Pre-Cana Preparation

Will and I attended Pre-Cana yesterday at the Catholic Center in Ft. Worth. This is a marriage prep course that we were told was 'mandatory' to get married in the Catholic church. Those of you who are Catholic or married a Catholic, you are aware of this 'laundry list', as some say, that you must complete before invitations are sent out. Well, in my maturity and growing-up-ness, I have decided that I am going to make the best out of every situation. God gives me lemons, by gosh I am going to make fantastic lemonade! Well, Pre-Cana was no different. Yes, I was dreading waking up extremely early on the last day of my glorious Christmas break to drive to Ft. Worth without coffee to sit in a meeting room for 8 hours discussing the Catholic way of marriage, but I knew that I needed to take something from this. I needed to make my lemonade.

Oh boy did I ever. I think Will and I learned so much in such a short amount of time that it was overwhelming. I have grown up my entire life Catholic, but I never learned what it was to BE a Catholic. I knew that I had to do things because I was Catholic and that was the way it was. I learned the reasoning behind many different Catholic view points and the actual Catholic ways opposed to assumptions. I had no idea what it was to be a Catholic!!

It was extremely refreshing to be reaffirmed in my faith AND religion, also in my relationship with Will. This course made it blatently obvious that we are meant to be together!! It made me so much more excited about wedding planning. I had just wanted everything to happen, but didn't want to work for it. Now, I cannot wait!!!! I wanted to start calling people and getting things booked on our way home. Six o'clock in the evening on a Sunday is not the perfect time to do this! Thus, I worked on it today during my conference.

I can already tell a difference in our relationship. The Pre-Cana's foundation was learning how to love your spouse as God loves us; freely, totally, faithfully, and fruitfully. One of the exercises was determining if different acts and situations were showing God's love in the four different ways. We were encouraged to take this with us to use in our daily life as a constant reminder. (side note: Will and I tend to joke around sometimes.....ok a lot) Last night, he poked me in the side, and I spouted off "Is that loving me as God loves? Freely? Totally? Fruitfully? Faithfully?" Now, I used it in a light manner, but ever since then, we have said it at least a dozen times. It totally worked! We are constantly reminded to love each other as God loves.


Needless to say, I made lemonade and I am basking in it's sweet taste. I think my cup even has a little pink umbrella in it. I wish I had learned all of this sooner, but this was when God wanted me to be exposed to it. We definitely learned so much that will help make our marriage long lasting and blessed.