reactions to injustice can be just that–reactions. There is risk here that we are reacting more from our own biased perspective and hurt. A more considered response comes from a freedom that arises from within a space of ongoing healing. And yet healing so often can seem illusive.

As we continue to live and move and have our being together in this world, let us remember “the empty chair” and wonder who might be in it and ask what they might have to say, what they might be thinking and believing. Let us work a little more, using all our tools which we have been given by our Creator to heal ourselves so that we can be sustained in our ministry as pastoral caregivers, remembering always that we do this together, always beginning again.

News from St. Francis by the Lake Episcopal Church, Canyon Lake, TX

News from St. Francis by the Lake Episcopal Church, Canyon Lake, TX

In the Diocese of West Texas

Tricia Jones, Diocese of West Texas Regional Representative

At the close of 2025, St Francis by the Lake, Canyon Lake, completed ten years as a licensed COHI Center!  To start our 11th year, fourteen members renewed their covenants, were commissioned, and had their hands anointed during the worship service on January 4, 2026.  We celebrated Epiphany that evening, bringing gifts of canned food for the food bank and popping Old English style "crackers" that contained gold crowns, a prize and a riddle.

Commissioning L-R:  Lynn Zimmermann, Tricia Jones, Linda Hillin, Debbie Barnwell, Fr David Chalk, Becki Nichols, Nancy Summers, Teresa St John, Julie Chalk, Ann Freiberger.  Members not pictured: Jo Conchado, Patricia Doyal, Jay Hillin, Ana McDonald and Velda Vukoder.

Epiphany Celebration clockwise: Debbie Barnwell, Julie Chalk, Fr David Chalk, Linda Hillin, Nancy Summers, Teresa St John, Lynn Zimmermann, Tricia Jones, Ann Freiberger, Becki Nichols, Brian Freiberger.  Members not pictured: Jo Conchado, Patricia Doyal, Jay Hillin, Ana McDonald, and Velda Vukoder.

St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in San Antonio Commissions New Lay Chaplains

Mary Tacy Young, Center Leader

On December 14, 2025, St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in San Antonio commissioned Nancy Hawkins and Liz Conklyn as lay chaplains and recommissioned Mary Tacy Young, center facilitator; Gretchen Bealer, font of all knowledge; and Marilyn Schrantz. This is a nice start for this two-year-old Center!

The group picture is (L to R standing): Fr. Irv Cutter, Rector, Gretchen Bealer, Nancy Hawkins, Tricia Jones Diocese of West Texas Regional Representative, Liz Conklyn, Mary Tacy Young, center leader, and (sitting) Marilyn Schrantz.

All Lay Chaplains were treated with charming goody bags including COHI-themed cookies.