Religion

MrsBelsito · November 2012

My Fiancee and I are both Agnostic.
His family is Roman Catholic.
My family is Luthern.

We want to keep God out of our vows and ceremony completely, but we can't figure out how to do that without offending someone.
Any suggestions?

artbyallie · November 2012

There are plenty of secular ceremony scripts to be found, and I'm assuming your officiant will be secular and likely will have one or more prepared that you can potentially customize. It's not hard to have a wedding without mentioning God. The only truly required part is affirming that you are choosing to enter into marriage with your partner.

If your families are offended, so be it. (And I say that as a Christian myself) It would be sacrilegious for you to incorporate a God you don't believe in into your wedding.

s-aries8990 · November 2012

How would excluding God from your vows be offensive? I think it would be more offensive to include that verbiage even though it means nothing to you. A UU minister or JP officiant would be able to help you.

HandBanana · November 2012

I would not worry about offending others. Most likely people won't even notice.

MrsBelsito · November 2012

Thanks Snippet17!
Its really nice to have someone who was/is in the same situation =]

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_customs-traditions_religion?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:36Discussion:175f8c8e-4e6a-4db3-80c8-bc29272729d5Post:9897adae-968b-4e24-8836-7b97b512e8c5">Re: Religion</a>:
[QUOTE]My fiance and are are like you guys, except my family is Roman catholic and his is luthern, but we both are agnostic . I know the person performed out ceromony has many different ways for us to choice from and mold it into what we want. We don't have anything about god or the zombie in our wedding. And we are using poems instead of items from the bible.
Posted by snippet17[/QUOTE]

MrsBelsito · November 2012

Thank you everyone!
I just want everything to be perfect =]

Jen4948 · November 2012

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_customs-traditions_religion?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:36Discussion:175f8c8e-4e6a-4db3-80c8-bc29272729d5Post:0d0b304c-db17-49e5-8cb9-7d76e5afc11e">Re: Religion</a>:
[QUOTE]Thank you everyone! I just want everything to be perfect =]
Posted by MrsBelsito[/QUOTE]

Well, since there's no way that can happen, why not try for minimal imperfections? ;)

Congratulations and best wishes!

RoMy215 · November 2012

I grew up Jewish, H grew up Christian and neither of us practices any religion. My BIL got ordained online and performed the ceremony that we wrote. It was very short, but it was difficult to make it much longer. We had one reading (The Apache Marriage Blessing - www.todays-weddings.com/planning/readings/apache_blessing.htm) and felt that was perfect.

He did step on a glass (as is usually customary in Jewish ceremonies). But it was because we liked the story behind the tradition. So we introduced it by saying something about how fragile life and marriage is and that our marraige should last as long as it would take to put the glass back together.

I'm quite certain we offended and upset several people.

But it was exactly the ceremony WE wanted; and while there are several things I wish I had done differently--that is not one of them.

ForeverCubes · November 2012

If you are Jewish and you want the perfect memory of your wedding or the perfect gift idea for someone check out FOREVERCUBES, www.forevercubes.com, Or check our the facebook page for more information and youll remember your chuppah stomping moment for life

ForeverCubes · November 2012

If you are Jewish and you want the perfect memory of your wedding or the perfect gift idea for someone check out FOREVERCUBES, www.forevercubes.com, Or check our the facebook page for more information and youll remember your chuppah stomping moment for life

s-aries8990 · November 2012

As a believer, it is always way more offensive to pretend to believe than to admit you don't. Just as long as words or traditions hold meaning to you, I don't find them offensive, but if they are done for show, I am... does that make sense? I don't care if someone is an atheist, but I do care if they are but continue to go to church, wear religious jewelry and "pray to God" with others. I had a roommate in college who was offensively athiest but would go to all of the Campus Ministry events and speak with the Sister as though she believed.

Just make no mention of God and only vow to eachother and your witnesses.

Peledreamsofrain · November 2012

We were in a similar situation too. My husband and I are Agnostic, his family is deeply religious baptist, and my family is a mix of athiest and Lutheran. We pretty much couldn't please everyone no matter what, so we just did a blend that felt right. Since my DH wanted a pastor as officiant that was an old family friend, we couldn't exclude religion. We just picked passages that we liked from the Song of Solomon and respectfully bowed our heads. Our vows were carefully worded so we were swearing to each other, not a diety. Even if you don't believe in the religion, if you handle it right, I don't think it's disrespectful to include it in your ceremony. I know it made our families really happy to have even a little included. And being Agnostic meant that we didn't disbelieve in the diety, we just didn't think any one religion has all their i's dotted and t's crossed.

jcs226 · November 2012

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_customs-traditions_religion?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:36Discussion:175f8c8e-4e6a-4db3-80c8-bc29272729d5Post:58c83ff8-8861-48c8-87c0-f65a3608f849">Religion</a>:
[QUOTE]My Fiancee and I are both Agnostic. His family is Roman Catholic. My family is Luthern. We want to keep God out of our vows and ceremony completely, but we can't figure out how to do that without offending someone. Any suggestions?
Posted by MrsBelsito[/QUOTE]

My fiance and I are dealing with this as well. We are both agnostic, while my mother is a Devout (with a capital D, and pushy) Catholic. His dad is catholic, his mom is agnostic, and they are not pressuring us either way. My dad is not pressuring us either. We have planned a very small civil ceremony on a beach and my mom keeps telling me I need to get married in a church and refuses to come to the beach ceremony. I have told her that we do not attend church so why pretend? I guess she thinks I can still be "saved", I dont know. We are considering doing a church ceremony, with just immediate family, after <strong>our</strong> beach wedding,but dont want to jump through hoops to do it, so now we are struggling with that. I continue to remind her that this is not about her, but she cant hear that.

Either way, if it doesnt bother your parents at all, then you are lucky <img src="http://cdn.cl9.vanillaforums.com/downloaded/ver1.0/content/scripts/tinymce/plugins/emotions/images/smiley-wink.gif" border="0" alt="Wink" title="Wink" />. Dont worry about potentially offending anyone else!

Religion

Re: Religion

Choose Another Board

Search Boards