Today I would like to talk
about ceremony and that it is much more than about
hatching, matching and despatching.
It is more than what Europeans associate with
birth, marriage and death.
It really is, in this day and age referring to
rituals which define an individual identity as he or she
moves from one stage of life to another.
I recently attended a seminar on Drugs and
Alcohol and they promoted the idea that young
adolescents today, because there aren’t ritual and
ceremonies in their lives, search for other rituals such
as drugs and alcohol, petrol sniffing and chroming in an
attempt to escape the emptiness of life.
Because ceremonies haven’t
been apart of western society for some time many people
feel ill at ease in a ceremonial situation and for most
the closest they come to ceremony is attending a
christening or marriage.
In this modern day civil celebrants are taking
over from ordained ministers of religion.
Ceremony today involves music, dance and creating
a sense of the sacred.
We are no longer a kind of substitute cleric but
we are often now seen as elders, ministering or serving
the community, engaging in passing on core values to the
next generation.
So often when I marry
couples they may have completed their family and the
little ones are sometimes the flower girls or pageboys
and often the son will walk the mother down to her
perspective husband.
So what I am saying is things are the same and
yet they are different.
It is only one generation ago that it would be
unheard of not to be married in a church and it was
considered absolutely unacceptable for a bride to be
pregnant before she walked down the aisle because that
would have meant that the couple were ‘doing it’ so to
speak and she would not be allowed to wear white.
A wedding is an occasion where a man and a woman enter
an explicit public, exclusive unreserved and life long
commitment. There need be no special clothes, flowers,
vehicles, processions, photography, food, drink or
guests. All that are needed are the public words of
commitment, the rings, the certificates and, in the case
of a Christian ceremony, prayer.
The purpose of a wedding is to make a man and woman's
deep and lasting commitment to each other explicit. Each
makes to the other an unconditional vow of love and
affection. The commitment is available to the spouse and
the wider society.
The Prophet, Kahlil
Gibran:
Love one another
But make not a bond of love.
Let it rather be a moving sea
Between the shores of your souls
Fill each other's cup
But drink from the same cup
Sing and dance together and be joyous,
But let each one of you be alone
Even as the strings of the lute are alone
Though they quiver with the same music
Give your hearts,
But not into each other's keeping
For only the hand of life
Can contain your hearts
And stand together
Yet not too near together
For the pillars of the temple stand apart
And the oak tree and the cypress
Grow not in each other's shadow.
Tips for a great relationship
Balance the time you spend at work with the time you
spend working on your relationship
Til next time,
Annie.
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