A Sacred Vow, Neenah, WI (2026)

07/26/2026

I actually think marriage is all about you.

Before you decide I've completely lost my mind, hear me out.

I think most people hear that sentence and immediately think I'm talking about getting your needs met. That marriage should make you happy. That your spouse should complete you. That if you're unhappy, something must be wrong with the marriage.

That's not what I mean at all.

I mean I think marriage has an incredible way of refusing to let you hide from yourself.

Most people think marriage reveals who they married. I think marriage mostly reveals who they married.

You.

I don't know another relationship that exposes a person quite like marriage.

It exposes whether you're patient. Whether you're humble. Whether you're emotionally mature. Whether you know how to apologize. Whether you can regulate yourself when you're angry. Whether you can remain kind when you feel unseen. Whether you know how to communicate instead of withdraw. Whether you can receive correction without becoming defensive. Whether your love depends on your feelings.

Marriage has this remarkable way of introducing you...
..to yourself.

I honestly think that's one of the greatest gifts God gives us through marriage.

The problem is that many of us walk into marriage looking almost entirely in the wrong direction.

We're watching our spouse. How they're communicating. How they're loving. What they're doing wrong. What they're still need to change. Whether they're meeting our needs. Whether they're becoming the person we hoped they would be.

Meanwhile, marriage keeps quietly turning our attention back toward ourselves. Not to condemn us. To form us.

I honestly think marriage is one of the most selfish things you'll ever do...
..if by selfish you mean spending decades confronting every part of yourself that still doesn't know how to love.

Your impatience. Your pride. Your fear. Your need to control. Your inability to listen. Your tendency to assume the worst. Your difficulty forgiving. Your emotional immaturity. Your selfishness.

Marriage has a way of putting all of it on the table. Not to shame you. But because love cannot transform what we're unwilling to acknowledge.

I think we've become very good at asking, "How is my spouse doing?"

I'm not so sure we're very good at asking, "How am I doing?" "Who am I becoming?" "What is this marriage revealing about me?"

Because the truth is, every conflict, every disappointment, every misunderstanding, every sacrifice, every ordinary Tuesday is revealing something.

Not just about your spouse.

About you.

Maybe that's one of the greatest purposes of marriage. Not simply that you would find someone to love. But that, through loving another imperfect person for a lifetime, you would slowly become more capable of love yourself.

I think that's why marriage is so difficult and I think that's why it's so beautiful. In the end, marriage isn't simply about finding the right person.

It's about allowing God to use another person to reveal everything in you that still needs to become more like Him.

07/20/2026

Last night I spent the evening with a family that, by almost anyone's standards, had built a beautiful life.

A beautiful home. Two wonderful children. Close friends gathered around the table. Laughter. Hospitality. The kind of evening that makes you quietly think, this is beautiful.

In fact, I found myself hoping that what I was seeing on the outside reflected what was happening on the inside. I hope they have a marriage marked by friendship, sacrifice, forgiveness, shared faith, and a genuine desire to help one another become the people God is calling them to be.

I often wonder, how often do couples intentionally stop to ask what kind of life they are actually building together?

Not just what kind of house they're building. Not what careers they're pursuing. Not what schools their children attend. Not what others admire. But the life itself.

Because I think one of the quiet dangers of our culture is that we can spend years building a life almost by default. We work hard, make the next practical decision, follow the next expected step, and before we know it, we've built something that looks successful from the outside without ever asking whether it's the life we truly wanted to build together.

That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with a beautiful home, a successful career, busy children, or a full calendar. Those can all be tremendous blessings. The question isn't whether those things are good.

The question is whether they are helping us become the people we hope to become.

Whether they're helping us build the kind of marriage we actually want our children to witness.

Whether they're helping us become more patient, more generous, more faithful, more present, more capable of loving well.

Every choice we make is quietly shaping the culture of our home. Every habit. Every priority. Every "yes." Every "no." Every season. Whether intentionally or unintentionally, we are always building something.

While we often think we're building a life...that life is quietly building us.

I think one of the most important conversations a husband and wife can return to throughout their marriage is not simply,

"Are we happy?" or even, "Are we successful?"

But,

"Are we faithfully building what God has entrusted to us?"

Because that changes everything.

It reminds us that marriage is not simply something to enjoy. It is something to steward.

