Blessing of our Marriage

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brshooter

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My wife and I will be getting our marriage blessed (or convalidated) on May 22nd. I am curious as to what is involved.

We were married by a justice of the peace 20 years ago. I was raised Methodist and my wife was raised Catholic. Last year, we embarked on a faith journey that found us enrolled in the RCIA program at our local Parish and we both received the Sacrament of Confirmation at the Easter Vigil this year. It has been a wonderful addition to our lives. The next step is to bring the Lord into our Marriage.

I have had a couple of conversations with our Pastor on providing the details of our marriage and selecting a date. This is going to be a very small event. I don’t want to say informal, as we are inviting the Lord into our relationship, but we have no family that will be able to attend due to location and timing. We are thinking that it would be our neighbors (who were our sponsors) to act as witnesses and perhaps a few people from our RCIA program.

Our Pastor is very busy right now as our Parish has just kicked off the capital campaign on remodeling our Church. is is a very big project. We do have a meeting set up for the 15th to do some planning on the event and get some details. I was just curious if someone could give me some idea of what to expect.
 
Welcome home! Congratulations!

Convalidations are typically, but not always, 10-15 minutes long. It is essentially the Liturgy of the Word, the vows are witnessed and pronounced, and TA-DA! You’r married in the Church.

If you’re planning something “informal” please wear your Sunday best, anyway. Your wife does not have to rent or buy a wedding gown, and you certainly don’t need a tux, but this is a sacrament. I am going from experience with my husband, who is a bit of a dowdy dresser on purpose, but please don’t wear jeans!

Your sponsors would be excellent choices as witnesses. Give an older kid if you have one, or one of the neighbors a camera, even a disposable one, because this is worth photos. Have cake and coffee in a meeting room in the parish center or home after.

And get your wife some flowers! A small wrist corsage would be nice.
 
I had the joy of having my marriage blessed not long ago. It took about 10-15 minutes. I wore some nice dress pants. My husband wore his work slacks and polo-type shirt. It was very nice. It isn’t so much about what you wear, but listening and feeling the presence of the Holy Spirit enter your marriage by affirmation of your vows. Afterward, our family, friends, and church members who stayed after Wednesday mass to witness our ceremony were treated to a supper by our priest. It actually meant more to me than my original wedding day, probably because after 12 years of marriage, I actually knew more of what the vows meant. Congraulations on your upcoming vows! 😃
 
brshooter said:
My wife and I will be getting our marriage blessed (or convalidated) on May 22nd. I am curious as to what is involved.

We were married by a justice of the peace 20 years ago. I was raised Methodist and my wife was raised Catholic. Last year, we embarked on a faith journey that found us enrolled in the RCIA program at our local Parish and we both received the Sacrament of Confirmation at the Easter Vigil this year. It has been a wonderful addition to our lives. The next step is to bring the Lord into our Marriage.
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Just curious, because I am in a similar situation. How were you able to enter the Church at the Easter Vigil before having your marriage situation resolved?
 
rick43235 said:
Just curious, because I am in a similar situation. How were you able to enter the Church at the Easter Vigil before having your marriage situation resolved?
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Unfortunately, there was very little council on this topic in our RCIA class. Otherwise, we would have addressed it sooner. We were originally going to wait until our anniversary in July to get our marriage blessed. Once we realized that we would be in a state of mortal sin (fornication), we decided to speed up the process. We have been living as brother & sister since before Easter. Not an easy task, but one we are committed to until our marriage becomes valid.

Talk to your Pastor about your situation. I’m sure he can offer council as to what needs to be done.

Thanks to all for your replies.

God Bless.
 
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