WHAT we do monthly, we can and should do also annually, except that this time we spend a little more of effort. Moreover, the duration of the exercise is much longer, and the environment more conducive for deeper reflection. This is what the annual retreat provides.
A really big effort is required for doing an annual retreat. We have to go out of our way – literally, – drop our usual work load, and arrange for an out-of-town stay. We have to be prepared to go to a figurative “desert place”, away from the usual hustle and bustle of our natural physical environment. Just setting the dates up, booking a place, and ensuring that we can actually go on the pre-determined dates would require a deep and serious commitment to actually doing the retreat.
Moreover, we have to be prepared to be out for at least three days. That is a long time for any person burdened with a heavy and complicated schedule. One has to be prepared to cut the “umbilical cord” that ties us to our work and our other usual activities. And then, there is this special atmosphere that must go with a retreat: it is a time for long silence, when we generally stay away from the usual banter we strike up with people who are with us. Many of us are not used to keeping quiet and staying silent for any stretch of time, and much less if that silence is to be used as an occasion for a long, uninterrupted conversation with our father God.
Why all this fuss about doing a retreat, then?
It is an opportunity to look at our life and our work as one whole, indeed against the context of our birth and our eventual but inevitable death. Within this panoramic context, we set our over-all relationship with our father God and examine it carefully. How much of a good child have we been? And what do we have to do in order to please him so much more? This provides us with the framework for our personal prayer – a long, really intimate conversation with God.
The silence we observe during a retreat is only external. It pertains only to the usual conversation with the other persons around us. We refrain from engaging in such usual conversation so as to enable us to carry on an intense, continuing conversation with our father God. We review our life and our work. We think of the time we still have here on earth; and we consider the time when we have to pass from this world, and render an account of our life and work to God. The concrete topics and eventual resolutions this type of conversation would inspire us to bring up in our personal dialogue with God!
In a retreat, we do the same things that we do during a monthly evening of recollection. We review our life, taking a much closer, more detained look at all of the strategic priorities in our personal road map. After a deep examination of our life, we go to a more general confession, which can cover a longer stretch of our life (much longer than the weekly horizon we have when we go to our regular weekly confession). We may also have a longer chat with a spiritual mentor. We can also use the occasion to stock up our mind and heart with good ideas and great yearnings that would help orient our life and work more directly towards God.
What we get out of a retreat – after all that time and effort – is the peace of a conscience that has fully opened itself to the grace and work of the Spirit of God. It is a very good preparation for a good, peaceful, and happy death. It is one of the best insurance policies we can take out for a truly successful life, marked by our eventual entry into eternal happiness in the bosom of our father God.