God has entrusted us with a spouse. Perhaps children. A home. Time. Resources. Friendships. Influence.

The ordinary, often hidden moments that slowly shape a family over decades. One day, I don't believe we'll be asked why our life didn't look like someone else's.

We won't give an account for another family's marriage, another family's home, or another family's success. We'll be asked what we did with what God placed into our own hands.

Did we love well? Did we remain faithful? Did we keep choosing one another? Did we become the kind of people capable of building a marriage that reflected His love?

Comparison quietly asks, "Why don't I have what they have?"

Stewardship asks, "What am I doing with what God has given me?"

I think that's the better question. Perhaps it's the one that quietly builds the most beautiful families of all.

07/14/2026

I think one of the greatest mistakes couples make is approaching marriage as though someone has to win.

It often sounds like this:

"I've apologized more than they have."
"I'm always the one who initiates."
"They're the problem."
"I'm right."

And maybe you are. But marriage is one of the few places where being right can still mean you both lose.

When we begin keeping score, the relationship slowly becomes a competition instead of a partnership. We start measuring who has sacrificed more, who is carrying the heavier burden, who has apologized first, who is giving more, and who is getting less.

The problem is that score keeping almost always shifts our focus away from the health of the marriage and back onto ourselves.

I often encourage couples to ask a different question.

Not: "Who's right?" Not: "Who started it?" Not even: "Who's more hurt?"

Instead ask: "What serves the marriage right now?"

Sometimes the answer is an apology.
Sometimes it's listening instead of defending.
Sometimes it's taking responsibility for your part, even when your spouse still has work to do.
Sometimes it's setting a healthy boundary.
Sometimes it's choosing to pause the conversation until both of you can speak with greater clarity and charity.

Marriage is not about pretending problems don't exist or avoiding accountability. Healthy marriages require honesty and sometimes very difficult conversations. But those conversations should never lose sight of the mission.

You are not opponents trying to defeat one another. You are two people trying to protect something far greater than either of you could build alone. In healthy marriages, no one truly wins unless the marriage wins. The goal was never simply to prove a point. The goal was always to protect the relationship.

06/30/2026

There are a lot of people I am probably not the right coach for.

If you're looking for someone to simply reassure you that everything will work itself out, I probably won't be the best fit.

I believe strong marriages are built intentionally.

I believe communication can be learned.

I believe conflict can become one of the greatest opportunities for growth.

I believe trust can be rebuilt.

I believe people can change.

I believe virtue can be cultivated.

I believe healthy marriages are not found. They are built.

But perhaps most importantly, I believe marriage is meant to form us.

Marriage has a way of revealing who we really are. It exposes our strengths and our weaknesses. It brings to light our pride, our fears, our selfishness, our wounds, and our capacity to love. At the same time, it invites us to become wiser, steadier, more faithful, more patient, and more capable of authentic self-gift.

That doesn't mean accepting unhealthy behavior or avoiding difficult conversations. In fact, I believe healthy marriages require clear communication, healthy boundaries, personal responsibility, and the courage to address hard things rather than avoid them.

I work primarily with seriously dating couples, engaged couples, and couples in the early years of marriage because I believe those years establish patterns that often shape everything that follows.

I don't simply help couples build stronger marriages.

I help them become the kind of people capable of building one.

Because strong marriages aren't built by perfect people. They're built by people who are willing to continually grow in virtue, communication, sacrifice, humility, responsibility, and love.

Ultimately, my hope is that every couple I work with leaves with far more than better communication or fewer arguments. I hope they leave with a clearer vision of what marriage is truly for, practical tools to build it well, and a deeper commitment to becoming the husband and wife God is calling them to be.

If you're looking for someone who will simply tell you what you want to hear, I'm probably not the coach for you.

But if you're looking for someone who will walk alongside you, call you higher, and help you intentionally build the marriage God is inviting you into, I would be honored to be part of that journey.

06/21/2026

One of the most common things I hear from struggling couples is some version of: "I would be willing to work on this if my spouse would just..."

If my husband would communicate better. If my wife would stop criticizing me. If they would become more affectionate. If they would listen. If they would change.

While those frustrations are often understandable, there is a problem with this mindset. It places the future of the marriage almost entirely in the hands of the other person.

