The Church calls marriage a vocation: a way in which God calls most Christians to holiness, and a sacrament in which the love of Christ for his Church becomes present in the love of a husband and wife. Discerning it is therefore more than deciding whether you are in love. Pope Francis in Amoris Laetitia devotes a section to preparing engaged couples and insists that the sacrament of marriage is not a social convention or an empty ritual but a vocation to be prepared for with the same seriousness as any other; Saint John Paul II in Familiaris Consortio described the stages of remote, proximate and immediate preparation. This guide is for a person, or a couple, asking whether God is calling them to marry — and to marry this person.

What you need

• A relationship that is real, exclusive, and serious enough that the question of marriage is genuinely on the table
• Daily prayer, alone and, when possible, together
• Honesty with each other about faith, children, money, family and the past
• A priest, a married couple you trust, or a spiritual director to talk to

When to pray it

Daily during the courtship; a shared prayer — an Our Father and a Hail Mary — at the end of time spent together is a simple beginning.

Steps

1. 1

   Step 1: Understand marriage as a vocation

   Read what the Church teaches: marriage is a lifelong, faithful, exclusive covenant between a man and a woman, open to children, and for the baptised a sacrament that gives grace to live it. It is a call to lay down your life for another every day. Ask yourself first whether you want that — a whole life given, not a partnership of convenience — before asking whether you want it with this person. Amoris Laetitia's chapter on love in marriage, built on Saint Paul's hymn to charity (1 Corinthians 13), is the best short reading.

2. 2

   Step 2: Pray about it, alone and together

   Bring the relationship into your daily prayer: thank God for the person, ask honestly whether this is his will, and pray the Prayer to the Holy Spirit for light. Go to Mass together, and begin to pray together, simply — an Our Father▾ and a Hail Mary▾, or a decade of the Rosary. A couple who cannot pray together will find it hard to raise children who do.

3. 3

   Step 3: Know the person, and know the faith you share

   Take time. See each other in ordinary life, in the other's family, under stress, with money, with children, in disagreement. Talk about faith directly: whether you both believe, whether you will practise, what you expect of each other. If one of you is not Catholic, the Church permits such a marriage, but the Catholic must promise to do all in their power to have the children baptised and raised Catholic, and the other must know it; that conversation belongs to discernment, not to the wedding rehearsal.

4. 4

   Step 4: Talk about children, faith and money

   Speak plainly about the things marriages founder on. Children: that you are open to them, how many you hope for, and that you will not use contraception but will learn natural family planning if you need to space births. Faith: the practice of it in the home. Money: debts, habits, work, generosity, who decides. Family: how much of it, and whose. If you cannot have these conversations now, you are not ready to marry; if you can, you are discovering whether you can be one.

5. 5

   Step 5: Seek counsel

   Talk to a priest about the relationship, and ask a married couple whose marriage you admire to speak honestly with you both. Your parents, if they are wise, know things about you that you do not. Many parishes offer marriage preparation inventories that surface differences early; use them as tools of discernment, not hurdles. Listen especially to concerns you would rather not hear.

6. 6

   Step 6: Live chastely during the courtship

   The Church asks engaged couples to reserve sexual intimacy for marriage, and not as a rule imposed from outside: chastity in courtship keeps your judgement free, lets you learn each other as persons rather than as bodies, and is the first practice of the fidelity you are discerning. If you are living together, speak to a priest about it honestly; it is not a barrier to marriage but it is a matter for confession and for a decision. Go to confession together in the months before the wedding.

7. 7

   Step 7: Decide, and begin preparation

   When prayer, knowledge, counsel and peace agree, decide: propose, or accept. Then go to the parish promptly to begin marriage preparation — most dioceses ask for six months to a year — which will include meetings with the priest or deacon, a preparation program, natural family planning instruction where offered, and the gathering of baptismal and freedom-to-marry records. Keep praying together through the engagement; the discernment continues until the vows, and the vocation begins with them.

Tips

• You are not discerning whether the other person is perfect but whether God is calling the two of you to become one in him.
• Most dioceses ask couples to contact the parish six months to a year before a wedding date; discernment should be done before you book the hall.
• Peace, not intensity, is the mark of a discerned decision. If you cannot bring the relationship into prayer, ask why.
• If either of you has been married before, speak to a priest early; the Church will need to establish that you are free to marry.