Sacraments
How to Pray as a Married Couple
Preparing for Matrimony · 7 steps
Simple, sustainable prayer for spouses: starting small, a morning offering together, grace at meals, a decade of the Rosary at night, Mass and confession together, and renewing your vows.
7 steps · About 10 minutes
Pope Francis writes in Amoris Laetitia that a few minutes of prayer together each day can be found, and that in it a couple can thank God, ask for what they need, and entrust one another to him. Saint John Paul II said in Familiaris Consortio that conjugal prayer is the shared response to God's own initiative in the sacrament. None of this asks a couple to become a monastery; it asks for a small, honest habit that survives children, shift work and tiredness. This guide gives one that many couples have found they can keep.
What you need
- Five minutes at a fixed point in the day, agreed on together; the point matters more than the length
- A rosary, or ten fingers
- A crucifix or an image of the Holy Family somewhere you both see it
- Patience with each other: one of you will usually be more inclined to this than the other
When to pray it
Morning, at meals and at night, in whatever measure you can keep; Sunday Mass together every week; confession together a few times a year; your vows renewed on your anniversary.
Steps
Step 1: Start small and fix the time
Choose one moment you already share every day, going to bed, the first coffee, the drive to Mass, and attach one short prayer to it. Agree the time out loud so it is a decision and not a hope. The Sign of the Cross and a together at the end of the day is a complete beginning; if that holds for a month, add a and a line of thanks for the day. Amoris Laetitia says that family prayer is a means of expressing and strengthening the faith of the whole household, and its first cell is the two of you.
Step 2: Make a morning offering together
Before the day scatters you, stand together for a moment and pray the : 'O Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I offer you my prayers, works, joys and sufferings of this day...'. Say it as 'we' if you like, or each say it quietly while holding hands. Add one intention aloud for the other: 'for your meeting', 'for your mother', 'for patience with the baby'. Thirty seconds is enough, and it means the day's work is offered before it is done.
Step 3: Say grace at every meal you share
is the easiest prayer to keep and the first one children learn: 'Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts, which we are about to receive from thy bounty, through Christ our Lord. Amen.' Take turns leading it. After the meal, when you can, add the : 'We give thee thanks, almighty God, for all thy benefits, who livest and reignest for ever and ever. Amen. May the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.' Say it in restaurants too, quietly, and in front of guests; it is a small public witness and a private habit at once.
Step 4: Pray a decade of the Rosary at night
The full Rosary takes twenty minutes, which is often too long for two tired people; one decade takes three. Before bed, one of you announces a mystery, the day's set or the one you both love, and you pray the , ten and the together, with the if you wish. Add an intention: your marriage, your children, the one of you who is struggling. Saint John Paul II asked families to pray the Rosary and said that a family that prays together stays together, quoting Father Patrick Peyton; a decade a night is how most families actually manage it. On the nights you have more, pray the whole thing.
Step 5: Go to Mass together
Sunday Mass is the one prayer no Catholic couple should pray apart. Go together, sit together, and receive Communion together; if one of you is not Catholic, or not yet able to receive, come together anyway and pray for each other at Communion, praying the . When a couple can, a weekday Mass on the anniversary of the wedding, or on a morning that suits, becomes a quiet renewal of what was begun at the altar. Talk about the readings afterward, even for a minute in the car.
Step 6: Go to confession together
A few times a year, before Christmas and Easter at least, go to confession on the same afternoon. You confess separately, as always, but going together says something: that you both know you fall short, that the marriage needs mercy, and that you would rather begin again than keep score. Pray the beforehand, and afterward, if you can, sit together in the church for a moment and pray the , which is a marriage prayer if ever there was one. Familiaris Consortio calls the Sacrament of Penance a source of forgiveness and reconciliation for the whole family.
Step 7: Renew your vows
On your anniversary, and at any family Mass where the parish offers it, renew your consent to each other. There is no set formula; many couples simply say again, quietly, at home or at the altar after Mass, the words they said at their wedding: 'I promise to be faithful to you, in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, to love you and to honour you all the days of my life.' The Church offers a blessing for married couples on their anniversary in the Book of Blessings, and many parishes hold an anniversary Mass each year; ask for it. Then pray the together, and the , entrusting the next year to Mary and Joseph.
Tips
- Start smaller than you think you should. A Glory Be at the bedroom door every night is worth more than a Holy Hour once.
- Pray for each other out loud, briefly and specifically. It is disarming, and it changes how you argue.
- Do not use prayer to make a point to your spouse. God is the one you are talking to.
- When one of you does not want to pray, the other prays quietly for both. Prayer is never a battleground.