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Building a Eucharistic Marriage

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Building a Eucharistic Marriage

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Building a Eucharistic Marriage is a 7 part online program for Catholic couples. The Discovering Our Deepest Desire (D.O.D.D.) The D.O.D.D.

curriculum is not just about strengthening marriages, but it is also about building Marriage Education teams in our church that provide marriage support and encouragement to those in need. It seeks to encourage ongoing support versus a “flash-in-the-pan” approach. Too many people wait too long to get help for their marriage, out of fear of what it will look like to others. Often, couple’s wait until their marriage is in extreme crises or at the end-of-the-rope before finally seeking help; and often, at this point, it is too late. concept is built upon creating ongoing support for couples and for reducing the stigma of marriage education being only for those in trouble. Rather, it should be readily available in our churches in order to help couples grow in and work at their marriage, ongoing, with the support of their faith community.

10/27/2026

(Matt. 5: 9) – “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”

The hardest part about my job as a Marriage Therapist is seeing spouses, who are supposed to be each other’s beloved helpmate, be so cruel and unkind to one another. Some of the things I have heard over the years I wouldn’t even consider doing to my worst enemy (seriously). As a therapist, my mission is to help restore unity, compassion, understanding, and overall peace. In doing so, I have learned more about the depth of what Christ was saying in his sermon on the mount in the passage above.

Blessed is the peacemaker. Blessed is the one who takes a ‘time out’ instead of letting a disagreement turn into a shouting match. Blessed is the one who tries to understand their spouse’s point of view rather than becoming defensive at most everything they say. Blessed is the spouse who encourages their spouse to become a better person rather than the one who is regularly finding fault in them. Blessed is the one who is gentle in their reactions towards their spouse when frustrated, instead of jumping to anger and disappointment.

So many fights could be avoided or lessened if we approached each situation with a mentality of peace. When my wife and I were doing a marriage talk, she said something that I use in therapy often. She said “I don’t know why I started to think the worst about Greg back in the difficult times in our marriage. He has always wanted the best for me, and I for him. We just needed to rediscover that and realize that our method of resolving issues was what needed to be fixed.” The best way to bring about peace is to start by making our interactions more inviting, calm, and focused on understanding and seeking resolve. It takes time. It takes work. But it especially takes humility.

ACTION STEP: This week, seek ways to implement one or all of the ideas in paragraph two above.

10/27/2026

It’s live! Listen to Reclaiming the Heart of Marriage 🎉
https://open.spotify.com/episode/1EPZFPY6r2shWY02b5lzTO...

After months of prayer and preparation, the ‘Building a Eucharistic Marriage’ team would like to introduce Reclaiming the Heart of Marriage —a brand new podcast about boldly living out the true vocation of Marriage in a confused and broken world.

If you have ever wondered how to truly thrive in your relationship with your spouse, this is the podcast for you! Hosted round-table style by our very own Greg Schutte and cohosted by fellow therapists Alex Wallace and Dr. Josh Englefield, we dive into effective communication approaches, navigating grief, and everything in between. Launched on the feast of St. John Paul II, we humbly pray for his patronage and for this podcast be a source of strength, healing, and joy for couples everywhere.

We’re excited to share our faith, training, and personal experiences as therapists, husbands, and fathers, and we would love to have you join the conversation! If you’ve ever had a relationship question that you wish you could run by a Catholic therapist, now’s your chance to gain insight from 3! Simply email us at the address provided in the podcast, and we’ll tackle the problem together!

And the first episode is live RIGHT. NOW.

We would love for you to give it a listen, hit Subscribe, and let us know what you think! Welcome to the mission of reclaiming the heart of marriage, starting in your own home.

10/20/2026

[This week I would like to start a series of looking at our marriages through the lens of Christ’s words to all of us.]

(Matt. 5: 7) – “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”

I have often talked to couples about forgiveness being a free gift of mercy. The offender may never ask for it or deserve it, but we are called to give it anyway, because it helps us reduce the bitterness that holds our hearts bound. But even more so, we do it because Christ asked us to. Mercy can be very difficult to give at times, but think about all the times we ourselves begged for or longed for mercy for a mistake we had made, but never got it. And if we did receive it, do we also remember the gratitude we felt?

Christ especially calls spouses to have mercy on one another. He calls for us not to punish each other for the mistakes we make, but rather to give forgiveness. We may be tempted not to because we are afraid our spouse will perceive trust is again granted, but this is not the case. Trust needs to be rebuilt and this is what we owe our spouse when we hurt them. It becomes a charitable act of the will to learn from our mistakes and to make things better out of love for our beloved.

Withholding mercy often just creates more divide between spouses and creates an environment that often discourages the rebuilding of trust. In this passage from Matthew, Christ calls us, to mutually show compassion and mercy toward each other so as to ‘do unto our spouse, as we would like to have them do unto us.’ Also, remember, every time we say the “Our Father” prayer, we ask God to forgive us as we forgive others.

ACTION STEP: This week seek to give mercy to your spouse any chance you can.

