Marriage Retreat: May

About a Matrimony Retreat

While separate rooms are provided all to help with the spirit of silence, such a retreat gives that long-desired occasion to establish resolutions in common with your spouse or fiancee, both moving again at the same speed. No longer is it one who goes on retreat and comes home to find the other unprepared to make adjustments and/or changes. It is both “head” and “heart” of the family that hear the same words, heed the same advice and look in the same direction at their goals. Each forms personal resolutions for himself; but that is not enough. They are a unit. They are one, and so they talk quietly together on their evening walks and form the best resolve for both. No one can dispute the worth of having in the priest an objective judge of age-old friction or grudges borne. Practical programs of improvement are set in place that will make daily life better for years to come.

The many couples who never received proper preparation for the beautiful sacrament of matrimony find here that of which they were deprived. To learn the same rules is so necessary for Catholic married life and proper expression of conjugal love, but these rules cannot be covered from the Sunday pulpit. Some things are too sacred for all to hear. A retreat can help to fill this hole.

Moreover, the common mistakes in raising children, which are so difficult to spell out in public without the children themselves thinking less of their parents, can be dealt with here, lest they be realized only too late.

Or as age creeps on and serious changes of life take place, we find ourselves poorly equipped to make decisions on things we had never questioned before. Perhaps it is time to ask advice, as we are not the only ones who struggle with the adjustment and who are called to refine our love.

Some find themselves speaking a different language than their spouse. Maybe it is time for the priest to act as translator? Some see nothing higher than the chores of the day. What is it all for? Over and over again, the same old tasks? Learn to look higher and see your amazing role.

Or is it a problem of forgiveness for true offenses that have cut so deep? One can love another who has sinned, but it is not easy. Sometimes no remedy is enough without a retreat. You may find that mountains become mole-hills on retreat.