My Daughter is Getting Married! (Someday)

My daughter is getting married! Well…someday.

That’s what she thinks anyway, and I am inclined to agree with her. At almost 18 years old, what she wants most in life is to be a wife and homeschooling mom (maybe my husband and I HAVE done something right!). I’ve mentioned the possibility of a religious vocation to her, but she’s pretty sure it’s “not for me”.  She’s been planning her wedding since she was about 12 years old, and likes to joke, “All I need now is a groom.”

I’m happy to say that my daughter has also put some thought into planning her marriage – at least as far as someone of her tender age is able. In a college-level writing class she took during her senior year in high school (just last year), she wrote every essay assignment on some aspect of marriage: traditional marriage (stay-at-home wife, working husband), working out problems in marriage, making marriage last. She and I discussed some of her relationship issues, as well as marriage generalities and specifics, and I think it’s been a good thing.

She does have a groom in mind, and this steady relationship has been going on for more than a year. The two of them have had some disagreements and “issues”, and they “almost” broke up a couple of times. But they have worked things through each time, and continue to consider themselves a couple.

I have to admit, though, that sometimes my husband and I have doubts about this young man she’s dating. Why? Well, he’s a nice kid, but he’s not Catholic. In fact, he’s barely Christian. He’s declined our daughter’s invitations to attend Mass with her, saying he doesn’t like that “formal” type of Christianity. He has a stubborn streak, too, and tends to dig in his heels when he thinks he’s being “pressured” - which is to say the subject of religion has not been mentioned.

So, while I pat myself on the back for “teaching” my daughter how great it is to be a stay-at-home wife and homeschooling mom, at the same time I berate myself for failing to inculcate in her the importance of having a Catholic husband. Still, our conversations about weddings and marriage have opened the door to some further instruction on our Catholic identity.  We’re a work in progress, I guess.

Sometimes I wish some nice Catholic boy would come along and sweep my daughter off her feet. Michael Voris (of RealCatholicTV and the Vortex), during his coverage of World Youth Day, commented that he was meeting “lots of young people…lots of young men” who were passionate about their faith, orthodox in their outlook, and serious about their spirituality. As if he could hear me through the computer screen, I yelled, “Where?!?” Unfortunately, I don’t think any of those young men live in our town. (Seriously. There really are not all that many nice Catholic boys in the right age range for our daughter!)

Of course, there is also the slight complication that my daughter is not looking for anyone else to sweep her off her feet. So I pray daily for the boyfriend’s conversion; I pray that I will properly guide my daughter; I pray that Our Blessed Mother will guide my daughter in her choice of a husband. Sigh.

I also remind myself that when my cradle-Catholic husband married me, I was not Catholic. In fact, I was pretty anti-Catholic. I became even more so after we were married. But in the end, I became Catholic! How did that happen?! It’s a long story, but I think the answer is: by the grace of God.

Perhaps God has a plan like that for my daughter and her boyfriend.