During marriage preparation (and also in the midst of your marriage) it is essential to stay rooted in a spiritual perspective. There are so many graces available to you through the Sacrament, and I encourage you to beg for them!!
There are many great prayers, novenas, and spiritual resources for marriage preparation. During our engagement, I found myself returning to these 3 prayers often and they gave me the strength, perspective, and graces I needed to navigate the months leading to our wedding day.
Shortly after we got an engaged, a dear friend of mine sent an engagement card with this litany for marriage! Every day during engagement I would pray this litany and beg for the graces for my marriage, in advance. It helped to open my heart and prepare my soul for the Sacrament. Now, my husband, Andrew, and I can pray this litany together and invite the Lord to work deeply in our marriage.
This beautiful 9 day novena prayer can be prayed over and over again. Amidst all the wedding decisions, preparations, and waiting it can be easy to fall into distraction and discouragement. This simple prayer, "Jesus, I surrender myself entirely to you. Take care of everything." can be used at any moment throughout the wedding planning process.
3. The Rosary
In every season of my life, I find myself clinging to Our Lady and connecting to her through The Rosary. If you'd like to pray for your future spouse in a unique and personal way, I invite you to consider praying a daily decade of the Rosary for them, with specific intentions.
On each bead, you can offer the Hail Mary for one part of your future spouse's life. Even before I met Andrew, I used these 10 intentions to pray for my future spouse and then was able to pray for Andrew specifically during our engagement.
Below is an example of what those 10 Hail Mary intentions could look like:
That ______ will continue to deepen his relationship with Christ daily.
That ______ will have holy friendships and brotherhood throughout his life.
That ______ will pursue virtue daily and grow in holiness.
That ______ will receive strength to fight against his weaknesses.
That ______ would hear and listen to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit.
That ______ heart would be moved towards kindness.
That ______ will possess a perseverance in prayer.
That ______ will be filled with courage to be a witness for Christ.
That ______ anxious heart would be calmed to live in the present.
That ______ would love strongly and passionately.
Uniting my hearts to all of yours!
xoxo,
E