Whose Wedding Is It?

Mrs. Bastard and I did not have a religious wedding. Oddly, at the time, she was still religious but preferred a JoP. We had no problems with it, as for reasons unrelated to religion, most of the Bastard family (the real religious whackos) were not invited.

My mom was there (Catholic) but I didn’t hear anything about it from here, since she’s the type that wouldn’t say “Boo” to Pac-man.

Here in Florida, a wedding may be performed by a Notary Public. I’m a Notary and an atheist. I’d be delighted to perform an atheistic wedding for you….no charge!

My wife’s mother didn’t have anything to do with planning our wedding (nobody did, really; we just told them where to be and when). But she’s had that sort of response from her mother. At this point, her mother just ignores the subject, although it took some doing.

When my wife and I moved back to Pittsburgh, she started getting mailers from her mother’s church. When she asked her mother about it, the response was, “Oh, they much have found your address somehow.” Yeah, that must be it. Someone is just sitting there with a phone book looking for people that might have attended in the past.

Long story short, there was a big fight over it, and my wife called the church and asked to be removed from the mailing list.

Family will complain whatever you do for your wedding, so you may as well do it exactly how you want to.

We found an officiant in the yellow pages. She wasn’t affiliated with any church but she was a minister. She had a book of services to pick from and you could do a little mixing and matching and there were several non-religious options. We even got to choose her uniform and we went with a purple robe that looked like something a minister would wear, that probably helped with the eyebrow raisers.

The ceremony was on a stage in a community theater so we had the organ too. We incorporated a lot of traditional elements but none of the religious stuff.

We were very independent when we planned our wedding – we didn’t ask for any money from our parents (although they insisted, to help with catering, etc.) and we chose to have our college chaplain (an amazing Methodist minister who fostered great relationships between the different religious groups on campus as well as the secular humanist group) counsel us and perform the ceremony.

We had each of our attendants (eight in all) read a passage, all from different books. The only one from the Bible was from 1 Corinthians 13 (yeah, I know…) and the rest were from a wide variety of religious and non-religious sources, including a Star Trek episode. It was beautiful.

Neither of our families put up a bit of fuss, although we weren’t outed on either side. It was a very everybody-friendly wedding.

My husband and I had an entirely godless wedding eleven years ago. No one said a word to our faces, but I eventually got reports through the grapevine that many of the (older, more conservative) attendees were horrified and disgusted by our bizarre ceremony. I expected nothing less, and couldn’t care less. The ceremony was about my husband and me, and no one else — certainly not imaginary sky-beings.

If I were to ever get married, it’d be completely non-religious. My mom hates the fact that I’m an atheist, which surprises me because she was never very religious. She once told me she’d rather I believed in Zeus than nothing at all. (I wonder how she’d feel if I converted to Islam?)

She feels sorry for me that I have no faith in a deity, which to me is strange.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand, my mom would prefer I just go elope than have a big wedding, she was married twice and said eloping was much better. I’d personally at least want a big party, but I wouldn’t mind eloping, then celebrating with friends and family. Though I gotta wonder if people would come from out of town just for a party and not an actual wedding ceremony?

Sorry for rambling, I’d never really thought about this much before. I’ve told my boyfriend of 3 years that I’m not really interested in “making it official” because I don’t need a piece of paper telling me I’ll be faithful to one person.

My dad kindly agreed to be ordained as a “minister” through the Universal Life Church (ulc.org), and he performed the ceremony for us. So I’d say he didn’t have any trouble with a non-religious wedding.

Allison, two friends of mine were married at a dual faith ceremony. It was interesting to see how a traditional Persian wedding with swords and salt throwing was performed while a stuffy Anglican Priest stood around looking embarrassed.

I just got married this past August. My uncle, a pastor in Connecticut, did the ceremony. Even though neither of us is religious (I’m roughly agnostic bordering on atheism and she just doesn’t really care), we reasoned that since neither of us has that big a problem with religion in general, and since both our families would have gone absolutely nuts otherwise, that we could stand a religious ceremony as long as it was kept generic enough. I picked a passage from the Bible that was as non-theological as possible and I instructed my uncle to keep the sermonizing brief, considering it was an outdoor wedding in West Chicago in late summer.

Yeah, it was a compromise. No, I don’t think I could have done any better.

Though it was all I could do to keep from rolling my eyes when he mentioned “the Atheist who cannot be joyful for he has no one to thank” in his sermon…

My husband’s mother, prior to (and during) our wedding, would pepper our answering machine with, “Why haven’t you invited *my* friends from church, why aren’t you going to have it at *our* church?”

My husband was raised Methodist, and until he was 18 was an avid church-goer, I was raised Catholic, and just… never really had any belief to speak of. I think, because my husband and I both met when we were 18, when he was questioning his faith, that she holds me somewhat responsible. She still hints that we need to attend service.

