Whose Wedding Is It, Anyway?

One of the most helpful pieces of advice Rock and I received when preparing for our own wedding was from Fr. Peter, the priest who did our marriage prep work with us. One day he said to us, “You know, this isn’t your wedding.” “What are you talking about? Of course, it’s our wedding!” I responded, in my usual knee-jerk fashion. Peter then went on to describe some of the emotional and psychological stuff going on for just about anyone attending any wedding, but especially for family members and close friends of the couple getting married. For our parents, it is their daughter’s/son’s wedding; for our siblings, it is their sister’s/brother’s wedding; and so on. Our wedding was a big deal to those who were close to us, but for different reasons than it was a big deal to us.

Beginning to see his point, I wondered what could be done about it. Peter helped us to see that we could not do anything about the way people were feeling, but that planning our ceremony with awareness and sensitivity to these dynamics and needs could go a long way in making it a better service for everyone. Being headstrong and terribly sure of myself at the time, I’m not sure how good a job we did in following through on Peter’s advice in planning our own wedding ceremony. But remembering this perspective did help us to navigate some of the more interesting behaviors that emerged from a few family members during the days leading up to and including our wedding day.

These days I find that I am deeply impressed with the couples I have worked with as a Celebrant. So many of them really do make a great effort to honor the needs and traditions of their families of origin, while still being true to themselves as a couple. And what is lovely about a Celebrant wedding is that you have all the options in the world to work with to create just the right ceremony for you!