10/20/2026

(John 15: 12-13) “This is my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”

Marriage is such a great gift to us from God. Through this Sacrament, designed by the Lord, we have the privilege of not only becoming one with another person, but also being able to share a lifetime of support, love, and service. We get the opportunity to share our heart with another person and to see into the depths of their heart.

In addition, as it confirms in John 15 above, we also have the opportunity to experience the greatest form of love through our marriage, because in marriage we are called to “lay down our life” for our spouse through a lifetime of sacrifice and service. We do this through how we care for each other in times of need. We do this through our openness to having and raising children. We do this through working through our differences and through managing and overcoming our concupiscence together. We have so many occasions throughout our life together to grow in this Godly love, but only when we fight against our selfish desires and always seek the good of our spouse.

The beauty is that we don’t have to do this alone. God promises graces to us, through our sacramental union, to strengthen us and to guide us in this mission. As we serve each other in marriage, we have the opportunity to grow in love and compassion, and experience a foretaste of the “heavenly wedding feast” (CCC 1642). As St. Mother Theresa once said, “A life not lived for others is not a life.”

ACTION STEP: This week, thank God for the opportunities he gives you in marriage to practice a greater form of love.

10/20/2026

It’s that time of year again when school starts back up and kids return to learning - some at physical locations outside their home, while some begin the process at home with a homeschooling parent. Many of us look forward to this time of year, while others dread it. Some are too new to parenting and have not started down this road yet, though others only look back to the memories of “those days.” Whatever the difficulties we have faced, are encountering, or will someday have to tackle, with this annual event, one thing is always for certain in these transitions: we must leave something behind as we move forward to the next phase.

This became all too real to me as I dropped my 6th child (my fourth daughter) off at college 1,100 miles from home in a state I know very little about. It did, and still does, cause a mix of emotions for me because it comes with the realization that her childhood has come to an end and her adult life has just begun. It is exciting and excruciating all at the same time. I’m cautiously happy for her and sad for her mother and myself. We are proud of and happy for her, but for us, it is another loss. Another leaving behind what was. As we watched the college slowly disappear in the rearview mirror, the stark reality of our new life ahead with just one of seven kids left at home, was the direction our GPS was taking us.

Author Henri J. M. Nouwen, once wrote: “The losses remind you constantly that all isn't perfect and it doesn't always happen for you the way you expected; that perhaps you had hoped events would not have been so painful, but they were; or that you expected something from certain relationships that never materialized. You find yourself disillusioned with the irrevocable personal losses: your health, your lover, your job, your hope, your dream. Your whole life is filled with losses, endless losses. And every time there are losses, there are choices to be made. You choose to live your losses as passages to anger, blame, hatred, depression, and resentment, or you choose to let these losses be passages to something new, something wider, and deeper. The question is not how to avoid loss and make it not happen, but how to choose it as a passage, as an exodus to greater life and freedom.”

I wish I had a great advice for all who are reading this regarding the method for successfully navigating these times in life. However, I too am in the throes of this struggle. I do know, however, that staying stuck in ‘what was’ is only a recipe for overwhelming, unresolved grief and bitterness. But, I do feel encouraged by Nouwen’s suggestion to look for the beauty in choosing a new path to move forward in.

Many things need to be left behind in life in order for us to move forward onto the next experience; the next area of growth; the next person in our life that needs a friend; the next lesson we need to learn to become better and not bitter, the next challenge God desires for us to encounter in order for us to realize how much we can trust in Him. Cherish the memories, but don’t linger there too long. Keep your eyes on the bright horizon in front of you.

ACTION STEP: This week, together with your spouse, seek a direction that celebrates your past accomplishments, while at the same time also builds upon it with new experiences that can create a “greater life and freedom.”

09/24/2026

(John 8: 4-5,7) - “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So, what do you say?” …when they continued asking him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”
I used to love this passage when I was a kid, often because I felt like I was blamed for so many bad behaviors, and I wished everyone else knew they were ‘no saint’ either. Today, I still love this passage, but for reasons not the same as my earlier one. We live in a world where so few people take accountability for their own behaviors and many even justify their poor decisions. Many are quick to point blame at others to get the culpability off of themselves.

This is very destructive when it is displayed in our relationship with our spouse. So many couples that I see in therapy are quick to list all of the faults of their spouse and exaggerate each memory in hopes of getting me on their side. In addition, they are also good at minimizing their own liability through a string of justifications and accusations of spousal misunderstandings and lies. These moments quickly digress into a pool of angry banter and tears.

In the Scripture above, Jesus is calling each one of us to look at our own sins and failings and to “heal thyself first.” The problem is that we expect others to change, but often we are not willing to do the same. We expect so much of others but give back so little of ourselves in return. The only person we can change is ourselves. Focus more on how you can make things better in yourself and in your relationship. And, since none of us are without sin, we need to stop throwing stones and instead start using them to build bridges back to each other.

ACTION STEP: This week, avoid quick justifications of your behavior and blaming of your spouse for problems in your marriage. Seek to improve yourself first.

