{Discernment Series} A Courtship Story

As part of this discernment series of looking closer at both the religious and marital vocations, I wanted to provide a deeper glimpse into discerning each vocation.  Since I am not married or a religious sister, I asked my sister if I could share her and her fiancé's {Andrew} story here and am delighted that she permitted it to be shared.  This post was originally published on my personal blog.  Be blessed!

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Andrew: I remember seeing Anna for the first time at the Adoration Chapel at the Catholic Church a few months after I committed to a 5:00 a.m. holy hour. I don’t know when it was though—sometime in the late summer or early fall of 2009. I remember praying at least once, “Why can’t I meet anybody who wakes up early to make a holy hour?’ I love telling people that we spiritually stalked each other a year before we met.

Anna: I signed up for a weekly 5:00 a.m. holy hour shortly after moving in August of 2009, and I noticed that Andrew was also there each Tuesday morning. I remember one morning at Adoration I was praying about my vocation and a quote popped into my head from a talk I’d heard: “If you’re looking for a spouse, run towards Christ, and then look around and see who’s running with you.” Picture this: when that quote came to mind I was sitting in the chapel with Christ in front of me and Andrew sitting right across the aisle… I immediately noticed him, but my response was “no, not him God, I don’t even know him.”

I was honestly was a little relieved when he stopped showing up that November. I figured I didn’t have to worry about him anymore. 

Andrew: Even though our holy hour encounters ended when I moved in November 2009, I stayed involved with the Catholic Young Adult Group. Thus, we met formally in the summer of 2010 when Anna joined the group. Not long after, as the group discussed the Seven Sacraments, Anna caught my attention with a great talk on the Eucharist. She introduced me to the Adoro te Devote, the great prayer of St. Thomas Aquinas. Then we ended up on the leadership team together. I joined her at a midnight holy hour on New Year’s Eve and asked her out to see South Pacific. She said she already seen it. I awkwardly tried to ask her out for dinner, likely made a fool out of myself, and let the matter drop and kind of pretended it never happened. Me, overthinking just about everything, questioned the prudence of dating someone in the leadership of the young adult group. I used the excuse that it would create drama.

Anna: In my defense, it was about 2:30 a.m. when he asked me out (after holy hour, midnight Mass, and a game night with other young adults) and I wasn’t thinking well on my feet. Plus I was kind of surprised to be invited to the very same show I had just seen literally two or three days earlier with my family. I definitely liked him at this point and was half expecting him to ask me out, but given the situation I got kind of flustered and when he switched to asking about dinner I just said maybe. I expected him to try again, but when he didn’t after a couple weeks I figured I had lost my chance and we continued our friendship as if nothing had happened. In hindsight though, I’m glad we ended up with an extra few months before we started dating, as we really got to know each other well and had a strong friendship to build on later.

Andrew: That’s not to say I didn’t notice her. Anytime I was joking around at a leadership meeting, I noticed her trying to stifle a laugh. During a research trip/vacation, we emailed back and forth and at her suggestion, I made a visit to a Shrine in the area. She did scold me at one point for checking my email on my phone instead of enjoying myself. I’d be lying if I said the scolding didn’t put a smile on my face.

Nonetheless, I got a bit tunnel-visioned in my Lenten penance and then, it was May 2011. I was getting these impulses to ask her out again. Naturally, I took it to prayer; the thoughts of asking her out grew stronger. “Ok, fine,” I prayed, “I’ll try asking her out but if this one doesn’t work out, you’re going to have to come up with another plan because I’m done with this dating thing.”

The opportunity came up toward the end of May. One of the regular young adult events was the monthly “First Friday Fun”—an evening Mass followed by some activity. For June 2011, we were playing mini golf a few miles down the road from me. I knew Anna had started a new job that was closer to me than her place. I fired off a friendly email and asked her if she’d like to stop by for dinner and carpool to the mini golf place since parking is always a catastrophe. We both planned to go to Mass before work. Somewhat to my surprise, she said yes.

Anna: He initially asked if I’d like to carpool in person at a young adults group meeting. He didn’t mention dinner or say anything else at the time since we were part of a larger conversation, but I caught a look in his eye and wasn’t surprised when he followed up by email a few days later and offered to make me dinner before the mini golf trip. It was a casual dinner with good food and then we met up with the rest of the group.

