Kat and I did a civil ceremony today at city hall, the legal and contractual part of our marriage. We had gotten the idea somewhere that this would be necessary for tax purposes. Various people have told us since that it isn't, though I still figure better safe than sorry. I know a couple who found out a couple years into their marriage that there had been some mixup and they weren't legally married. But more importantly, I'm glad it worked out this way because it's actually quite important to me to keep this part of our marriage separate from the spiritual and sacramental aspects of it, which we will celebrate on the 30th, in an Orthodox wedding ceremony. It obviously wouldn't be the end of the world to spend five minutes after the service filling out paperwork. Lots of people do it. But aside from not being any fun, I think it would be a distraction from what is actually happening in the service.
An Orthodox wedding is not a contract. It's a sacrament. I'm going to do my best to explain this, though I'm no theologian. As I understand the terms, a contract is something we do: two consenting adults make an informed decision, and agree to mutually submit to certain terms. A sacrament, however, is something God does to us and in us. Clearly it still requires the voluntary cooperation of two consenting persons, but in an Orthodox service this precedes the wedding. We are consenting by showing up at all. But what we are consenting to is not a list of contractual terms, but a transformation in our spiritual state by the action of the Holy Spirit in the Church.
The most striking sign of this for most people watching will be our silence. In an Orthodox wedding, the bride and the groom make no vows. They don't even say "I do". All things being equal, they don't say a thing. The priest says a lot of prayers, the choir sings some hymns, and there are plenty of places where the congregation (presumably including the bride and groom) participate in and affirm what is happening by saying or singing "Amen".
Aside from me and Kat, our priest, Father James, and the church choir, the only other people actively involved our our sponsors. Wedding sponsors in the Orthodox Church tend to be a married couple we look up to who will be (to a certain extent) responsible for our marriage before God. They pray for us, they give us advice, they kick our asses when we're being dumb. In our case our friends Matthew and Cheryl are filling this role. They're close friends of ours who've been married for the better part of a decade, have three kids, and have a much better idea than we do of how marriage actually works. They've already been very active in our relationship, from the very week we started dating to the present, and have given us some excellent advice as we prepare for marriage. We're very blessed to have them in our lives.
So what actually happens in the service? Basically, there are two parts to it. The first is called the Betrothal. Kat and I will meet in the entrance of the Church and walk in together, with our sponsors. No one is walked down the aisle, no one is given away. This was the first thing that really appealed to Kat about the Orthodox service: the obvious equality of it. I don't do anything she doesn't do, she doesn't do anything I don't do. We enter into marriage side by side, as equals. Father James will meet us at the entrance, and somewhere between the entrance and the middle of the Church we will stop and perform the Betrothal. Essentially this is an exchange of rings. The rings will both be blessed and we will each briefly wear the ring we're giving away (just on the first knuckle in my case) before placing the rings on each others fingers. A lot is said and/or sung, but this is the essence of what is happening here.
Once the Betrothal is done, we move more into the centre of the Church for the Crowning. Again, there is a lot said here, but there is one basic event. "Crowns" are placed on our heads, and we process in a circle three times. These crowns will be flower wreaths made by our brilliantly creative friend Kim. Flower crowns are the Greek tradition, while Russians go for actual crowns. We chose to do this Greek style for purely aesthetic reasons. Russian culture loves splendor and grandeur, while we, as 21st century North Americans, are more comfortable with the "less is more" approach. But that doesn't matter all that much in the end. Crowns, of whatever variety, are used in the Orthodox service for a doubly symbolic purpose. On the one hand, any married couple in the Christian tradition is automatically a symbol, or even a representative, of the union of Christ and the Church. We are crowned in the service because through the sacrament we enter into that mystery, and share the glory of Christ. Christ's crown, however, is also a crown of thorns, and that is the second meaning of the crowns. Marriage is an act of martyrdom, not in the sense that we have to die on the spot, but in the sense that we need to sacrifice ourselves for each other every day, every minute, for the rest of our lives. In that sense, choosing to marry is choosing to die to ourselves, as Christ said, to take up our crosses and follow Him.
I'll write more soon about what is said in the service, and other things people should know beforehand. But now, I'm going to bed. It's been a long day, and emotionally draining. But it's been good. I hope it didn't seem like I was being dismissive about the contractual side of marriage. Anyone who has watched the excellent video I posted on facebook the other day, in which Timothy Keller discusses the meaning of marriage, will know how important that "piece of paper" can be. But for us it's peripheral. The ceremony today was nice. It felt simple and honest. I was giddily happy to be making those initial vows to the woman I love. Our friends Jeremy and Helen witnessed for us, then we took goofy pictures around City Hall and went out for beer and nachos. It was good and meaningful and blessed in its own way. But we aren't married yet. On December 30th, through the mystery of grace, you will see the Butroses for the first time.
Until then.
J.
