Engaged and in need of advice

[Catherine_W]

Hello, I have been engaged since March and I really love this person and 100% want to spend the rest of my life with him. However he is not Catholic (he is Anglican). We have been dating for about three years, and during this time he has come to mass with me almost every week, and has read numerous books on Catholicism, watches EWTN and is trying to learn more about it. However it seems the more he learns the more he is confused about it and it brings us so much sorrow. Because I know I believe that it is true and I want to raise our future children Catholic and I know that so far all of his prayers and all he has learned is not leading him any closer to the Catholic Church. I think he feels his only option is to convert, but he would only want to do that if he felt God was calling him to do that, and he currently doesn’t feel that. I think the Church requires that when a couple gets married they must promise to raise the Children Catholic, but how can one agree to raise their children to something they them self can not fully believe? We really have so many beliefs in common, but not all of them. I just don’t know how to make things better. I think God is calling us to be together, and yet I don’t see how we will ever figure this out. He is going to start RCIA this week to try another approach at learning about Catholicism. But I was wondering if there are any couples out there that were ever in a similar situation with advice. And for prayers, they are always helpful.

 

[dulcissima]

He doesn’t have to agree to raise the children Catholic. He just has to be advised that you have to agree to do your best to see that the children will be raised Catholic.

It really does sound like he is making an effort and his heart is in the right place. I would say, maybe he needs to just start his RCIA classes, stop worrying, and stay open to the Holy Spirit.

Don’t give up. I know inter-faith relationships can be difficult, but it sounds like the two of you are really on the right track.

 

[annb]

Have you or he read Home to Rome by Scott and Kimberly Hahn? I highly recommend it!!

 

[IlovemyChurch]

Just to correct the above post:

Rome Sweet Home by Scott and Kimberly Hahn

My only advice would be not to actually get married untill you are both 100% sure where you stand with this issue,

In marriage you share your everything that you are and have with the other person, it must be horrible not to have them understand & agree with such an integral part of yourself. You are already experiencing some of that sorrow, I believe it will only get worse if this same situation is replicated in marriage because you will want to feel like a part of each other…but just won’t be able to.

Then either one of three things will happen…

1. You will abandon your faith
2. He will abandon his
3. You will both stay with your faiths and never be quite able to connect fully, because there is a gulf of difference.

It does also make it harder to raise children (but not impossible, depending on how committed you are to bring them up Catholic, and how facilitating he is).

It is indeed a very good thing and a blessing that he appears open to the idea of converting.

Maybe he is too set on the idea of “feeling” whether God is calling Him to convert. God also gave us our intellectual reasoning and a satisfied intellect can also be a ‘calling’ to convert. Putting everything down to ‘feeling’ is not always productive because feelings are easily misleading.

Perhaps what you should do is really make sure that you are fully clued up on all the teachings of the Church yourself, and that you have read explanations from multiple angles and multiple sources, so that you are better able to explain and guide him.

I live in England so I know many ex-Anglican Catholics.
Tell them their Church was started by Henry VIII because he wanted to divorce. That’s usually a good starting point for showing how ridiculous their denominatio is.

Good luck & God Bless,

Remember marriage is forever and ever…dont go into it hoping he will change. Because he might not. and you only get one life, so don’t waste it being in a predictably unhappy situation. Better to stay engaged for 15 years and then marry certain, then engaged 6 months, followed by a lifetime of heartache.

 

[SemperJase]

There are times when you should not prioritize your feelings in a decision.
Think.
If you follow your heart now (famous advice from Hollywood) what is the likely result, a blessed marriage or even greater heartbreak as your religious convictions become a wedge in your marriage?

If he doesn’t convert will he agree to raise the children catholic? And if he agrees, isn’t that a sign that his religious convictions about his own faith are not that strong?

His willingness to go to RCIA is great news. Perhaps he will convert. If he does, great.

If he doesn’t, God is probably not calling you to marry him. St. Paul wrote “Do not be unequally yoked” as a warning about this situation. You shouldn’t go into a marriage with someone of a different faith.

While it will be painful to cut off that relationship, it would be even worse after 10 years of marriage and 3 kids when your faith differences become impossible to reconcile.

Also, don’t tell him now that his decision to convert after RCIA will decide whether you stay together. That would seem like blackmail and you need him to make an unpressured choice.

God bless you both.

 

[jmb100]

catherine,
sounds like you have a wonderful fiance! just the fact that he is going to attend rcia is something. i speak first hand on interfaith marriages.

i still remember when i started getting serious w/ my now dh…my mom said: ‘keep in mind, he is not catholic, this could be a problem’…i thought…yea, yea, yea…who cares…i was not practicing at all, in any way…it just did not matter to me.

we got married in tha catholic church. we attened mass as a young couple only on christmas and easter and ended up fighting over everything on the way home. kids came along, i ‘caved’ and agreed to baptize them episcopal. i found myself attending their services by myself! then there was a life changing event in my life 5 years ago which brought me FULL steam back to the church. thank god! i love my faith. dh has not missed mass w/ our family even once in 3 years…but he refuses to go thru rcia…reasons are so many that it does not apply to your situation.

my point is that it would be so wonderful if you could go thru the program and that he sees the truth…the faiths are so close, there should not be any question…maybe he could start out going to the class for you and then come out of it knowing it was for him…this would be my hope and prayer for my dh! good luck! god bless.

as a side note, i am currently reading scott/kimberly hahns rome sweet home and loving it. i hope to have some areas highlighted soon for dh to read.

 

[BlestOne]

I am a divorced and remarried cradle Catholic. It is what I learned in my first marriage that led me to a few decisions. First, after the stuff I went through, I refused to marry a man who was not a devout Catholic. Long story short, of course I met an incredible Protestant because God has a sense of humor. Very early on, I let him know I would never force conversion, but then, I would never marry a man who wasn’t Catholic. We continued to date and I invited him to mass with me. For the first year he went every other week with me and every other week to his church because his daughter was required to go 50% of the time since she was attending school there. After a while he went to both on the weeks he had his daughter and to mass with me and my kids when he didn’t. He read the book “Catholicism for Dummies” and asked questions. I did my best to answer his questions and learned alot from the experience. After another year he joined RCIA at my parish. I went with him but to be honest, I was very unimpressed with the touchy feely stuff and the lack of heavy doctrine teachings. He was less than impressed too. Not to be discouraged, he often met with our DRE and pastor which helped alot. He became Catholic the next Easter Vigil which caused problems on his side of the family. A year after he came into the Church, our pastor asked to talk to us after mass one day. I thought, “Oh great, what did the kids do now?” so we follow him to the sacristy after mass and as soon as we get in there Father looked at us and asked, “So are you 2 ever going to get married? I see you in mass every week and you look like a married couple and you act like a married couple. I have seen how you all interact with all the kids and it looks like they all accept you as their parent or step parent, so what is holding you back?” It was just the wake up call my DH needed at the time, which leads to the second thing I learned from my first marriage. He still didn’t know what that would be. I refused to marry someone who would not pray with me on a daily basis…I firmly believe that a marriage needs daily prayer to not only survive but to flourish and I wanted the whole dream this time around… I wanted a sacramental marriage that lasts forever…I want God’s plan!!! After the questions from Father, I finally told him my other “I will only marry if” requirement. He very much agreed with me and 3 months later he asked me to marry him pending our annulments from our former spouses.

You can and should have the whole dream…the sacramental marriage, the spouse that shares in educating children about faith matters… My advice is pray about it, and then talk to your fiance about your concerns. Ask him to pray about it too. God won’t abandon you.