married and loving it! - WWME Encounter Resource Library

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INITIAL PLANNING AND PREPARATION GUIDEESTABLISH THE DATE and timing for presenting the enrichment. We recommend atleast 45 days for planning and promotion. Page five is a sample proposal that can be changed to reflectyour facts and presented with other materials to the pastor. Experience has proven that this program ismost adaptable when scheduled on a Saturday since parish facilities are usually more available than onSunday. Presenting the program on Sunday is also probably workable if it could be started by very earlyafternoon. The program takes about six hours.TIMING of the program is approximately six hours in duration including initial welcomingwith continental breakfast and lunch. We have arranged the day to coincide with the Saturday vigilmass—parents pick up their children and all attend the vigil Mass while the Passion Team prepares for afamily dinner right after Mass. Although it is preferable, the dinner is optional when parish activities precludeuse of the facility.CHILD CARE is one of the most important elements of this program, as most parents todaydon’t use the traditional babysitting system. We highly recommend that the pastor offer “on campus”child care in parish facilities that are totally separate from the adults. Some parishes have hired theregular day care personnel to staff the pre‐school facilities or nursery, as well as hiring other parishionersto offer “friend‐care” for older children. It is not necessary to have a formal program, but the focusis on having something entertaining during the six hour period. Meals and snacks are also provided bythe Passion Team and are included in the registration fee.FACILITIES REQUIREMENTS include a large enough space to seat couples at tablefor eight. Round tables are great, but rectangular are very acceptable. A large parish hall or cafeteriaseems to work well. In a large space we usually set up one end as the presentation space, and the otherfor eating and snacks. Other facilities needs include a place for childcare and informal space for coupleprivate time—we used the parish gardens and a few of the spaces in and around the parish or school.We number the tables and pre‐assign couples to tables in order to have a mix of couples married shorterand longer times. Each table of couples stays at that table for the entire day, and we try to have at leastone ME couple at each table as well.FOOD options are numerous, depending on the cooking or service kitchen that may be availableand the number of couples attending the program. For continental breakfast and snacks goodchoices are the traditional coffee service along with bagels, pastries, fruit salad, juices, milk etc. The localdiscount warehouses are usually the best resources for bulk food and beverages. For lunch and/ordinner, good choices are sandwich trays or rings that are pre‐made, lasagna trays or catered dinnersfrom Boston Market or other local restaurants. Experience has proven that the Passion Team also enjoysdoing some preparation of one or more of the meals. In addition, coffee, tea and paper productsare usually supplied by the parish in order to hold down the cost per family for the enrichment.MARRIED & LOVING IT!(MOST OF THE TIME)© 2006 David & Lucy Snyder for Worldwide Marriage EncounterPage 3
INITIAL PLANNING AND PREPARATION GUIDE Cont’dPROMOTION is another must for planning and preparation, and a variety of advertisingmethods is recommended. Advertise the date of the enrichment 45‐60 days ahead of time—this canbe done by either an announcement or flyer in the bulletin or some posters put in strategic places. InSection 2 of this manual there are sample bulletin announcements, information flyers, registrationforms and a combination flyer with removable registration form. These templates can be personalized/changedto reflect each enrichment’s date, times etc. We have also given three minute witnesstalks at all the masses two weeks before the enrichment and in another parish the pastor spoke personallyat all of the masses to invite couples to attend.REGISTRATION AND FINANCIAL It is recommended that the parish handle theregistration process with members of the Passion Team being involved in order to plan for the packetsand food. If the parish uses “Parish Pay” or some other on‐line donation/registration process, itwould be advantageous to have the registration taken on‐line as well as by traditional methods. Theregistration fee is usually $25 or $30 depending on the meals offered and the availability of paperproducts from the parish. Sometimes it is necessary to take the registrations by phone and the couplepays the fee at the door—we also advertise that scholarships are available. The Passion Team usuallyhandles the purchase of the food and also prepares the Couple Packet materials. A purchasereimbursementagreement between WWME and the parish seems to work best.THE PASSION TEAM Organizing the Passion Team will require some discernmenton the part of the WWME Community. The Facilitating Couple should be chosen for their love and enthusiasmfor marriage and couples. They should also be self‐starters who have a very positive perspectiveabout marriage and how couples are doing their very best to make their marriage a greatone. The presentations should be simple, clear, crisp and full of many POSITIVE personal examples.In addition to writing the presentations, the Facilitating Couple should be very confident and practicedspeakers, who can think on their feet and be adaptable to whatever may happen during the enrichment.This couple should be so familiar with the materials that they can present without readingevery word. One caution—this is not a Weekend so we do not use ME jargon in our presentations.There are also four of the presentations that include a five minute sharing from aTestimonial Couple. These testimonies are short additional witnesses that provide further examplesto the attending couples of positive strategies that have worked in their relationship. It is importantthat each couple who does a testimonial ties in their experience of the WWME Weekend as a part oftheir growth. After all, we are inviting couples to the Weekend. The Testimonial Couples should writeout their presentation and they should be reviewed by the Facilitating Couple to ensure that there isno repetition. The Facilitating Couple should be prepared to change their examples if this happens.Other members of the Passion Team include couples to help with registration, meals, setup,table leaders, promotions and any other administrative arrangements that may be needed.MARRIED & LOVING IT!(MOST OF THE TIME)© 2006 David & Lucy Snyder for Worldwide Marriage EncounterPage 4
Page 1 and 2: MARRIED AND LOVING IT!PLANNINGANDPR
Page 3: SECTION 1INTRODUCTIONThe MARRIED &
Page 7 and 8: MARRIED & LOVING IT!(MOST OF THE TI
Page 10 and 11: REGISTRATION FORMMARRIED & LOVING I
Page 12 and 13: SAMPLE ENRICHMENT SCHEDULE AND LOGI
Page 14 and 15: SECTION 3LEADER PRESENTATION AND TE
Page 22 and 23: FOUR FAST FACET FACTSEXCAVATION OF

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