When considering the practice of offering marriage catechumenate during the months preceding the wedding — a practice still very common in many parishes — one might think that this catechesis belongs to the stage of immediate preparation, according to the classification proposed by the Church. To discern whether this is correct or not, it is necessary to clearly understand what the stages are.
Proximate preparation is the stage in which the engaged couple should deepen their understanding of the Sacrament of Marriage in order to engage in authentic discernment. This stage implies closeness but does not yet imply certainty that the marriage will actually take place.
The recent document Catechumenal Pathways for Married Life (CPML) emphasizes that this is the time of the “final decision”:
“The specific goal of this stage is to finalize each couple’s discernment about their vocation to marriage. This may lead to the free, responsible, and deliberated decision to enter into marriage, or it may lead to the equally free and deliberated decision to end the relationship and not marry.” (CPML, 55)
To make it even clearer that this phase must serve as the foundation for discernment, the same document indicates that proximate preparation should precede the decision to marry and the wedding preparations, that is, the formal engagement:
“At the conclusion of this stage, the Rite of Betrothal could take place as a sign of entry into the subsequent stage of final preparation” (CPML, 59)This preparation consists of moments of doctrinal formation but also of close accompaniment for the couples, promoting prayer and a lived life of faith. According to the CPML (Catechumenal Pathways for Married Life), this is one of the catechumenal pathways — that is, a true catechetical journey. Like any catechesis, its primary purpose is instruction for discernment, meaning the necessary knowledge for a conscious decision.
Therefore, marriage catechumenate clearly falls within the proximate stage, also understood as the “personal preparation for entering marriage,” in accordance with Canon 1063, paragraph 2 of the Code of Canon Law. It is, therefore, a necessary moment — not to say mandatory.
The next stage, the immediate stage, no longer focuses on discernment but rather on the time of engagement, that is, on preparing for marriage. In this stage, doctrinal, moral, and spiritual aspects may be addressed, but mainly as reminders. The main objective is to prepare spiritually for the celebration of the Sacrament of Marriage, which may be done through moments of prayer, retreats, confession, liturgical preparation, among others. The CPML (Catechumenal Pathways for Married Life) is very clear and objective in its definitions. For this reason, I transcribe here three of its paragraphs from the section on immediate preparation:
69. In view of the wedding celebration, care shall be taken to involve the spouses in the choice of readings for the Mass, and possibly even the options provided for other parts of the rite (e.g., the various aspects of the entrance rite, the moment of the marriage blessing, the formularies of the prayers of the faithful, the hymns, etc.). One aspect which should be heavily emphasized is the awareness of a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit during the Rite of Marriage. This effusion of the Spirit forms part of the dynamism of grace initiated in Baptism, but also provides a new aspect to the divine charity infused in us from Baptism, one which now takes on the features of “conjugal charity”. Those saints invoked in the litanies also act as intercessors in view of this outpouring. Couples can derive great benefit by invoking the Saints or Blessed spouses of our times, who have already lived the experience of being husbands and wives, fathers and mothers. They could also invoke other holy intercessors who are important for the spouses, so as to enhance the dignity of married life within the Church community and help everyone understand the beauty and strength of this sacrament in the economy of salvation.
70. A one/two-day spiritual retreat would offer great benefit if held a few days before the wedding. Although this may seem unrealistic given the many commitments related to wedding planning, nevertheless great benefits have been produced when it has been implemented. Indeed, it is precisely the hustle and bustle of the many practical tasks associated with the upcoming celebration that can distract the betrothed from what matters most: the celebration of the sacrament and the encounter with the Lord who comes to “inhabit” their human love by filling it with His divine love. Excessive anxiety about “things to do” can cause distraction, and risks overshadowing all the spiritual preparation which has filled the previous months. In this sense, a short retreat in the run-up to the wedding can help refocus on the essentials and turn the couple’s gaze away from secondary things and instead toward the Lord, who comes to meet the bride and groom and brings to fulfillment the vocation to which He has called them. In those cases where an actual retreat is impossible, even a shorter time of prayer (such as an evening meeting, or “prayer vigil”) could serve this purpose. In any case, the invitation to such a retreat should take account of a couple’s concrete life commitments, as well as the effective possibility they have to make time for a retreat before the wedding celebration, so as not to make it unworkable.71. Shortly before the wedding, couples should celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation, either during the aforementioned spiritual retreat or at a “prayer vigil”, or even in another context. Experience shows that receiving God’s forgiveness – perhaps even making a more involved confession covering previously-confessed sins, if appropriate – prepares spouses better than anything else to welcome the grace which God offers them in the Sacrament of Marriage, since it removes feelings of profound guilt resulting from past “baggage”, grants inner peace, and directs the spirit toward God’s grace and mercy and toward that which really matters. It also diverts attention away from the merely material aspects of the wedding. Moreover, confession ahead of marriage – which sometimes occurs after years of “avoiding” the Sacrament of Reconciliation – offers many people a chance to return to the regular reception of the sacraments. A communal celebration of the Sacrament of Reconciliation may also be considered wherever possible. Such a celebration may involve the participation of the engaged couple’s respective families, along with the marriage witnesses and others wishing to participate, so that the gift of divine mercy might be poured out on their families, which also require internal reconciliation and need to be strengthened in communion. In this way, all who participate in the wedding may be helped to live this moment in the correct frame of mind.
Given the clarity offered by this document, it seems clear that the differences between the proximate and immediate stages of preparation — in terms of both timing and objectives — are not to be confused. The former, which has also come to be known as matrimonial catechesis and includes the Preparation Sessions for Married Life (PSML), will be explored in detail in the questions throughout this book.
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