EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT
ATTENDING A SANCTIFEYED RETREAT!
1. WHY SHOULD YOUR PARISH ATTEND A CONFIRMATION SACRAMENTAL RETREAT?
This retreat is helping Families Fall in Love with the Sacraments. SanctifEYEd is a family retreat designed to help families rediscover the mission and beauty of the sacrament of Confirmation. Dr. John R. Wood, an eye doctor, uses analogies of the eye to help parents and students learn to “See the Light of Christ, and Be the light of Christ.” He also draws from his experience as a state champion runner featured in his book, “Where There is a Will There is a Way,” to inspire families to be saints!
Research is clear that parental lives are the most powerful religious curriculum of all. If parishes are not reaching parents as part of their sacramental prep, they are missing a huge opportunity. Parents are called to be primary educators, not parishes, but parents are difficult to reach. We want to help you reach them!
2. WHEN ARE THESE RETREATS OFFERED?
Most retreats take place on Saturdays or Sundays during the school year. The list of available dates can be found at our schedule page. Contact us if you have a special request by clicking below.
3. WHAT IS THE RETREAT STRUCTURE?
Sample schedule: SanctifEYEd Retreat 12:30pm - 4:00pm
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12:30pm - 1:00pm
Registration
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1:00pm - 1:45pm
Session 1 The Power of Sacramental Grace/Jeopardy game
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1:45pm - 2:30pm
Session 2 Our Story and the Love of the Father
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2:30pm - 2:45pm
BREAK/Transition
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2:45pm - 3:30pm
Students in Adoration
Parents in Gym with John
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3:30pm - 4:00pm
Session 3 The Holy Spirit’s Gifts that Make us Saints!
4. WHAT KIND OF FACILITIES ARE NEEDED?
We will need a large gym/hall/auditorium style room for the main part of the retreat. We highly encourage both parents to come, so you need a space big enough to accommodate 3 people per family.
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We also need a location for adoration big enough to handle the number of students attending the retreat.
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5. HOW MANY PEOPLE CAN ATTEND A RETREAT?
As many as your facility will allow. See #4 above regarding the need for a large hall and adoration.
6. WHAT RESPONSIBILITIES / EQUIPMENT DOES THE PARISH NEED TO PROVIDE?
A. Book the facilities for the day.
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B. Contact families inviting them to the retreat. One parent is required to attend with the child, but we HIGHLY recommend both parents. We provide you with a Parent Letter to get them excited and encourage them to both come and encourage parents to write letters to their student.
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C. Provide us with a roster of kids so we can order materials. (We need to order crucifixes AT LEAST one month before the retreat.)
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D. Provide us the EMAILS OF THE PARENTS IN ELECTRONIC FORMAT (Click here) before the retreat so that we can register them for the follow up 25-week Saints in the Making Family Email Challenge.
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E. The parish is responsible for any food provided.
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F. A priest or deacon for the Eucharistic adoration portion of the retreat and to bless the crucifixes.
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G. An XLR Connection and a microphone are useful. We can bring a sound system if needed. A microphone and piano for adoration are ideal.
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H. We highly encourage you to invite parents, sponsors, and other family and friends to write care letters to the students to be handed out during adoration. You will be responsible for gathering and distributing these letters if you choose to do so.
7. WHAT ARE THE COSTS?
NOTE: Please do not allow costs to be an obstacle. We have scholarships from the Knights of Columbus (KofC) and/or will waive the retreat fee for first time parishes if you want to trial the retreat.
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The retreat fee will be $20 per student ($500 max per parish and it is waived the first year a parish participates in this retreat). This will include access to all of our virtual retreats to use for any families who miss the retreat or in any way you wish to use the programs. The cost of the family gift bags is $30 per bag, per student. For live events, we order and pack all the materials needed including a large, beautiful crucifix for your home.
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We are confident that you can fully cover the costs of the gift bags by considering one or more of these fundraising options!
Consider asking the local KofC to help sponsor these materials, or give us a contact person and we can contact them for you. John Wood is a KofC member and would be glad to come to a meeting to explain to them how these events build strong families and vocations. We include a KofC ad in the gift bag Retreat Resource Manual and we encourage the men to join. It's a way of increasing membership for the local council (with young dads!) Here is a KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS VIDEO (Click here) you can give to your local council to ask for support! Most parishes that have reached out to their local council have gotten most if not full sponsorship from their local knights!
Parish mentorship and family adoption program. We will give you a FLYER (Click here), bulletin ad, and promo video to request members of your congregation to "adopt" a Confirmation family. Their role would not only be to provide the $30 support of a gift bag, but also to pray for their "spiritually adopted family" during the year as the student prepares for Confirmation!
We strongly encourage and request that each parish who is involved in a Dragon Slayers or SanctifEYEd retreat consider hosting a one-night mini parish mission with John Wood once every 4-5 years. We give you a VARIETY OF TOPICS TO CHOOSE FROM (Click here), a marketing plan to follow, and all kinds of marketing tools. There is not a parish fee as long as you agree to follow the marketing plan. A free will offering will be collected to support the SanctifEYEd retreat after the presentation, and your parish will keep 50% of the profits from that evening! We plan on offering around 12 fundraising events per year.
8. WHAT KIND OF FOLLOW-UP DO YOU PROVIDE?
A. At the retreat, we give an ANONYMOUS SURVEY (Click here to view) to every parent which gives us valuable information on where they are currently at in their spiritual journey and how we can help them.
B. We don’t just tell these parents to be primary educators and then leave them to fend for themselves. We follow up with them for 25 weeks with our Saints in the Making Family Challenge! This challenge includes resources and ideas for the whole family within a weekly email. There are 4 tracks to this family challenge: Deep Roots for parents, Dragon Slayers for children, SanctifEYEd for middle school and teens, and Into the Breech for men. To sign up for yourself to see the content provided, CLICK HERE!
9. WHAT IF A CHILD / FAMILY IS UNABLE TO ATTEND?
Sometimes conflicts happen or people get sick (or pandemics suddenly strike!). No worries. Families may join other area retreats, or we offer an online version of our retreat as well and give you all the tools necessary for a family to experience the retreat from home. Live retreats are always best, but if necessary, you can offer the VIRTUAL RETREAT OPTION (Click here).
Note: The virtual retreats are included for FREE for all parishes who do our live retreat.
10. WHERE ARE THE RETREAT VENUES?
You can view our current retreat schedule by CLICKING HERE. If there is a venue you are interested in contact us to check for availability. We are working to find venues large enough to accommodate more parishes. Please contact the Mission Director at 419-731-3518 or at areinhart@extraordinarymission.com to discuss venue options. If you are not in the diocese of Toledo, OH or surrounding area, please consider our VIRTUAL RETREAT OPTION (Click here).