Without realizing it, many couples end up waiting. Waiting for the other person to take the first step. Waiting for the other person to apologize. Waiting for the other person to become more patient, more understanding, more attentive, more engaged. Meanwhile, both people remain stuck.

I often think of marriage like a dance.

Every relationship develops patterns over time. Some patterns are healthy. Some are not. But once the dance becomes familiar, both people begin anticipating each other's next move. When one person changes their movement, the dance changes.

That does not mean the other person will immediately respond well. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they resist. Sometimes they don't know what to do because the pattern has existed for years. Nonetheless, the dance has changed.

This is why I often encourage people to focus less on controlling their spouse and more on taking responsibility for their own part of the relationship. Not because everything is their fault. Not because unhealthy behavior should be ignored. And certainly not because healthy boundaries no longer matter; but because growth almost always begins with the person who is willing to move first.

The spouse who chooses patience when impatience would be easier. The spouse who initiates the difficult conversation. The spouse who takes responsibility for their contribution to the problem. The spouse who begins setting healthier boundaries. The spouse who decides to become more intentional instead of remaining resentful.

Too often, couples view themselves as opponents waiting for the other person to make the first move. Healthy marriages are built by people who remember they are on the same team. A team does not win because one player performs perfectly. A team succeeds when both players remain committed to the mission, even while they are still learning, growing, and improving.

You cannot force your spouse to change. But you do have far more influence over the direction of your marriage than you may realize. Sometimes the marriage begins to change the moment one person stops waiting for the other to go first.

06/14/2026

One of the questions I think people should spend more time asking during discernment is this: Who does this person become when life is hard? Not when they're rested. Not when things are going their way. Not when money is plentiful, the children are healthy, and everything is unfolding according to plan. Who do they become when they are stressed, disappointed, overwhelmed, afraid, or under pressure? That version of a person matters.

At some point in every marriage, life will become difficult. There will be financial strain. Health concerns. Loss. Conflict. Unexpected suffering. Moments where neither spouse feels particularly strong. And when those moments come, character matters far more than chemistry.

I think many people spend years evaluating attraction, compatibility, shared interests, and emotional connection while giving far less attention to questions like:

Can this person take responsibility when they are wrong?
Can they remain steady when circumstances are unstable?
Can they have difficult conversations without becoming cruel?
Can they tolerate discomfort without running away?
Can they persevere when things do not go as planned?
Can they continue loving when loving requires sacrifice?

Those qualities are often far more predictive of the strength of a marriage than many of the things people focus on during dating.

For those who are already married, this question still matters because marriage is not only revealing who your spouse is. It is revealing who you are. When life becomes difficult, do you become more patient or more reactive? More humble or more defensive? More willing to work as a team or more focused on protecting yourself?

Marriage has a way of exposing both our strengths and our weaknesses. Not to shame us, but to invite us into growth. The goal is not to find a perfect person who never struggles. The goal is to become the kind of people who remain rooted in love, commitment, and virtue even when life is not easy. Because you do not truly know the strength of a relationship when life is easy. You learn it when life falls apart.

06/09/2026

I recently spoke with someone who was worried she had married the wrong person.

The reason? She wanted to pray with her husband, but he felt uncomfortable doing it. They were both Catholic but he was not nearly as engaged in his faith. She saw other couples praying together and began wondering if something was fundamentally wrong.

But I think many couples make the mistake of evaluating their marriage based only on where they are today instead of where they are trying to go.

Not every couple starts in the same place. Some couples pray together from the very beginning. Some don't.

Some enter marriage with strong communication skills. Some have to learn them.

Some are naturally affectionate. Some have to grow into it.

Some enter marriage with a deep faith. Others are still figuring out what they believe.

The question is not always, "Where are we right now?" The more important question is, "Do we share a vision for where we want to go?" Marriage is not simply about finding someone who already possesses every quality you desire. It is often about growing into those qualities together.

That doesn't mean ignoring serious issues or pretending red flags don't matter.

But I think many couples become discouraged because they expect immediate perfection instead of gradual formation. The problem with that though is that growth in marriage is not always perfectly synchronized.

Sometimes one spouse is growing rapidly in faith while the other is taking smaller steps.

Sometimes one person is learning healthier communication while the other is learning patience.

Sometimes one person is overcoming old wounds while the other is developing the courage to set healthier boundaries.

