She Liked His Photo And Then Thought: “Oops!”
19
In March of 2019, her second day using CatholicMatch, Monica stumbled upon Adrian’s profile...
She “liked” a photo because he seemed pretty cool. And then she looked closer and thought, Oops!
Adrian, 52, was nowhere near her. “I felt hopeless because he was in the UK and I was in Florida!” she recalls. So considering the huge ocean between them, she shrugged it off. But Adrian messaged her a few hours later, and the two began to talk....every single day.
Perhaps this wasn’t an “oops” after all!
Soon they had traded numbers and were talking through WhatsApp. They discovered they had both turned to CatholicMatch because they both sought a marriage based in the Catholic faith.
“We both grew up in Catholic families; unfortunately, we both had marriage with persons that did not practice our faith and Catholic values. We both knew that a marriage without God will not work!” Monica, now 48, says. Her previous marriage was just a civil union, so she was free to reenter the dating world as soon as she felt ready. She joined CatholicMatch because she wanted any new relationship to immediately be based on shared religious values and beliefs. She was impressed with the app, because the search option had many filters including age, location, religious values, hobbies, and personality types. Adrian, for his part, had a seventeen year old son from his previous marriage, and had to go through the annulment process.
As they kept talking, they quickly decided they needed to meet in person.
Adrian, a math teacher in a private London school, had spring break that May. He arranged a flight to Tampa, Florida to pursue this promising connection. After their first day together, Monica brought him as a surprise guest to a family barbeque, where she introduced him to about twenty cousins! Before now, she hadn’t told anyone she was talking to someone. All her extended relatives gave her the thumbs up, and she was impressed Adrian wasn’t intimidated by the crowd of introductions.
“We had a wonderful time, and we realized that our values were similar and our faith was very important in our lives,” Monica remembers.
The next four years would bring many trials of patience, but their fireworks start gave them courage and energy to continue dating long distance. In total, as the months and years passed, Monica made eight trips to London, and Adrian made nine trips to Florida. The long flights and time zone differences made dating difficult, but they relied on technology to help them out. And of course, a year into dating, the Covid pandemic put a huge obstacle in their path. With all the borders closing, Adrian was unable to fly to Florida for well over a year! So Monica made six trips to London between March 2020 and December 2021, in order to keep seeing each other in person.
Long-distance dating in the midst of lockdowns wasn't easy.
Alone in Florida, Monica had to go long stretches without seeing Adrian, and also was unable to visit her parents in her native Colombia. This was a recipe for loneliness and depression to settle in. She and Adrian began doing regular Novenas together during this time, and kindled a love for the Rosary.
“We felt that our relationship got stronger when we put our trust in God,” she remembers. Her spirits lifted with this prayer practice, and they soldiered on with patience. In July of 2022, Monica and Adrian took a trip to Medellin, Colombia to finally meet Monica’s parents. While there, Adrian asked for her father’s blessing to propose.
Then in October, he got to pop the big question!
Monica said yes, of course, and started planning her move across the ocean to join her beloved in London. Visa applications take a very long time, so they knew they still had to be patient and wait on God’s timing!
Finally, she was able to move to the UK in February of 2023, and they celebrated the Sacrament of Marriage together two months later in April.
Four years of waiting and praying was all worth it!