Brothers,
You are invited to a 4-hour interactive online retreat focused on transforming racial pain in America. The event is hosted by Ohio Illuman and will be led by Byron McMillan and Dr. Bill Clark. Details of the event are below. We hope you will join us for what we believe will be a ground breaking new program within Illuman. Please also urge the men in your community to consider joining us. Your participation matters!
Interactive Online Retreat Details
The pain you do not transform you transmit.
Fr. Richard Rohr
Date
Saturday, July 25, 2020
Time
1 PM - 5 PM EASTERN
Retreat Leaders
Byron McMillan & Dr. Bill Clark
Location / Platform
A Zoom link will be provided to registrants
Cost
$50
(*Scholarships Available - To request assistance, send email to info@ohioilluman.org)
Retreat Leaders
Byron McMillan
Byron McMillan is a former Army Captain and decorated combat veteran turned nonviolent contemplative peacemaker. He is from Raleigh, North Carolina and a graduate of East Carolina University. Byron is the founder of RiverFlow Communications and has been deeply influenced by the School for Conversion in Durham, North Carolina, the Christian Community Development Association, MIT’s U-Journey, Illuman, the Mystic Soul Project, and the Center for Action and Contemplation, where he completed the Living School in 2019. He humbly acknowledges all his faults and failures on his unending journey of descent where he is slowly learning to observe and experience all things in love. Byron McMillan currently resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Dr. Bill Clark has been the Northwest Director of Peace Catalyst International (PCI) since 2012. PCI Is a faith-based nonprofit that works closely with building bridges between Christian and Muslim communities. He and his wife Julie lived and worked in China for 10 years before moving to Kazakhstan. Living and working among Muslims in Central Asia is what birthed in them the desire to be peacemakers upon their return to the US. Slowly that work began to include the painful history of Black people and the systemic racism which undergirds a social system that is designed to work best for people who look like him. Oh, and he did have a side gig as a concert promoter. After discovering the local Bosnian Muslim community loved jazz, he promoted a series of jazz concerts that raised money for humanitarian projects in Muslim communities.
Dr. Bill Clark
Registration
Course Outline & Preparation
(You will also receive this information in a registration confirmation email.)
Evidence of transmitted pain is prevalent throughout America. It appears we are at a pivotal time to truly begin transforming this pain, but how do we do this?
In this 4-hour interactive online retreat we will:
Reckon with our past
Where did the concept of race come from?
How did race shape America’s beginning?
Documented history from black and brown perspective that is not taught in our schools
Reveal truths about our current systems and structures shaped by race and linked to our nation’s historical record:
Mass Incarceration
Health disparities based on race
What the 2nd Amendment is really about
Reparations to the descendants of American slaves
Police Brutality
Share personal stories
What did we learn as children about race?
How did what we learn impact our adult living?
How do we see race today?
Why are you curious about white privilege?
What have these past few months been like for you?
Commit to healing
Ourselves
Our communities
In preparation for this course:
Listen to at least two of the following podcasts:
Take notes and come prepared to learn and share
Pray, ponder, meditate on, think about the Warrior-Spirit Prayer of Awakening:
May all beings be granted with strength, determination and wisdom to extinguish anger and reject violence as a way.
May all suffering cease and may I seek, find, and fully realize the love and compassion
that already lives within me and allow them to inspire and permeate my every action.May I exercise the precious gift of choice and the power to change that which makes me uniquely human and is the only true path to liberation.
May I swiftly reach complete, effortless freedom so that my fearless, unhindered action be of the benefit to ALL.
May I lead the life of a warrior. Angel Kyodo Williams (From Radical Dharma p.93-94)