Kate and Mike’s first date had the perfecting ending: enthusiastic — I just can’t stop talking to you — conversation paired with chocolate covered strawberries. It was February 15, 2014. As good as that date was, their second one was even better, Kate, 31, shares in a phone interview.
“I was pretty shy when we first met in person. I was afraid to hope for too much. My few bad dating experiences had made me feel guarded and apprehensive about dating."
Mike could relate to Kate's anxiety. He had recently gone out twice with another CatholicMatch member.
“I felt that both dates had gone pretty well, but on the drive home from the second date, I got a text from her saying that it was not going to work out,” says the 33-year-old.
In addition to some negative dating experiences, neither Kate nor Mike had ever been in a serious relationship because they had spent time discerning the religious life.
Lost in Fort Wayne
For their second meeting, Kate drove to Fort Wayne. “I’m from a rural area, and I had never driven to Fort Wayne, so I had no idea what I was doing. I did not have a smartphone or GPS—just a paper map. I got off on the wrong exit and ended up downtown. I was driving around, and Mike kept trying to direct me.”
Kate stopped at St. Mary’s Church to get her bearings and Mike, worried that they would miss their dinner reservations, told her, “Stay there, I’ll come get you.”
Laughing, Kate says, “He rescued me, and we made it to our dinner reservation with five minutes to spare. Afterward, he took me to the movie Frozen.”
At the end of the date, they found themselves sitting in Mike’s car, not wanting the evening to end once again. Before opening her door to leave, Kate leaned over and gave Mike a kiss on the lips.
Mike laughs, “And I returned it! I was a little surprised when I saw her making a move, but I thought, 'I am going to do this too. It was actually my first kiss.'”
She adds, “Then we got out of his car, and we were standing by my car saying goodbye; we exchanged another kiss and a hug as the cold winter’s snow was swirling around us. I remember thinking, ‘This is amazing—who cares about romantic movies. Real life is so much better!'”
From then on Kate and Mike saw each other every weekend, taking turns driving the two-and-a-half hour distance between them. Very early on, they discussed the possibility of marriage. To think only a short time earlier Kate's family and friends had to persuade her to join CatholicMatch!
"My second oldest sister, Kristine, who had met her husband, Jeff, through CatholicMatch a few years prior (they were married in 2012) [encouraged me]. I was also being lovingly ‘prodded’ by just about everyone, from family and friends to my boss at my former part-time library job, to give CatholicMatch a try, so, I guess, you could say that God was using any means necessary to call me here!"
I don't usually like surprises, but...
Around May or June, Mike and Kate went to a LifeTeen Mass followed by Adoration. “Beforehand the priest gave a little talk, and he happened to mention, ‘Before the Blessed Sacrament would be a great place to propose.’ I heard Kate say, under her breath, ‘Yes, definitely.’ From that moment on, I knew that I wanted to ask her to marry me in front of the Eucharist in an Adoration Chapel,” Mike recalls.
He ordered a ring online, and it arrived barely on time; Mike had plans to propose to Kate after the 11:00 a.m. Mass in the Adoration Chapel. “We were b
ack there for a half hour, and there were a lot of people in the Chapel, so I couldn’t quite get the courage to do it. I thought if I propose in the church, we are pretty close to the Eucharist, but she was starting to open the door of the church to leave. I was like, ‘Hang on a sec.’ I pulled out the ring and got down on one knee.
Kate says she was trying to figure out what was going on. “I thought, ‘Wait, aren’t we going outside? No, we aren’t.’”
Then she saw Mike pull out the ring and thought, “Oh, shiny!”
Kate began hyperventilating. Mike remembers, “I waited a few seconds of her to calm down, and she said, ‘Well, are you going to say something?’”
With a statue of Saint Joseph looking over them, Mike popped the question, and Kate nodded her head yes. “I was surprised, even though we had talked and prayed together about marriage pretty early on," Kate says. “I definitely was not pushing for a proposal, but at the same time I knew my answer.”
Kate revealed that she doesn’t usually like surprises, but Mike’s proposal was an exception. “The proposal is one of those memories that I go back to because it was such a perfect moment.”
A two-year whirlwind
Kate and Mike were married on July 3, 2015, the eve of one of their favorite saints, Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati, at Kate’s home parish St. Boniface in Lafayette, Indiana. “Because we had the wedding in Kate’s hometown, we had the reception in Fort Wayne so that we could accommodate both of our families.”
One thing that has been both a blessing and a challenge for Kate was how quickly things happened after getting engaged,
including a new teaching position, a 100-mile move, marriage prep, a wedding, a honeymoon, and a honeymoon baby—whom they named Frassatia Elizabeth.
After all of this, they moved from their rental to their first home. “It took a while for me to adjust emotionally after leaving my friends and family,” she says. “There are very few things in life worth such upheaval, but marrying Mike is definitely one of them.”
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