Wedding program wording: communion

[Allegra]

I only say invitations because wedding programs are not something that is done here. So the only other option would be to speak to each non-Catholic invitee privately which would be JUST as impractical.

Couldn’t the priest do an announcemet like other posters recommended. Is there a good reason why you can’t have a worship aid other than it “isn’t done there”? I highly doubt it is forbidden. If you have alot of people attending who aren’t Catholic it might be a good tradition to get started.

My husband is from another state and he often pulls the “they don’t do that in Wisconsin card” on me. He is often been amazed at all the things that went on in Wisconsin right under his rosy nose that he’d never noticed before or simply never experienced himself.

For a long time he insisted that people just didn’t eat sweet potatos in Wisconsin. Then one Christmas we went to grandma’s house and lo and behold!..A huge bowl of sweet potatos right in the middle of the table! My husband says, “Grandma, when did you start making sweet potatos?” Grandma says, “Well, I’ve made them just about every year!”

Anyway, my point is that if it is helpful to you, and the church doesn’t say you can’t do it, then why not do it?

 

[nickybr38]

Couldn’t the priest do an announcemet like other posters recommended. Is there a good reason why you can’t have a worship aid other than it “isn’t done there”? I highly doubt it is forbidden. If you have alot of people attending who aren’t Catholic it might be a good tradition to get started.

My husband is from another state and he often pulls the “they don’t do that in Wisconsin card” on me. He is often been amazed at all the things that went on in Wisconsin right under his rosy nose that he’d never noticed before or simply never experienced himself.

For a long time he insisted that people just didn’t eat sweet potatos in Wisconsin. Then one Christmas we went to grandma’s house and lo and behold!..A huge bowl of sweet potatos right in the middle of the table! My husband says, “Grandma, when did you start making sweet potatos?” Grandma says, “Well, I’ve made them just about every year!”

Anyway, my point is that if it is helpful to you, and the church doesn’t say you can’t do it, then why not do it?

I wouldn’t trust the priest to. As I said, the only Catholic wedding I ever went to he ended up forgetting.

I dunno… I suppose a wedding program could be considered. Thankfully I don’t have to worry about any of this anytime in the near future so I have time to consider my options.

 

[Allegra]

I wouldn’t trust the priest to. As I said, the only Catholic wedding I ever went to he ended up forgetting.

I dunno… I suppose a wedding program could be considered. Thankfully I don’t have to worry about any of this anytime in the near future so I have time to consider my options.

Here’s another idea. If you think the preist will forget, ask him if you can have the cantor read the announcement. Often times, cantors announce the number of the hymn that is sung during communion. If you are going to have a hymn during communion, you could have the cantor read that announcement as they are announcing the hymn number.

 

[VeritasLuxMea]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I’ll recommend that he speak directly to the Priest on this one. I didn’t realize this was something that the Priest handled directly.

Couldn’t the priest do an announcemet like other posters recommended. Is there a good reason why you can’t have a worship aid other than it “isn’t done there”? I highly doubt it is forbidden. If you have alot of people attending who aren’t Catholic it might be a good tradition to get started.

You never know, perhaps it is culturally acceptable for it to be in a wedding invitation where he/she lives?

 

[Allegra]

You never know, perhaps it is culturally acceptable for it to be in a wedding invitation where he/she lives?

It might be culturally acceptable, but I think the probability is high that the message won’t be accurately recieved by those it is directed toward. I’m trying to think of how that would sound to someone who is not a Catholic and perhaps has only infrequently attended a Church and if a person doesn’t know what “Communion” means, it could be misconstrued that the person is not invited to participate in the wedding. That would be my main concern. If one can’t get the priest to get the message accross and doesn’t want to have the announcment in the missal then maybe the message could be sent “through the grapevine”. In other words, other family members could explain it as people are gathering and getting seated.

 

[LilyM]

Ahem! It’s called a worship aid!

It’s actually very useful if you want to use hymns that are not in the hymnal at the parish you are getting married in or if you have alot of people attending who are not Catholic.

Besides all of which it is a nice souvenir of the wedding

 

[Allegra]

Besides all of which it is a nice souvenir of the wedding

That’s true. Scrapbook people love em! I had a few requests for extras after my wedding.

 

[brinkman2310]

At our wedding out of 120 guests, fewer than ten were Catholic and, of those ten, none had been to a TLM in years. On our wedding website, we had an FAQ section with one of the questions being “I’m not Catholic. Should I receive Communion?” Answer: “Nope. Just sit tight.”

At the wedding, we tucked a program into each missal. The program wasn’t anything fancy–just a half-sheet of paper with directions to the reception on one side and information about the church, celebrant, and music on the other. It also had this bit:

Guidelines for the reception of Holy Communion
Through the Words of Consecration the bread and wine brought to the altar during the Holy Mass are truly, substantially and really changed (transubstantiated) into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.

Because reception of Holy Communion implies both a belief in this doctrine as well as full doctrinal and sacramental communion with the Catholic Church it is reserved to fully practicing Catholics in good standing.

The Church kindly asks non-Catholics and those Catholics who are not presently disposed to receive the Eucharist to refrain from coming forward, yet to join the congregation in prayer at this most sacred moment.

Thank you for your respect in this matter.

If you choose to receive Communion, please be aware that in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, Communion is not distributed in the hand, but received on the tongue while kneeling at the altar rail.

