The image that a couple walk together in the witness of the Community and God to swear the promise of living forever is very beautiful and sparkling. Marriage is God’s predestination, it is a symbol of God’s love for human. That is why Catholic marriage is a Sacrament to bring the family happiness.

The Church has many necessary procedures for a couple to prepare their family life. Besides the normal rituals, Catholic marriage also has the following differences:

1. Marriage must originate in love

Catholic attach great importance to love, especially the love between the husband and wife. Therefore, before a couple presents themselves to the parish priest, they must go through the process of learning and loving each other. Both of them have to love voluntarily each other without compulsion by any others. When they determine their married life, they will decide to get married and present themselves to the parish priest where they live.

2. Study the Catechesis

The Catechesis of the Catholic marriage is the luggage that the Church prepares for young couple to enter into family life with a certain knowledge of religion and life. Usually, the study time for both people is about 6 months, but the Catechumen will study longer. Some people say that the learning time is too long and forced. Howerver, we can think that family life is very complicated, hence, it is necessary to have a amount of certain knowledge about family life. Taking six months to pursue the lifetime happiness is a worth doing.

3. Announce matrimony

After studying the marriage Catechesis , if two sides decide to get married, they will present it to the girl’s parish priest. And then, He will make thrice of matrimonial announcement.

The matrimonial announcement aim to let everyone in the Community know. They will give prayers and consider what is the obstacle, then resolve them first or report them to the pastor, and also to set the wedding ceremony. Many people think that this will affect the privacy of two person. But we can find out that it is a good way to encourage community life, which is also a good thing for young couple after getting married.

4. The celebration of Sacrament of Holy Matrimony

This is the most sacred and important day for the couple, when they completed the Catechesis course of marriage, two person decide to get married. The Mass will celebrate with special liturgical rites, consisting of three parts:

Part one: Interrogate newlyweds

In a Catholic marriage, the Celebrant in turn asks the bride and groom three questions about freedom, love and respect each other, and accepting children. These questions help the couple confirm formally in front of everybody that they are truly conscious and mature when deciding to marry. This means that they have freedom to marry, accepting the meaning and purpose of marriage. They will love and be faithful, ready to receive and educate children.

Part two: Give the vows

This is the main part of the Matrimony of a Catholic marriage. The newlyweds will give an oath of  marrying and engageing their loyalty to each other for the whole life.

Part three: Bless and exchange wedding rings

When both have agreed and promised in front of God’s witness, the eye-witness will declare that they will formally become a couple. The groom will give the ring and kiss the bride in front of everyone as to publicize their marriage.

The circular ring is a symbol of eternity by Caholic. Therefore, the ring is an indispensable item and the groom gives to the bride as a promise that they will live forever together.

In some Catholic marriage, you will see the bride and groom, each person holds each candle. Do not be surprised because each candle that they hold represents the life of each person before marriage. Both will use their own candle to light another candle and blow out them.

Next, the couple, two eye-witnesses and the parish priest will sign in the Matrimony Book. This book will be stored in the archives of the parish. This signature may also be made after Mass.

The Matrimony ceremony ends. Mass continues.

The Matrimony is the most sacred thing for every Catholic marriage. If we meditate, we will find out that the great values of the Matrimony. It is the basis of family happiness, establishing gender equality, and the basis of combating the polygamy phenomenon. It is also the foundation to protect the happiness of women. In short, Catholic marriage is a beautiful culture of humanity. And we need to preserve and expand it to make the world becom better.