Product Description
Many couples want a spiritual but not a religious ceremony that truly celebrates their unique set of beliefs, values and life circumstances. They want their ceremony, their way but don’t know where to begin or what questions they need to ask. The Wedding Ceremony Planner is a comprehensive and user-friendly guide. It covers everything you need to know to create a beautiful ceremony text and to anticipate and address all the profound and mundane logistics with ease, grace and fun. It includes hundreds of text excerpts reflecting the many voices with which our hearts speak. There are also ten sample ceremony texts for the inclusion of children, the telling of the couple’s story, the renewal of vows and a commitment ceremony. Checklists and worksheets are included to manage all the details. The Wedding Ceremony Planner is also an invaluable resource for clergy of all faiths, wedding planners and location coordinators. Sprinkled with anecdotes about lessons learned by couples creating their weddings, this book is filled with the wisdom of experiencePraise for The Wedding Ceremony Planner-Weddings are sacred acts surrounded by material hoopla. The Wedding Ceremony Planner clarifies the worldly issues but keeps the spirit central. It-s the balance that every couple needs.–Marianne Williamson, author, The Gift of Change-With countless samples of ceremony segments and worksheets to put them all together, The Wedding Ceremony Planner affirms what we all hope for: to communicate our love in a clear, heartfelt manner that truly reflects who we are.–Jack Canfield, co-author, Chicken Soup for the Bride-s Soul–In this time of increasing exchange and friendship between people of many cultures … what the world needs is an intelligent and compassionate -how to- book on performing interfaith ceremonies. This book is an excellent example.–The Very Reverend James Parks Morton Founder and President of the Interfaith Center of New York-[This book] was [wonderful] in helping us create our wedding ceremony. Not only was it easy to follow, but it made us think of things we never would have thought of on our own … Going through the book also brought us closer … it is the one thing we have sat down and done 100% together.–Jennifer Buehler and Frank Yanoti Jr., Bride and Groom-Planning the wedding ceremony in itself can be a process of discovery for a couple entering marriage … this marvelous book … help[s] couples design a ceremony that truly and personally characterizes the meaning and uniqueness of each union.–Pril Smiley, Mohonk Mountain House-This book will aid and guide the couple in the creation of their unique wedding ceremony that appropriately states their personal beliefs. How refreshing, how important, how appropriate to help make the wedding yours.–Alexandra Stoddard, author of Choosing Happiness
The author says she honors all spiritual traditions, but in the book she basically calls hand fasting and broom jumping stupid and does not include them. The reason she gives for handfasting is because hundreds of years ago it was an engagement ritual. What wedding traditions haven’t changed over time? She obviously just has something against pagans who are the main people to do hand fastings. She also implies they everybody wants a spiritual wedding even if they don’t have a religion. Broom jumping is left out because she thinks it is racist for white people to do them. I guess black people are not supposed to read this book? This book is only meant for people who want a typical ceremony and are christians who are too lazy to go to church, couples who belong to different mainstream religions or people who cannot get married at their church because of a previous divorce. The examples in the book are also boring and generic, I did not find anything in it I could use. It does explain the parts of a ceremony. If you are a pagan or an atheist, or are looking for creative ceremony ideas, look elsewhere.
Rating: 1 / 5
I found this book to be full of religiously-themed and cheesy/saccharine passages (sorry!). We’re trying to plan a non-religious ceremony and really didn’t find this book helpful at all as far as writing our ceremony. This book was good for convincing us that we needed a rehearsal and for pointing out some procedural things we hadn’t thought of. Otherwise, you could probably find any of the passages included in the book (or something better) elsewhere on the interwebs–this is a good book to use if you haven’t planned anything about your ceremony, but if you’ve already been researching it, I don’t think this will be worth your time (unless you are writing your own religious ceremony, in which case, this could be the book for you).
Rating: 2 / 5
I found this vendor to be fantastic. The moment I ordered the book, I had already received an e-mail notifying me it was going in the mail. I got it only days later with standard shipping. I would use this vendor again.
Rating: 5 / 5
being type-A, we bought 7 planning books and put sticky pads and notes in all of them. However, we soon found that this book was the only one we kept referring to. It’s very well structured — giving you choices for each part of the ceremony. Judith Johnson is a gifted writer and, in the end, it’s her writing that sets this book apart from all the others. She made our wedding truly special and very personalized. Many many people have told us that it was the sweetest and most beautiful wedding they’d ever been to, and we give this book much of the credit for it.
If you’re only going to buy one book, buy this one.
Rating: 5 / 5
My husband and I did not get married in a church and therefore we were on our own to design a wedding ceremony. We had no idea how to get started until we found this book. We both read the entire thing and crafted our ceremony based on it’s passages. One of the ideas we incorporated was a candle ceremony that included my husband’s children in the creation of a new family symbolized by us all lighting a candle. Even weeks after the wedding, we continue to receive calls from our guests telling us that they are still on a high from the love and beauty in our ceremony. Thank you Reverend Johnson for helping us create a ceremony that we will never forget.
Rating: 5 / 5