Nineteen women — all strangers — came together for a weekend.

        They were Christian — some Catholic, others Protestant. And they ate, slept and prayed together.

        And they talked about race. When they parted, they parted friends, committed to each other and to each other's causes.

        “Wow, was it inspiring,” said Rachel Anderson, a 62-year-old postal retiree from Evanston. Ms. Anderson, who is black, said she felt that the other participants really listened to her.

        “When a stranger asks you to expose yourself, it can be so cleansing,” she said.

        It was a small but potent dose of racial healing, said participants of the Tristate's first Racial Healing Weekend Retreat for Women, held Oct. 12-14 at the Sisters of Charity Spirituality Center in Delhi Township.

        The retreat was the brainchild of a focus group of women who suggested to the Sisters of Charity planners a weekend retreat on race, said Sister Carol Brenner, one of the organizers.

        Though organizers had a goal of 30 women — 10 white, 10 black, 10 Hispanic — 19 proved to be the magic number, Sister Brenner said. The group was small enough to get each mem ber involved.

        Two facilitators from the National Conference for Community and Justice led the exercises.

        April Vale, a white Price Hill resident, said the racial hurt she heard changed her views on police-community interactions.

        “You don't realize how much you don't know,” she said.

        “You hear about things and you normally would have jumped to judgment. But when you hear it from someone else's perspective, someone like you, who goes to church every Sunday morning. ... If I hear of a situation between a cop and a black person, I think (I) will not be so quick to judge who's right and who's wrong.”

        Ms. Anderson said she described how, throughout her life, each time her family would move to a racially integrated neighborhood, it didn't stay integrated for long — white neighbors and businesses would move out. Her parish church would go from a mixed congregation to a predominantly black congregation. The sense of rejection was deep.

        “You say you'll never see each other again, so you can be honest. We were honest, and the pain came out,” she said.

        On Sunday, each participant paired with another of a different race to stay in contact with for at least 12 months. The group also formed a phone chain to support people's efforts to change their community.

        The phone chain is already working, Ms. Anderson said. Several retreat participants have contacted her to sign up with her as volunteers at a soup kitchen.

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