Michael and Deanna Johnston of Tyler, Texas, hold hands during an interview. / Daniel Ibanez/CNALast week, the Vatican made suggestions for a year-long “marriage catechumenate” to help Catholic couples get ready for the sacrament of marriage.
Since it comes before a lifetime commitment, Pope Francis referred to sufficient marital preparation as an issue of justice in the document’s preamble.
However, the sacramental preparation a couple goes through before their wedding can differ greatly depending on where they live.
Three stages of Catholic marriage development were suggested in a brochure titled “Catechumenal Itineraries for Married Life,” which was released on June 15 by the Dicastery for Laity, Family, and Life and is now available in Italian and Spanish.
According to the dicastery’s suggestions, the first stage, referred to as “proximate preparation,” should last “approximately one year.”
The second stage would occur in the weeks leading up to the wedding, and the third stage would follow the couple over their first two to three years of marriage.
According to the text, the idea of a marital catechumenate is comparable to the early Church’s baptismal preparation: “a faith formation and accompaniment in the acquisition of a Christian lifestyle, specifically intended at couples.”
According to the Vatican, the length of the impending preparation should be around a year, depending on the couple’s prior religious and ecclesiastical commitment.
“Having made the decision to marry — a moment that could be sealed by the rite of betrothal — one could begin the immediate preparation for marriage, lasting a few months, to be set up as an actual initiation into the nuptial sacrament,” it explained.
“The duration of these stages should be adapted, we repeat, taking into account the religious, cultural, and social aspects of the environment in which one lives and even the personal situations of each couple,” the document said. “What is essential is to safeguard the regularity of the meetings in order to accustom couples to take care of their vocation and marriage responsibly.”
The Diocese of Tyler’s director of family life, Deanna Johnston, said that while she supports a longer period of marital preparation, the diocese cannot simply provide couples a 12-month checklist of tasks to complete.
“It gives us a challenge, I think, as family life directors,” she told CNA during an interview in Rome, where she traveled with her husband, Michael, and the oldest of her four children, 7-year-old Alexandria, to take part in the World Meeting of Families.
“We can’t just send couples through a program and expect that to be the thing that gives them a happy, healthy, holy marriage,” she said.
She stressed that the Church needs to portray the idea of a “marriage catechumenate” as a path to create a successful marriage, and not just another burdensome chore to complete, at a time when many couples are terrified of divorcing or come from families of divorce.
She claimed that developing ties with engaged couples that endure long after the wedding is a big part of this.
“I know for us, we’ve been married for only nine years, and so much life has happened,” Johnston said. “I remember going to Engaged Encounter and some of the things that they had us discuss, but life is very different than I think we thought it would be back in 2013.”
Even for devout Catholics, according to Johnston, the engagement phase presents a chance to develop personally and in virtues like chastity.
“That’s one pushback that I’ve heard is like, well, if you have two really well-formed Catholics, why would you make them wait for the sacrament of marriage? But even as well-formed Catholics — Michael is a former seminarian, I am a deacon’s daughter, like we were good Catholics, right? — but we’d never been married before,” she said.
“So, recognizing that these two individuals have never experienced married life together, that it’s so worthwhile for us to invest that time and relationship building to make sure that they have a strong foundation.”
Marriage preparation should be extended from the typical 4-6 months to an 8-12 month program, according to Sheila Reineke, coordinator of the Diocese of St. Cloud’s Natural Family Planning program.
According to Reineke, this “would allow for relationships to form with the other couples that the couples are meeting with.”
They have the potential to grow into a tiny community, in my opinion.
Sheila and her husband Vince have four adult children and have been together for 34 years.
Early on, they claimed, their own marriage was strengthened by finding community and camaraderie with other Catholic couples in a Bible study.
Reineke acknowledged that there are always important exceptions, such as for military couples, and that some people already find the present basic requirements for marriage in the Catholic Church onerous.
“I would start by listening” to couples’ concerns, she said. “But again, I think if we speak to them with love and explain the reasons for it, many couples really enjoy the process when they get to the end of it.”
Michael Johnston, Deanna Johnston’s husband, oversees the theology program at a Catholic high school.
He claimed that a year of preparation for a lifetime commitment did not seem excessive.
By “forming them in moral theology, Church history, and ethics just so that they have an orientation towards what marriage actually is at a very young age, or even at a relatively young age,” he and his colleagues try to start even earlier, preparing teenagers for a successful marriage relationship in the future.
He pointed out that working on creating virtuous Catholic families now will benefit the offspring of those unions who will be entering high schools in a dozen years.
The Johnstons and Reinekes concurred that using mentor couples as part of engaged formation is beneficial.
According to Bishop John Doerfler, the mentor couple concept is also used in the Diocese of Marquette.
One challenge newlyweds frequently encounter is feeling alone or isolated, “particularly when troubles may occur,” he said.
“Over time, it is our aim that through supporting mentor couples, they will realize that they can call out to someone and not have to face challenges or troubles alone.”
With the idea of a 12-month preparation, “there needs to be some kind of flexibility,” he said, “because often people will approach us when they have already set a date for their marriage and we want to be able to work with them as best we can.”
“But I think in general, trying to look at preparation for a whole year is a good idea, with some flexibility depending on the circumstances in which people find themselves,” the bishop said.
When engaged couples are going through marriage preparation, Deanna Johnston noted, “we won’t have every single answer for them when they’re going through marriage formation in the very beginning, but if we can set it up so that the Church is there to walk with them through all of these different changes and challenges in life — maybe that’s very idealistic but I think it’s very worthwhile.”