Turning up to church wedding just because you can. Would you?

Our wedding was very similar, @PatNoodle. We got married in the village where my MIL lived, in the church where she was very active, and it was lovely to see people from the village at the service, alongside our friends and family. I honestly can’t remember if any of them came to the reception, but as it was a buffet in the village hall, if any of them did come in, it would have been fine.

My dad used to be a church warden, and he and the vicar arrived at the church ahead of a wedding to find the bride’s mum and dad putting name cards in all the pews, women on one side, men on the other, and the vicar very firmly told them that they weren’t allowed to do this, because of the rule outlined in the OP.

See I don't find that weird. A church is a family and a local congregation might want to see a new 'member' joining up :)

But the church cant hold private events, do you just mean at a time a service wasn't on. welcoming new members of the church is the point of the ceremony so if no members are present who is welcoming the child.

That makes it even worse!

I'm from an Irish Catholic background but have lived mainly in the UK. It's perfectly normal, even expected for parishioners and loosely acquainted friends of friends/parents to turn up for a wedding service. There were about 6 of MILs friends at the back of the church for our wedding. I didn't know who they were back then but they were all very friendly and smiley. It's the same for funerals

we are going to a friends son's wedding next week. We are only invited to the evening do but will be very happy at the back of the church during the service to show love and support for the young couple and their families. Then we'll head off and do our own thing until the evening reception starts.

The whole point of a wedding, or indeed a christening is that it's a PUBLIC declaration of commitment.

If you use someone's church you are making it their business.

I now can’t believe your point of view. Your family were imposing on someone else’s culture. You can’t think it’s weird for those people to be doing their cultural practices alongside the bits your family are appropriating.

Your family shouldn’t have been sticking their noses in someone else’s religion if they don’t like the way it works. It’s actually offensive.

Ah this old trope.

People didn’t care any less about weddings than they do now.

I was verger at a couple of weddings but I don"t think I would turn up to a random wedding just for fun.

Yes, I think there is a definite village element to this, and there is a kind of "wedding voyeur crowd" - usually older people with time on their hands IME.

I think that is kind of harmless, given they are sort of background noise and wouldn't have expected an invitation, nor would they really draw attention.

But I do think that turning up anyway when not invited but you had kind of hoped to be is passive aggressive and honestly a bit lame. I'd be too proud to take one of the "cheap seats" if I knew I wasn't wanted. Yes, you can, of course you can. But why bother at that point?

Yet they went to church to have their child christened - did they not realise what they were there for.

You've got it the wrong way round - the child and family were sticking their noses into the life of the church and congregation - but that's fine if they got pretty pictures 🙄

Not my kid, not my business.

Well that explains a lot.

I went to a random wedding uninvited when I was about 7.
I was playing with my friend in the village, and we noticed lots of people arriving at the church, so we followed them in our of curiosity. Next thing we know, there’s a wedding happening. We were only little but we knew we had to stay quiet and not try to leave. So we sat through the whole thing, left when everyone else did, and then carried on playing!
This was the 70s so kids just roamed around in our village without parents.

We had some uninvited people in the church when we got married, people I vaguely knew like friends parents. I didn't mind at all.

It’s a means to an end. “Community” is just an excuse for nosey people to stick their wick in where it’s not wanted.

Random people or people who knew your mum and wanted to pay their respects?

Of course,this is MN where people talk about inviting people to funerals.

Yet the congregation wanted to stick their noses into another family’s business!

Good grief - the arrogance!

It's a church! It's the congregation's church, not yours. Who on earth do you think you are?

I've heard it all now! 😂

That’s even sadder. What’s the point of the christening if she’s never gong to go to church or be part of the congregation.

I really like the idea of the broader community coming along to celebrate christenings and marriages together - it’s really sad that we’ve lost that sense of community, and I don’t think the church bit should be by invitation. There’s a whole bit for people to object, so it’s important that anyone can be there!

We have a lady sat in a wheelchair at the front of all our wedding pictures. And 20 years later we still have no clue who she was. She was.

I think it's one thing some older ladies from the congregation turning up to see the bride (my only experience of this - often they'd been involved in setting up their church for the occasion; I'm not saying men can't won't) and quite another thing for someone who knows the couple and is explicitly not invited to show up anyway.

A couple who came to our wedding brought their four kids with them, despite being told quite clearly that the invitation was just for the adults and that it was a child free wedding. Our caterers had to scratch around finding space and food for them. It was quite awkward because other, closer, friends who had kids thought we’d made an exception for these people but not them.

When another guest asked why they’d brought their kids, they just shrugged and said they “wanted to.”

She needed to be christened to attend her local school.

We had extended family (DH’s side) who were not invited to any part of the wedding show up at the church which was awkward to say the least! I think they thought we might squeeze them in to the reception, especially as they travelled from another country(!) but there was literally not one spare chair. BIL sorted it all out with them, I didn’t even know until 3 days later when they were at MILs house (they’d hung around!) and we stopped by on the way to the airport