AIBU to think that barring children from RELIGIOUS weddings misses the point about what religious weddings are for?

[Wamster]

A couple of disclaimers first:

Not religious myself. Am agnostic verging on atheist.

If the couple marry in a secular ceremony (NOT involving religion), well I don't think they are being unreasonable not to invite children. After all, all they say is the legal bits with perhaps a few personal words in their vows. Fair enough.

But given the fact that most religions are based upon concepts of community, family life, why do people think it OK to bar children from such events when they are a vital part of what a religious wedding is supposed to be about?

Also, is it practically possible to ban children during wedding service (it obviously IS for private party/functions after wedding)? Cannot anybody walk in off the street to witness a church wedding? I've been to a lot of weddings where casual passers-by are at back of church just looking. Or can the Vicar lock the door?
Isn't the fact that everybody (not just guests) can witness vows a vital part of it for most religions, anyway?

It makes them less religious, that's for sure.

People have started offering their opinons because, frankly, instead of weddings being low key affairs that took place in the local church/ register office, they have now become major events that people have to shell out a small fortune for -and this includes the guests.

A very selfish relative of mine chose to marry in the wilds of Scotland -her family are from South East, thus meaning a very long drive, accommodation costs and so on.

It pees people off.

If people are going to be Bridezillas who take the attitude that everyone else's needs can go to hell because it is her 'big day', she should be prepared for criticism. End of.

At the end of the day the bride and groom can do as they please on "their" day - who cares what the guests want, if you don't like it don't go!!!

Am sad that people can make solemn promises before God when they clearly don't believe in him, for me that shows a lack of respect to the church community.

We regularly have visitors coming to our church to have children baptised etc, they are made to feel very welcome by the church family but for many it is obvious that our presence is not wanted/required and we are somehow invading their space.

The whole church/community thing is far from straightforward. The local parish church was so bound up with local administration in days gone by that, for a lot of people with real ties to a place, the church is more than a religious establishment, it is a local hub and a tie to the past.

Venetia - I have Lanyons from Devon/Cornwall in my family tree - we might be distantly related!

The concept of the 'big day' is more or less meaningless now, anyway, the couple have usually cohabited for some time and have children.
NOTHING wrong with this in itself, but, please, the concept of a 'big day' is seriously made null and void when they've already set up home and had children.

I think the phrase 'who cares what the guests want' sums up pretty much why the guests get pretty peed off with bride and groom.

supersewer is right, though, I will not be going to any weddings in future. Made a commitment to go to one a few months back which I had to attend in the end and even though the guests were extremely well behaved, their body language could not hide the fact that waiting 90 minutes in a foyer while the bride and groom had their photos taken was pretty stressful. Not to mention the fact that they had not bothered to designate an usher so the bride's family were on the wrong side.

I will not make that mistake again. Any invites will be dealt with 3 days later with a polite refusal.

@Wamster
"TondelayoSchwarzkopf, to be honest the things you describe here tend to be prompted by religion not atheism. Atheists do not sacrifice goats. Genocide tends to be prompted by religious belief."

Um...here's the point > you missed

I thought it was funny, Tondelayo.

Oppsadaisy - ypu r so rude- believe it or not the wedding is about the bride and groom not your sprogs and your feelings about what weddings should be!

No. The only time a wedding is about the bride and groom is if they pop down the register office with a couple of witnesses -which is about as private as it can possibly be in the UK.

If the bride and groom want it to be about them this is what they should do.

Do they seriously think they can get away with all kinds of just because they are getting married?!

You can't have a show-off wedding without an audience guests. Any performer who abused/neglected his audience would soon lose fans.
At least at a concert, people are paying to see the act they wish for enjoyment.
What exactly does a guest get out of a wedding? Any 'free booze' and sitdown meal is negated by cost of transport, accommodation, babysitters and so on, and small talk with people you barely know. Or, if you do know them, you probably see them regularly anyway and don't have to go to a wedding to see them.

Bridezillas should bear this in mind.

Thank you kungfu - I try and keep the mood light.

If you object that much to a wedding, don't go Wamster

Etalb - hiya - yeah, horses for courses, I guess.

She had already made it quite clear that her old friends no longer fitted into her £££££££££-lifestyle-££££££££££££ as I said in my earlier post.

It was quite clear she did it on purpose cos she knew it would exclude most of us from being able to go. She just wanted to be seen to invite loads of people but manage to exclude the "unsuitable" ones.

