Since we’re getting married in a Catholic church, NEPA Groom and I had to complete a pre-Cana class in order to move forward with our preparations. And since the King’s College Chapel isn’t like a regular, full parish, they don’t offer one of their own. NEPA Groom and I looked at all of our options and decided to do the one day seminar style class. Thankfully, the Diocese of Scranton offers a lot of options and is pretty thorough with the information they provide on their website. We registered and attended our pre-Cana class in February, well in advance of the big day.

Now, neither of us really knew what to expect, and I was particularly nervous because I’m not Catholic. All the research I did online really didn’t help because in situations like this, it seems like it can vary from Parish to Parish. So, if you’re doing pre-Cana in the Northeast PA area, my review will probably be more accurate. Either way, I hope you find it useful!

The class was scheduled from 8 am to 4 pm at a church about 20 minutes away from us, so it was an early and long day. We got there and got signed in, and they had some breakfast waiting for everyone. The room was set up with round tables, with two couples per table. There were a lot of good things that we got from the day, and some *interesting* things.

The Good

The class was run by a married couple, and was fairly relaxed. Having gone through this themselves, they tried to keep things light hearted where they could to break the ice. This particular couple was also time conscious, and covered everything thoroughly and still got us out 2 hours early. Sweet!

I think the whole day opened up a lot of good conversations for us – we really heard more about the magnitude of the commitment we were making, and it really started to hit home for us both. We also took the FOCCUS test, and have been having a good time going over those answers with our priest and talking about our expectations of marriage and what we want to see happen.

Finally, the class was very accepting of non Catholics. In fact, the couple made a point to thank any of us who weren’t Catholic for coming and for being open to at least listening to what they had to say. They made a point of not trying to force anything on any of us. They asked that we’d have an open mind and said it was up to us to decide

The *Interesting*

And then… then, well, I guess there’s no nice way to say this. But then there were the other couples in the room. I’m sure some of them were nice. I’m sure some of them were genuine and in love and headed towards healthy marriages. I just didn’t get to sit next to any of them.

We took the FOCCUS test first, and to keep things truthful, the boys from one side took their tests across the room and the girls from over there joined the ladies on the other side. I kid you not, during the test, the 3 other women at my table cheated on the test with each other. They asked each other for answers like it was a middle school math exam, not an inventory designed to identify points for conversation with the person you plan on marrying. They literally took the whole test together, identifying the answers that would cause the least waves, rather than what might be the truth.

After that, the couple that was at our table with us spent most of the six hours we were there texting other people on their cell phones, and showing each other the texts they were getting. At each break opportunity, they jumped up to go talk to someone else. It was a little discouraging to see, but I did my best to focus back on NEPA Groom and why WE were there. I hope maybe something managed to stick with them and will help them down the road!

Has anyone else taken their pre-cana class in the Northeast PA region? How did your experience compare? Did you get anything good out of it?

Sweet! Lookie what we got in the mail today:

It feels good to know that this is scheduled and we’ve mad a little bit more progress. Though now the letter itself is making me worry about bad weather. And what “comfortable clothing” really means. Sigh.

Getting married in a Catholic Church seems like it will be an interesting experience. So far, the mounds of paperwork have been! From what I’ve read online, it seems like the requirements can vary slightly from parish to parish, and that can get purty confusing for a non-Catholic like myself. I thought I might be able to shed some light on what the Diocese of Scranton requires for all the NEPA Brides & Grooms in a similar spot right now:

• First and foremost, you both need to be baptized by someone, at some point. You’ll need to get a copy of your baptism certificate from your home church, dated within the last 6 months.
• If you are Catholic, you will need permission to be married outside of your parish. I’m assuming this is fairly common cuz if you are both Catholic, you’ve gotta choose a church! This can be a written note or it can be a phone call between priests.
• Attend a Pre-Cana Conference, Engaged Encounter Weekend, or another form of approved pre-marriage counseling.
• We are required to have 2 letters each confirming we have never been married before. This can be as simple as a hand written note, and it could be provided by each set of parents, if you are able to do so.

PHEW! Once your priest has all of these, he can begin to process the paperwork. In our case, he will also have to ask for an exception to be made to allow me to marry in the church. It’s a common thing, and is generally approved, but one you should be aware of.  Our goal is to have much of this gathered and scheduled by the end of this month.

Were you surprised by the amount of paperwork involved in getting married?

Well, we had our first meeting at the King’s College chapel tonight, and I think it went pretty well! The priest in charge of the chapel remembers me from my time at the school, so it was nice to catch up a bit. We used the time to get to know each other a little bit, since he didn’t know FH that well, and he also let us know what we had to do next. It looks kinda (meaning SUPER DUPER) overwhelming in list form, but here we go:

• FH needs to get a letter from his parish priest saying we can marry at the college chapel
• We need to find a pre-cana course we can attend and knock that out of the park
• We both need a copy of our baptism certificates from our churches, dated within the last 6 months
• 4 letters (2 each) from people close to us who can verify we’ve never been married before
• The priest will have to fill out a request for a dispensation as I am not Catholic

It sounds like a lot. It feels like a lot, but Fr. Hockman assured us it’s a lot of paperwork but nothing that will be a problem. He’s never had a wedding denied, so that makes me feel better. He was also really open to how we want to put our ceremony together. I’ve been reading about other brides’ experiences getting married in the Catholic church, and it seems to vary a lot. Some priests are so strict with their rules! I think we’ve found a good fit and we’ll have the flexibility to have a meaningful ceremony for all parties.

So now, it’s up to FH to get things sorted with his church while I research this marriage preparation business. Has anyone else gone through this? If you know of a good course to take in NEPA, I am all ears.