Marriage is not two identical journeys happening at the same pace. It is two people walking toward a shared destination while each continues their own individual formation.

We grow in our relationship with our spouse. We grow in our relationship with God. We grow in our role as parents, if we are blessed with children. And throughout life there will be seasons when one person is stronger in a particular area and seasons when the other is.

The goal is not that both people arrive at every milestone at exactly the same time. The goal is that neither person stops moving toward what is good, true, and life-giving. The strongest marriages I have seen are often not the couples who started in the best place. They are the couples who remained committed to growing.

Together and individually. Who continued taking small steps toward the marriage they wanted to build. Who understood that growth takes time. Who learned to encourage rather than condemn. Who kept their eyes on the vision instead of becoming consumed by the gap between where they were and where they hoped to be.

A shared vision does not mean you are both at the same place.

It means you are moving in the same direction.

And sometimes that makes all the difference.

06/02/2026

I recently came across a discussion that has been stuck in my head.

A wife had been asking her husband for 18 years to take his shoes off when he came into the house. Not a week. Not a month. Eighteen years. The children followed the rule. The husband did not. As people discussed it, someone quoted 1 Peter 3:1: "Wives, be subject to your husbands."

I found myself wondering how often we use Scripture to ask whether someone is being respectful, while never asking whether someone is being loving.I don't think the issue was ever the shoes. The issue was that for 18 years, a wife communicated: "This matters to me." And for 18 years, a husband communicated, whether intentionally or not: "It doesn't matter enough for me to change."

The older I get, the more I realize that many marital conflicts are not actually about the thing being discussed.
The dishes.
The spending.
The phone.
The shoes.

The issue underneath is often much deeper. It is the human desire to know that our hearts matter to the person we promised our lives to. What struck me most about the discussion was how quickly people wanted to debate whether the husband intended any disrespect. But marriage is not lived through intentions alone. A spouse experiences our love through our actions.

A husband may not intend to communicate disregard. A wife may not intend to communicate criticism. Yet, after enough years, the impact of our actions begins to speak louder than our explanations.
This is why Christ's model of marriage is so challenging.

When St. Paul tells husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the Church, he is not merely calling them to be willing to die for their wives someday. He is calling them to imitate Christ's self-gift every day. Calvary was not the beginning of Christ's sacrifice. It was the culmination of a life poured out in love. Most husbands will never be asked to lay down their lives in one dramatic moment. But they will be asked to lay down their lives in a thousand ordinary moments.

When they choose their wife's good over their own convenience.
When they choose understanding over being right.
When they choose sacrifice over comfort.
When they choose service over self.

The challenge is not reserved for husbands. Every spouse will be confronted daily with the choice between self-protection and self-gift. Perhaps this is where many of us get stuck. We imagine that holiness in marriage will be found in heroic moments. Yet more often it is found in the daily opportunities to place another person's good ahead of our own preferences.

The irony is that most of us can identify the sacrifices our spouse should be making. We are much slower to recognize the sacrifices God may be asking of us.

The modern world often teaches us to fight for our rights. Marriage teaches us that love often requires us to surrender preferences, comforts, and even legitimate rights for the good of another. Not because we are forced to. Not because we are controlled. But because love willingly sacrifices.

Perhaps this is why so many marriages struggle. We naturally notice what our spouse owes us. We notice where they are falling short. We notice the sacrifices they are not making. Yet the Christian vision of marriage consistently turns our attention in another direction. Not: "What am I owed?" But: "What is God asking me to give?" Not: "Why should I have to change?" But: "How is God inviting me to love more completely today?"

Sometimes the most significant moments in a marriage are not the grand gestures. They are the seemingly insignificant moments where one spouse decides: "This may not matter much to me, but it matters to the person I love." Perhaps that is one of the hidden paths to holiness within marriage. Learning to die to ourselves, not in the extraordinary moments, but in the ordinary ones.

Sometimes holiness looks less like grand gestures and more like taking off your shoes because someone you love asked you to.

05/28/2026

I think one of the biggest misunderstandings about marriage today is that many people enter it primarily focused on whether they feel loved, fulfilled, understood, desired, or emotionally satisfied.

They focus on questions like:
“Will this person make me happy?”
“Will I feel loved?”
“Will my needs be met?”
“Will this relationship fulfill me?”

