Virtually almost all millennials have to struggle with the current state of dating. Worse still, if you still harbor romanticized ideas of that old school innocent mystic of traditional spouse hunting. Today, powered by swiping apps like Tinder, the in thing on the current dating scene is low-commitment casual flings with a heightened focus on physical intimacy.
Consequently, the dating environment can present severe challenges for are looking for that special someone with whom they are looking to settle down. In an even worse-off situation are daters that have specific non-negotiables like sharing a similar faith and traditional values.
Faith-focused dating sites like Christian Mingle and eHarmony aim to fill this void by providing a community of religious daters where members can seek out matches with similar religious beliefs and Christian values. On sites like this, you can significantly expand the number of options available to you and increase your chances of finding a potential mate that matches both your beliefs and your dispositions.
However, for some families, it is especially important to them that they marry within their sect. And while finding a suitable partner who subscribes to your religion can be tough enough, adding in denominational requirements can quickly complicate things.
Situations like this are where extremely niche platforms like CatholicMatch come in quite handy.
CatholicMatch: Catholic Dating and Catholic Singles
When you are seeking love with a partner who subscribes to both your religion, sect, and personal religious views, you are left with a tiny amount of users on any platform who fit your criteria to the T. CatholicMatch aims to change that.
CatholicMatch is a platform for Catholic dating that accepts Catholic singles from around the world, creating the perfect community for members of the faith to find that particular person. As a religious dating site, CatholicMatch's primary focus is facilitating marriage, but site members can also seek other forms of companionship like friendship on there.
Since its launch in 1999, CatholicMatch has grown into one of the largest dating websites that target explicitly Catholic singles. The platform was created by Catholic founders Jason LaFosse, Brian Barcaro, and Mike Lloyd as a passion project to help out struggling Catholic singles.
With over 27 million Catholics in the US alone, CatholicMatch has a sizable target audience, and they are currently doing a great job of capturing a significant portion of them. Now, the platform has over 1.5 million registered members, and they get up to 500,000 active users every month, significantly dwarfing every other Catholic-specific site and even more Christian dating platforms.
While CatholicMatch does not have all the bells and whistles of popular dating platforms like Match and eHarmony, its massive hyper-targeted user base makes the website a real gem for its members. Furthermore, their platform is modern, simple, and pleasant to use.
Who is CatholicMatch For?
Finding love with someone that shares the same religious views as you can be tough. That's why CatholicMatch tries to solve this problem, for Catholics at least. CatholicMatch is excellent for Catholic singles who want to expand the number of viable options available to them, and the platform can be a lifesaver for people with a small circle of believers in their everyday lives.
Whether you are seeking romantic long term relationships or just some new faith-first friends, CatholicMatch is an excellent option for finding people of the faith near you.
However, the platform is open to all Catholics, irrespective of how they practice their faith. Here, you will find both strict followers of the tenets of the Church and people who have a more laissez-faire approach to their religious practice.
Are you a Catholic that is frustrated with the casual dating-fuel dating sphere of today, CatholicMatch offers a platform where the Sacrament of Marriage is held in high regard. Many of the website's features focus on faith and family, and they help members find people with complementary traits and interests and that have the potential for becoming life partners.
The platform also hosts active discussion forums that offer an avenue for Catholic singles to share ideas and learn about Christian dating and marriage.
CatholicMatch is open to Catholic singles from around the world. However, the majority of the site members are people from the US, the UK, Canada, and English-speaking European countries. Nevertheless, if you have a sizable Catholic population in your country, the chances are that you will find some matches on the platform.
CatholicMatch: Effectiveness
Since its launch in 1999, CatholicMatch has grown to become the largest dating website that targets explicitly Catholic singles. The platform now has a sizable member base and one of the highest active members to user base ratios in the industry, with more than half of its members logging in every single month. One thing you can be sure of with CatholicMatch is that the platform has mass appeal, and their visitors keep on coming back.
When it comes to providing a supportive community of like-minded singles with a strong Catholic identity, the CatholicMatch platform delivers on its promise.
The platform takes faith seriously, and it focuses on building new Catholic families and connections. Consequently, the CatholicMatch has a wealth of success stories that detail many of the site members finding love on there.
CatholicMatch Features
Design
The CatholicMatch website is a matter-of-fact, straight-to-the-point interface that gives you the meat of the platform without any gimmicks or unnecessary features. Almost every page on the site is free from clutter, is simple and well organized.
The website is up to date, and it features clean contemporary aesthetics.
Getting Started
Getting registered on CatholicMatch is a pretty simple and straightforward, albeit lengthy process. The entire signup process should take you around 30 minutes to complete.
