A religious education coordinator watched too often as some of her students eagerly prepared for first Communion and confirmation only to discover their parents would be unable to share in celebrating the sacraments of their faith.

Hoping to find a solution to the problem she turned to her pastor, who heard the reason for her anxiety and decided to do something about it.

What was done would bring both parents and children together in a deeper understanding of their faith.

Seventeen of these couples had their marriages convalidated on Sept. 28 during two nuptial Masses at Holy Cross Parish in West Sacramento.

The ceremonies were the second weddings for each of the couples, but the first time their marriages were blessed by the church.

The Catholic Church’s term for such sacramental marriages that follow civil ceremonies is convalidation. It applies to Catholics who marry outside the church and later want to make that marriage valid in the eyes of the church..

According to canon law, the couples do not renew vows taken earlier but make a new decision to marry, a new act of the will.

The group marriage ceremonies, said Salvatorian Father Chad Puthoff, pastor of Holy Cross, were most of all a gift to the entire parish community.

“These couples are affirming their experience of God to the church, through better participation in the sacraments and being married in the church,” he said. “It’s a big family event all around.”

Father Puthoff said that he had instructed couples preparing for convalidation in a previous diocese in which he served. But it wasn’t until Maria del Refugio Martinez, religious education coordinator and pastoral associate at Holy Cross, alerted him that some couples in the parish needed to validate their marriages that he became involved in the process in the Sacramento Diocese.

Martinez said she simply could no longer watch with sadness as so many parents were not able to join with their children in receiving Communion.

“I was thinking these children would receive the sacraments and then go home and that sacramental experience would not be what they would see,” Martinez said. “If the parents received the blessing of marriage (in the church), they could share their faith as a family.”

Holy Cross parishioners Pedro and Margarita Venegas were two of the instructors appointed to assist in preparing couples for convalidation. The couple brought to the training experience a very personal understanding of the process.

First married in 1997 in a civil ceremony at Sacramento’s McKinley Park, the Venegas, both Catholic, made the decision to be married outside the church while Pedro awaited finalization of the annulment of a previous marriage.

From the start both husband and wife, who are raising five daughters, knew something vital was missing in their life together.

“We couldn’t show our children the way of our faith because we weren’t receiving the Eucharist every Sunday,” Pedro Venegas said. “We wanted them to see that marriage is a commitment and to make our marriage right with the Lord.”

He shared with the couples preparing to convalidate their marriages the difference having his own marriage convalidated at Holy Cross five years ago made in the life of his family.

“The beauty of being able to pray as a couple, as one, is almost beyond expression,” Venegas said. “There has been a closeness with our Lord, being able to receive the Eucharist together and saying the rosary together made us realize he is walking with us.”

Gina Rinetti, who was in the group of couples who convalidated their marriages at Holy Cross, remembers when being married in the church became something that could no longer be put off.

“Our daughter Alexa received first Communion two years ago and she was asking why mom and dad didn’t go up and take the host,” Rinetti said.

The couple’s first marriage had been a civil ceremony performed nine years ago at Lake Tahoe. While her husband was born and raised in the Catholic faith, when the couple was first married Gina was not Catholic.

She said exchanging vows in a nuptial Mass will provide a stronger foundation upon which to raise their five children.

“To be able to now participate in Communion with our daughter and when our son receives first Communion this spring makes everything more complete,” Rinetti said. She and her husband are now also becoming active in parish ministries.

Francisco and Deanna Gonzalez also participated in the group nuptial Mass. The circumstances of the Gonzalez’ first marriage more than 25 years ago in Indiana is still painful for the couple to recall.

The marriage occurred in a community where people of different ethnic backgrounds lived on separate sides of town. Deanna Gonzalez said because her husband is Mexican and she is Caucasian the priest at the Catholic church where they went to arrange their wedding refused to marry them. Their wedding was subsequently held in a Church of God.

The couple’s five children have all been baptized in the Catholic faith but the couple has never felt comfortable about the fact that their marriage was not blessed by the church.

“We’ve been married but it’s not the same as having the peace of mind knowing you have the grace of God,” Deanna Gonzalez said.

Father David Deibel, vicar for canonical affairs for the diocese, said there is a need and responsibility for parishes throughout the diocese to seek out and instruct Catholic couples who marry outside the church.

“We do see a need for catechesis (addressing) the bond of marriage and all conjugal issues,” he said. “Living in a culture of disposability, the church needs to give witness to values of stability and fidelity.”

Affirming this view, Father Puthoff, for one, said he believes there are “a lot more people” who would like to convalidate their marriages and he plans to support and encourage them to do so in the future.

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