Sponsor Couples

Jackief11

Hello ladies. I know alot of yall have discussed Engaged Encounter, but we opted for the Sponsor Couple meetings instead (FI is a football and baseball coach so there is literally NO TIME for EE). Can anyone tell me what we can expect? We start this Sunday and I'm pretty excited, the FI, not so much. He's not Catholic and is a little nervous, but is converting after the wedding. Any information will help maybe put his worries at ease or tell us what to expect. Thanks

ring_pop

We had a sponsor couple and we really loved it. They still used a book to guide our meetings to talk about the same types of things that (I presume) they discuss in other types of pre-Cana sessions, but we really loved the 2-on-2 time and getting to know each other so well. We talked about stuff like communication, conflict resolution, intimacy. Our couple was really wonderful and supportive, and we had the freedom to speed up or slow down the sessions as needed. We still get together with them every now and then.

[Deleted User]

I have not heard of Sponsor Couple meetings as an option. We did the full EE Weekend. I would assume they could discuss with you a lot of what is discussed in a typical EE Weekend, however, on a scaled back version. Since they are your "sponsor couple" during your engagement, I would think they would also be available to answer any questions that may come up while planning your wedding or other concerns or questions you may have about Catholic marriage.

DFWIndian

We just finished our first Sponser Couple session.  I know personally our couple is very sweet and fit us perfectly. We were there for 3 hours! This was a little much for FI, but we made it through and know what to expect next time.

There are 5 sessions in our pre-cana book which we will have to go through. Pretty much you do the work book chapters and then talk about it in the meeting. The whole reason for it is to make sure you are discussing these topics. I wasn't too fond of discussing homes issues with strangers, but they didn't expect us to say more then we wanted to. They just want to make sure you as a couple were discussing it. There was nothing in the first two chapters my FI and I hadn't discussed so it wasn't bad.

Sidenote: you may want to add them to your guest list. If we are meeting with them this much I know we will definitely be inviting them to the wedding.

bibliophile2010

My parish actually uses sponsor couples in addition to a more standard Marriage Prep process. The sponsor couples go over your FOCCUS results with you and lead the discussions (2 or more depending on the couple) based on that.

This totally reminded me that I need to email the wedding-lady at our parish to make sure that we are good-to-go in that area.