It was a week ago today that my life changed forever…or perhaps it was the day I met him. In any event, I’ve promised countless people that I’d write up the story (at least my side of it) of how we got engaged {how we met/our love story may or may not come later, I haven’t decided yet. Would you want to read it?}.
I went to his home in Michigan with him for Thanksgiving to meet his family. After a couple of days of being around plenty of people, our inner introverts were exhausted! Anthony knew that I want to visit all of the cathedrals in the country. He looked into visiting the one in Detroit, but never heard a response back. A co-worker of mine had told me about the National Shrine of St. Thérèse in Royal Oak, Michigan. Growing up only half an hour from the Shrine, my fiancé-to-be had never heard of it. When the plans for the cathedral fell through, he looked into the Shrine.
Saturday morning, after a big Thanksgiving dinner and a Friday full of shopping, we decided to go to the Shrine, just the two of us. We drove out there and it was a chilly Michigan morning. As we walked around he told me that he didn’t have his gloves. I kept pestering him as to why he wouldn’t bring them when he made sure that I’d packed every cold weather thing I owned. He kept telling me that it was a sacrifice, but wouldn’t tell me what it was a sacrifice for. (I later found out that the ring box didn’t fit in his pocket with the gloves so he went without the gloves. Let me just say that I really wasn’t expecting the proposal.)
We made our way into the church (which was absolutely beautiful) and started walking around. We both tend to take a lot of pictures (I took nearly 300 that day of just the church) so we wandered in the empty church and took pictures and took in the beauty of it all. After an hour or so he wanted to find the adoration chapel. I, again missing what was coming, wanted to keep taking pictures. We left the sanctuary and in the hallway I saw display cases and, of course, had to look at each one of them and explain all of the old things to Anthony because I’m nerdy about theological things. Finally I saw a sign for the adoration chapel…and the gift shop. The gift shop, fortunately for Anthony, was closed, but they had display cases that I wanted to pour over. They had Christmas ornaments out that were priest’s vestments with every color of the liturgical year, statues of St. Thérèse, crucifixes and all kinds of beautiful things. After he let me “ooh and ahh” over the display cases, we finally made our way into the adoration chapel.
Little did I know when I snapped this picture that when I walked out that door I’d be an engaged lady…
We walked in to the small chapel and there was a wall of relics and, naturally, I wanted to look at all the relics (I didn’t)! He asked me where we should sit, but there were only a few pews and there were people in each of the small pews. I noticed that there were two kneelers at the front of the chapel that no one was using, so without really asking him, I walked up there, knelt down, and started praying. He took my hand at one point and it was still cold. I remember wondering to myself why his hands would be cold and what he could be nervous about, but I didn’t think twice about it. I remember praying about whether or not we should get married and when I opened my eyes I noticed a bouquet of all of my favorite colors of roses (typically seen as a sign from St. Thérèse) right next to me. However, because we were at the Shrine of St. Thérèse, there were roses everywhere so I kind of wrote it off. Anthony asked me if I was ready to go so I got up at started walking out of the chapel. All of a sudden he said my name loudly (which sounded like a shout since we were in a quiet adoration chapel!) and I turned around planning to scold him for being so loud, but by time I turned around he was already down on one knee with a ring box in his hands. He said something to the effect of, “In front of God and all the angels and all the saints, and all of the people in this chapel, will you be my wife?” I excitedly said, “OF COURSE!” and we hugged as an older gentleman said, “God bless you both” and two old ladies started crying in the back of the chapel (not making that up). We prayed some more before leaving the chapel and I began calling every person I knew!
Taken just after our first Mass as an engaged couple, and the priest even gave us a blessing!
Please keep us in your prayers as we prepare for marriage!
