Golden Memories

By Michelle Martin
Staff Writer

Three of the hundreds of couples marking 50th wedding anniversaries this year reflect on the day they tied the knot and tell how they've kept it tied through the ups and downs of half a century.

For the 832 couples who gather at Holy Name Cathedral Sept. 17 and 24,1950 has become a golden year.

It’s taken on a precious quality not because of blind nostalgia for what many people remember as a simpler time, but because it was the beginning of so much: the beginning of their marriages, their families, and, in a special sense, a new relationship with God.

The Archdiocese of Chicago has been recognizing couples in their 50th anniversary year for at least 15 years, and it has become a project that the entire Family Ministries Office enjoys, said Andrew Lyke, the director of Marriage Ministry.

The tribute includes the Mass, carried on closed-circuit television in the nearby auditorium for the overflow crowd of friends and relatives, and a short reception afterward.

“These are couples who have beat the odds, especially in a culture that does not seem to value marriage,” said Lyke. “This is what we would hope for all the couples who come through our marriage preparation program, that 50 years later they would come back for a celebration like this. If I could, I would have a parade.”

So would the children of Jasper and Barbara Roy, who attended the special Mass celebrated by Auxiliary Bishop Raymond E. Goedert Sept. 17, the actual day of their 50th wedding anniversary. All 13—seven boys and six girls—planned to come back for the celebration, said Jasper Roy, a deacon who works as a chaplain at Cook County Jail and as business manager at Holy Angels Parish.

Barbara Roy remembers the wedding at a Baptist church just down the street from Holy Angels—the couple did not formally become Catholics until their oldest son started Catholic school.

“It was nice and sunny that day, not too cold and not too hot,” Barbara Roy said. “I think I just wanted to get the wedding over with.”

Her husband remembers the large wedding party and the fun they had at the celebration.

“I was just 23 years old,” he said.

Now, five decades older and wiser, they have some advice for couples just starting their married life.

“Just try to get along with one another,” Barbara Roy said. “Don’t try to control the other party, and don’t let the other party control you. Do the things God put you on this Earth to do.”

“You certainly have to give and take,” Jasper Roy said. “I think a person really has to want to live a Christ-like life, and keep the children in church as long as you can. That’s what we did, and they’re all doing well. It’s not so much what you say—it’s what they see.”

The Roys share a wedding anniversary with Gregory and RoseAnn Serratore, but they didn’t see them at the Mass on Sept. 17. The Serratores chose to have a service with a renewal of vows at their own parish, St. Mary, Star of the Sea, on their anniversary, and attend the archdiocesan celebration Sept. 24, at the Mass to be celebrated by Cardinal George.

But more than most couples, they know what they will experience. Both of them have served as ushers at the golden wedding anniversary Masses for the last 10 years.

“I think this is going to be a different feeling,” said Gregory Serratore, a deacon at his parish. “This time I can kind of relax and enjoy it.”
“I just hoped and prayed for some years that we would be able to participate,” RoseAnn Serratore said.

Gregory Serratore spent some of his time this month remembering what he was doing the week before the wedding, which took place at Santa Maria Incoronata Church, now St. Therese Chinese Catholic Mission.

“In those days, you had to be 21 to get married without your parents’ permission if you were a man. I missed it by three months,” Serratore said. “It was very embarrassing going to the marriage license bureau with my father.”

His wife, five months older, didn’t have the same problem.

Now, when they look back on their marriage, they credit God with helping make it last.

“You’ve got hard times, good times, laugh times and cry times,” RoseAnn Serratore said. “You’ve got to have faith in one another and faith the Lord. That’s the main thing. In times of trouble, that’s what gets you through.”

“Kids today, they expect their marriages to be always perfect,” Gregory Serratore said. “My wife and I, we had a lot of rough times. We were very religious. That got us through these 50 years. … Anyone who doesn’t want God in their marriage is making a big mistake. When you get married, it’s you, your spouse and God.”

Giving faith a place in their marriage has served Josephine and Robert Pauli well, too.

The couple was married June 17, 1950, after a week that Josephine spent praying that the weather would be cool enough that her father would don a tuxedo for the ceremony at St. Mel Church.

“The good Lord saw to it that we had a cooler day,” she said.

Robert Pauli said he was just worried about getting time off from work for the wedding and the honeymoon.

The couple celebrated their anniversary with a service at Divine Providence Church in Westchester, followed by a party. They planned to attend the Golden Wedding Anniversary Mass Sept. 17.

The Paulis have six sons—the youngest twins—and Robert Pauli supported them by first working as a butcher and then running a wholesale meat company with his brother.

Their busy life probably helped keep the marriage working, Pauli said.

“Between coming home from work, eating dinner and getting the kids to bed, I didn’t have time to get in trouble,” he joked. “And I couldn’t afford to divorce the kid, even if I wanted to. But I didn’t want to.”

Early in her marriage, someone gave Josephine Pauli a bit of advice that she would like to pass on.

“Always say three Hail Marys with your husband before you go to bed at night,” she said. “I probably haven’t done that as much as I should. But when you do, it does keep you from staying angry.”

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