He Dated Her Best Friend First!

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In January of 2018, Joe, a college Biology professor from Illinois, made a New Year’s resolution of sorts- to try online dating and to go on more dates. Right around the same time, Catherine, also from Illinois, created a CatholicMatch profile as well. Not long after signing up, she saw Joe’s profile in the ‘new members’ section on her homepage one day. 

Shortly after that, though, she started talking to a local man named John. Things seemed to be going well, but then a month after they started messaging he suddenly went radio silent. Frustrated, Catherine decided to take a break from CatholicMatch, and put her profile into “on vacation” mode, so that “people would know you’re available, but not around [right now].” During roughly that same time frame, Joe started talking to Clare. 

He dated her best friend first...

Clare happened to be Catherine’s best friend, so Catherine heard about Joe several times while the two of them were getting to know each other and going on a few casual dates. As Catherine tells the story, she thought he sounded like "a really great guy". And, when Clare kept referring to Joe by his first and last name, she was surprised to realize that Joe’s uncle was the pastor at her home parish!

Then, one day a month or two after Joe and Clare started talking, she called Catherine and said, “Cat! He was previously engaged. I don’t know how I feel about that. We’re going to take a break.” After a month had passed, Catherine learned that Clare and Joe were going their separate ways. 

He showed up at her home parish!

Then, one Sunday not long after, Catherine spotted Joe several pews ahead of her at Mass! He and his family had traveled to attend a 25th ordination anniversary celebration for his uncle, her pastor. Catherine laughed as she recalled, “It’s the only time I’ve ever texted in Mass, but I whipped out my phone and texted Clare. ‘Yo! Joe’s here!!!!!’” Clare encouraged her to go up and introduce herself, but she was nervous and no meeting took place. 

She saw that he’d already messaged her.

That night, Catherine went on CatholicMatch to look at Joe’s profile again only to see that he’d messaged her two weeks previous! Since she now had “confirmation that he was cute in person,” Catherine immediately wrote back. Joe reported feeling “startled” when the woman who hadn’t responded to his message for two weeks abruptly sent him a long “gushy” message and fessed up to seeing him in person that same day without saying anything!

Still, the two made plans to meet up for a lunch date. 

On their first date, she kept pushing back her other plans...

Their first date, in early June of 2018, was a resounding success. Though Catherine originally told Joe she had just an hour to meet, she ended up pushing back her later plans multiple times because they hit it off so well. After they talked for four hours, Joe went home wishing he could cancel his evening lecture “so I could sit down and just relive the memory of having just met this wonderful woman!” In fact, the date went so well that when Joe told his mom about it, he described the date as “successful” and “promising,” and concluded, “I could see myself marrying this woman!” 

Joe and Catherine dated for about six months before he proposed. During that time, they frequently navigated the nearly three-hour-roundtrip drive between each other’s hometowns, and they also worked through some baggage from previous relationships. Catherine noted that openness and honesty were key for each of them to achieve closure on their respective pasts. By the end of 2018, Joe was ready to propose.  

The proposal got rescheduled!

Joe originally planned to propose on December 30th, 2018 but Catherine ended up being sick the day before, so he pushed his plans back to New Year’s Eve. While Catherine knew that he would be proposing at some point, he threw her off the scent by enlisting his mom’s help. He told Catherine that he was taking her out to dinner, but asked his mom to call him while they were driving to the restaurant and ask him to pick up something that she had “forgotten” at his family’s home parish after New Year’s Eve Mass. 

But, then this happened...

While they were driving to the restaurant in Joe’s ‘75 Ford Elite coupe “Ruby”, they were involved in a car accident! Another driver hit them, but fortunately, everyone was okay. And, though their arrival was delayed, the two eventually made it to the chapel behind Joe’s parish  (which he had decorated with Christmas lights!) where Joe was finally able to propose- and Catherine accepted! 

They set a date for July 27th, 2019, and Joe’s uncle, Catherine’s pastor, officiated at their wedding Mass. Afterward, they took a two-week honeymoon hiking in the Canadian Rocky Mountains in British Columbia and Alberta. Fast forward to now, Joe teaches full-time at a community college near his hometown, and Catherine stays at home with their son Johnny and daughter Cecilia. The couple has found that having an attitude of appreciation for the other person, working as a team, and acknowledging the hard work that each is doing to make their marriage and family strong have paid dividends.

Their words of advice for singles:

When asked what words of encouragement they’d offer to anyone hesitant to try online dating, Catherine quipped that her mom compared online dating to “shopping for a husband!” She continued more seriously, “What do you have to lose? There ARE great Catholic men out there, believe it or not, and maybe the right one is waiting for you on CatholicMatch!”

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