Earth & Soul Annual Retreat, The Great Search 1, Richmond VA

The teachings of this retreat are based on John Philip Newell’s forthcoming book The Great Search: Turning to Earth and Soul in the Quest for Healing and Home (especially Chapters 1, 2, and 3, drawing on the wisdom of Thomas Berry, Nan Shepherd, and Martin Buber).

The text for this three-year program is John Philip Newell’s forthcoming book The Great Search (releasing August 2024). In the meantime, his is the recommended reading. The shared prayer book for this program is .

In 2016 John Philip Newell began the Earth & Soul initiative, including a series of annual retreats (now called Sacred Earth Sacred Soul – Celtic Wisdom) to help reawaken awareness of the sacred in all things through the recovery of Celtic wisdom for today and to help translate this awareness into compassionate action in our lives and world.

In 2022 he began a second series of annual retreats (called The Quest for Healing and Home – The Great Search) to address the deep spiritual yearnings of this moment in time and to help give birth to new beginnings in our lives and world. 

Both these series follow a three-year cycle of teaching and spiritual practice in the context of annual retreats. Participants may join at any stage in the three-year cycle and attend any of the Earth & Soul venues across the country.

About John Philip Newell:

John Philip Newell (born 1953) is a Celtic teacher and author of spirituality who calls the modern world to reawaken to the sacredness of Earth and every human being.

Canadian by birth, and a citizen also of Scotland, he resides with his family in Edinburgh and works on both sides of the Atlantic. In 2016 he began the Earth & Soul initiative and teaches regularly in the United States and Canada as well as leading international pilgrimage weeks on Iona in the Western Isles of Scotland.

His PhD is from the University of Edinburgh and he has authored over fifteen books, including his latest award-winning publication, Sacred Earth Sacred Soul, which was the 2022 Gold Winner of the Nautilus Book Award for Spirituality and Religious Thought of the West. His forthcoming book (August 2024), also with Harper One, is The Great Search, in which he looks at the great spiritual yearnings of humanity today in the context of the decline of religion as we have known it.

Newell speaks of himself as ‘a wandering teacher’ following the ancient path of many lone teachers before him in the Celtic world, ‘wandering Scots’ (or scotus vagans as they were called) seeking the wellbeing of the world. He has been described as having ‘the heart of a Celtic bard and the mind of a Celtic scholar’, combining in his teachings the poetic and the intellectual, the head as well as the heart, and spiritual awareness as well as political and ecological concern. His writings have been translated into seven languages. In 2020 he relinquished his ordination as a minister of the Church of Scotland as no longer reflecting the heart of his belief in the sacredness of Earth and every human being. He continues, however, to see himself as ‘a grateful son of the Christian household’ seeking to be in relationship with the wisdom of humanity’s other great spiritual traditions.

In 2011 John Philip was awarded the first-ever Contemplative Voices Award from the Shalem Institute in Washington DC for his prophetic work in the field of spirituality and compassion. In 2022 he received the Sacred Universe Award from the Well Center for Spirituality in Chicago, IL in recognition of his significant work in furthering humanity's relationship with the sacredness of Earth.

Host or Publisher School of Earth & Soul, Virginia