Wow...knocking on the church without any attempt to be respectful of anybody who may be Catholic. You're kinda being an a** on this one.
I'm actually quite respectful of people who are Catholic. Again - my wife and in-laws of 11 years are Catholic. They are wonderful people and I've met many others though their Church that are wonderful. I've been attending Catholic church for over 11 years. I pay money to send my kids to private Catholic school. There are many fantastic Catholic people. My beef is with the church, not the congregation.
To Davidoff: Sounds like you just ran into a priest/church that might not have been the right fit with ya'll. While the Catholic church does seem to have some general guidelines as far as marriage preparation, each parish is a little bit different. For instance, when my cousin got married apparently they had to do the FOCCUS, had a number of meetings w/ the priest, and had to choose between either a retreat or meeting w/ a sponsor couple. When my wife and I got married (and this was all during this past year), we just had to do the FOCCUS questionnaire, meet w/ her priest a few times to discuss it and that was it....no retreat, no sponsor couple, no endless meetings. The meetings w/ her priest were pretty enlightening as he discussed w/ us our differences, which like you, weren't many at all. And instead of preaching to us, we discussed...we got to talk about why we felt differently and actually have a dialogue about it. And that did help us in areas where we were weak. Now granted, she knows her priest very well since her dad is a deacon at the church...but I didn't know him, and I felt very comfortable talking to him and fine about the whole process. I wouldn't quite give up on the idea of getting married in the church as I think you just need to look around and find a church/priest that you are comfortable with meeting. Each priest has their own strengths and weaknesses...some are good at counseling couples while others are not. To DaDakota: It might seem a bit hypocritical, but I don't think it is....would you not listen to the advice of a counselor who is trained and qualified (has the certs and degrees) to give advice to married couples even though they themselves are not married. Personally, I would not hold that against them if I feel they are giving me quality advice...same holds true for priests...even though they do go through the seminary (and can't wed) they do (maybe not all) and can get college degrees...I think my wife's priest had a degree in psychology. To Manny: Pretty offensive statement. You have to understand that the act of Communion is a very sacred thing in the Catholic Church...according to the Church you are literally eating and drinking the body and blood of Christ (I don't necessarily hold to that as being truly literal but that's for another discussion). Even if you are baptized Catholic, you cannot take communion unless you have taken the Sacrament of Communion (and go through the preparation). I used to know someone in my Christian youth group that was not Catholic, but saw him take Communion during masses that he attended. That upset me because he took it but I'm sure did not fully understand it's meaning or importance. And I guarantee you if I went to any other Church and was not allowed to take part in something because of it's sacredness, I would fully understand. I'll agree the Catholic Church can be very structured and that structure might not be for everyone. But can you honestly be against the thorough preparation the Catholic Church requires you to go through when the divorce rate in this country is so high? Hell the state just passed a law requiring all couples to go through a state sponsored marriage prep before getting married or risk paying a marriage fee. The Catholic Church's marriage prep and the FOCCUS survey are designed to help couples ready themselves for the ups and downs of spending a lifetime together by locating and discussing your differences, hopefully with someone that can offer insight, suggestions and analysis. If you score badly, the Church will not forbid you from getting married....but the survey is designed to help couples figure out on their own if they are truly ready for marriage.
JD, I understand what you are saying and I have been in services where it was stressed to really take communion seriously - to the point of thinking that the bread is Christ's body and the wine is His blood. Now don't get me wrong, I have never been in a church service where communion was taken lightly but there are some places where the emphasis is definitely on the bread being "Christ's body". And I was a member of the Episcopal church for several years and even went through confirmation and had the Bishop confirm me and all the 9 yards. Yet, they had no problem with me taking communion before I was confirmed. That's my gripe with the Catholic church. If the Episcopal Church which has a confirmation class and the Bishop coming to confirm you will allow people who are not confirmed Episcopalians but Christians, nonetheless take communion then why can't the Catholic church do the same? But seriously, I will have to agree to disagree on this point. It looks like I am not very successful at getting some of you to understand where I am coming from. That's cool - no offense taken and I didn't mean to offend with my comments.
I can certainly understand that...like I said the Catholic Church's highly organized structure is not for everyone...it's not like I agree with everything that comes from the Vatican (and as Catholics were are supposed to which I don't agree with either ). But I would imagine other religions (maybe not all) have sacred rituals that they don't allow people from other faiths (even different sects of the same faith) to be part of.
I just don't think a Priest can even be remotely correct on the challenges of marriage. It is like someone without children giving child rearing advice, it just rings hollow. Today is my 13th anniversary, and I would not be willing to tell anyone we have it figured out, because every day is a challenge in a marriage. And I love every minute of it.....well....most minutes anyway ! Davidoff, Just find a church you are comfortable with, love your wife, tell her "Yes dear" as often as you can...and you should do ok. Heck, you guys have been together long enough, not much will change I would bet... Have you guys been living together too? DD
I know many people who never did any of the counseling etc after telling the Priests they were going to. The Priests never ask to see a certificate or anything. But if you must, do the weekend retreat instead of the couple counseling too. We had to do the test and a weekend deal. It was easy and had no problems. Then again we didn't take it too seriously. It was like d-hall, go to the class during the day then go out for drinks at night. I might have been stoned too, I don't remember, it was over 7 years ago. My wife and I spent most of the time drawing funny pictures of the people giving the lectures. We actually saved and still have them.
Somehow I suspect he'd say religion, and particularly the faiths that exist under the umbrella of his name, is kind of screwed. I look forward to comments from people more expert than myself, but I sincerely doubt he intended the kind of division inspired by the various sects of his true believers.
Thanks for the comments guys, I've been so frustrated with the whole situation that I just needed to vent about it even though it's over and done with.. While I do feel that many of you are correct that the situation may have been different with another priest/church it would have been just too much for us to attempt all over again.. I feel that we made the right decision for us and ever since we did planning with our new church has been how it was meant to be, ENJOYABLE!
Isn't this kind of par for the course for the Catholic Church? I've heard stories like this before. If it's not for you, then it's not for you. Why get so worked up about it? *EDIT: comment not intended for the threadstarter.* I'm getting hitched in February and we're doing it in the Presbyterian Church. The ceremony will be like, oh...I don't know.....about 5 minutes? Good luck, Davidoff. As a fellow future groom......Lord knows, we're gonna need it....
Um, maybe reconsider the terminology here, all things considered? I do think the system of a priest giving relationship advice is unfortunate. It might have made sense 100 years ago, but now people have access to more resources if they really want advice in this area. Also, I wonder when the church will reconsider this no-marriage-for-priests thing. It is based largely on a late medieval practice by which the church would inherit all land owned by priests. It was an introduced condition of the priesthood, not an original one. I work with a lot of priests (Jesuits), and I think they're very very cool in general, but the no-marriage thing seems outdated, against nature, and impractical.
i got married in a catholic church and the priest seemed cool to me at the time and he later became the archbishop, his name is fiorenza he retired he let us march down the aisle to led zepplin so it was awesome they tried to get me to go to classes sign some papers and a bunch of other stuff but i told him i didn't believe; i went part of the day to one class but i left out early; then my future inlaws work politically behind the scenes to keep the wedding on- i stayed an athiest and my wife was allowed to stay a catholic, but i think there was some question about what our children would be?