At the wedding, an aunt on my side of the family – KEPT – asking why we didn’t have the service in the church, wouldn’t we have preferred to have it in the church, it would have been nicer in a church…

David D.G., some mothers do this sort of thing. They simply can’t deal with the notion that their offspring might actually believe something so unreasonable. If there really were an afterlife, my own mother would be up in heaven, STILL shouting “No you’re not!” whenever I admit to being an atheist… and she died in ’03 at age 83.

Why do people feel they have to have a religious wedding when the God they believe is omniscient?

Wouldn’t God know your commitment or lack thereof whether the two people stood by themselves at an oasis in the most isolated part of the Sahara or stood in a church with a thousand guests and a Bishop officiating?

My mother was horrified by my first wedding, in an Episcopal Church! Not Catholic! That marriage went down in flames after two years. This time my husband and I went to the courthouse and had a lovely ceremony with just us and two friends. My parents did not say a word. I think my mom was just happy I wasn’t pregnant. The next year my sister got married in an outdoor ceremony, so it was clearly also not a Catholic wedding. I don’t think she got any grief from my mother, either. Sometimes I wonder if my mom feels like a failure, one daughter an atheist and the other a less than half-assed Catholic.

I live in Germany. Here the churches are not allowed to perform a wedding unless you are already married by a government clerk. So the usual thing people do is they get married in the city hall, with just a few family members and a witness or two (like bridesmaid and best man) and a day later (or sometimes up to a year later) get married in a church – the “big” ceremony with a party afterwards.

Now, my wife is protestant (only nominally, she does not go to church) and I am an atheist. She wanted a “big” church wedding. I told her if she insisted, I would go through a ceremony that for me would be meainingless, but I would rather not. Turned out, what she actually wanted was a “nice” ceremony with lots of traditional elements and a wedding dress and stuff. She did not like the town hall weddings (which are essentially just the signing of some papers).

So I rented a medieval castle for a few hours, got the clerk to come there and do a ceremony which included some music, we chose our own pledges, my bride got her white dress and a horse carriage ride, and the location made for great pictures, better than any church.

My wife is sooo glad we did not do the “two weddings” thing!

All my relatives and friends remember is what a nice ceremony we had.

I think what relatives want most is that you demonstrate that you are aware of and respect traditions, as these are outward rituals of social bonding, especially across generations. Outside of organized religion, you need to find a way to somehow “respect traditions” in your own way. We emphasized that a wedding is not only the union of two people, but of two families. They were so happy!

My dad kindly agreed to be ordained as a “minister” through the Universal Life Church (ulc.org), and he performed the ceremony for us. So I’d say he didn’t have any trouble with a non-religious wedding.

That is so cool. :o)

muffin wrote:

Though I gotta wonder if people would come from out of town just for a party and not an actual wedding ceremony?

I’d like to briefly report that, yes, if they’re cool, people will totally come in from out of town just for a party.

I try to do this with friends as part of a reunion every year or two (schedules depending).

A party is a great reason to visit someone. It’s even better if it’s a party celebrating two people that everyone likes/loves.

In the end, you don’t get to keep the money, so you might as well save some up and visit friends, family, and loved ones every now and again, reason or no reason!

No kings,

Robert

It’s going to be years yet before I’m through with grad school, comfortably employed, and finally able to even think about settling down, but thoughts about my future wedding surface pretty regularly.

I’m not too concerned about my wedding day from a ceremonial standpoint, given as neither of my parents are religious either… my future bride’s family may be a potential area of concern, but I can burn that bridge when I come to it.

What I’m preoccupied with, rather, is just what a secular lesbian wedding would be composed of. I can guarantee it will be delightfully free-form!

And in case you were wondering, I live in California, one of the two states in the US that has come to the conclusion that gay people are people.

My husband and I were married a little less than a year ago in a secular ceremony.

Despite the fact that my husband’s mother and grandmother are devoted Catholics, neither of them had a word to say about our ceremony that wasn’t positive. For one, we didn’t include them (or my lesbian parents for that matter) in the ceremony planning. We wrote the entire thing ourselves, and included no one. Also, I think they didn’t even miss the “god” parts of the wedding because we really worked hard to write up a ceremony which was filled with our personalities and our thoughts on partnership.

I also think it helped that they had no expectations of us getting married in the Catholic church, since my husband has attended Mass twice in the past 17 years (once for a friends wedding, and once for his father’s funeral). Also, they knew I was raised by Jewish lesbians, so I don’t think they expected me to convert.

All in all, my advice is to write your ceremony yourselves, and keep the family involvement to what color napkins to choose and which flowers look best with your appetizers. The ceremony is to personal to involve anyone else, IMO.

Sara, do tell your family you’re having an irreligious wedding. It’s not fair to drop something on them like that.

Maybe some of this might help:

Mme Metro and I had an irreligious ceremony. My family are Catholics, and while I wasn’t comfortable claiming atheism, I definitely wasn’t a believer. Mme is agnostic in the sense of: “Soon enough you’ll know, so why worry about it?”

