About

How did Marriage Retorno come about?
Marriage Retorno was created by a priest by the name of Fr. Gabriel Calvo and a group of married couples who had a great desire to deepen their Spiritual lives as a couple. They wanted to approach God as a couple. Before his ordination, Fr. Calvo was profoundly moved by the talk given by Pope Pius XII on the occasion of the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes in February 1952. The Pope was calling all men and women to make a change. To no longer evangelize salvation from outside the human condition. He said " No, now we must approach the Divine through the human. We must begin to enter more fully into the human situation and discover the divine within it." When married couples first approached Fr. Calvo for spiritual direction, he was hesitant, but the Pope's words still rung in his heart. For many years, Fr. Calvo met with married couples and eventually the Marriage Encounter program was created in Spain, and later taken to the United States during a Christen Family Movement Conference. (Fr. Chuck Gallagher saw the value in the program and created Worldwide Marriage Encounter.) However, many of the couples were not picking up the spiritual dimension of the Encounter. Those that did take home the spiritual dimension wanted more. They wanted to approach God in the oneness and unity of their Sacrament of Matrimony. With the help of spirit and prayer-filled couples, Fr. Calvo created the second step of Marriage Encounter in the form of Marriage Retorno. The first English speaking Marriage Retorno was held in Ireland in 1970. The Spirit used the priest and couples who made that weekend as the yeast for the growth of Marriage Retorno in the United States and Canada.

The Marriage Retorno experience came to the US in 1972 at a CFM Conference at Notre Dame and began spreading throughout the country. It drew from the large number of couples that had experienced Marriage Encounter. It seems they had the same yearning for more as the couples in Spain. In 1975, a few of the original Marriage Retorno team couples and priests gathered at Morristown, New Jersey to review what was happening with Marriage Retorno, and tried to determine how best to continue to support the growth of Marriage Retorno in North America. They determined that Marriage Retorno was a community of couples and religious who were serving in a ministry to other couples and religious seeking a richer relationship with God, living in the Lord. They decided to establish a central office to coordinate Marriage Retorno among the couples and religious who were serving in the Marriage Retorno ministry. They did not want to establish another organization like Marriage Encounter. Rather, they saw their role as supporting other couples and religious in their existing ministries,"ministering to the ministers".

There was also a need to remain independent of any one of the Marriage Encounter organizations existing throughout the country. Marriage Retorno could then serve each of these Marriage Encounter organizations, without being seen as attempting to proselytize couples from one group to another. Intentionally, there is no follow up after a Marriage Retorno weekend. All couples and religious are encouraged to go back to their own ministry or to join one if not already involved. They are encouraged to join a prayer group to continue to grow in the Lord in a community of fellow believers. True, some couples and religious do choose to join the Marriage Retorno ministry as presenting couples. This is really a small number, and many of whom are active in Marriage Retorno also continue to support and work in their original ministry. This ideal has not always worked out as human beings are suspicious by nature. Some Marriage Encounter communities were not open to Marriage Retorno. They were concerned it would drain their membership, or possibly threaten their control. As noted this was never a goal of Marriage Retorno as we only want to serve married couples and religious in their ministries.

To support the Marriage Retorno structure in the United States, Retorno was incorporated as a non-profit organization in July 1978 in the state of Minnesota. This gave the group legal standing and allowed donations to Marriage Retorno to be gifts to charity for income tax purposes. As a corporation, there is a president, a vice president, a treasurer and a board of directors. In this organization, a Coordinating Couple and a priest are selected every three years to serve as the officers. The Coordinating Couple and the Priest are responsible to then select couples and religious to serve as members of the board of directors. The main role of the officers and the board is to serve the Marriage Retorno community by providing a central place to share information and insight and to maintain the integrity of the weekend. A newsletter called the Ram's Horn is used to communicate to the larger Marriage Retorno Community. It is published a few times each year.

Fr. Calvo also insisted that Marriage Retorno have a Bishop serve as an Episcopal Moderator. It is through our moderator that we are to maintain communion with the Church. Since the beginning Marriage Retorno has been served by Bishop Stafford of Baltimore, MD, later Denver, CO; Bishop Daily of Long Island, NY; and most recently by Bishop Wm. Franklin of Davenport, IA.

Fr. Calvo was personally involved with the development of Marriage Retorno in North America and worked with the Marriage Retorno community, translating the Spanish Marriage Retorno manual to English. The original manual was published in 1977. Fr. Calvo then revised the Marriage Retorno manual in 1990. North America presenting teams use this manual to prepare and present Marriage Retorno weekend. Fr. Calvo copyrighted both manuals.

The present US-Canada Marriage Retorno Coordinating Team was elected at the last Marriage Retorno Conference in Cedar Falls, IA in October 2005. They are Rick & Deb Giarusso and Fr. Mel Hemann.