Wedding Overload

So trying to find a church and place to have a reception is insane.  Who would have thought that it would be so hard to talk to a priest or a planner at a church to at least let you know dates of availability?  For some reason, it is difficult to get answers from them.

Although I may have had a break through with the Old Cathedral, they have dates available in August but we need to have permission from our pastor that we can get married there.  Problem number 1, we don't have a pastor because we don't belong to a parish.  Which coincides with problem number 2, we don't belong to a parish so we can't just call our church to get married there.

Why does the Catholic church or the St. Louis Archdiocese have to make this so complicated?  Why can't we just pick a church that we like and pay them to get married there?  It's not like the churches in the City aren't needing money...

And don't even get me started on reception hall costs...Too Much on a very small budget!