My mother was happy I found someone. I was in my thirties and had had several girlfriends she’d rather forget (so would I, for that matter). However, she had some great wisdom for us:

“The wedding isn’t about the people getting married.” Which it isn’t, if you think about it.

She also stood out of our way as we planned the ceremony, except to offer some terrific insights: Invite all family members, even the ones you don’t like, for e.g.

If your family gives you unwanted pressure, particularly your mum–give her a task and a role in the wedding. Something she can concentrate on that will hopefully take her mind off the godlessness of the whole thing and make her feel part of it all. After all, when you reject her faith, you’re rejecting part of her.

Mme and I had several fights. I had always assumed that when it came time to get married or buried it might be good to let the churchmen do what they’re good at. I also liked the style of a traditional wedding. Mme was no damn way gonna swear to love and honour (the word “obey” somehow mysteriously fell out of the vows) my chubby ass in a church she didn’t like, in the name of a god she didn’t believe in. And furthermore–did I think she was going to process down an aisle or anywhere else with all those people staring at her?

During the brainstorming, there was a hell of a lot of storming on that last point, until one of us (probably me) came up with an idea.

She found us a wonderful, zany marriage comissioner, who conducted a non-religious ceremony that allowed people a little time to pray for our success if they wished.

We had the wedding outdoors (in March, in Canada, which kept the ceremony short as people were going blue–we had unseasonable snow three days before the wedding!). And instead of Mme lurching down the aisle, we stood in the gazebo of the civic rose garden with our best people (well, stick garden in that season) and had everyone process to US, led by our witnesses.

My witness read 1 Corintians 13, which I think helped the religious folk appreciate the solemnity of the event, and is a wonderfully godless yet still meaningful passage.

It was, in my ‘umble, a rousing success. And my folks never let out a peep about it being a non-church wedding.

Oh–and Mme would insist: Make sure you groom a friend to take over for you. The week before the wedding you should be able to hand him or her a bunch of cheques for the caterer, DJ, or whoever, and stop planning.

Mme called the person she chose her “wrangler”.

We had a peep from the mother-in-law about “respecting tradition” and making it “look good for grandma.” It was just a peep, though. We just said “no, mom. Thanks anyway.” Then it was over and we went ahead with our totally secular wedding.

Unfortunately, it was hetero-normative. The official who did our signing talked about marriage being between “a man and a woman,” despite the fact that homosexual marriage is legal here. My mom, my husband, and I all reported afterwards that we had wanted to say something but hadn’t wanted to make a scene. I regret that none of us did. I found that to be an unwelcome and unnecessary intrusion into OUR ceremony. I wish I had thought to talk to the woman beforehand about saying something neutral like “between two people,” but it honestly didn’t occur to me that someone would phrase something in that way here and in this day and age.

No one said anything to us when we got married this summer about the ceremony not being at all religious. Then again, my mother did (a little passive-aggressively) announce in the Christmas letter last year that I am “actively rejecting Christianity” so I don’t think the relatives were surprised.

We didn’t invite anyone. It’s much easier to ask for forgiveness acceptance than for permission them not to be the controlling people they are.

I’ve had two secular weddings and nobody seemed to have had any problem with it. Twenty-one years ago, ex-husband (who turned out to be gay, but that’s another story) and I were married by a retired judge, and two years ago, my husband and I were married by the owner of the bed and breakfast (Universal Life or Church of What’s Happening Now or something) where we had the ceremony. Both weddings were outside.

For the first wedding, the judge supplied several completely secular readings, and my ex and I just picked the one we liked. The B&B owner supplied the same type of thing, and my husband and I went through and picked out the parts we liked and added things I found on the internet.

I had some issues when my husband and I first announced our intentions to become legally married…namely, we’re atheists and my father is an Episcopal deacon. When he first heard of our plans, his first question was if we were going to have him officiate the ceremony!!! I was horrified! Not only could I not figure out how to tell my (elderly) father about my atheism, but I had always wanted him to walk me down the aisle – and how could he do that if he were officiating? That bothered me as much as the religion thing at the time…ultimately we ended up with a weird wedding with no aisle to walk down, and a humanist officiant. I still think he’s grumpy about it.

When DH and I were married nearly 6 1/2 years ago we had an outdoor ceremony and reception at his uncle’s mansion. We hired a judge who was willing to be “short and sweet and completely secular”. We used pop/rock ballads as our music. The flower girl & I were the only ones who walked down any sort of “aisle”, the groomsmen and bridesmaids were already positioned with the groom.

We planned and paid for everything ourselves so our families weren’t even involved in the process. The only complaint I recall about the lack of religion was from DH’s older sister. She was bothered it wasn’t going to be in a church & that we were using a judge instead of a minister of some sort. She ended up not attending (she lives out of state). If anyone else had any issues with our secular union, they kept them to themselves.