Need help understanding this please

TeamBaby

FI and I want to have mass with our ceremony, and would obviously like to choose the readings.  I copied the following paragraph from the church's website.  Is this saying that we cannot choose the readings if we decide to have a mass?  We're not marrying at our home parish (we're military and live out of state), and although this church is allowing us to marry there, they have/are not easy to work with at all, so I don't particularly want to ask them just yet. 

Thank you!

SATURDAY EVENING WEDDINGS, THE SUNDAY OBLIGATION and READINGSIn our diocese, any Mass that begins after 4 PM on Saturday is considered a Sunday Mass.  Therefore, wedding Masses on Saturday evening are also Sunday obligation Masses.  This also means that Catholics that wish to attend this Mass (even though not invited to the wedding) cannot be turned away. Strictly speaking, for wedding Masses on Saturdays after 4 PM, the readings for that Sunday are to be used.  If the ceremony is a wedding ceremony without Mass, then other readings may be chosen.

[Deleted User]

What time do you plan on having the wedding? From what I gather, it sounds like if you are having your wedding on a Saturday and it is after 4pm, yes, you must use the following day (Sunday) readings. However, if your wedding is before 4pm, you can choose your own readings.

They are just saying that you cannot stop outsiders from attending your wedding/mass given the fact that it is a mass regardless of whether you have it before or after 4pm. This is pretty much a rule for any church regardless of denomination. They aren't going to deny anyone entrance to the church considering people can fullfill their Sunday requirement of attending your wedding & mass.

We were not even allowed to have our wedding that late. The church and everything had to be cleaned up by 4pm for the 5pm Saturday evening mass.

HTH

TeamBaby

I understand not turning people away, and I'm ok with that.  We plan to have our wedding at 6pm.  It's the "earliest" we could have it in the evening (our choices were- before 1 or after 6).  I really want to have a mass, but I wanted to choose our readings.  I want it to feel like a wedding ceremony with a mass, not a typical mass and oh-by-the-way there's a couple getting married.  

I'm just feeling like if I want to have a wedding ceremony, I can't have the mass to go along with it.  It's like I have to choose one or the other. 

[Deleted User]

Yup, that is pretty much what it sounds like. I have never heard of that before. It seems a bit odd to me that they would even let you have a wedding that late on a Saturday. Our home parish and the one we attend where we currently live both have Saturday evening masses. I am taking it as though this particular parish does not have a Saturday evening mass.

Can you look into a different parish in the area?

TeamBaby

They do have a Saturday mass at 4pm.  Which is why I don't understand why my wedding would have to be the 2nd mass of the evening?  I've had the absolute worst experience dealing with this particular church.  It took us 5 months just to secure our date due to the red tape.  (Priest would say "I need this, this and this to lock in your date."  We would do it, then he'd turn around and say, "ok, now I need this and this."  It went on like this for months!)  The only reason I haven't said to heck with this church is because it's the same church my parents were married in over 33 years ago, so it's really important to me.  *sigh*

Calypso1977

its my understanding that if your wedding is at 4pm or later on a Sunday that you must use the readins for the sunday mass.

if you have your wedding pre-4pm, you can select your own.  htis is because your mass wont count as teh sunday obligation.

k8ly

I'm thinking this is exactly why most churches don't allow weddings so late. 

From what I'm "hearing", if they hold a mass of any kind after 4, it must fufill the Sunday obligation and be open to the public.  In order to fufill the obligation, there must be certain readings.

So - you either get to have a mass, which then must be open to the public AND fufill the Sunday obligation, or you don't have a mass, thus eliminating the need to fufill the Sunday obligation and you can choose your own readings, or you choose the 1:00 timeslot.

