Divine Retreat Centre

The next retreat at Somersby is the Marian Retreat, which runs from Friday evening, 9 October, to Sunday afternoon, 11 October. It is residential: you come up on the Friday and stay until the final blessing on the Sunday. Below is the whole of it, hour by hour, exactly as the centre has set it out.

Friday 9 October

5:45 pm — Volunteers’ prayer
6:00 pm — Song, Rosary
6:30 pm — Dinner
7:30 pm — Divine Mercy Chaplet
7:45 pm — Holy Mass
8:45 pm — Instruction
9:00 pm — Rest

The first evening is deliberately short. People are arriving after work and after the drive up, so the day asks for very little: the Rosary, dinner, the chaplet, Mass, and a word of instruction about how the retreat will run. Lights out at nine.

Saturday 10 October

7:00 am — Angelus and Rosary
7:25 am — Talk
8:00 am — Breakfast
9:30 am — Song
9:45 am — Talk
10:30 am — Tea break
11:15 am — Song
11:30 am — Talk
12:15 pm — Lunch
1:30 pm — Song
1:40 pm — Talk
2:15 pm — Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament
2:45 pm — Confession
3:00 pm — Divine Mercy
3:30 pm — Way of the Cross
3:45 pm — Tea
5:00 pm — Praise and worship
5:10 pm — Talk
5:50 pm — Break
6:00 pm — Mass
7:00 pm — Dinner
8:00 pm — Silent Adoration

Saturday is the long day, and the shape of it is worth reading twice. The morning is four talks with singing between them and meals around them. The afternoon turns from listening to praying: the Blessed Sacrament is exposed at a quarter past two, confession begins at a quarter to three, and the Divine Mercy chaplet is prayed at three — the hour, which is not an accident at a centre with a Shrine of St Faustina. The Way of the Cross follows. The day closes with silent adoration at eight.

Sunday 11 October

7:00 am — Angelus and Rosary
7:25 am — Talk
8:00 am — Breakfast
9:30 am — Holy Mass
10:30 am — Tea break
11:15 am — Song
11:30 am — Talk
12:15 pm — Lunch break
1:30 pm — Song and praise
1:45 pm — Talk
2:30 pm — Preparation for Adoration
2:45 pm — Adoration
3:45 pm — Final Blessing

Sunday morning carries the Mass, and the afternoon is given almost entirely to adoration — a quarter of an hour of preparation, then an hour before the Blessed Sacrament, then the final blessing at a quarter to four. You will be on the road by four.

Coming

The retreat is at the centre itself, in the bushland above Somersby, about ninety minutes north of Sydney. Places and the current cost are on the Marian Retreat page, and the schedule lists everything else coming up. If anything here is unclear, the office would rather you rang than guessed.