The retraction reads:

"I declare myself a Catholic. I want to live and die as a Catholic. I retract all my heart whatever I have said or written or done against the Church and our Lord Jesus Christ. I give up Masonry which is an enemy of the Church."
"The head of the diocese may publish this retraction, which I make of my own accord, to repair as far as may be possible the scandal caused by my writings and by my acts. May all men forgive me for the injury which I have caused to many."

After his confession Dr. Rizal was married to Josephine Bracken, the adopted daughter of a Hong Kong retired engineer who had come to Dapitan to see if there was any cure for his lost sight. Rizal had fallen in love with the girl, who was ten years younger than himself, and had asked her to stay in Dapitan until they could be married but tho authorized by law there was no provision in the Philippines for civil marriage and so there was no chance for the ceremony until this reconciliation with the church. His wife, the daughter of an Irish sergeant in the British army in India and, to judge by her features, an Indian mother, was also of his faith.

The belief that Mrs. Rizal was an Eurasian is borne out by the fact that she was educated in the Italian convent of Hong Kong which has so many of that mixed blood. Her adopted mother, Mrs. Taufer, from whom she took her middle name of Leopoldine, was Portuguese, and thru her knowledge of that language she found Spanish ways to learn. If she had not known Rizal personally she at least knew of him while he was practicing medicine in Hong Kong.

It was now morning and after a short interval the march to the place of execution, on the Luneta, was begun, on foot and with a heavy escort of soldiers.