STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

ILoveChoo · Hermes

any catholics out there?

nunzi182 · Kate Spade

I'm Catholic. From my experience, churches don't usually like to perform marriages for people that don't regularly attend their church or the church of a neighboring city. If you can get lucky enough to set a date with the church they will send you all of the information about pre cana. Sometimes, if there aren't any pre cana classes in your area between now and the time you're to get married, they'll allow you to skip it (this happened to my sister.)

I know that a lot of churches like you to be engaged for at least a year before marrying also, so that may be a factor. I hope this helps and if you need more information ask away!

ILoveChoo · Hermes

yeah, we've been engaged for two and a half years! we just didn't tell the church. and my priest back home said he will do it and has us on his calendar, but said we should do pre-cana down here... which is going to be a problem since we don't regularly attend any particular church. We just haven't found one in the area that's a good fit for us (ie. not just a bunch of old people that glare at me all through mass and make me feel ridiculously uncomfortable), and my schedule changes every week...so I go wherever will work best... I guess I really just need to call them and explain this to them, but I'm scared . I am seriously too shy sometimes.

maybe I should just talk to Fr. Bill (back home priest) and see if he can talk to them or wor something out. I am really close to him and he knows that I'm a good catholic...

nunzi182 · Kate Spade

That will probably be your best bet then (talking to Father Bill) because he can guide as to how things work and whatnot. I really wouldn't worry about calling a random church near you because they can usually make exceptions and are very accomodating.

Karina · Chanel

Our precana is scheduled for the 25th of this month. I will let you know how it goes..

ILoveChoo · Hermes

Karina, thanks- I'd love to hear about it!

I am such a wimp. My mom is calling Fr. Bill for me- she said she had been talking to him anyway and he mentioned that I might just be able to do it up there as long as I register with a church down here. I'll keep you updated. Worse comes to worse, I guess we would just push our date back a few months- I'm really just trying to rush it because I love the fall and don't want to wait a whole more year...

Escrime · Kate Spade

We lived in CT and got married in New Orleans in a Catholic ceremony. One of my childhood priests performed the ceremony, and neither of us were affiliated with any one specific church in CT.

However, we needed to do Pre-Cana, and I looked up the programs they had in CT. I also just went to the church I liked the best out of the ones we had gone to and talked to the priest. I explained the situation to him, and he was pretty understanding, and agreed to help us do our paperwork that we needed done before the church as long as the priest conducting the ceremony contacted him and they could work together.

I think they talked once on the phone, and I took care of getting things to whomever needed them.

Our Pre-Cana weekend started on Friday night and we left Sunday afternoon. It was pretty intensive, but it was great. It was small workshop type sessions where they had two couples (one fairly newlywed and one married for a while) and a priest talking to us, and we discussed things like religion in marriage, how couples fight, money issues, etc. They are basically trying to give you tools to help lay a stronger foundation for communicating with each other, etc. I would say it's like a pre-marriage bootcamp, with a lot of focus on your Catholic faith.

After that, we got a certificate (which the church required in our paperwork). We also each had to have three people sign affidavits affirming that we were able to be married in a Catholic church and ceremony (no prior divorces, good moral character, etc.). We also had to send in copies of our baptismal certificate, as well as each signing affidavits saying we were Catholic, entering into this union solemnly and willingly, that we agreed to raise our children catholic, entering into the covenant of marriage with each other and would not divorce, and neither of us were married (currently) or divorced.

I still have the paperwork in my files if you have anymore questions!

ILoveChoo · Hermes

thanks, escrime! my situation is really similar to yours so that gave me the courage I needed to call them up and sort this out. So, I am now registered for a one day marriage prep class...this Sunday. yeah. I think I might throw up...