Wedding Celebrancy
If you have just made the decision to get married, Congratulations I hope you have many happy years together!
These days most of us are marrying through choice. Our understanding of the concept of marriage is more individual. Fewer people feel comfortable with inflexible religious or bureaucratic approaches. Making a public declaration of your love for and covenant with another human is an intensely personal, emotional and spiritual act. It is always so much more than signing a contract with a well dressed and charming council employee in attendance.
The logistics of planning a wedding can dominate the event; investing time in creating space for your own stories to intertwine can help offset this. It will certainly help ensure that you remember more than the spreadsheets and seating plans!
Some of us want to share this space with just the person to whom we are committing and our own personal and shared beliefs. Some of us want to share our promises and new status with all our friends, family and family of choice. In both cases we deserve to feel special, celebrated and bound together by a meaningful shared experience. Changing your legal status as a couple still requires that you book an appointment to sign those contracts with a registrar. They help with your paperwork, whilst a celebrant helps you with your meaning, joy and sense of connection.
Working with a celebrant will help you explore the values and beliefs that you hold, individually and as a couple. It helps you set the scene for how you wish to live your lives together and helps you share a sense of connection. In doing so it will help you create a ceremony that is memorable, important and completely unique to you.
I have always felt uncomfortable that so many traditions around weddings owe more to Victorian Legislators than to personal definitions of partnership, commitment and sharing. Each relationship is unique and should be spoken about and treated accordingly, including the rituals with which it is celebrated.
As a celebrant I will be delighted to help you tease out your story and its meaning in order to give you the best, first day of the rest of your life.