Andrew: Through the month of June, we went to dinners and started spending time together. She taught me a great card came that she learned from her grandmother called “Kings in the Corner.” We got to know each other better. I had dated before, but never really clicked with anyone on a spiritual level. I wanted any relationship to revolve around vocational discernment. Marriage is a call from God. I wanted to be with someone who I could help grow spiritually, and who could help me grow as well. The more I got to know Anna, the more I was convinced that she was who I was looking for.

Anna: I was a bit stressed with moving that month, and Andrew was a wonderful support and listened to my venting more than once. He even took a day off from work to help me move, which also gave him a chance to meet my family. Sometime around then my parents also gave a talk on marriage for the young adults group which helped me to see the beauty of the married vocation and desire to discern it more fully with Andrew. I was praying about our relationship throughout that month and had the sense that God was drawing us together. Plus my sister was starting to nag me and ask when we would make it official.

Andrew: I asked her if she wanted to go up to the city for a surprise on July 3, 2011. The surprise was the rehearsal of the Capitol Fourth concert. This is the concert broadcast on PBS every Fourth of July. The rehearsal is missing just a couple things: the crowds and the fireworks. We went to dinner on Capitol Hill and walked down to the gate, only to be turned away—severe storms were rolling in. We debated a few moments on what to do—characteristically, neither of us were being decisive. We decided, ultimately, to head to shelter. We entered a parking garage just in time. It started pouring rain! We ended up playing cards on a picnic blanket on the garage floor. It was certainly a surprise, though not what I planned. Eventually we went home and watched a movie on St. Damien of Molokai that I had from Netflix, had a good discussion on dating, and we were official.

Anna: As part of that discussion he asked me: “true or false, dating is to marriage as seminary is to priesthood.” I said true. So we began our relationship with the understanding that we both saw it as a time of discernment and formation for marriage.

Andrew: We got into a routine of going to Mass together, praying together (particularly the Liturgy of the Hours), hiking, cooking, and so forth. We also took the advice of a couple we knew and started reading to each other. Since we both saw dating as discernment, we started with Venerable Fulton Sheen’s Three to Get Married and a book called Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts.

At some point, we both realized that the marriage thing wasn’t an “if,” but a “when.” Anna said she wanted to be surprised by a proposal, but didn’t want to be caught completely off guard. I gave her fair warning that I was going to talk with her dad. I contacted Anna’s sister and tried to arrange a dinner with her without raising Anna’s suspicions that I was the one making arrangements. We settled on May 4. On the way, I asked Anna if we could stop at the Adoration Chapel (the same one in which we spiritually stalked each other prior to meeting) for Evening Prayer and some quiet time, since I had just gotten though a busy day at work.

Anna: I was a little suspicious, but I didn’t think he’d had time to get a ring, so I kept telling myself it wouldn’t be that day.

Andrew: On the way down, Anna told me about the homily that morning at Mass. The priest (who is doing our marriage prep) talked about the connection between marriage and the Eucharist. After we prayed Evening Prayer, I whispered to Anna, “Speaking of marriage and the Eucharist, there’s another reason I wanted to stop here.” I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I’m fairly certain I told her I love her and want to serve her as her husband. I got down on one knee (as best I could between two pews) and asked her to marry me. I was overjoyed when she said yes. I look forward now to a lifetime of adventures and misadventures, but most of all, to all the years that I will spend living a life loving and serving her.

Anna: It was simple but beautiful, and I can’t think of a better location. We prayed Evening Prayer quietly, and then I saw him slip his hand in his pocket and realized that it really was happening. I believe he told me that he wanted to propose in the presence of Christ since he wants Christ to be at the center of our marriage. He pulled out a beautiful ring with a diamond that has been in his family since 1943 and two sapphires, which are my birthstone and a lifelong favorite of mine. As we left the chapel, our joy was overflowing in giggles which we were both trying to stifle until we got outside. I look forward to spending the rest of my life at Andrew’s side, journeying together through life, sharing our joys and supporting each other through our struggles and continuing to grow in love for each other. 

Anna and Andrew are to be married Saturday, November 9, 2013.  Please keep them in your prayers as they begin their life together in Christ.  

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Next in the discernment series: the journey of one sister's discernment to religious life.