This is TCE Theology and Current Events, Number 45, Dating Advice to Young Catholics.

Hello, my name is Father David Nix. This is the Padreira Peregrino podcast.

Please subscribe if you like my material. Now we jump into my dating advice to young Catholics.

If you want to marry someone, you need to have more than just the checklist covered on orthodoxy

and wanting a bunch of Catholic kids.

You actually need to be in love at least somewhat with a person of the opposite sex and they should be somewhat in love with you.

You only got one shot at this and you really don't want an annulment.

So go slowly and deliberately in courting.

Marry someone you love, but don't look for someone who's perfect because perfect people

don't exist.

Yes, that checklist should exist as far as being a good Catholic, but there has to be some

chemistry with the other person.

So don't settle for a loser because it's better to be an old maid or an old bachelor than to marry the wrong person.

You should only attempt to court another Catholic who is equally yoked theologically.

If you don't think that your future spouse is already on

his or her way to heaven without you, do you think that that person is going to get your kids to

heaven? Of course not. This whole flirt-to-convert thing rarely works out for a happy marriage.

There are a few exceptions, but they are rare.

On the other hand, if you're a perfectionist,

keep in mind I had an Australian priest's friend

who used to say to young women,

stop looking for Saint Joseph

...