What is Marriage Encounter?

The Marriage Encounter weekend is a weekend of rediscovering yourself, your spouse and your marital relationship.

The Marriage Encounter is a positive personal experience for a couple, which offers you a technique of loving communication and dialogue that you can use for the rest of your lives.  Marriage Encounter is not a retreat or a marriage counseling session.  It is not a time to look at the past but rather an opportunity to look at your future together.  It is a weekend of allowing God to be the center of your marriage.

 Marriage Encounter is for any couple who wants to enrich their marriage.  The weekend is designed to expand and deepen the joys a couple share together, whether they have been married a short time or for many years.

We welcome all faiths: however, the Marriage Encounter is conducted in the framework of Christianity and is expressed in traditions and understanding of the Christian Faith. What happens at the Marriage Encounter?

An atmosphere is created on the weekend in which the couples can concentrate exclusively on one another.  A series of talks are given by a priest and a team of trained couples.  Each talk gives the husband and wife an opportunity to look at themselves as individuals and to look at their relationship as husband and wife.  It starts with the love you have for your spouse and helps you to build, expand and deepen that relationship.  The weekend shows you the way to do this and provides you with the means.  The rest is up to you.

The Marriage Encounter weekend is oriented strictly to each individual couple.  The presentations are given to the group as a whole.  After each presentation, the couple is given time, in privacy of their room for their own personal dialogue.  There is no group discussion.

 Does a Marriage Encounter enhance a good marriage?

Yes.  It becomes better.  The difference between marriages that are good, average and poor, is the level of communication between husband and wife.  In all marriages, there are times when the husband and wife take each other and their relationship for granted.  This weekend presents each couple with the opportunity to stop, take a fresh look at themselves, their partner, their marriage and their priorities for their relationship.  The Marriage Encounter weekend experience offers each couple the insights, tools and the confidence to enrich their love for one another.

Where are the Marriage Encounter weekends held?

Marriage Encounter weekends are usually held at retreat houses.  Weekends begin on Friday evening and conclude on Sunday afternoon.  In most cases, there is a waiting list for the weekend, so when you decide to attend, please make your reservation as soon as possible.

Some reactions:

"We began our journey of discovering and learning.  Here we felt the healing we hoped for.  The genuine forgiveness we never thought possible.  Here we regained the love we though was lost.  Most important of all, we found the missing cornerstone needed to prop up our marriage -- God in the center of our lives."

"The Marriage Encounter experience opened our minds to a better understanding of each other and to feel a love so deep and so true.  A love we believe is in every marriage if only both husband and wife would put their hearts and souls into keeping the sanctity of their marriage vows."

"The Marriage Encounter for us was a weekend of hope, giving insight on how beautiful a marriage can be if nurtured and loved."

"My spouse and I love each other very much, but we felt that the world was slowly pushing us apart.  Daily problems with money, the children, and our jobs were steadily becoming more important than our relationship.  Marriage Encounter has helped put things back in the proper perspective.  It's great!"