Marriage for Life: Seeing the levels of church at work, National Marriage Week to be celebrated February 7-14, 2026

By Jay Wonacott

Director of Marriage and Family Life

for the Diocese of Boise

I am amazed at the complexity and the many levels of the Catholic Church and how they function together.

Tip O’Neill, U.S. Speaker from the Reagan-era, once said that “all politics is local.” It may also be said that the experience of the Church is local, but there is much more to the Catholic Church. A universal, worldwide Church is a big Church. Most Catholics experience living the faith in their homes and at their local parishes.

Sometimes people visit their diocesan cathedral and maybe see their local bishop once or twice. The bishop, of course, represents the diocesan Church, but also the universal Church as one of the successors of Christ’s Apostles. Most Catholics do not know much about the workings of the Church at the diocesan, national conference or Vatican levels. Church life is experienced at the local level, with the drama and politics of one’s local parish.

However, all of these parts of the Church are intimately connected. It is important for people to know these layers of the Church and how they collaborate and interact.

I would like to take the idea of National Marriage Week as an example, not only to talk about the value of marriage, but also to illustrate how the levels of the Church help promote marriage.

Last November, Pope Leo’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith issued an official note on marriage, specifically addressing the idea of monogamy and the nature of marriage. It is officially titled Una caro: Doctrinal Note on the Value of Matrimony as an Exclusive Union and Mutual Belonging.

Jay Wonacott

The head of this Vatican office, Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, describes the purpose of the note:

“In this Note, we will consider the most important interventions of the Magisterium on the given theme, as well as a series of authors from antiquity to the present — including theologians, philosophers and poets. We have found a great wealth of reflections that affirm the unity of the spouses, their mutuality and the all-encompassing significance of the marital relationship. In this way, the various texts come together to form a beautiful mosaic that will surely enrich our understanding of monogamy.”

Having some theological training, I am one of those people who will read a document like Una caro for clarifying teaching, but also because it is part of my job to try to keep up with documents issued by the Vatican and the Magisterium of the Church.

Here is a passage from Una caro that teaches about the nature of marriage:

This expression is a verbal manifestation of a deeper reality: a conviction and a decision to belong to each other mutually, to be ‘one flesh,’ and to walk together along the path of life. As Pope Francis said: ‘Married couples, too, should form a first-person plural, a “we.” [They should] stand before each other as an “I” and a “you,” and stand before the rest of the world, including the children, as a “we.”’ This happens because, although they are two different people — two individuals who each retain their own unique and inalienable identity — the spouses have, by their free consent, forged a union that places them together before the world. It is a union that generously opens itself to others, but always starting from that unique and exclusive reality of the conjugal ‘we.’

There is great food for thought in this one small paragraph. Global teachings like these are shared with the universal Church, and then national churches work to develop practical programming or teaching based on what is coming from Rome.

A great example of this is National Marriage Week. As the director of marriage and family life for our diocese, I received an email from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), promoting National Marriage Week 2026. The U.S. bishops have a website dedicated to marriage ministry called For Your Marriage.

The email stated:

Dear Marriage and Family Life Directors, Feb. 7-14 is National Marriage Week. The celebration of National Marriage Week is an opportunity to focus on the beauty of building a strong and dedicated life together through the sacrament of matrimony. World Marriage Sunday will be celebrated Feb. 8. This year’s theme from National Marriage Week USA is ‘Together With Purpose.’

Inspired by this national movement, our theme will be: Man and Woman He Created Them: Together With Purpose.

This theme honors the unique gifts of men and women and how these gifts are expressed in a spirit of complementarity. We see men and women today lacking a sense of purpose, both in their personal lives and in relationships. This sacred week will honor the 10th anniversary of Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (‘The Joy of Love’).

In an effort to emphasize that we have been created to complement one another, the Secretariat of Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth is offering various resources to all dioceses for those discerning marriage, engaged couples and those already living the vocation of marriage. These resources include an at-home weeklong retreat, a marriage-centered lectio divina, a preaching resource and flyers for parishes. Resources can be found through the USCCB and For Your Marriage. Check back regularly for updates, as new resources will be added.

At the diocesan level, I share this information with our parishes, which then decide how to share it with parishioners through social media or parish bulletins. The parish level decides what it would like to do to support marriage in local communities.

A great example of this process is our upcoming local marriage retreat at St. Mark’s. I am collaborating with leaders at St. Mark’s and St. John’s Cathedral to promote a Valentine’s Day weekend marriage retreat at St. Mark’s Catholic Church.

The retreat will be held Friday, Feb. 13, from 6 to 8 p.m., and Saturday, Feb. 14, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. It is titled Tools to Cultivate Your Marriage.

The retreat will include fun Friday night activities, practical content to nurture marriage, Saturday morning Mass and meals. It is open to engaged and married couples.

It is at the parish level where “faith” meets “life.” The multiple levels of the Church make it rich and complex. The Body of Christ has many parts working together for the benefit of the everyday Catholic who is simply trying to live the faith, follow the Lord and receive the grace Jesus wants to give through his imperfect servants striving to do his will.

Do something for your marriage this February. Read a Church document on marriage and discuss it, participate in the at-home weeklong retreat provided by the USCCB, or join us at St. Mark’s for our local marriage retreat.