Why a Weekend Retreat?
Two key opportunities set a weekend retreat apart: There is more time for prayer and relationship-building, and there is an opportunity to “get away” and sink into a new and perhaps meaningful place. Because a weekend retreat is inherently a heavier lift for both the organizer and the participants, leaning into these two distinctions is essential for creating a fruitful experience.
Getting Away
There are retreat centers everywhere, and each one is different. A center may be built around a particularly holy site or simply overlook a beautiful vista. Some are home to religious orders and consequently embody a particular charism. No matter where you go, it’s worth learning the history and meaning of the place itself – or, put another way, asking why retreatants should travel from their homes to this place?
This is an important consideration: How will retreatants get to your retreat? Is there good public transit available? Will you organize a carpool? You don’t want distance to be a deterrent.
What’s more, you’ll want to make sure the retreat center can adequately host your group. You’ll want to get a sense of the accommodations: Can the center satisfy a variety of dietary needs? What are the rooms like, and will folks need to share? Is there adequate space for small group sharing, and is there a room big enough and equipped to handle your primary presentations?
Once there, you’ll want to make good use of the space. Integrate the campus itself into your retreat. Will you invite participants to go on a nature walk, pray with the images hanging in the hallway, or spend time with the charism of the religious sisters who own the building? Again, since you — and the retreatants — have gone through the trouble to “get away,” make it worth everyone’s effort.
Building the Retreat
The retreat can follow a similar structure as a day retreat, but the retreat itself obviously has more room to breathe. That means you can take longer with introductions on the first night; your icebreaker can take a full hour if necessary. Give folks the chance to get to know who they’re spending their weekend with.
You might consider reflecting on a story arc to sustain the retreat: the first day introduces the theme and the participants; the second day invites a deepening sense of self, engaging with challenge and personal struggle; and, the third day provides some celebration of self—the setup, the conflict, and the resolution. Reflect on these questions: Who am I? Whose am I? Who am I called to be? You can then hang your theme on this scaffold.
If you have a team of leaders, be sure to prepare them in advance through a series of pre-retreat formation meetings. Use this time to cast a shared vision for the retreat’s theme and to workshop any talks or activities that will be presented. Remember: the point of a talk isn’t to make retreatants cry – it’s to share a personal experience of God that helps listeners better understand God at work in their own lives. Be sure leaders know how to facilitate small groups.
If your retreat begins with dinner on Friday and ends with lunch on Sunday, that gives plenty of time for presentations, small groups, and personal prayer. You might also consider a communal activity for Saturday night—a movie that hits on some of the retreat’s themes, for example—and some sort of ritual to end the retreat experience, perhaps Mass.
Remember: a weekend retreat can be a formative experience for a group, so having clear next steps for participants (i.e. a service activity, a social, etc.) is a great way to sustain momentum and deepen community
