Love-Themed Spiritual Retreat Allows Youth to Reflect on Relationships

February 26, 2025

Mercy Home’s biannual spiritual retreats, held at La Salle Manor in Plano, Ill., give our young people unique opportunities to engage in deeper reflection away from their everyday routines at the Home and at school.

“It’s like a weekend of group therapy,” Marc Velasquez, Director – Milieu Training and Cultural-Spiritual Engagement, said.

Realistically, Velasquez wants our young people to come back and say that they learned one thing about themselves and also hopes that they had a lot of fun. And with fun, he said, comes connection.

“I want them to be more connected or make a new connection with someone else on the retreat,” he said. “I think we’re always pretty successful with that.”

At each retreat, Mercy Home coworkers select a theme that resonates with something youth may be experiencing at any given time. The latest retreat, for example, held the weekend before Valentine’s Day, focused on the idea of love.

“We talk a lot about what relationships look like to the kids,” Velasquez said. “We talk about romantic relationships, but also family relationships.”

Eighteen of our young people, alongside six coworkers, attended and learned about C.S. Lewis’ four loves: familial or affectionate love, friendship, romantic love, and spiritual love.

In one of the sessions, the young people made friendship bracelets for themselves. Lawrence, one of our young people who attended the retreat, said that he realized he needed to show himself more love.

“If you can’t show yourself love, how are you going to be able to show others love?” he said.

Each of the six structured sessions throughout the weekend were based on the idea of love. In one session, youth made symbols out of clay that represented family and placed them inside of their clay house.  But they were also asked to create their ideal future family using the same method.

“They started to think about who the important people in their life are,” Velasquez said. … “We also wanted them to think about while your past is part of who you are, it doesn’t have to be your future.”

Participants also wrote affirmation letters to themselves on antique paper with wax seals. They’ll open the letters in the future, Velasquez said. They also went around and wrote affirmations on each other’s envelopes. 

“It was our way to talk about not just self-love, but then also friendship and crossing paths with somebody and them being able to lift you up as well,” Velasquez said.

While most of the weekend was structured, participants also had free time as well. They walked around the lake, danced with friends, and played in the game room.

“We have a schedule and sessions, but a good retreat has to be a loose experience, it has to be fun,” Velasquez said. “You have to give kids space to stretch out a little bit. We want them to be young and not worry so we tell them they can’t have their phones, so they’re completely disconnected from the city and Mercy Home.”

One of the more unique aspects of the retreat is that it brings the younger and older youth together. At Mercy Home, most young people live and do activities primarily with peers who are closest in age to them. But these retreats give the older youth a chance to be mentors and leaders.

Since coming to Mercy Home in 2013, Velasquez has intentionally shaped spiritual programming that is youth centered and responsive to trauma and spiritual dissonance. In addition to off-site spiritual retreats, he organizes spiritual celebrations held at the home throughout the year. All of these activities play an important role in healing and building relationships.