• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Catholic Review

Catholic Review

Inspiring the Archdiocese of Baltimore

Menu
  • Home
  • News
        • Local News
        • World News
        • Vatican News
        • Obituaries
        • Featured Video
        • En Español
        • Sports News
        • Official Clergy Assignments
        • Schools News
  • Commentary
        • Contributors
          • Question Corner
          • George Weigel
          • Elizabeth Scalia
          • Michael R. Heinlein
          • Effie Caldarola
          • Guest Commentary
        • CR Columnists
          • Archbishop William E. Lori
          • Rita Buettner
          • Christopher Gunty
          • George Matysek Jr.
          • Mark Viviano
          • Father Joseph Breighner
          • Father Collin Poston
          • Robyn Barberry
          • Hanael Bianchi
          • Amen Columns
  • Entertainment
        • Events
        • Movie & Television Reviews
        • Arts & Culture
        • Books
        • Recipes
  • About Us
        • Contact Us
        • Our History
        • Meet Our Staff
        • Photos to own
        • Books/CDs/Prayer Cards
        • CR Media platforms
        • Electronic Edition
  • Advertising
  • Shop
        • Purchase Photos
        • Books/CDs/Prayer Cards
        • Magazine Subscriptions
        • Archdiocesan Directory
  • CR Radio
        • CR Radio
        • Protagonistas de Fe
  • News Tips
  • Subscribe

Where to get married?

March 1, 2018
By Father Kenneth Doyle
Filed Under: Commentary, Question Corner, Worship & Sacraments

Share
Share on Facebook
Share
Share this
Pin
Pin this
Share
Share on LinkedIn

My daughter is soon to be engaged to a young man who attends a Lutheran church. She has received all of her Catholic sacraments and attends Mass regularly. Now she is in turmoil about where to get married.

Her future in-laws are expecting them to marry in his hometown Lutheran church, where his family are adamant members — and that is the town where the couple expect to settle and raise their family.

I am wondering what the Catholic Church’s guidelines are and how she can be married with the blessing of the Catholic Church. Whenever we try to discuss the matter, my daughter ends up in tears.

She doesn’t want to convert to Lutheranism, and she doesn’t want to disappoint her own family or his. Can you offer any insight that might help? (central Minnesota)

Please relax, and have your daughter do the same. The solution is right at hand. Your daughter can be married in her husband’s Lutheran parish church and still have the marriage recognized and blessed by the Catholic Church.

She and her fiance would need simply to meet with a local Catholic priest sometime ahead of the wedding to do the necessary paperwork in applying for the Catholic diocese’s permission.

The priest will explain that your daughter will need to promise to continue to be faithful to her own Catholic faith and practice and that she will do all she reasonably can, within the context of the marriage, to see that any children are baptized and brought up as Catholic.

Her husband will not need to promise anything, but simply be aware that this is the commitment your daughter is making. If they would like, they can even ask a Catholic priest or deacon to participate in the marriage ceremony — perhaps sharing some of the prayers or readings with the Protestant clergyperson.

In circumstances like these, a wedding ceremony that is mutually agreed upon and mutually planned can do a lot to bring two families into a deeper harmony at an important time.

Print Print

Share
Share on Facebook
Share
Share this
Pin
Pin this
Share
Share on LinkedIn

Primary Sidebar

Father Kenneth Doyle

View all posts from this author

| Recent Commentary |

The virtue of patriotism

Sculpture of St. Rita and St. Therese with a cross and holy water font at the center sits on a table

A Gift and a Connection to the Past

Expert discusses serious harms of smartphones for children and how to limit their use

Cupcakes with 2025 graduation toothpicks in them and a bowl of cookies

Our 31-hour Road Trip

St. Paul and discovering that sin is ‘missing the mark’

| Recent Local News |

Deacon Gary Elliott Dumer Jr., active in men’s ministry, dies

Radio Interview: The music and ministry of Seph Schlueter

Hunt Valley parishioner recalls her former student – a future pope

Father Herman Benedict Czaster, former Curley teacher, dies at 86

Loyola University Maryland graduate ordained Jesuit priest

| Catholic Review Radio |

CatholicReview · Catholic Review Radio

Footer

Our Vision

Real Life. Real Faith. 

Catholic Review Media communicates the Gospel and its impact on people’s lives in the Archdiocese of Baltimore and beyond.

Our Mission

Catholic Review Media provides intergenerational communications that inform, teach, inspire and engage Catholics and all of good will in the mission of Christ through diverse forms of media.

Contact

Catholic Review
320 Cathedral Street
Baltimore, MD 21201
443-524-3150
mail@CatholicReview.org

 

Social Media

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Recent

  • Nearly one in three conceptions in England and Wales end in abortion, government figures reveal
  • The virtue of patriotism
  • Caring for others, serving life is the ‘supreme law,’ pope says
  • Deacon Gary Elliott Dumer Jr., active in men’s ministry, dies
  • Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors’ new president ‘pioneer in his field,’ French lawyer says
  • Radio Interview: The music and ministry of Seph Schlueter
  • Jesus did not ignore those in need, and neither should Christians, pope says
  • Cardinal Czerny asks church to remember seafarers on Sea Sunday
  • Kansas Catholic school building vandalized, defaced with swastikas

Search

Membership

Catholic Media Assocation

Maryland-Delaware-DC Press Association

The Associated Church Press

© 2025 CATHOLIC REVIEW MEDIA, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

en Englishes Spanish
en en