He was several years ahead of dating apps and helped hundreds of people find true love and a partner to live the faith.
This is the story of Fernando Cuevas Raposo, a priest who was the matchmaker for 270 marriages.
Father Fernando is an Opus Dei priest and chaplain of several residence halls in Valencia, Spain. He is 67 years old, lives in Ibiza, Spain, and began matchmaking Catholic couples 13 years ago.
Thanks to his strategy, more than 500 people found love.
This priest helped more than 500 people find the love of their lives
Over the past 13 years, Father Fernando applied the same methodology for all the candidates.
People hoping to find their Catholic match fill out a form.
They include their name, age, birthday, height, studies, place of employment, hobbies, virtues, shortcomings, what they would like in a person, their commitment to the faith, and their ecclesiastical movement of formation in the Church.
Once each applicant submits their information, Father Fernando analyzes it and considers possible matches. If he sees compatibilities between people, he passes along each his candidate’s card. Then, if they give the go-ahead, he shares contact information.
“I pass on the phone number and tell the person that they will contact them in 24 hours. And there they will say or do whatever they want. I already forget there. My work is finished”, the priest told the digital newspaper El Español.
But the candidates looking for a match arrive by the dozens every day. The priest receives 20 requests daily and immediately develops his work as matchmaker.
“270 have married. I counted it. Not one more and not one less. Maybe in a week I can tell you that there are five more, but for now they are those,” he assured.
And although the number of marriages is incredible, what causes him the most happiness is that none of the couples have divorced.
“That they do not separate is not because of the technique. I have not trained them nor have I done the pre-marriage course for them. That is because they are very spiritual people and they are very used to giving and giving themselves”, he said.
In the midst of a society turning its back on God, Father Fernando finds his work important.
“Society is very secularized and people have tremendous religious ignorance. And lack of interest. They have no interest in the things of God because they have not been brought up that way. Those who do want to live their faith attach great importance to it and want to find someone like that.”