A Letter from Fr. Paul Frey
Dear Ones,
Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!
Our marriage preparation process is designed to help you become part of Christ Church and to strengthen your relationship with God and to serve the world in Christ's name. We understand that is not going to be the case for all, but we do believe it is important for you to have the fellowship and support of a church community; therefore we desire and hope each couple who get married at Christ Church is able to be active in our congregation and fellowship. It you are not already involved in the life of our parish, we invite you to join us for worship on Sundays and other weekly gatherings, and to introduce yourself to pastor and others.
I hope that Christ Church can be helpful to your marriage. I’ve done many wedding services and they last an hour or so. But we want our marriages to last a lifetime. Because we value marriage, and not just the wedding, I generally meet with couples 3 to 4 times before the actual wedding rehearsal and wedding.
So, before to our first meeting please do the following: Fill out the Wedding Application on the Christ Church Laredo Website and then contact me by phone, e-mail, or text. Look over the “Planning a Wedding” document, write down your notes, questions, etc. and bring it with you to all our meetings.
Once I receive your wedding application, I will set up a quick phone call and then e-mail you links to fill out a computer inventory from Prepare Enrich designed to help you grow in your relationship as we prepare for your wedding. When I receive your Couple report, I will send that to you along with a short workbook designed to help you as we move toward your wedding day and we will set up our first appointment.
At your first appointment, come prepared to spend a couple of hours going over the report and a few pages from the workbook, as well as $35 dollars, the cost for the couple’s relationship report from Prepare-Enrich. We will spend 2 to 3 sessions to review this information. Before the 3rd or 4th session, each of you will write out a detailed family history, which you will bring to the session and then we then talk about them. At each of our sessions we talk some about wedding details. Please remember the reason for sharing personal information with me is to help the two of you grow and have a great marriage.
My schedule is somewhat flexible, but often full, so the sooner we set up times the better for all of us. I’m sure that the two of you also have very busy schedules, and am willing to try to find “creative” times to meet when necessary. (If one of you lives out of town, we can do some of this via phone, Skype, Facetime, etc.)
If either of you has gone through a divorce let me know. For my Bishop to allow me to officiate at your wedding, I must get him some information no later than 30 days before the ceremony - ideally earlier.
Yours in Jesus Christ,
Paul A. Frey
Rector