Paul and Jean said their first “I love you” to each other when they met at the airport in New Mexico. Paul had flown from California to meet the woman he’d been talking with on CatholicMatch for five months.
They went from the airport to a local Italian restaurant. Both were nervous, but excited.
“The first thing that attracted us to each other is that we both had the same religious and political values,” Jean said. “We both wanted someone who had the same beliefs and life goals, and we found that in each other.”
For their second date, they went bowling and played arcade games. On another of their early dates, Jean took Paul on a tram ride. Paul got bad motion and altitude sickness, but the couple looks back on it as a funny experience.
Neither Paul nor Jean had been married before. He was a member of CatholicMatch off-and-on for three years while Jean was on the site for two years. Jean’s brother met his wife on CatholicMatch and Paul’s sisters found their husbands on other dating sites. That’s why they both decided to try CatholicMatch.
Initially, both experienced frustration with people judging based on looks and profiles.
Both were ready to give up. But then they were matched and instantly knew “it was meant to be.”
“It takes getting to know people,” Jean said. “Not picking and choosing what you want like socks at a flea market.”
Being long-distance for the first 10 months of their relationship was hard, but between phone calls and weekly FaceTime dates, they made it work. “We would go visit each other once every few months and talk daily,” Jean said. “We eventually did mini video-chat dates on Sundays and played games together.”
In July 2020, seven months after meeting online, Paul moved from California to New Mexico to be near Jean.
A month after moving to New Mexico, Paul and Jean visited the local zoo. Paul dropped to one knee in front of the giraffes and asked Jean to marry him. It was August 15th 2020, Mary’s Assumption into Heaven day.
“He chose this day to express that our relationship was based on Catholic values,” Jean said.
Paul chose this feast day to propose because Jean would be the ‘Mary’ in their relationship and the future mother of any children they have.
Their wedding is planned for this winter. Due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, their wedding plans are simple. “It will just be Paul and me, my parents, my brother and his wife, and my niece and nephew,” Jean said.
“We both know in our hearts that God used CatholicMatch to join our lives together, Jean said. “We figure that God has brought us this far, and we will not let the pandemic keep us from getting married!”
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