My sister also got married by two religious clergy. She got married in the Catholic church in her H’s hometown - and where they would live, but she hadn’t lived there yet at the time. Her H’s family has a strong presence in their Southern Baptist Church, and their minister performed half the ceremony as well. Her H later converted to Catholicism and is actually now a deacon.
I got married by a Catholic priest in the non denominational chapel on the campus of my alma mater. H was not catholic, nor active in any religion. I don’t think I ever went to mass in the 4 years I was there. But I actually had a second priest from NYC perform half the ceremony. He was a last minute addition. I’m not sure I even knew about it beforehand. But he was the godson of my great-grandmother. He confused a lot of the guests (most were from H’s side) about the family from Jamaica. Everyone was scratching their heads saying “I thought she was from DC and American?” Never heard of Jamaica, Queens, NYC!
The only sticky point in mine is that the Catholic Church strongly discourages the song ‘Here Comes the Bride.” They don’t prohibit it outright, but they don’t want it. I said that was stupid (not out loud). I wanted to walk into it, and I did.
The experiences of friends’ kids who married in the Catholic Church in the past decade indicate that you may be correct. H was not Catholic, but it was relatively easy for us to get married in the church (I did it for my parents, and I have since left the church). D & SIL considered getting married in the Catholic Church because it was so important to his mom. When he heard what was necessary for them to do so, SIL told his mom that they were getting married in church, but not the Catholic Church. Several friends have kids who were running all over trying to get records of their sacraments from the various parishes that they attended over the years. I don’t recall having to do anything like that.
I will say, though, that our archdiocese has come under fire from both recent popes for being too traditional. Other archdiocese and individual parishes may be less strict.
I believe my older sister had all 3 of her D’s marry their spouses in catholic churches. No one else of those who married had a ceremony in any church between S, other niece and nephew. Not sure what our two engaged nephews and their fiancée’s will do. We have been to other weddings at other churches and several ceremonies at nonchurch venues (heck I performed one at oceanfront lanai).
The church of your baptism is supposed to keep all the records. When you get the next sacrament, that church notifies the ‘baptism’ church, so everything should be in one place.
I get that that doesn’t always happen, but it is supposed to. My daughter was baptized in a hospital, but there was actually a parish there in the chapel. That was supposed to be her ‘home’ parish. Right. She was ‘rebaptized’ (really no such thing) in my parish and that became her home. I would never trust the hospital parish, which didn’t have a secretary or even a full time priest, to keep records.
DD1/SIL/Gkids physically are in the San Antonio Diocese, but they are in an Anglican Ordinary Church (A parish of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St Peter) - Bishop is in Houston and there are 40 parishes in US and Canada with this Bishop. Almost all of their priests are married except new ones coming in via seminary. Their Mass is a little different and sometimes their readings are different (as a differing ‘rite’). Their Bishop is ‘an outsider’ as the Bishop cannot be married – and all Bishops are approved by the Pope.
I agree sometimes Catholic restrictions by a particular parish can look like they are pushing away, being rigid enough to be almost punishing.
Some priests are better at smoothing things over, having things work out well - while others have their own restrictions or allow staff to make restrictions that cause additional grief and take away from the positive wedding experience/sacramental experience it should be.
The four older grandkids were baptized in another state; when they were looking at scheduling the 5th child being baptized in their current parish (where they were members for almost a year), the Deacon responded by email instead of a phone call or set up an individual meeting - and he had no clue who they were. This particular Deacon was responsible for Baptisms. We had time critical for DH and me to be able to attend Baptism, and it went over the Deacon’s head that we were from out of state and scheduling the Baptism was important before my DH flew in and we flew back. DD1/SIL wanted the one appointed priest to do the Baptism, and it was a matter of SIL catching him going to his office after daily Mass to ask and schedule. The Deacon also in his email had them complete an on-line presentation video on Baptism which was fine, but you think they do know things with their 5th child….
DD1 was a member at the Cathedral, so scheduling the wedding there worked out easily - and she had been part of the college ministry team for years before her after college professional job and joining as a regular member at the Cathedral. Since she was a member that tithed, did not have to pay the separate fee for cathedral wedding. Fortunate that the historic hotel which has a lot of business patrons during the work week had a very good contract with the block of rooms, and all but the locals stayed at the hotel. SIL’s parents had worked out a hotel contract for their older son, and with DD1/SIL’s wedding, got free valet parking thrown in which saved all of us quite a bit of money – we of course tipped the parking attendants, but it saved each of us at least $40 ($10 each time you dropped off or picked up your car). Some had the airport shuttle and didn’t have a car there (the church was not far walking but most got rides who didn’t have a car there as it was July hot).
There are back ups, and now everything is digital too. Plus for my kids, I have certificates.
My father had no official birth certificate because the city clerk’s office had a fire shortly after his birth. Wasn’t an issue (things were more lax back then to get a new SS card, driver’s license, etc) until he needed a passport. The clerk’s office only had ‘baby boy Smith’ and his date of birth. I think he was able to get the passport with a bunch of stuff like a baptism certificate, some doctor records, and a letter from his father (luckily still alive) that he was indeed ‘baby boy Smith’ born on XX/XX/1934. One of the issues was he had a brother so they needed to make sure he was this ‘baby boy’, and not his brother.
If you’ve ever done any genealogy, much is done using church records, especially in countries like Ireland. They use birth and death, but also the sacraments as gee, there are 47 Mary Catherines and 114 John Michaels who may be cousins or siblings or no relation at all. Can you trace Mary Catherine O’Conner born xxx and baptized yyy and married zzz? Or was that her cousin?
My sister in law does a ton of genealogy research and most of her clients are, like us, Jewish. Jewish genealogy is very challenging for many reasons but a lack of the equivalent of Church records is one( biggest reason is of course the destruction of records during WWII)
I was just reading on some Reddit thread about a reception that had a buffet and they ran out of food before the last few tables were served. How awful! It appeared as if some of the earlier guests served themselves large portions, and some people went back for seconds before all of the tables were served for the first time. Some people recommended that if you have a buffet, you hire servers to avoid these problems.
We had a Christmas buffet dinner, and the caterer hired said they had the ‘right’ amount of food for the group, but the last 15 people did not get a meal - and you are right - there are people gross enough to walk around the line to pick at seconds knowing we didn’t have a meal. Some ended up going to the dessert table - and that was also very picked over. They absolutely did not handle well. We left.
I have attended several weddings ( as well as other parties ) served buffet style ( including D’s) and have never seen one where people rushed to get seconds before everyone else got a turn. I have also never seen one where the food ran out.
Sounds like either poor planning by the caterers or poor management/behavior the guests.
I’ve been to two somewhat recent buffet dinner wedding receptions. In both cases, there were servers serving the portions out…and there was plenty of food!
I decided to have heavy appetizers. One of the appetizers was shrimp cocktail. I was assured that there would be enough food.
Ran out of shrimp, I think they got some more but people ate that also.
My mom was freaking out. I think she let my husband and I plan the wedding but I don’t know what I would have done differently. I ordered enough food for the people who were attending
I’ve not been to many events where they run out of food. At S and DIL’s wedding (buffet), there was LOTS of food that kept being replenished—appetizers and then main buffet and dessert. I’d blame the caterers. They are supposed to estimate appropriately and serve and replenish.
