A year-long engagement that walks alongside your parish — forming a core team, teaching St. John Paul II's vision, and leaving a community equipped to carry this mission on long after we go.
From January to December 2025, the Image of God Institute were blessed to bring JPII’s Masterwork to a unique, dedicated group of parishioners through four Behold Retreats, two Equip Training Seminars and six Unpack Presentations. The variety of ages involved, from many young adults to seniors, and the couples that continued to come back for Unpack and became “Equipped” show much commitment to the Gospel and the Good News JPII’s brings to light.
August 16th, 2025
This retreat provides a solid foundation of why we were created and what will lead to our utmost fulfillment. Discover your deepest calling and how prayer and the Sacraments provide the quickest, most joyful route to this reality. Experience rich content plus discussion and witnesses (married couples, one consecrated celibate) in a home environment. Prepare to be challenged, encouraged and more deeply rooted in Christ.
Wednesday evenings from September 17 to October 22, 2025
7 pm
Wednesday evenings in the fall, enjoy a new topic unpacking the wisdom of St. John Paul II. Learn how the treasures of JPII can dramatically bless your prayer life, your family and the entire St. Peter community.
No RSVPs needed. We look forward seeing you there.
October 25th, 2025
9am - 5pm
This retreat provides a solid foundation of why we were created and what will lead to our utmost fulfillment. Discover your deepest calling and how prayer and the Sacraments provide the quickest, most joyful route to this reality. Experience rich content plus discussion and witnesses (married couples, one consecrated celibate) in a home environment. Prepare to be challenged, encouraged and more deeply rooted in Christ.
October 29th, 2025
7:00 - 9:00 pm
Attendees will learn how to grow in their knowledge of Theology of the Body as well as their ability to share it. So many difficult topics of this current culture are addressed through TOB. Discover how to spread this positive and transformative message with your children, grandchildren, friends, co-workers and potentially here at St. Peter. Hear evangelical tips for bringing the Good News into everyday life and around the parish. Participants receive a manual.
November 8th, 2025
9 am - 5 pm
Final Retreat Offered for St. Peter Parishioners! This retreat provides a solid foundation of why we were created and what will lead to our utmost fulfillment. Discover your deepest calling, how prayer and how the Sacraments provide the quickest, most joyful route to this reality. Experience rich content plus discussion and witnesses (married couples, one consecrated celibate). Prepare to be challenged, encouraged and more deeply rooted in Christ.
September 7th, 2025
12:00 - 2:00 pm
Attendees will learn how to grow in their knowledge of Theology of the Body as well as their ability to share it. So many difficult topics of this current culture are addressed through TOB. Discover how to spread this positive and transformative message with your children, grandchildren, friends, co-workers and potentially here at St. Peter. Hear evangelical tips for bringing the Good News into everyday life and around the parish. Participants receive a manual.
Four experiential retreats over the course of the year.
A six-week teaching series introducing St. John Paul II, the foundations of his wisdom, and what it means to live it.
Toward the end of the engagement, we raise up a core team.
Three integrated parts over the course of a year — four Behold Retreats (most held in parishioner homes), a six-week Unpack teaching series, and Equip training that forms a core team of parishioners to lead this work themselves. All of it is built around your parish, not dropped onto it.
We start by meeting with your leadership to strategize — which groups to reach, when to schedule retreats, where Unpack fits in your calendar. From there, the year unfolds at a rhythm you can actually sustain: retreats for teachers, clergy and staff, and core team leaders; a six-week Unpack series in the fall or during Lent; and Equip sessions toward the end to raise up the parishioners who will carry it on.
Equip is the piece that makes this sustainable. It’s a series of sessions — usually two or three near the end of the engagement — where parishioners who’ve been through Behold or Unpack learn how to lead retreats themselves. In their homes. With their friends and families. In their Bible studies and small groups. The goal is that when we leave, the mission doesn’t.
A core group of parishioners who are living this and passing it on. We’ve watched alumni host Behold Retreats in their own living rooms, lead small groups through the material, and shape the formation culture of their parish long after our engagement ended. That’s not a best-case scenario — that’s the design.
No. Unpack and Behold Retreats are built to introduce it — St. John Paul II’s background, the foundations, what he was trying to do. We start where your parish is.
No — and this is one of the most common misunderstandings we address. St. John Paul’s wisdom isn’t primarily about issues of morality. It’s an incredible worldview that reshapes how you pray, how you see yourself, how you live in your family, how you encounter Jesus. Morality, ethical choices flow downstream from it. We start upstream.
