This week we're back in France filing paperwork for my carte de sejour, the French equivalent of a green card. While we're here, we've got a whole list of lovely errands to run... and of course, the list is growing. The good thing is, if everything goes off as well as the paperwork submission did (thank goodness! It was smooth like spreading peanut butter on a good, thick bread), we'll be super prepared for October 13: Jour-J, like the French call it.
I did realize that time is sliding by quite quickly. We're now past the 2 month mark. The RSVPs are trickling in, my dress is in the hands of the seamstress, I'm all reserved up for my trip back to the US for bridesmaid dress fittings, and I'm starting to get excited. All is going well.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Thursday, August 2, 2012
You Must Have a Religious Ceremony Revelation
We are having a Catholic wedding ceremony this time around. It requires a lot of stuff, one of them being "marriage preparation" which amounts to several meetings with a priest to read this little book containing a collection of scriptures applying to marriage and love and discussing them.
At first, I was sure it would be nothing more than an interesting exercise where I would be forced to lie a bit lot about my stance pertaining to my practice of the Catholic religion in my every day life and future since I am completely non-practicing.
I was only half wrong.
Interestingly enough, the little book offers some really (surprisingly) good advice for married people (or actually any people whom are coupled off). It says things (in the discussions) that are real to life and reminiscent of not only someone married but also someone happily married for many years who is probably also some sort of successful professional marriage counselor. In actuality, it's written by a priest.
So our challenge with this planning this stuff was initially in which language to do it. At that time, my French was limited to niceties and adjectives, my German was (and still is) limited to food shopping, ordering and preparation, but my English is pretty strong. Our visit to the presbytère of Montargis provided us with a preview of their super organized and well-planned preparation program in French. Unfortunately, I didn't understand much. Double unfortunately, we'd be hard pressed to make it back to France for several weekends in a row. So we had to find another option. Options remaining: prepare in Greifswald in German (nearly impossible for it to be useful to both of us) or hope we have good luck and find somewhere in Berlin or Hamburg with an English program.
Somehow luck was on our side.
Mr. Fox found the English-Speaking Roman Catholic Mission in Berlin that was not only quick to respond to our inquiry but also fantastically accommodating, flexible, and just overall super.
Our priest seems to be pretty with it. We haven't had to lie... much. (But of course on the subject of birth control usage we had to fib. Who is really diligent enough to do natural family planning?!?!) But in spite of the with-it-ness of our priest, he tends to say these not-with-it things like "women tend to be unable to make decisions when they are emotionally charged (not totally wrong thought this does not only pertain to women) so in these cases you should leave it to your husband to decide." I don't completely disagree. In general, this is not bad counsel. However, you must know that these comments were made within the context of discussing the wedding preparations. Sadly, all of these are emotional decisions and if I left them up to Mr. Fox we'd be having a shoeless backyard kegger with fancy food. (Okay maybe not quite to that extremity, but I'm sure I'm close...)
Another example of the not-with-it-ness is when we read a scripture about how a wife with "governed speech" is a super thing for a man to have (Sirach 26:1-4, 13-16). So after reading this one, he asks us what we think the definition of "governed speech" is.
Me: (confidently) A woman with some education in how to handle herself appropriately in all situations and does.
Mr. Fox: (cautiously) A woman who never is embarrassing because she
The Priest: (basically, but not exactly) A woman who knows her place.
Me: (trying hard not to rebut or make faces) Ah.
Of course I expect stuff like this. He's a Catholic priest (and a pretty old one at that). So needless to say, though these things go off well, and we tend to have some (unexpectedly) awesome and down-to-earth conversations, Mr. Fox has come away with some niftily annoying soundbites that he can deploy whenever he feels like exercising his a**hole muscle.
Me: (discussing *fill in the blank* about the wedding) I can't decide between X, Y and Z. Maybe W or V or ...
Mr. Fox: (a*hole in full tilt and chuckling like a naughty child) Remember what the priest said! When you can't make a decision you have to listen to me!
Me: *sarcastic eyeroll*
Who knew scripture could be so fun?
 |
| The little book. They've even got a website! Source. |
I was only half wrong.
Interestingly enough, the little book offers some really (surprisingly) good advice for married people (or actually any people whom are coupled off). It says things (in the discussions) that are real to life and reminiscent of not only someone married but also someone happily married for many years who is probably also some sort of successful professional marriage counselor. In actuality, it's written by a priest.
So our challenge with this planning this stuff was initially in which language to do it. At that time, my French was limited to niceties and adjectives, my German was (and still is) limited to food shopping, ordering and preparation, but my English is pretty strong. Our visit to the presbytère of Montargis provided us with a preview of their super organized and well-planned preparation program in French. Unfortunately, I didn't understand much. Double unfortunately, we'd be hard pressed to make it back to France for several weekends in a row. So we had to find another option. Options remaining: prepare in Greifswald in German (nearly impossible for it to be useful to both of us) or hope we have good luck and find somewhere in Berlin or Hamburg with an English program.
Somehow luck was on our side.
Mr. Fox found the English-Speaking Roman Catholic Mission in Berlin that was not only quick to respond to our inquiry but also fantastically accommodating, flexible, and just overall super.
Our priest seems to be pretty with it. We haven't had to lie... much. (But of course on the subject of birth control usage we had to fib. Who is really diligent enough to do natural family planning?!?!) But in spite of the with-it-ness of our priest, he tends to say these not-with-it things like "women tend to be unable to make decisions when they are emotionally charged (not totally wrong thought this does not only pertain to women) so in these cases you should leave it to your husband to decide." I don't completely disagree. In general, this is not bad counsel. However, you must know that these comments were made within the context of discussing the wedding preparations. Sadly, all of these are emotional decisions and if I left them up to Mr. Fox we'd be having a shoeless backyard kegger with fancy food. (Okay maybe not quite to that extremity, but I'm sure I'm close...)
Another example of the not-with-it-ness is when we read a scripture about how a wife with "governed speech" is a super thing for a man to have (Sirach 26:1-4, 13-16). So after reading this one, he asks us what we think the definition of "governed speech" is.
Me: (confidently) A woman with some education in how to handle herself appropriately in all situations and does.
Mr. Fox: (cautiously) A woman who never is embarrassing because she
The Priest: (basically, but not exactly) A woman who knows her place.
Me: (trying hard not to rebut or make faces) Ah.
Of course I expect stuff like this. He's a Catholic priest (and a pretty old one at that). So needless to say, though these things go off well, and we tend to have some (unexpectedly) awesome and down-to-earth conversations, Mr. Fox has come away with some niftily annoying soundbites that he can deploy whenever he feels like exercising his a**hole muscle.
Me: (discussing *fill in the blank* about the wedding) I can't decide between X, Y and Z. Maybe W or V or ...
Mr. Fox: (a*hole in full tilt and chuckling like a naughty child) Remember what the priest said! When you can't make a decision you have to listen to me!
Me: *sarcastic eyeroll*
Who knew scripture could be so fun?
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