Called Session 5: Matrimony
When a teen misses a session of High School Faith Formation, the Concord Carlisle Catholic Collaborative expects that teen to view the video(s) missed and complete this simple online form.

The videos for this session are found at Formed.org (free subscription - choose our church when you sign up), then choose from the Menu at the top "Programs" - "Youth Programs". Choose the channel "YDisciple" and find the series "Called: Discover Your Vocation".

Session 5 is titled "Called to Holy Matrimony". Watching the video will take about 25 minutes, and answering the questions may take 15 minutes.

Disclaimer: Tony knows this couple personally - we still exchange Christmas cards! Tony was also at the wedding - at 12:57 in the video, I'm the guy with the glasses, blue shirt, and full tie right behind Annie's dad walking her up the aisle. (You can barely see me.)

When Annie visited the Boston area in 2019, she came by Tony's house. In the winter of 2024, when Annie was in the area to promote her camp (spoken about in the video), Tony reconnected with her (the other guy in the photo works at Annie's camp). For more information about Camp Wojtyla, visit their website... it's a really neat organization!
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Winter 2024, North Shore Massachusetts
Teen's First Name *
Teen's Last Name *
Which session does the Teen regularly attend?
 *
Overview
In this session we will discuss the vocation of Holy Matrimony. Holy Matrimony, along with Holy Orders, is a "sacrament at the service of communion". God unites a husband and wife in marriage and gives them the grace to grow in selfless love for one another and for their children. This love builds up the Body of Christ and is a witness in the world. The life-giving and forgiving love within marriage mirrors, in some real way, the creative and redemptive love within the Blessed Trinity. For this reason, marriage is more than a contract; it is a covenant. That is, marriage is an unconditional, mutual pledge to love and honor one another “in good times and bad, in sickness and health, all the days of my life.”
Icebreaker: Scar Show and Tell - do you have a physical scar? How did you get it? If you don't have any physical scars, you can share a story of an injury you suffered or an embarrassing mistake you made.
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage
Have you heard the expression “They are dating seriously”? It usually means a couple has been together a long time and the expectation is they will eventually get married. However, “dating seriously” should imply that a couple is preparing thoughtfully for marriage and considering what life together will be like in 5, 10, 20, even 50 years. In fact, you should think seriously about marriage even before dating so you can establish some criteria for a future spouse.

Imagine that you and your fiancé are in Catholic marriage preparation, and you are asked the following questions. How would you answer? (Answer at least 5)
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - what makes a married relationship distinctively Christian?
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - how would you describe a model marriage?
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - At what point do you think you are financially prepared for marriage? (little or no debt, savings account, own a home) (thought from Tony: I paid off my car loan, and was debt-free, the day before I proposed marriage to my wife Tina)
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - Where would you like your family to live? (city, small town, in the country)
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - What family traditions will be important to you in your marriage and family life?
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - In your opinion, what makes a great parent?
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - How will you discipline your children?
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - What are your views on putting children in daycare?
Icebreaker: Getting Serious About Marriage - How will you educate your children? (home school, Catholic school, public school)
Introduction
Thanks for sharing about your scars and your thoughts on marriage and family life. Tragically, many people have been scarred by failed marriages, making it so important that we seriously think about what makes successful marriages. (This is no judgment on you or the family in which you are growing up, but rather points to the ideal the Church offers for marriage.)

The Church calls divorce “a plague on society” because of the grave harm it causes to families (CCC 2385). But there is a remedy to this plague, and it is found in God’s own scars—on the hands, feet, and side of His Son, Jesus Christ. The grace of the sacraments flows from Jesus’ scars, that is, His death and resurrection.

Holy Matrimony, along with Holy Orders, is a sacrament of service. God unites a husband and wife in marriage and gives them the grace to grow in selfless love for one another and for their children. This love builds up the Body of Christ and is a witness of God’s love for the world.
Theme Scriptures: Genesis 1:27-28; 2:24
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it’...
Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh.”
Opening Prayer
Heavenly Father, we give You thanks for the gift of our lives. We know that You have created us out of love and for a specific plan. Help us to see the many blessings You give us every day. Lord Jesus, we long to be Your faithful disciples. Forgive us for the times that we fall short and fail to trust in You. Holy Spirit, open our hearts and minds so that we might know the will of God and have the desire to follow it.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Watch Video Segment 1 and answer the questions below.
Scott and Annie shared the ways in which they prepared themselves for their vocation.
Both committed their lives to Jesus, grew in their understanding and love of Sacred
Scripture and the Church, and immersed themselves in Christian friendships. In addition,
they both sincerely discerned their vocation through prayer, dating fasts, and visiting
religious communities.

