Ceremony and Vow Ideas
jgaudet5388
member
Teacher inviting Students to wedding
My fiance and I are both teachers, so we were thinking of inviting our students to the church for the wedding. We both teach in Catholic schools so it would be special for our students to see the sacrament take place. Does anyone have any poems or invite ideas we could use? TIA
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Re: Teacher inviting Students to wedding
You couldn't possibly be saying that you would invite these people to see you get married and then not let them attend your reception, as that is really rude, mean and confusing. All people invited to the ceremony MUST be invited to the reception. If you want a poem for that, here you go:
We know you see us 5 days a week for class
So you won't be THAT surprised we we treat you like an utter ass.
Come to our wedding, because we need attention when you come to church
so we can teach you that some adults will leave you in the lurch
After the Mass when you get up from your kneel
GTFO- what, you thought we would buy you a meal?!
As teachers we need to teach you that some adults are unbelievably rude
and will do things like invite you to a wedding without any food.
We need to make sure you know you aren't a REAL guest so you don't get confused
Even though we invited you, you can't come to our reception, so don't be bemused
Even though you gave up a Saturday and got dressed up to celebrate us
When the real guests go to celebrate, you go home after church on the bus
We were raised by wolves and have no decency or manners
to the point where even children can see how terrible we are at being wedding planners.
We don't even care that you feel like you have been given the short shrift
Oh, and that table over there is where you leave your gift!
For one thing, regardless of anyone's status in your lives, it's rude to invite them to the ceremony but not the reception, which is to thank them for attending the ceremony. Nobody, not even students, feels "thanked" by being asked to attend a ceremony but not hosted afterward. They feel jerked around.
Second, keep your relationships with your students professional. When you invite them to your personal events, you start blurring lines that need to stay clear.
And third, just how big a role do any of your students play in your lives on an individual basis? Are you going to remember them, say, 10 or 15 years from now?
No poems or other "cutesy" wording in invitations make any of this acceptable -- they just compound the rudeness and impropriety of it.
Also, if you're inviting minors, you also need to invite their parents together with their SOs to both the ceremony and reception to supervise and transport their kids.
However, you can't invite your students in any way, shape, or form. You just can't invite someone to the ceremony only - it's super rude. Essentially it says that "we want you to make time to see us get married, but we can't be bothered to host you after." The only thing you can do is tell them when/where the ceremony is, if they ask, and hope they and their parents know that anyone is welcome to show up for a wedding Mass. I presume it's in the same parish as the school where at least one of you teaches?
As some noted above, it is inappropriate to invite someone to the ceremony and not the reception. Also, you're potentially crossing boundaries into perceived favoritism if you mention this to some and not all of the students. Lastly, I don't know about your school, but ours has very strict guidelines about maintaining professional boundaries with students. Inviting them to your wedding can be perceived by parents or by your administration as an invitation to socialize outside of school in an unofficial capacity. If a student shows up to the Mass, that's fine. But I strongly urge you to not say anything to them about it.
OP, I emailed a picture to the parents of my students (after the fact, obviously) of the whole congregation with their hands extended over us for the nuptial blessing (I run a parish's religious ed program), and told them they could share/explain with the kids about the sacrament if they wanted.