Clarissa and Zachary

Clarissa and I went on a Catholic Engaged Encounter Retreat. It was an overnight retreat from February 13 to 14 at the Christ the King Retreat Center. It was a great opportunity for Clarissa and me to get away from the distractions of life and spend some time focusing on our relationship and our upcoming marriage.

Two couples and a priest led the retreat and gave the talks. One of the couples was unable to stay for the second day so we got a new couple the morning of the second day. The presentations included topics like finances, raising children, intimacy and sex, natural family planning, and prayer. The format of the weekend really was conducive to growing as a couple. We listened to the presentation. When the talk was over, we wrote about the talk focusing on the provided discussion questions. After a period of writing, Clarissa and I joined up in our discussion room and read what the other wrote. When we were done, we would discuss what we had written and the topic as a whole.

Many of the presentations were quite good, and the personal witness and examples that the couples provided really helped put the lifelong commitment that is marriage in perspective. One unexpected, but very neat, aspect of the retreat were the experiences that the priest had to offer. He talked about his “marriage” with us, the Church, and it very similarly mirrored what the two couples were talking about in their own marriages.

The accommodations at the retreat center were quite nice, and the food was pretty good. Meals were really our only opportunity to socialize with other couples on the retreat. Even though Clarissa and I had roommates in our (separate) rooms, we really did not have much time to get to know them. However, that did not feel like too big of a deal because of how much Clarissa and I grew as a couple over the course of the weekend.