Annie felt a strong call to mission—to start a Catholic summer camp—before a strong
call to her vocation. In the beginning, she felt some tension between her potential vocation
and her career goals. However, she eventually found peace in giving her goals to God and
trusting that somehow they would be fulfilled in her vocation. Why is it important to give
priority to our vocation over career or life goals?
 *
Scott believed, like many Catholics, that holiness is the expectation of priests and nuns
but not necessarily lay people. This was a struggle for him as he felt drawn to God but not
to the priesthood. As a result, he feared that God wanted him to become a priest. If you
were Scott’s friend at this time, how would you have advised him? *
Scott shared that it was not until college that he came to understand his faith
and own it. Why do you think it is important to take personal ownership of your faith
before marriage? *
Watch Video Segment 2 and answer the questions below.
Scott and Annie met at a conference. Annie says: “While I was speaking with him, wanting
to know more about his ministry, I was drawn in—accidentally really—to him.” Scott says:
“As soon as I met Annie, I began to fall in love with her.”

Do you believe in love at first sight? Is Scott and Annie’s story evidence of it?
 *
According to Professor Scott Stanley at the University of Denver, a young couple
marrying for the first time today has a lifetime divorce risk of 40 percent. What are some
things that you can do in preparing for marriage to ensure that yours lasts a lifetime? *
There are many relationships of love between human beings. There is the love between
spouses, the love of a parent for a child and a child for a parent, the love between siblings,
the love for grandparents, aunts, uncles...and the love between friends. Only one of these
relationships, however, was raised by Jesus to the level of a sacrament: the married love
between husband and wife.

Why do you think Jesus made Holy Matrimony a sacrament?
 *
Watch Video Segment 3 and answer the questions below.
Be sure to listen closely to the Powell's comments about Ephesians 5 from the bible, before responding to those questions.
There is a well-known real estate billionaire and television personality who has been
married three times. After his second divorce, he had this to say about marriage in an
interview on television: “Well, if you have to work at it then maybe it’s not worth having...I
have to work at everything else in my life. I have to work at my work. I just think a marriage
should be easy, not hard.”

How would you respond to that comment?
 *
Ephesians 5:21–32
“Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives, be subject to your husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. As
the church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.”

Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the church and handed himself over for her, to sanctify her, cleansing her by the bath of water with the word, that he might present to himself the church in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

So [also] husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one hates his own flesh but rather nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

"For this reason a man shall leave [his] father and [his] mother
and be joined to his wife,
and the two shall become one flesh.”

This is a great mystery, but I speak in reference to Christ and the church.
There is a popular saying that goes: “Behind every great man is a great woman!” How is this saying similar to what St. Paul is saying to the Ephesians? *
Why do you think it is significant that the first miracle Jesus performed was at a wedding?
When we think of “holy people,” we often think of those who have taken vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. In reality, the Church has also canonized many married people as saints, like St. Thomas More and St. Elizabeth Ann Seton. St. Isidore and St. Maria of Spain were married to each other and both canonized. Marriage, like the priesthood and consecrated life, is a path to holiness. How do married couples embrace the spirit of poverty, chastity, and obedience?
Watch Video Segment 4 and answer the questions below.
Through the seven sacraments, Jesus continues the work of salvation He began in His earthly ministry.

The Church calls Holy Orders and Holy Matrimony sacraments at the service of communion. Why do you think Holy Orders and Holy Matrimony are connected in this way? *
The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches: “The Christian family has an evangelizing and missionary task” (2205). If Catholic families took this call seriously, how do you think they would impact the world? *
Concluding Thoughts
Many couples put more effort into preparing fort heir wedding day than they spend preparing
for a lifetime of marriage together. The challenge this week is to take to personal prayer the
questions from the “Getting Serious About Marriage” activity we did earlier. Ask Jesus to help
you develop convictions in these areas. In addition, consider adding to the list the qualities
and convictions you are looking for in a spouse. This will help you to be more intentional and
honest in a dating relationship. As the saying goes: “People don’t plan to fail; they fail to plan.”
Closing Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, which makes possible the one flesh union between husband and wife. Lord Jesus, by Your presence at the wedding feast of Cana, You taught us that You desire to be the center of the marriage covenant. We pray for the grace to be more fully devoted disciples so that we might be the best spouse that we can be, if and when we get married. Holy Spirit, we ask that You empower Christian families to embrace their evangelizing and missionary task in the world. We pray that the institution of marriage would be strengthened, and we pray for all those suffering as a result of the breakdown of the family. May they come to know that the Church “is a home and family for everyone, especially those ‘who labor and are heavy laden’” (CCC 1658).
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