In the coming months we will be introducing you to some of the staff at Ave Maria Press by sharing proposal, engagement, and wedding stories. We encourage you to share your own wedding story by filling out the “Our Wedding Story” section of your personal profile (see the Our Wedding Story section of the Together for Life Online Team profile for details) here at Together for Life Online.
Naturally, we are starting this series of wedding stories with our CEO and publisher, Thomas Grady, who has been married for more than thirty years!
Tom and Mary Grady’s marriage didn’t begin in the usual way—you know, with a traditional proposal. Instead, a thirty-year-old Mary Cichy popped the question at a restaurant bar, glass of bourbon in hand.
“So, Grady, shall we do this?” she asked.
“Yes, of course,” Tom responded.
A Blast from the Past!
And with that exchange, Tom and Mary embarked on the typical adventure of a newly engaged Catholic couple—find an apartment, plan a wedding, make a wedding dress, and meet with a priest.
“We were young, naive, and innocent looking,” Tom said of their nine-month engagement period. “What I remember is that we were very much in love and looking forward to getting married.”
All the while, they were hours apart in separate towns—he in Chicago and she in Fargo, North Dakota. Given the lack of technology at the time, communication wasn’t always easy.
“This was before e-mail, cell phones, and even faxes,” Tom said.
But they kept themselves busy with the tasks necessary to prepare for their life together. Mary took on the daunting enterprise of making her own wedding dress, which Tom still gushes over today. Tom took to painting their apartment and helping out with wedding planning whenever possible.
The spiritual dimension of their engagement was filled with thoughtful conversations with a Benedictine monk who insisted that they memorize their wedding vows and eventually presided at their wedding Mass. This relationship, which the Gradys still value today, was particularly formative in their preparation for their wedding day and marriage by challenging them to focus on their marriage rather than the wedding, Tom said.
Though Tom and Mary weren’t gifted with a helpful planning tool like Together for Life, Tom remembers being “extensively involved” in choosing the readings and music for their wedding Mass at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Fargo.
“We also decided to distribute the Precious Blood as extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion, though we were a bit concerned about the possibility of spilling red wine on Mary’s white dress,” Tom recalled.
In deciding to help distribute Communion, Tom and Mary underscored the core value they identified for their wedding and their marriage: hospitality. That value was brought to every detail of the wedding as they hosted hundreds of friends and family from all over the country, inviting many of them to help with the countless tasks of coordinating the joyous events of that day.
As a man who carries around a fragmented and disheveled program from his wedding, it’s safe to say that Tom remembers his wedding day fondly. However, he insists that there is no need for young couples today to stress about every little detail of the wedding.
“People today often treat weddings like a sporting event by spending a lot of money,” Tom said. “Don’t worry if the wedding isn’t perfect . . . the grander adventure is marriage itself.”
