College can be a very stressful time to try and decide what to do with the rest of your life. To help students figure out these next steps, the Trinity Chaplaincy will be sponsoring a pre-spring semester retreat for sophomores and juniors, titled “At the Crossroads of the Adventure.”

The retreat is a way for Trinity students to come together and discover more about who they are, the different types of roles and identities they take on and what kind of directions they want to take for their next steps in life.

“It’s not about what you’re going to do with the rest of your life, but it’s about making the next smaller steps and being intentional about those small steps,” said Stephen Nickle, Trinity’s chaplain.

The first part of the retreat will focus on creating a small, close-knit community and will then move on to bigger themes like  “exploring the contours of my identity,” “determining the values and instruments of my vocation,” “recognizing beneficiaries of my vocation” and “living with the hardships of my vocation.”

Working with Nickle at the retreat will be John Lewis, who has been an adjunct professor in the religion department for the past 10 years.

“He does a lot of work with vocation and how our work settings and our work callings interact with who we are as whole human beings,” Nickle said.

The retreat will take place at Mo-Ranch, a 500-acre camp and conference center in the Texas Hill Country. Nickle appreciates the large open spaces and beautiful scenery of the ranch.

“Just the place itself is evocative,” Nickle said.

Although the Trinity Chaplaincy has sponsored other retreats in the past, this is “the first one that is focused primarily on vocation broadly defined,” Nickle said.

One of the topics of the retreat will be how religion and faith traditions can shape our vocation.

“There are a lot of different categories of being that we occupy in life,” Nickle said. “Religion can definitely be one of those categories of being.”

However, the retreat is not directed toward students of any particular religion. In fact, Nickle believes having students with a variety of different perspectives on religion would be beneficial to the retreat.

“All these kinds of questions can be answered from a purely secular angle, and that can be a very interesting process, and these questions can also be informed or spiced up from different perspectives of faith,” Nickle said.

Because the discussions will be largely focused on things like making the next steps in life and finding possible directions, Nickle is hoping to work with students “who are willing to step back and really examine their life, but also potential trajectories.”

The retreat will take place from Jan. 12-14. The cost is $40, or $20 for the first 15 people who turn in their checks. Space is limited, but spots are still available. Contact Nickle at [email protected] or 210-999-7341 for more information about the retreat, and check LeeRoy for the link to sign up.