09/24/2026

(Sirach 11:7-8) – “Before investigating, find no fault; examine first, then criticize. Before hearing, answer not, and interrupt no one in the middle of his speech.”

One of the biggest turn-offs in trying to communicate with another person is when they talk over us or start to respond and give a rebuttal before we have even finished our thoughts regarding an issue. This can happen regularly between married couples and is often a huge reason why marital communication breaks down. This behavior tells our spouse, without ever saying it, that ‘I don’t want to hear what you have to say, and I don’t agree!’ If we don’t listen, we won’t understand. If we don’t understand, how can we ever deal with the real issue at hand?

Too many people hear only enough to start formulating a defense, which in turn puts the whole conversation on a defensive path. Sometimes we hear only enough to override our spouse’s observations with our own views of the situation, and again we start a battle between two perceptions. Denying or disagreeing with someone’s perception is often a recipe for disaster if we are not willing to first understand it.

However, productive communication demands respect for each person. As listeners, we must allow them to explain their ‘perception of things’ and seek to truly understand their point of view, before presenting a counter perception. I know this sounds a little technical, but all this is suggesting is that it is more destructive to argue when you don’t fully understand than it is to gather all the information before responding, disagreeing, or criticizing. We all have our own perspective about things, and understanding their side of things, before we get our ‘dander up,’ will often help us to reduce sending our spouse the wrong message.

ACTION STEP: This week, stop yourself from interrupting your spouse during discussions and seek to first understand their point of view.

09/22/2026

Marriage Matters Video #93 -- Control or Consideration

09/14/2026

(Romans 14: 19 – 21) – “Let us then pursue what leads to peace and to building up one another. For the sake of food, do not destroy the work of God. Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to become a stumbling block by eating; it is good not to eat meat or drink w**e or do anything that causes your brother to stumble.”

Here is a passage in Scripture that is hard for many people to swallow (pun intended). Why? Because often we want what we want, when we want it, and we get upset with our spouse (or anyone for that matter) when they get in the way of it. We want to blame them for having the problem and get upset with their unreasonableness or infringement on our rights or our little pleasures in life. But what I have often found is that 99% of the time, when someone who loves you has an issue with what you are eating or with what you are drinking and how much you are consuming, there usually is a fairly good reason for it.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard one spouse complain about the other spouse’s use or abuse of alcohol, only to get a rebuke and a justification from the other spouse about their choice. Then when I learn more about their situation, I hear story after story about how alcohol was involved in many of their conflicts. I also have heard couples make multiple comments about the types of food their spouse eats and lets their children eat. The majority of the time, the deep concern in their complaint is usually regarding a worry they have about their spouse’s health or maybe about how much money is being spent.

Either way, we have to ask ourselves, is this choice of food or drink worth the destruction of my marital relationship? What is it about my actions regarding this choice that is causing so much angst for my loved one? Why am I finding it hard to let go of this particular pleasure in my life? I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have things we find pleasure in, but if my pleasure is causing my beloved pain, for whatever reason, is it worth it?

ACTION STEP: This week, take note of any choices you are making regarding food, drink, or maybe even activities that cause your spouse concern. Seek help from God and your spouse in choosing more “relationship friendly” options.

09/14/2026

We are bombarded everyday with negative news about corruption, scandal, death, and destruction, which often evokes our fears and weighs down our hearts. This negativity can depress our mood and incite anger and frustration. Too often, I have seen how this ‘focus on all the problems of the world’ has created division, frustration, or concern between spouses as they argue politics, feel pressure to compromise values, or just watch as their loved one self-destructs over issues that they have no control over. It happened in my own marriage just a few years ago.

Caught up in my own hopelessness regarding the leaders of our nation, my wife saw me focused more on conspiracy theories and news hype, than on being joyful for my many blessings. It wasn’t until I listened to a podcast by Fr. Mike Schmitz that my heart and mind finally found freedom from the chains I had placed on my own heart. The podcast that I listened to was called; “It’s Not Your Vineyard.” The message that I heard loud and clear was that this world is not my vineyard to control and fret over. It is God’s vineyard, and He is still in control. It is His job to work out all the messy details of judgment and redemption. My job is to do the Will of God every day, to do the things that are within my control, and to shine Christ’s light and truth into the world around me.

You see, Satan wants to destroy our spirits through getting our ‘eyes off of Christ’ and the mission God has placed before us. He wants us to focus more on the ‘raging sea’ around us, so that, like Peter, we will start to sink into the depths of despair, hopelessness, and wrath. In turn, the devil uses this anger to also self-destruct the relationships we have around us. But God says, “Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matt. 14:31). Once we learn to give to God our cares about the world, trust that He is watching over us and His vineyard, and seek His grace to help us fulfill the mission He has set before us, we will finally know peace in a world that is at war. And that peace we find in knowing, loving, and trusting God, will radiate toward those we love and the world around us.

ACTION STEP: This week, turn off the news, trust God to deal with the ‘vineyard, and find more ways to let your light shine to your family.

Address

4945 Riverton Road
Dayton, OH
45414

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm

Telephone

+19372627010

Website

http://eucharisticmarriage.org/

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