About.

Gardener's House is a response to the call of Jesus of Christ heard through people's need for a time apart, pray and discern. Characterized by hospitality, welcoming the rich diversity of all persons we are an offering of compassion, focusing on the needs of individuals. It embodies a unique lifestyle focusing resources to help people hear what God wants to say to them in a setting of silence and solitude.

What is a Contemplative Community?

A contemplative community experiences the contours of a Love that: welcomes one another, reveals our identity, gives us our vocation, sustains us in our vocation, holds us accountable for living responsibly (growing in depth), guides our journey, shares one another's joy and supports one another through sorrow, sickness, death and the breadth of life's challenges.

A true contemplative community implies a way of life, a way of living and seeing reality; it implies above all constant attentiveness as we go through our daily activities. This daily activity is also known as the "daily round." It is composed of simple things - providing a meal, gathering regularly in contemplation, praying with and for each other - as well as recognizing the gifts of joy and celebration. Being in community also calls us to forgive seventy times seventy-seven.
Contemplative community is created when its members accept that they are not going to achieve great things, that they are not going to be heroes, but that they will simply live each day with new hope, like children, in wonderment as the sun rises and in thanksgiving as it sets. Contemplative community is created when we recognize that the greatness of humanity lies in the acceptance of our insignificance, our human condition and our earth. It is made manifest when we thank God for having put in a finite body the seeds of eternity which are visible in small and daily gestures of love and forgiveness.

The Holy Spirit has worked and is working to form this contemplative community, Gardener’s House of Prayer, as a community of grace around Jesus and the story of God’s love for us. It is a physical and spiritual space that supports the discovery of our spiritual gifts, celebrates both the synergy and diversity of these gifts within the community, and lovingly supports the exercising (praxis) of these gifts within the community and throughout God's Creation. (1 Corinthians 12).​

Gardener's House of Prayer Rule: Trellis of Life

The Rule of Life was written by Saint Benedict in the sixth century as a guide for individual, autonomous communities. A rule of life is not mandatory or coercive. It is a choice for establishing a pattern that nourishes and grows us spiritually. In establishing a rule of life we must consider several ideas. Honoring this contemplative tradition, Gardener's House of Prayer offers this Trellis of Life as the pattern that we set for our daily lives:
  • One commits to seeking, recognizing, and loving God in daily life.
  • One accepts and uses contemplative practice, the quiet ordering of the soul through prayer.
  • One commits to praxis (or intentional, regular practice of an exercise or pattern) that includes personal prayer and/or group prayer intended to discern God’s call on our lives. As we participate through prayer and study in the community of the Triune God, everyone at Gardener’s is also, in God, in community with one another.
  • One gathers with others of similar mind to share a meal or an activity, with the intention of celebrating the gifts of God in our hearts and in our world. Prayer is foremost of this gathering.
  • One commits to growing closer to others in the Spirit of Christ. Through praxis we grow closer to God and to others. As we grow in communion with others, we grow in faith, hope and love.
  • One commits to helping others on the journey to discover the Divine.
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Suzanne Broussard
Spiritual Director

Suzanne Broussard is a certified spiritual director with 25 years of experience in clinical settings; religious education, spiritual and retreat ministries with a focus on the holistic development of adult spiritual formation, ecumenical and interfaith, individuals and groups. She provides solid theological knowledge about the life of the Spirit; fidelity to a personal faith journey as well as openness to transformation; compassion—someone who listens and with whom you can be at ease; who takes your quest seriously and facilitates your growth in trust; a life of prayer and acceptance; and commitment to hold confidences.

Here for You

Gardener's House provides a supportive praying community and competent spiritual direction. Study of and research in Christian Eastern and Western Spirituality is provided.