Point Loma Nazarene University’s Spiritual Renewal Week offered students the opportunity to participate in a “Prayer & Yoga” event that counted toward their required chapel attendance. Students said the event offered a calming space to slow down, reflect and reconnect with their faith during a busy week.
The event was hosted on Nov. 4 at McCullough Park at 4 p.m. It combined physical movement, mindfulness and spiritual reflection.
Spiritual Renewal Week happens once a semester and is designed to provide students with moments of rest, prayer and spiritual reconnection. According to Kirstyn Teegarden, director of discipleship ministries and creative arts, the addition of yoga as one of the week’s events came from her experience in seminary.
“Our ‘Prayer & Yoga’ event has been a regular part of Renewal Week since fall 2022, which is when I started here at PLNU on the chapel team,” Teegarden said in an email interview. “The church I was attending at the time hosted what was called ‘holy yoga,’ where one of the parishioners would combine yoga with spiritual practices of prayer and scripture reading.”
The event was led by yoga instructor Brooke Thompson of Honey and Soul Co., who has been teaching yoga for 13 years and has led the event during Spiritual Renewal Week for the past three years.
“Yoga is the practice of connecting your breath to your body to your thoughts,” Thompson said in an email interview. “It is a tool that helps to calm the nervous system through breath work. And the yoga postures help to relieve stress in the body, then, we can focus the busy mind on meditation, on Scripture and communion through prayer.”
Teegarden said she hoped the event would offer students a new way to engage with prayer outside of a traditional chapel setting. Thompson’s guidance, which included a series of movements, breathing exercises and moments of prayer and reflection, helped accomplish that.
“I begin by finding an intention that I want to weave through the entire class,” Thompson said. “It can be a scripture, poem, quote, etc. I will sometimes incorporate a breath-prayer or mantra to help practice breathwork and mind-focus. Then I will build the movement and music around the intention, using the postures and body to connect it all together.”
Teegarden said the location of McCullough Park plays a major role in creating a peaceful atmosphere for participants. Thompson added that the setting is a connection to mindfulness and faith.
“The gorgeous sunset, trees, clouds, breeze and ocean view is a perfect place to use the five senses to connect to the present moment,” Thompson said. “Creation connects us to the Creator and brings a sense of peace.”
For students, the combination of a calming environment and reflective practice made the experience meaningful. Sarah Tischbern, a second-year psychology major, described it as a time to slow down and think more intentionally about faith and mindfulness.
“It felt very calming, like I remember when we started lying down, and I was right under the tree, just looking at the leaves blowing,” Tischbern said. “And it’s just very relaxing.”
Sophia Schmit, a third-year graphic design major, also appreciated the event’s setting and timing.
“McCullough Park is such a beautiful space; I think it was perfect for this event,” Schmit said. “It’s one of the few places on our campus that feels secluded and like you’re really in nature. The sun was setting, and you could also see the moon as we were wrapping up the session, which added to the serene feeling.”
Both students said that the session helped them feel more grounded during a busy semester. For Teegarden, the idea of rest and relaxation reflects what the week is all about.
“When I think about renewal, I think of it as a kind of returning, coming back to God and letting God breathe life into places that have grown tired or weary,” Teegarden said. “It’s about being recentered and reminded of who we are in him.”
Payton Bruce