Benefits of a Retreat: 10 Rs to look forward to when you go on a spiritual retreat

 A Retreat gives at least 10 Rs: 

• Refreshes
• Revitalizes for purposeful action
• Reconciles with God, our Creator and loving Savior
• Repairs deep-seated moral deficiencies
• Reduces stress and anxiety levels
• Rests and relaxes the soul
• Redirects away from trouble, the pains of purgatory and eternal damnation
• Restores our spiritual and even physical health
• Recreates you towards the best version of yourself
• Reconfigures you to live the Life of Love and Deep Joy of Jesus Christ. 

10 Reasons You Need to Go on Retreat this Year

by Nick Bernard in Life Teen (excerpts) 

1. You Need Rest. Even God took time to rest when He created the world!

2. Your Savior Needed a Retreat. Throughout the Gospels, Christ periodically takes time to step away from the world, and even from His disciples, to be alone with His Father.

3. You Need Community. Friendships centered on Christ will change your life, and a retreat is a perfect place to foster these relationships.

4. You Need to be on God’s Time (Kairos, anybody?). While on retreat, we sometimes seem to be in another world. We step out of our normal routine and live on God’s time, also known in Greek as Kairos. 

5. You Need Reflection. While retreats have the potential to change our lives in the future, they also give us a chance to look back at our past. By reflecting on who we’ve been, we can better understand who God desires us to become.

6. You Need Prayer. Retreats give us a unique opportunity to concentrate on prayer more than we do in everyday life. [And prayer, relationship with God is "the one thing necessary." (Lk 10:42)]

7. Your Life Needs to get Wrecked. Stepping into God’s love for a retreat weekend might reveal to us a relationship we need to change, a prayer style we ought to alter, or a perspective we hadn’t yet seen about a life decision. 

8. You Need Reconciliation. The gift of the Sacrament of Reconciliation gives us the chance to clear our lives of the sin that separates us from God and others.

9. You Need to Receive Jesus to be a Disciple. Retreats allow us to refocus our gaze on Him and reunite our efforts to His Spirit, enabling us to persevere in our mission as disciples.

10. You Need to Be Open to Changing Your Life. Retreats will not magically transform our lives but they can show us how to change our own lives. 

Why go on a Spiritual Retreat? 

by Fr. Francis Hoffmann

The powerful benefits of time alone with God  

You could be as wealthy as a king -- yet miserable -- if you have no friends. Or you could be as poor as dirt -- yet happy -- because you're surrounded by loved ones. 

A recent study of human happiness by the distinguished British economist Richard Layard concludes that the most significant factor for personal happiness is relationships with other people. And what personal relationship could be more important than the relationship with God? 

The saints -- who were notoriously happy -- gave witness to this reality. Even St. Maximilian Kolbe, the Claretian Martyrs of Barbastro, and the Carmelite nuns of Compiegne sang hymns of joy on their way to martyrdom. Immersed in conditions that would make mere mortals sad, these friends of God faced suffering with joy. It was their friendship with God that gave them strength and joy. 

But friendship takes time and needs to be strengthened by conversation. Couples who have strong marriages will tell you about the importance of getting away for a long weekend to spend time alone in conversation. We need to do the same with God, and that's why the Church warmly recommends annual retreats for the faithful. 

Retreats are a time away from our normal activities to spend time getting reacquainted with God, to examine the priorities of life and to make concrete and practical resolutions for improvement. Retreats can be a powerful step toward personal conversion. 

An Ancient Practice 

Before Our Lord began His public ministry, He spent 40 days in the desert praying and fasting as a way to prepare for the important work ahead (see Lk 4:1-13). Those were days of retreat.

During His three years of public ministry, Jesus would sometimes invite His disciples to "come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while" (Mk 6:31). Again, days of retreat. 

When Jesus entered forcefully into the life of St. Paul, He directed him to rise and go into the city, where he would be told what to do. For three days St. Paul neither ate nor drank, preparing himself to receive the spiritual direction of Ananias (see Acts 9:1-9). Those, too, were days of retreat