Help!!! Premarital Counseling

Honestly I would find a different pastor. If he can’t accept your views than I wouldn’t want him marrying me. You shouldn’t have to change your status to appease him

View Quoted Comment The only thing is, is we really wanted someone who knows us personally and is a part of our lives. That is one of the only things my fiance asked for. We really don't mind getting a liscence... Might make more sense actually, we just want to make sure that logistically it's the right decision with taxes and all of that kind of legal stuff...

View Quoted Comment Logistically that’s definitely up to you guys. Honestly at the end of the day you need to do what you feel is best.

View Quoted Comment Thank you! Hopefully we make the right decision!

Woah, red flag. Get someone else. I'm Catholic which is a pretty limiting religion when it comes to engaged couples. My priest is super old fashioned. Although he does prefer that engaged couples dont live together or sleep together before marriage, he is very understanding of it because it is not his place to judge. It is not your pastor's place to judge you and your FH. I wholeheartedly suggest you finding someone else.

I am so happy my church is not like this. I would absolutely find a different officiant - one that respects my choices and doesn't aim to dictate them based on their own comfort.

If you get legally married now, that would be your "actual" wedding. You should tell people and not mislead them - if your date is right, your wedding is over six months away. You'd be lying to your friends and more distant family for over a half a year.

I couldn't comment on your tax situation, but if you get legally married (big celebration or no) on or before December 31st you'll have been married in the eyes of the IRS for the entire year and will have to make a decision about filing jointly or separately. It could impact your health insurance or other things - but since you're planning to marry I assume those are things you've thought about already.

Are there any other associate or youth pastors in your church who could marry you instead? Or if you guys went to church growing up, anyone from your past churches that could be an alternative?

View Quoted Comment There's only one other pastor and my fiance grew up catholic and the only pastor I had growing up has passed away.

Honestly, I would find a different pastor. Yes, your living situation isn’t ideal as a Christian. But the fact that your pastor is telling you to basically go ahead and get married now just to appease his sense of morality is NOT ok. He shouldn’t WANT you to get married before you go thru the premarital counseling!

Yes, it’s important that you know you officiant. However, getting hung up on logistics over what is right FOR THE COUPLE is a HUGE red flag. I’m telling you this as a Christian who is active in my church and and close to my current and past pastors. In fact, my pastor from my high school days was on town This summer and we had a long talk about this very subject. He said his views on this have changed, and he now counsels and performs ceremonies for couples cohabiting because being an effective Christian leader means meeting people where they’re out and discipling them out of love and grace, not judgement and exclusion. The pastor at my current church feels the same. It’s a big issue today, as young couples are choosing cohabitation for a variety of reasons, one of which is the rising cost of housing and crippling student debt.

Seriously....do NOT just “get a certificate” now to appease the church you are in. THIS IS BAD ADVICE. And going through with a marriage before getting proper pre-marital counseling is a HUGE mistake. Take it from someone who didn’t complete it and later found out the now-DH was hiding a massive amount of debt 😡. Now my choices are to live with it or get a divorce. Had we completed the counseling before, we could have addressed it head on. Better to change your plans now than look back with regret later.

Please, think about this. His request is extremely short-sighted.

Thank you everyone for the advice. We are definitely going to discuss and rethink what we're going to do. Talking about it out loud with my fiance its starting to click that maybe it's not right...

I really appreciate everyone's comments!

I don’t think this is a red flag at all, it sounds like he’s doing his job right! My pre-marrital counselor told us that we should refrain from being “intimate” if we want to do this right. I don’t believe an unmarried couple should live together, but that’s just how I was raised. I say pray about it!

View Quoted Comment I’m a little confused at your contradictions. You said you’re a very active Christian yet you’re considering divorce over something that doesn’t actually permit you to get a divorce in the Bible. Please don’t take this as an attack or me being aggressive, I just wanted to point that out to you.

View Quoted Comment Oh and I hope his approach was a lot softer then what it seems and hopefully he’ll consider your ideas as well!

View Quoted Comment That’s the thing....it’s not something that I consider an option. My church didn’t require pre-marital counseling, and I wish they had. But entering a marriage under false pretenses is not good at all, and encouraging someone to “get the certificate” just to avoid living in sin is terrible advice. As a pastor, he should be leading them toward a healthy biblical marriage but also leaving them to make their own choices. No one should be “forced” into not sinning. And I have seen way too many young couple decide to get married before they are ready just to avoid sinning, and then down the road find themselves facing divorce, or an extremely unhappy marriage.

View Quoted Comment I definitely don’t think they should get the certificate before their wedding, but I do think they should consider finding a different living situation or just praying about it and seeing what answers are revealed to them. There’s no need to switch pastors if he can be open to their ideas.

View Quoted Comment We are definitely going to pray about it and discuss it more with our pastor. Not living together is something we can't practically do due to finances and also our pets we have together (one of which is a 5 month old puppy with behavioral problems and way too much work for one person). We've been living together for the majority of our relationship, so it's definitely something that can be talked about, but our lives are so intermingled with each other it just doesn't make sense for us in any way to live apart. If it was for a month or two it would be a different story, but we're not getting married until June.

View Quoted Comment Well said!

View Quoted Comment

I agree fully with this.

View Quoted Comment Y’all do what’s right for you. Pray about it, and be open to new ideas. I’m certainly not going to judge you for your choices, that’s between you and God. Your pastor should be discipling you, helping you to pray over all your choices, not condemning you for one you’ve already made or forcing you to get married before you’ve finished counseling. Maybe this is God’s way of leading you somewhere else.

Good luck with what you decide. But as someone else said. The purpose of the premarital classes is to prepare you for marriage. I disagree in getting a marriage certificate in order to take a class that's supposed to be about preparing you for marriage in order to have a fake wedding for your friends and family.

Can you discuss options with his priest about living in separate rooms. Or not having sex, etc..

Reading your post, I think for me red flags go up because as described he seems a bit judgy and lecturing about the choices you've already made.