For the life of me, I can’t find the original sources for this, but it’s pulled together from what I found on a few different websites.

 

[skigirl1689]

One side of my family is Catholic and at every wedding the priest announced communion requirements and invited all for a blessing, if they so wished. I personally would not put it in the wedding program as it can be misinterpreted if poorly written. Seeing it is rare for a wedding to have all Catholic attendees, I would think the priest would normally make such an announcement.

 

[Guineviere]

Ahem! It’s called a worship aid!

It’s actually very useful if you want to use hymns that are not in the hymnal at the parish you are getting married in or if you have alot of people attending who are not Catholic.

Fair enough. Back in the day we just kept people wondering “How long is this going to last?” And the non-Catholics were a wee bit freaked out. Lol

I have seen some programs that are more like playbills from a broadway show.

 

[JackieMom]

At Masses where it is likely that non-Catholics are in attendance (funerals, weddings, confirmations, etc), the priest will invite Catholics to come up and receive communion and invite non-Catholics to cross their arms for a blessing. This won’t be his first time around the block! I think the vast majority of people know the deal already, though. I would not print anything in the worship aid.

 

[nickybr38]

At Masses where it is likely that non-Catholics are in attendance (funerals, weddings, confirmations, etc), the priest will invite Catholics to come up and receive communion and invite non-Catholics to cross their arms for a blessing. This won’t be his first time around the block! I think the vast majority of people know the deal already, though. I would not print anything in the worship aid.

Yeah, you’d be wrong.

At my cousin’s wedding the priest said nothing. People knew not to go up because the bride had spoken to her family.

At another Catholic function there was a Protestant lady who was going up until my mother said: “Why are you going up? You’re not Catholic?” The lady honestly didn’t know until my mother spoke to her because the priests just don’t say anything - and this lady had attended many Catholic functions and received communion countless times so she was REALLY surprised to hear she shouldn’t be.

 

[Sarabande]

Your friend could always mention it to the priest friend who is marrying them the next time they meet or even on the day of the rehearsal. I’ve been doing weddings for 10+ years at over 100 different parishes and multiple dioceses, some years working almost every weekend with weddings from April through December. I can count on one hand the number of times a priest didn’t mention anything about being properly disposed of and able to receive the Holy Eucharist. Most priests will invite those who are Catholics in good standing for Communion. Some will also invite those who cannot receive Communion to come up with their arms crossed for a blessing, but it’s not as common now as it was when I first began to cantor at Catholic weddings.

That said, even when the priest mentioned it, a few couples still included it in their programs.

 

[Irishmom2]

I agree.

I don’t understand the whole “Wedding Program” trend anyway.

Oh good, I thought it was just me.

 

[Natural_Family]

We put
“Practising Catholics in a state of grace are invited to come forward to receive Holy Communion. Others may come to receive a blessing. If you wish to receive a blessing, please indicate this to the priest by crossing your arms.”
We also asked the priest to make an announcement but he forgot.
I think it’s a good idea to have something in the booklet as well as the priest (or cantor) make an announcement as some people don’t read what’s in the booklet and some people don’t listen to announcements. Proper reception of Our Lord in Holy Communion is worth making the extra effort to inform everybody.
Whoever makes the announcement should speak slowly and clearly as people who don’t understand what communion is need to be able to comprehend. That is also why it is a good idea to have the words for the announcement chosen and not ad libbed to avoid confusion. I have heard a priest make such an announcement at a wedding and thought that I understand what he’s talking about because i’m a Catholic to whom this matters, but if I weren’t, I’d be struggling, because it was said quickly, but at the same time waffling and not precise.
I love having a booklet to follow at a wedding so I can join in all the singing, contemplate the words and identify the people who have a role to play. I then know their names when I meet them afterwards. I keep many booklets which helps me remember the joy of the day and helps others preparing a wedding to think about what music, readings etc they would like to include at theirs.

 

[Sarabande]

We put
I love having a booklet to follow at a wedding so I can join in all the singing, contemplate the words and identify the people who have a role to play. I then know their names when I meet them afterwards. I keep many booklets which helps me remember the joy of the day and helps others preparing a wedding to think about what music, readings etc they would like to include at theirs.

I like reading a booklet as well. I especially like it when I’m a musician at the wedding because it’s a great way to double check that we have the same music. Every once in a while brides will change music without letting the music director musicians know even after you’ve double checked and confirmed everything with them before the wedding day. If there is a change, it’s usually something that’s typical in wedding repertoire, so musicians tend to bring all of their music with them just in case.

We had booklets at our wedding mainly because much of the music, including the parts of the mass and the “Our Father”, was in Latin and we wanted the translations or texts of the music that was in English. We provided the chanted Latin mass parts for those who wanted to sing along with the choir and us. What we did and choose was atypical for an OF wedding mass, but it was the kind of mass we experienced often at that parish every other Sunday and wanted to celebrate our special mass in the same way. Knowing that most Catholics don’t experience mass that way and may not know what was going on, we tried to make it as easy for them as possible by having a detailed booklet. We also had Filipino cultural wedding traditions and since only my mother’s family would have known what they were all for, it was important for us to have the reasons and explanations of the traditions, including the names of the sponsors (what they are), etc. I know that, as a guest and someone who may not be familiar with some or all of it, I would appreciate the details in the booklet.