Retreats

Laudato Si’ - Caring for All Creation

Hallmark #3 – We educate for and act on behalf of justice, peace, and care for all creation.

Retreat opens with students presenting their year-long interdisciplinary projects focused on stewardship. This retreat emphasizes the importance of their work on this project and connects these ideas to their lives. Focusing on God’s love for all creation, students explore how recognizing and allowing themselves to accept God’s love, they love and care for all of creation. This day involves faith sharing, Eucharistic Adoration, personal reflection, and class bonding activities centered on God’s love and the call to protect and act out of love for community and creation.

My Command is This: Love Each Other as I Have Loved You.

Hallmark #2 – We honor the dignity and sacredness of each person.

This retreat helps students understand the love God has for each individual, and how they are all called to love one another by honoring the sacredness and dignity of each person — loving others the way God loves us. This day involves faith sharing, Eucharistic Adoration, class bonding activities focused on loving one another through friendship to create a community that fosters a sense of belonging.

One Body with Many Members

Hallmark #5 – We embrace the gift of diversity.

This retreat empowers students to acknowledge the individual gifts and talents they possess, and how the diversity among them is what creates a beautiful community that fosters a sense of belonging for all. This day consists of faith sharing, personal reflection, a teaching Mass, and activities that help students understand that the diversity among them is a gift from God and how each of them uniquely contributes to creating community.

Sawubona – Seeing and Being God’s Goodness

Hallmark #1 – We proclaim by our lives even more than by our words that God is good.

One of the retreats’ main objectives is to encourage students to honor each person’s dignity and sacredness by seeing and being God’s goodness. An opening prayer service focusing on the “masks” each person wears in everyday life, emphasizes the need for individuals to be authentically themselves, accepting and loving others for who they are called to be by God. This day involves a class-wide service opportunity, faith sharing, and group bonding exercises to bring the class together in faith.

Leading With Love.

Hallmark #6 – We create community among those with whom we work and with those we serve.

This retreat is designed for the rising senior class to think about the leaders they hope to be in the coming school year and the community they want to create. The focus is on moving forward as leaders who are loved by God, loved by others, loved by self. This day involves faith sharing, a self-reflection meditation, and peer affirmations all focused on the importance of creating community among the class in the coming year as well as the NDA community. Students envision how they can foster a sense of belonging for each student next year.

The Vision of St. Julie

Hallmark #7 – We develop holistic learning communities which educate for life.

This retreat encourages students to reflect on what they have learned at NDA, and how they will carry this with them wherever they go in life. This day consists of prayer, personal reflection, faith sharing, and activities that help students consider how their holistic education at NDA has prepared them for whatever comes next after graduation.

Junior and Seniors selected for this highly coveted leadership position attend an annual retreat in August. This prepares the students to be servant leaders in the NDA community.