How To Design Your Wedding Ceremony (The Long and Short of It)

As I write my fifth post, I realize that I need to update those who stumbled in late on where I’m coming from. I am a rare breed of wedding minister that is not affiliated with any particular church and can perform any kind of wedding from Agnostic to Zen. Ministers from established churches do not usually let the couple be a part of the actual order of service for your wedding, but guys like me do. See my earlier post on choosing a wedding minister.

This posting is for those who don’t have a regular minister or are having a civil wedding in the location of their choice and so are putting together their own, customized service. These couples have the luxury of designing their service to any degree they wish, so this particular post digs a little deeper into the fine details of your wedding ceremony.

Later I will be posting about wedding issues that more broadly apply to all couples regardless of your situation.

When a couple books me for a wedding, one of the first things I like to do is find out what kind of service they want – religious, civil, or a blend -- and start emailing samples to them. One of the reasons that I send entire services is so that you can see how a wedding service goes together. If I just sent a laundry list of parts you might not know what order things should go.

Let me first say, there is no right or wrong, but there is somewhat of an order to a service that can be easily explained. The whole process is a coming together of two individual people and the structure of the service somewhat reflects that. Let me explain.

The couple starts out single, so the wedding party would reflect that by having the minister, groom, and groomsmen enter from a side door and stand in their places at the front while the girls come in one at a time, which reflects that the happy couple is not yet put together. Of course, there are times when it is a good idea to have the groomsmen escort the bridesmaids up the aisle – like when a bride wants it that way or when there are steps or other impediments where it is helpful for the girls to have an arm to hold onto.

Then you’re standing at the front but somebody is standing between you, usually the nervous father of the bride but any escort will do (or no escort, as it sometimes happens). You both answer a question with, “I do,” then Dad goes away and you are standing side by side, shoulder to shoulder in front of me for maybe a few more words about marriage.

Then the bride hands her flowers over and you face each other and recite vows. Then you put rings on each other. Then you are holding hands. Then you are declared husband and wife. Then you kiss. Then you walk out together and the groomsmen escort out the bridesmaids, a reflection of the wedding couple having just been united.

That’s the big picture. At the smaller level, the parts of a wedding ceremony are fairly easy to understand. It’s like a long speech with some action thrown in around the middle (if you use props – see my post about using props during your service).

Here’s the order of the typical wedding ceremony.  Either an opening prayer and welcoming (or just a welcoming for the civil services) is then followed by some kind of address to the attendees and also to the couple themselves. (Sometimes the Dad is seated right away even before the attendees are seated and before the welcoming – depending on need and the bride's preference.)

After that first address from the minister there may be a reading, either by the minister or a family member or friend, which is is a good way to include people whom you couldn’t have in your wedding party.

Then there is the long question that you answer with, “I do” or “I will.” If the bride’s escort is still there, he is then asked, “Who presents this woman to be married to this man?” Or something like that, to which he replies, “Her mother and I.”

Once the dad goes away you then repeat the vows and exchange the rings. The “I do’s,” vows, and ring exchange is the meat of the service, or the heart of the service. After these parts the couple usually starts to relax and enjoy the service a little more.

At this point you would include any symbolic ceremony of your choice, like the unity candle, sand ceremony, rose ceremony, water ceremony…you get the idea. Again, see my post on using props during a wedding service.

After that you might have one more short address to the couple, maybe a short reading (or prayer if it’s a religious service). After that is the pronouncement, which says something like, “Now that you have done this, that, and the other --and have agreed to this, that, and the other -- I now pronounce you husband and wife,”

Then the kiss (and the stomping of the glass if that applies to you). People clap and cheer. At this point the minister will tell you to get your flowers back from the maid (or matron) of honor and turn and face the audience. The minister will pronounce you as Mr. and Mrs. Whomever, cue exit music, and you walk.

Now, if the bride is not changing her name or hyphenating it, we can make the pronouncement go something like, “Please welcome Brad and Janet in their new lives together as husband and wife,” thus skipping the whole name-change issue altogether. This works well for the more liberated couples as well.

Words of wisdom concerning pulling together the rough draft for your ceremony: remember that you can read the service in your mind much faster than I can say it out loud.  The ceremonies I send out are all about the right length for a normal to small sized wedding.  A good rule of thumb is, the fewer the attendees the shorter the service should be.

When a couple tries to put together a service where they envision thirty minutes of me yakking, I end up saying the same thing over and over but in different ways. This can be tedious for everybody, including the bride and groom, especially at outdoor weddings where heat or the threat of rain is a factor.

Unless you are marrying in a church with a service that includes communion, you should expect a normal to large sized wedding service to last a total of about twenty to twenty five minutes, including the seating of the mothers and grandmothers and the exit of the entire wedding party, including said parents.

The actual service itself usually lasts about fifteen minutes or so. That may seem short, but in the hundreds of weddings I have performed over the years, I have seen the discomfort of couples and guests at the longer weddings when I seemingly go on and on, and it’s not pretty – especially if we are out in the hot sun.

Once I let a bride talk me into a REALLY long service. After I had been going on for almost half an hour, I finally came to the ending, which included the Apache Wedding Chant -- you know the one. It goes, “Now you will feel no rain…”

We happened to be in a big, glass conservatory and it actually started to rain just as I said those words. I rolled my eyes upward and the whole room, including the bride and groom, roared with laughter, which broke the tension that had built up during this extra-long service. I learned my lesson that day.

So if you are pulling together your own rough draft for your ceremony, you can time it by reading the text out loud, rather slowly. Public speaking is all about setting a certain pace and utilizing pauses so that everybody follows you and becomes engaged with what you are saying, so slow down! Doing this can also show you how long thirty minutes can be when it’s filled with somebody talking.

Other than length, the other issue of your wedding ceremony might be: making sure that everything in your ceremony is something that you WANT there; making sure that everything that you want to be included IS included; and making sure the groom has had a chance to offer an opinion of what he thinks should or should not be in your ceremony (they can surprise you sometimes).

Regardless of how long or short, big or small your wedding is the important thing is to enjoy it. Getting married should be fun. It’s a celebration to be savored, not a marathon to be endured.

-Rev. Sam

www.revsam.com