But a priest typically wouldn’t do that. Nor would an RCIA instructor.
Look, I know where you’re coming from, having made this journey myself. My dad’s family was Baptist, and we attended services at this church when aI was a child. When I was a teenager, we started going to a Methodist church, where I was confirmed. These churches are pretty different from Catholicism, yet here I am, today, a practicing Catholic.
I’m not saying at all that everybody can or should do it, just that it can be done.
I agree with talking to a priest in her church if you think you’ll be attending there. I believe not officially converting means you cannot receive the sacraments (including Communion), but you would certainly be welcome to attend the services.
If you are going to be married in a Catholic church, they may insist you attend a “pre-Cana” (I think thats the name) retreat. I’ve heard these are generally very non-threatening and are geared to answer many of the questions you may have and get couples thinking about how they would handle typical marriage situations.
You can get married in a Catholic church being a non-Catholic - I believe the only requirements are that you agree to try to raise any children Catholic. You also can’t have the typical Mass wedding, I believe. All this is the “official” church line - you may find a fairly liberal Catholic priest who would be willing to bend the rules.
If you want to do a little more research, I recommend beliefnet.com. There are tons writings there that address such issues by faith, and very active discussion boards that I’m sure will be enlightenting.
Yes - the Catholic church requires that all prospective couples (whether mixed-marriage or not) attend some sort of pre-Cana session. Papa Zappa and I attended one. There was actually a lot of good information discussed (though depending one’s views of birth control, some must be taken with a grain of salt; the couple who presented the natural family planning segment provided some genuine misinformation about other methods of birth control).
IIRC, the “have to agree to raise the kids Catholic” is true. As our priest presented it, you sign something saying “to raise the children in the full knowledge of the Catholic Church”, which isn’t precisely the same thing, but as he said, pretty much boils down to that.
The priest we met with was pretty open-minded about the whole thing; even introduced us to another couple who had married the previous year, who were in a similar boat (Jewish/Catholic pairing). And one of the things we did at pre-Cana was fill out a long questionnaire designed to help show areas of potential trouble, which they compiled / compared for each couple. Not surprisingly, we showed high levels of indecisiveness about 2 areas: religion, and in-laws (my parents were highly opposed to the marriage). All-in-all, a very positive experience.
Consider concentrating about the similarities between your own religious background and your girlfriend’s. Some things are pretty universal among all Christian denominations (like, Jesus, and some form of Communion) while others vary widely (for example, Mary’s virginity / divinity is not stressed nearly so much, as I understand it).
Think about whether you could be comfortable attending Catholic church with her, even if you don’t formally convert. The roof won’t cave in, honest Think about whether you can put up with the kids being raised formally Catholic, because if your lady friend is reasonably serious about her faith, this will be important to her. Think about whether you can agree on ways in which you won’t go along with the Church - e.g. birth control (she may not toe the line on that either, I know rather a lot of Catholics who don’t).
Do choose the priest/parish carefully when you start down this path. Despite all supposedly following the same Rome-based rules, the priest’s own opinion affects how he behaves. We were living in a college town at the time, and I think the fact that the priest we saw was tied to the college’s Catholic center, and also that we were living in the Deep South where Catholics were a suspiciously-viewed minority, may have helped.
I’m a Jew who used to be Protestant. I’ve been in lots of Catholic churches (as a tourist in France and Italy, and most recently as a bridesmaid at my sister’s wedding). No roofs have caved in on me yet…
Come on man, this is why we athiests get such a bad rap.
By the way, I was raised Catholic, so if you plan on joining up I suggest you get to the gym and start practicing squat thrusts. All the sitting/standing/kneeling can be tough on newbies.
Perhaps they’ve heard that people who don’t follow the Great Sky Fairy are much more apt to burst out with rude comments at inapproriate times, and they wish to avoid contact with such ineluctably rude people.
Out of curiosity, what do you mean by this characterization? Generally the conservative = traditional (negative generalization: narrow minded slave to tradition) and liberal = open minded (negative generalization: relativistic). Also, I would think a conservative less likely to change (i.e. convert to something new). Am I missing something?
Just to be clear, it is not Catholic (or Orthodox) belief that Mary is divine. Admittedly, folk beliefs have in the past pushed close to making her the fourth member of the Trinity, but orthodox teaching has always treated her as fully (and only, as opposed to the dual nature of her Son) human.
Thanks for the correction - yes, I phrased that badly. I was certainly never taught that Mary was “divine” as in “godly powers of her own”, just that she was a really holy, special person. She got quite a lot of press in my Catholic elementary school, even had her own prayer :). I was trying (badly) to express that Mary doesn’t seem to be focussed-upon as much in the various Protestant groups. I don’t believe, for example, that there’s a Baptist version of the Hail Mary.
Think about whether you can put up with the kids being raised formally Catholic, because if your lady friend is reasonably serious about her faith, this will be important to her. Think about whether you can agree on ways in which you won’t go along with the Church - e.g. birth control (she may not toe the line on that either, I know rather a lot of Catholics who don’t).