Many relationships that result in marriage after a very short amount of time spent dating don't end up working out. Marriage is a big thing, you can't just date for a year and then say "Ok, let's get married".
That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. A year is too short? SS - you're proving my point that the objections to my point of view are coming from non-Catholic sources - from this culture and its non-Christian attitudes.
Saying it takes a few years to get married is really just a hop skip and jump away from authorizing pre-marital cohabitation. It's not normal to see a woman one is thinking about marrying for years without consummating the relationship.
Spot on, Tele.
Our priest said the same during our pre-marriage classes. The period of engagement is a necessary evil, and a long engagement (or courtship) is an occassion for sin.
I first spoke wrote to my husband less than 9 months before our wedding day. We haven't been married exceptionally long, but we're certainly not a dismal failure.
We were both older and more "mature" than someone right out of high school, so we got to know each other sufficiently in that time. We were done growing up (NOT TRUE for someone only 18). We knew ourselves well, and what we wanted in a spouse.
Our time spent together was all quality time, getting to know the important things about each other. When you talk for hours about important topics -- you learn a lot. Watching TV or playing mini-putt golf -- not so much.
I'd like to add:
Once you decide you're going to marry someone, it's better to "get going and do it", just for reasons of prudence. Six months is a good trade-off between lowering the period of temptation, while not making it look like a shotgun wedding.
Six months is a good length of engagement; which is why you shouldn't fraternize with the opposite sex unless you're
ready to be married. Have two more years of college? Keep your nose in the books. I know it's hard, but it's even harder to want to marry someone for YEARS. A year would seem like a decade.