Hope61

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/cultural-wedding-boards_catholic-weddings_need-understanding-this-please?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Cultural%20Wedding%20BoardsForum:615Discussion:933d35e1-ac52-42ad-95d6-ab75b140e1eePost:55031327-6668-46cb-821d-d908655c228b">Re: Need help understanding this please</a>:
[QUOTE] I want it to feel like a wedding ceremony with a mass, not a typical mass and oh-by-the-way there's a couple getting married. :/
Posted by TeamBaby[/QUOTE]

I don't think it would end up being like this. Either people won't even know about the wedding Mass and so they'll plan to go to the normal 4pm or Sunday morning Mass. Or, maybe it will be posted in the bulletin (my parish lists weddings on the weekly schedule), in which case they still won't likely come or if they do they'll sit respectfully in the back and be fully aware that it is a wedding. Plus, you'll likely get to pick your music, and you'll have your procession, wedding party, flowers, etc... it will look completely like a wedding.

As for the readings, yeah, if its after 4pm they should be the Sunday readings. But, maybe you could put favorite quotes from your reading choices in the program or something? Also, check the Sunday readings for that weekend--they won't be exactly what you want, but maybe you'll be pleasantly surprised with what they are?

mica178

Talk to your priest.  My wedding was on a Sunday, and my priest said that we did not have to use the predetermined readings as our wedding took place outside of the normal time for the church's usual Mass.

As for uninvited people attending the ceremony, that is pretty much always the case with all church weddings.  There were random people who walked into our wedding ceremony.  They might have just shown up to pray at a time that coincided with our wedding, or they might have seen the wedding announcement in the church bulletin and decided to come and see.  It really didn't matter to us, hopefully they sent a silent blessing our way!  At any rate, we didn't have any reception crashers, if that's your concern.  I think most people understand that ceremonies might be open, but receptions rarely are.

Calypso1977

well, technically any nuptial mass is open to the public.  ours was listed in the bulletin as a nuptial mass - anyone could have attended adn received communion, although the only person who did was the father of our altar boys and i actually dont think he came up for communion, although he could have.

fleurdelis1016

I'm from New Orleans, where late Saturday (7pm or 7:30pm) masses are the norm, even in the city's Cathedral. They allow the couples to pick their own readings in the diocese, so what you are running into may be specific to that diocese that you are getting married in. I have always heard of masses of any kind being open to the public, so that I think is pretty much universal. I've never heard of a couple being forced to use Sunday readings, although it seems that I might be the only one.

mswood1977

In our diocese you are only required to use the Sunday readings if you have a Nuptial mass on Sunday.  They do not require that for Saturday nuptial mass, no matter what time the wedding is, though they are within their rights to set rules for their church.

Jay&Marissa

Our Church had a 7pm option and I don't think they required the Sunday readings...BUT I would actually embrace it, because it means you fulfill the Sunday obligation for you and your guests. We all had to try and figure out a way to scramble to mass the day after my late-night wedding, which was a little difficult for out-of-town guests leaving that day

Kristin789

>>So - you either get to have a mass, which then must be open to the public AND fufill the Sunday obligation, or you don't have a mass, thus eliminating the need to fufill the Sunday obligation and you can choose your own readings, or you choose the 1:00 timeslot.

Yes.  That.

clearheavens

I just wanted to add that my Newman parish at school also gave us 3 options: 11AM, 1PM, or 6:30PM Mass.  They have their Saturday Virgil Mass at 4:30PM and confessions at 3:30PM.

Because I didn't want a huge gap between the Mass and reception and I think 6:30PM is way too late, we went to my home parish instead before I could ask about whether we could choose our readings.  But I imagine that getting to choose is the norm.

Theresa626

I think it will still feel like a wedding even if you can't choose the readings.  At least you can choose the music!  And your guests will be your wedding guests and wedding party.  It will still feel like a wedding.  

2Bwed2011

Our church had this same thing printed in their "wedding policy" but our priest never mentioned anything about it to us during any of our meetings and actually gave us the book for us to choose our wedding related readings.  And our wedding is at 6pm also.  I would ask your priest about it and see if that is really a rule that is explicity followed.