FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: CARDINAL BURKE ENCOURAGES MARRIED COUPLES AT RETREAT

AUGUST 1, 2024 **MEDIA ADVISORY**

Cardinal Burke encourages married couples at retreat

LA CROSSE, WI - Friday evening, July 26, over 85 married couples made their way to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse, Wisconsin to attend the first ever married couples retreat there: “Two Souls United in Christ.” By the invitation of His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, the retreat was organized and led by the Wojtyła Community & Institute, a non-profit organization founded by Peter & Theresa Martin to propagate The Rule for Married Couple Groups written by St. John Paul II in 1969. 

The married couples were encouraged throughout the retreat to grow closer to one another by allowing Christ to work in their lives through the Sacrament of Matrimony. The married couples came from far and wide (Washington, Florida, and Texas to name a few) as well as many from Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa. 

Through a series of talks given by Peter & Theresa Martin, as well as ample opportunity to spend time together as a couple, the married couples deepened their marital love by recognizing the desire that God wants to show forth His love in their marriage (both to the couple themselves AND to the world). 

The weekend retreat was enhanced by the presence of Cardinal Burke who greeted them Friday evening, offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on Saturday, and joined them for lunch afterwards. His Eminence shared his desire for the strengthening of their marriages in his homily: “In the present moment when the attacks on matrimony and on the family seem the most ferocious, it is the Church, it is we who must show to the whole of society the truth in all its richness, and therefore the beauty and the goodness of marriage and of the family.” 

Cardinal Burke reminded the couples that: “[t]he Church accomplishes its mission of evangelization of the family with its teaching, with the celebration of the Sacraments and with the life of prayer and devotion, and with its discipline. Hence, the importance of following the rule for the married life, as it has been set forth by Pope Saint John Paul II.” A welcomed encouragement for those couples, many of whom were learning about this rule for the first time. 

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For more information visit wojtyłaci.com or to set up an interview with Peter & Theresa Martin, please contact the WCI at info@Wojtyłaci.com. 

A media kit with photos for your use can be found here. Please credit Wojtyła Community & Institute.