At 32, Angela was tired of trying to date men who weren’t actually interested in their faith.
“My ex-boyfriend, who I had met by chance . . . became resentful of me when I tried to encourage him to grow closer to the Lord,” she recalls. “I knew our relationship wasn’t going anywhere.”
Though she received advice from family and friends to take a dating hiatus after this inevitable breakup, Angela felt God calling her to take a more active role towards her vocation. And, this time, she joined CatholicMatch, because she knew her faith needed to be front and center in her dating life. This was back in 2024.
Just a week after joining and creating her profile, she found a message from 35 year old Luis, a first-generation immigrant from Mexico who was now residing in Chicago.
He had joined CatholicMatch because he was having trouble meeting faithful singles in person, too!
“I had already videoed and messaged several men, and though most of them were nice, I was not feeling any connection or interest in getting to know them more,” Angela said. “However, right from the start with Luis, especially after our first video chat, I knew there was something very different about him!”
With the instant spark they both felt, they began video chatting daily and set up their first date just two weeks later.
And it was the best first date that either had ever had!
“When I heard and saw his love for his faith and especially for adoration, I was totally caught,” Angela remembers. She was also touched that Luis had brought his mother back from Mexico for a visit, and Angela got to meet her on this first date, as well. Being from Ohio, five hours away from Chicago, Angela was intimidated by the idea of long-distance dating. But she kept forging ahead with courage and was open to where God was leading her! Luis, who had just returned from visiting family in Mexico, was much less deterred by distance. Their first date went so well, and they became attached to each other so quickly, that he drove to see Angela every single weekend for months on end. (Talk about intentional! Gold star for Luis!)
At the time, Angela was working as a nanny, caring for young children full time.
Luis had been working at FedEx, and a few months into dating, when the first “I love you’s” had been shared, he began looking into switching jobs to move closer to where Angela lived.
He began the process of starting his own trucking business, which meant he could move to an area of his choice, but it also meant his travel schedule would be kind of wild until the business really got on its feet.
But, as they say, love conquers all!
“It was as if we had known each other all our lives, it felt so right and comfortable,” she says. That didn’t mean that the dating process was always easy, of course. They still had distance, schedules, job changes, and a move to navigate. But these challenges felt like opportunities for growth and only brought them closer together.
A year after their first date, Luis brought Angela to the same place they had first met, a beautiful town square. He asked her if she would truly follow him anywhere. When she said of course she would, he dropped to one knee and held out the ring to propose. “It was beautiful!” Angela says.
Six months later in 2025, they were married in the Catholic Church!
The ceremony was a small and intimate wedding with their closest family and friends. Angela and Luis moved back to the Chicago suburbs for their first year, before Luis’ business took off and they were able to move back to Angela’s hometown, their shared goal to put down roots and start their family. And shortly after their one year anniversary, their son Jacob arrived healthy and precious!
“To anyone feeling discouraged about finding their future spouse, don’t give up hope,” the couple shares. “Trust His timing. Both (of us) had wished for our vocation to be fulfilled sooner and yet looking back, we can see that the timing was perfect, and that God was preparing both of us to be ready to fully receive the other!”