And while those things matter, marriage was never meant to revolve entirely around the self. We focus heavily on how loved we are by our partners but we forget that marriage is also meant to reveal how well YOU love. I think many people are truly unprepared for that reality.

Because marriage has a way of calling us out on everything we thought was hidden:

Where we struggle to communicate clearly.
Where we become defensive instead of humble.
Where we protect ourselves instead of remaining vulnerable.
Where we seek control instead of unity.
Where we want understanding from our spouse while struggling to truly understand them in return.

And I think many couples become discouraged when this happens because they experience conflict, disappointment, or difficulty and immediately assume something is wrong with the marriage itself and that they married the wrong person.

But that is the beauty of true intimacy. The trust and intimacy that marriage has is SUPPOSED to reveal where things still need work. Marriage is simply revealing the places where deeper formation still needs to occur. Not just within the relationship, but within each person individually.

Marriage has a way of confronting us with ourselves. Not the polished version we present publicly. Not the idealized version we imagine ourselves to be. But the real version: the selfishness, the wounds, the pride, the fears, the emotional immaturity, the unhealthy coping patterns, the lack of patience, the inability to regulate reactions when we feel hurt, unseen, or disappointed.

While that can feel painful, I actually think this is part of the purpose of marriage.That does not mean tolerating unhealthy behavior or becoming passive. Marriage should never be an excuse for dysfunction, cruelty, or lack of accountability. But I do think our culture has trained people to approach relationships with a very self-focused mindset.

People are constantly evaluating:
“Am I getting enough?”
“Am I still happy?”
“Am I emotionally satisfied?”

Instead of also asking:
“How am I contributing to the health of this marriage?”
“How am I growing as a spouse?”
“Who am I becoming through the way I love?”

However, marriage is not merely about coexistence or emotional gratification. And honestly, I think many couples stay stuck because both people remain focused almost entirely on what they are not receiving. Meanwhile, very little attention is being given to who they are becoming. Marriage is meant to refine us into become the best version of ourselves - a truly good human - which hopefully leads us to heaven.

It is meant to shape us into people more capable of authentic love, sacrifice, virtue, stability, fidelity, and self-gift. Not through meaningless suffering, but through the daily invitation to grow. I think strong marriages are often built by couples who stop viewing difficulty as proof the relationship is failing and start viewing many of those moments as invitations to become better, wiser, steadier, and more united. Growth in love sometimes requires stronger boundaries, clearer communication, greater accountability, or difficult conversations that many people avoid.

It requires the humility to ask:
“What is this situation revealing in me?”
“How is this conflict inviting me to grow?”
“What kind of person am I becoming inside this relationship?”

Strong marriages are not built by two flawless people who never struggle. They are built by two people willing to continually confront themselves, grow in virtue, repair after failure, and keep learning how to love each other more deeply over time.

Strong marriages are not built only in easy moments, and real love is not merely something we feel. It is built in the repeated decision to remain committed to the good of another person while continuing to grow in your capacity to love well over time.

05/24/2026

One of the biggest lies couples believe today is that conflict means something is wrong with the relationship. It doesn’t.

The problem is that most people were never taught what conflict is actually FOR. Conflict reveals. It exposes. It shows us not only where the relationship needs growth—but where WE need growth.

Our impatience.
Our pride.
Our defensiveness.
Our inability to listen clearly.
Our tendency to withdraw, control, react, avoid, or protect ourselves instead of truly love.

Conflict often reveals the exact places where greater virtue, maturity, healing, clarity, compassion, humility, and self-control are still needed. But most couples were never taught to see conflict this way. So instead of approaching conflict as an opportunity for greater understanding, formation, communication, and unity, couples often approach it as something to win, avoid, survive, or escape.

And over time, the relationship weakens. NOT because conflict existed, but because the couple never learned how to move through it together. Healthy marriages are not marriages without tension. They are marriages where both people remain committed to the relationship even inside the tension.

Where people learn:
how to pause before reacting,
how to take responsibility,
how to repair after hurt,
how to communicate clearly,
how to set healthy boundaries,
and how to remain on the same team even when emotions are high.

Conflict is not always a sign the marriage is broken. Sometimes it is revealing exactly where formation still needs to happen. And often, the couples who learn how to work through conflict well build the deepest trust over time.

A Sacred Vow

07/26/2026

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