To begin the process, you must enter your email address or use the Facebook integration to get started. After this step, you have to complete a series of questions that include everything from your personal information, your beliefs on life, relationships, and religions, to which diocese you identify with, and how often you attend mass.\
Since CatholicMatch prides itself as being a faith-based Catholic platform through and through, a significant portion of the signup process pertains to religious matters. However, you do get to fill out a 150-character personal introduction, as well as a host of personal information, interests, and relationship goals as you would on any regular dating platform.
Every portion of the signup process is mandatory, and you must also upload a profile picture before your account goes live. You could upload this picture from your computer or just pull one directly from your Facebook account if you signed up via Facebook.
In addition to setting up your profile, you can also take a Temperament Test, which helps the platform understand your personality and match you with other members appropriately. Furthermore, you also get the option of displaying your results from the test on your profile.
CatholicMatch also lets you set up to 20 multiple-choice questions on your profile for other members to answer so you have a feel for their personality before you engage them in a proper conversation.
Establishing Contact
Reaching out to other members on CatholicMatch is as easy as jumping to the matches page and hitting any of you with a message. However, the matches functionality is only active for people who take the Temperament Test as that is how the system rates you and finds your potential matches.
Furthermore, proper messaging is only available to paying members, as free members will have to settle for sending an Emotigram.
CatholicMatch also has a search feature where you can filter members by location, physique, religious inclinations, and lots more. Since providing information during signup is mandatory, most of the profiles on CatholicMatch are fully decked out. Hence, you will find a wealth of information on user profiles to help sort out members that match your criteria.
Alternatively, you can jump into the discussion forums where there is high engagement on polls and other hot-button topics that cover everything about the lives of Catholic singles.
Other Platform Features
Temperament Test: CatholicMatch uses a 3rd party temperament test that uses the four fundamental personality types as criteria for matching you with other users with complementary traits. Users can also post the results of this test on their profiles.
Interview Questions: With the interview questions features, you can add up to 20 multiple-choice questions on your profile for other members to answer. These questions are great for helping you get an overview of how the other person thinks, and they could also work as excellent icebreakers.
Emotigrams: Emotigrams are platform stickers that you can use instead of a message as a way to get the conversation started. Popular CatholicMatch Emotigrams include a rosary, a cup of coffee, or a bouquet. Emotigrams are available to both free and paying members.
CatholicMatch Pricing
CatholicMatch premium plans are available in three plans: a monthly plan at $29.99 per month and 3-month and 6-month plans that offer significant discounts.
| Duration | Price per month | Total Cost |
| 1 month | $29.99 | $29.99 |
| 3 months | $19.95 | $59.85 |
| 6 months | $12.95 | $77.7 |
While CatholicMatch's pricing is more expensive than your average dating site, it is quite common for niche sites like this to carry a premium. And with the site houses the most extensive user base of catholic members, the fee is worth it for people who are part of this audience.
Free Account vs. Premium Account
A free CatholicMatch account gives you access to all of the site's features, including search, profiles, and community forums. With a standard account, you also get the ability to reach out with an Emotigram.
However, you can't send messages with a free account. Furthermore, even if you receive messages from other users, you will be unable to read them until a 10-day window elapses.
A premium subscription, on the other hand, unlocks the messaging functionality and lets you send unlimited messages to any CatholicMatch member. Besides, you also get the ability to view read receipts and priority support from CatholicMatch.
CatholicMatch Pros and Cons
Pros
- The most extensive user base of any Catholic-specific dating platform
- No empty profiles, thanks to the detailed signup process
- Hyper-active community forums
- Verification via Facebook linking
- CatholicMatch offers a free plan extension guarantee on their 6-month plan
Cons
- No clear signs to tell paid members from free members
- A common problem with niche dating sites is a small user base anywhere that is outside a major metropolis
CatholicMatch Alternatives
Other alternative places where you can find Catholic singles include:
User Reviews
There is a wealth of success stories and positive reviews that testify to the efficacy of the CatholicMatch platform.
However, many of the negative reviews complained about meeting people that weren't Catholics on there, an issue that is bound to happen on any platform that tries to pander to a specific belief system.
Since everyone has a different definition of what “being Catholic” entails, it is not surprising that many of the reviews claim that the people they have encountered on there to not match their criteria. Furthermore, since there is no religious test you could dish out to verify the Catholic faith of each user, people who have absolutely no adherence to the faith could sign up to the platform just for the fun of it.
Other negative reviews highlighted a problem that is common with almost every dating site: the presence of fake and dead accounts. Till we get some sort of concrete verification for users of a platform, this issue isn’t going anywhere. However, who would want to give that much personal data to dating platforms, who are notorious for being all forms of shady?
