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Catholic Date Ideas: Praying for Vocations!
Healthy Catholic Marriages have frequent dates!
Research shows, married couples who regularly date, are less likely to consider divorce, more likely to have more romance and report better sex lives, communicate better, and enjoy marriage more! So we have decided to challenge you to AT LEAST one date a month! Need some ideas? Keep reading!
November’s Catholic Date Idea:
For some people, as soon as November 1st hits, the Christmas decorations come out and the Christmas playlists jump into rotation. For others, November is a time to slow down and look around and give thanks for all you have. It's a little shift to help prepare our hearts for Thanksgiving at the end of the month.
Since we've had Date Night Ideas about Gratitude in the past, I wanted to take it one step further, and give thanks for vocations, including good marriages.
Challenge Options:
Theme: Praying for the young people who will one day serve the Church through their vocations.
Plan a date that includes a visit to a perpetual adoration chapel or a quiet church.
Date activities:
Spend 15–20 minutes together in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.
Pray for the children and young people in your parish.
Pray for those discerning marriage, priesthood, and religious life.
Discuss how married couples can create a home where children feel free to discover God's calling, over a coffee or dessert while sharing one person who helped you recognize God's call in your life.
Conversation starters:
How can we help young people recognize that God has a beautiful plan for their lives?
What made us feel supported in discerning our own vocations?
How can we encourage vocations without pressuring young people?
Who in our parish might need our encouragement or prayers?
Prayer intention: Pray for seminarians, priests, religious sisters and brothers, and young people discerning their vocations.
Scripture: Matthew 9:37-38 – Pray to the Lord of the harvest.
Theme: Discovering how your marriage can become a gift to others.
Marriage isn't just about helping one another get to heaven. It's also about helping others encounter Christ through your love and service.
Date activities:
Volunteer together at a Catholic charity, food pantry, or parish event.
Take a meal to a newly married couple or a family with a new baby.
Visit an older married couple and listen to their marriage story.
Discuss how your marriage can serve your parish and community.
Conversation starters:
What gifts has God given us as a couple?
How can our marriage make the Church stronger?
Who could benefit from our friendship and encouragement?
How can we be a witness of joyful Catholic marriage?
Prayer intention: Pray for married couples to recognize their unique mission in the Church and world.
Scripture: 1 Peter 4:10 – Using our gifts to serve one another.
Theme: Learning from holy married couples who have gone before us.
Enjoy dinner or dessert together while learning about married saints and asking for their intercession.
Some couples to explore:
St. Louis and St. Zélie Martin – Parents who raised their children in holiness while living ordinary family life.
St. Priscilla and St. Aquila – A married couple who served the early Church together.
St. Thomas More and Alice More – A marriage lived amid difficult circumstances.
Blessed Luigi and Maria Beltrame Quattrocchi – A married couple who pursued holiness together.
Date activities:
Choose one holy married couple to learn about.
Discuss what made their marriage holy.
Identify one virtue you would like to grow in together.
Ask that couple to intercede for your marriage.
Prayer intention: Pray for strong, faithful, joyful marriages that become witnesses to Christ's love.
Scripture: Ephesians 5:21-33.
End date with closing prayer:
Come Holy Spirit. You flow so powerfully on this earth. Help us to become more aware of your presence. Help us to respond with courage at your promptings. Inspire us to create and nourish the spirit of discernment in our homes with our children. We pray for you to pour your peace and direction on all those currently discerning their vocation. We ask this through the intersession of our Blessed Mother Mary as we pray... Hail Mary...
Open with Monthly Check In Questions
Whatever you decide to do, try and discuss the following things as ice breakers at dinner, at home after kids fall asleep, during a walk, in the car after you’ve grabbed hot cocoa, or in front of the fireplace with a bottle of wine or a cup of tea!
Have you felt loved by me over this last month? Why or why not?
What can I do to love you better? (See another month's challenge about Love Languages!)
Do you have any prayer intentions I could pray for over the next month?
What has been your favorite memory or thing that happened over the last month?
What was the worst thing?
What is one thing you are looking forward to in the coming month?
Before the date ends, be sure to schedule your next date night together!
We pray you fall deeper in love with your spouse this month and enjoy this intentional time together!
Want more Support for Catholic Marriage?
Wondering How to pray with your spouse? Check out this eBook, How to Create a Prayer Routine as Husband and Wife to help you and your spouse either refresh your current prayer life or to jump start a customized prayer routine together!
How to Pray for Your Marriage using the Luminous Mysteries : this free eBook download is great for husband and wife to reflect on the Luminous Mysteries of the Rosary and how they relate to Marriage, guiding you to pray for your marriage as you pray them!
We challenge you to a date each month with our date night challenge! Looking for a date night in? Check out the Catholic Family Movie Night discussion prompts for the movie Groundhog Day!
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