Prayer Retreats 2011

Regent College invites you to deepen your capacity to listen and respond to God. We have one guided prayer retreat remaining as part of this year's Summer Programs.

The retreat will be lead by Dennis Okholm and will be held at St. Helen's Anglican Church, which is close to Regent College and is situated opposite a scenic park with panoramic views of the water, the city, and the mountains, and within walking distance of the beaches. The prayer retreat will include teaching, guided silent prayer, and lunch. Fasting during lunch is optional.

Encounters with Jesus (July 16)

At this prayer retreat will reflect on encounters Jesus had with certain individuals in the gospel accounts. We will look at what insights we can gain from how God meets us in Christ, and how our lives might be affected by such encounters—just as in each of the gospel encounters, people were never the same again.

Dennis Okholm is a professor of theology at Azusa Pacific University (Azusa, CA). He has been ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA) for nearly three decades, though he finds himself on the Canterbury trail. Prior to his return to his native state, California, he taught at three other institutions, most recently his alma mater, Wheaton College (IL), where he earned a BA in philosophy. He has an MDiv and an MA (church history) from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and a ThM and PhD in Systematic Theology from Princeton Theological Seminary.

Dennis has authored and edited several books, the most recent being Monk Habits for Everyday People (Brazos)—reflections on spirituality from several decades hanging around monastics as an oblate of the Benedictine order. He has done short-term mission work, taught in Sudan, Kenya, Romania, and Honduras; spoken at retreats and conferences; and has been involved in interfaith dialogues. "Doc Ok" (his nickname) especially enjoys researching early monastic literature and will be finishing a book on the seven deadly sins tradition as a Christian psychology during an upcoming sabbatical.

His wife Trevecca is Minister of Children and Families at St. Andrews Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach, California. They have a son, Ryan, who waits tables in L.A. and is married to a burgeoning screenwriter. And they have a daughter, Emily, who, along with her husband, Keith Ganzer, graduated from Regent last year and is now engaged in parish ministry in Montreal, while rearing the Okholms' first grandchild.

Dennis will be teaching Benedictine Spirituality for the Rest of Us during Regent's 2011 Summer Programs.