Retreats help deepen connection to the diocese, participant says

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Rosario Cano, shown with her husband, Rubén, says that diocesan retreats for Lent and Advent are opportunities to focus on spirituality.

HUNTINGTON/PRICE — Every year Rosario Cano, a member of Notre Dame de Lourdes Parish and San Rafael Mission, attends the diocesan retreats for Lent and Advent.

Now, after more than 20 years of doing so, Cano, reflects on how the retreats have changed her life. She, along with her husband, has become a lay ecclesial minister certified through the diocesan EMAUS program (lay ecclesial minister formation program in Spanish) and also is a V Encuentro delegate.

Her story in Utah started in 1990 when she arrived in Green River from her hometown in Mexico. There she met her husband, Rubén. They moved to Huntington in May of 1996. Once they were established, their first child, Ryan, was baptized. That was also the beginning of the Canos’ active ministry in and for the Church.

“Back then, there were lots and lots of Hispanics in Huntington, and some of them didn’t understand English very well, so I started being like a communication bridge for them,” Rosario Cano said.

The priests who were assigned to Mission San Rafael in Huntington at that time often didn’t speak Spanish, so Rosario Cano also acted as a translator between the community and the priests.

“It was not intentional, but little by little we were getting more involved, being active in the mission,” said Cano, who started traveling on a regular basis to the diocese’s Office of Hispanic Ministry to ask for information for the community.

After years of being active in social justice ministries, particularly with immigrants, in 2010 the Canos were accepted into the Spanish-speaking lay ecclesial minster formation program known as EMAUS. In 2014, they were certified and commissioned by Bishop Oscar A. Solis to serve as lay ecclesiastic ministers.

With that formation added to the one she has received by attending the diocesan retreats, “you really feel connected to the diocese,” Cano said.

“When you go to the diocesan retreats you really feel connected to the diocese; it helps you to feel connected and in communion with the whole diocese and with our bishop,” she said.

Emphasizing that the Diocese of Salt Lake City always invites people to get together at Advent and Lent to share and learn together through the diocesan retreats, Cano said that for her the retreats are opportunities to make time to focus on her spirituality.

“Our diocese always invites us during Advent and during Lent to set time aside, to stop in our agitated world so we can see where we are as persons [Catholics] and as part of our Church,” she said.

Reflecting on how each person has a special call from God, Cano said that attending the retreats also helps to discern that specific call.

“The  diocesan retreats help us to discern the call and what the next steps are that we need to take to continue on our way into God’s kingdom,” she said, adding that the retreats have also helped her to see the reality of “where we live in our diocese in all the levels.”

Sometimes people are disconnected from the diocese and the retreats “are a bridge to unite the communities, to awaken the desire to walk together with our bishop,” she said.

“It has never been about us, it’s always about God,” said Cano, who has also served as a diocesan delegate to the V Encuentro, the 2018 national gathering sponsored by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, to engage Hispanics/Latinos in the Church.

When the diocesan Pastoral Plan was introduced at the 2018 Pastoral Congress, Cano became very involved. She has visited many parishes and missions to transmit the five priorities of the Pastoral Plan.

“And at the visits we have learned what the parishes really need, what the people need. At  retreats we have been able to share what we have found,” she said.

As she teaches by example how to be a better Catholic, and as she shares with the community what she has learned, God has always been present, she said.

“Everything that we have gone through was God’s will. God gives us strength through the hardships; with love we have been able to get through everything,” she said. “And with the retreats, the diocese gives us the opportunity to live as a whole family; it gives us a sense of ownership.”

(For information about the 2020 Diocesan Advent Retreat, see the link.)