The whole affair was a bit of a chav-fest from what a mate of mine told me (I knew the photographer - just by coincidence) - and he told me all the rich people's children were there!

"No. The only time a wedding is about the bride and groom is if they pop down the register office with a couple of witnesses -which is about as private as it can possibly be in the UK."

Even then the bride and groom can't win because someone will whinge that they weren't invited or tell them they were selfish for not inviting people.

CofE weddings are about family life. What some people overlook is that it's about the family life, current and future, of the people who are getting married. Not all their bloody friends who they are inviting as guests.

Wamster, I'm with you on this one. Loved having children at my wedding and my husband and I very much hoped for children of our own (luckily we have been fortunate and number 2 is on the way!) so would have been a bit hypocritical to leave them out.

I understand when children aren't invited to weddings but the ones I have most enjoyed attending as a guest have been child-friendly, especially one with 2 year old twin flower girls - instant ice-breaker as all the guests went 'aaaahh' in unison as they tottered down the aisle!

"What exactly does a guest get out of a wedding"

Umm, doesn't a guest get to: blub at the ceremony, laugh / cry at the speeches, sup a few drinks, enjoy a lovely meal, have a dance, catch-up with old friends, renew acquaintances and meet new people, get a warm fuzzy feeling from seeing people dear to them looking lovely and having a splendid day, and feel honoured to be counted as one of their friends.

That's what I do, anyway...but then I tend to treat being invited to a wedding as an honour and a general Good Thing rather than some sort of thinly-veiled attack on my family togetherness / crass display of selfishness by the bride / conspiracy to bankrupt me etc....

Not a comment on weddings per se ,but there was a bloke on the radio the other day ,a priest or vicar ,not sure which and he said you didnt have to be part of a religion ,which is essentially the rules and regulations ,to be religious ,which he said was to think of others and the wider world and act accordingly .

In England ( not sure about Wales) your parish church is under a legal obligation to conduct your wedding/funeral ( no obligation to christen though) but it only applies to you parish church, so even if atheist openly, the vicar can not refuse to marry but he could be awkward about dates bells choirs, he only has to conduct ceremony.

As far as I understand no other denomination is obliged to marry you though the church of scotland definitely is not, though the individual ministe /vicar priest maybe sympathetic it depends on church if beautiful mediaeval church in country village booked up for 18 months probably not much chance but if an inner city church on main road that only has 4 weddings a year the minister will probably be delighted

As weddings are public events I am not sure how so many celebrities get away with excluding people, at least in scotland can not be secret as have to be displayed in local registry office for 6 weeks, but sometimes no-one notices the names Gordon Brown managed it press kicking themselves after for not noticing it at Fife registry office hahaha!!!

the parish church is based on your normal residential address ,

personally I think making vows in the presence of God when you don't believe is making a mockery of not only the church but also yourselves it makes it seem though you do not mean the vows

Its my party and I won't invite you if I want to...

I am an atheist. I had a church wedding with no children.

I had a church wedding as I am also a great lover of history and tradition. Almost every cultural tradition we have has been subsumed by the church in the last millenium including many relating to the rites of marriage. Therefore, although a non-believer, I felt it was appropriate to marry in church.

I had a child free wedding as I was child free myself and had no great love of children. None of my close friends had children at the time and I would have been happy for those with children to choose to stay away. It was not a day designed for children and I did not want to make any concession to them. There was nothing about children in our marriage ceremony and at our request the priest omitted the blessing for children.

It was unashamedly about dh and I and only us - it is the only family occassion that, as an adult, has been all about me and celebrating my future and my husband's. It was not about celebrating my family.

My only point, which has nothing to do with the OP's original point about children at weddings, is that C of E, and C of S even, sound very businesslike in the way they go about conducting weddings if they have a website with a pricelist!

I would like to point out that it is not the same for a catholic wedding, were they make you jump through hoops just to get married in a church outwith your parish (I wanted to get married in the church near my parent's house, not the one in the area I had moved to) and you most definitely do have to be catholic (at least one of the people getting married). Usually the priest has to know who you are as well, i.e. you have to be seen at mass. Also, yes they are open weddings and I get the point about there being a difference between registry and church weddings. I had random folk at the back of the church at my wedding. But generally churches are bigger than registry offices so it doesn't matter.

You'll probably find most people who don't want children at a wedding don;t actually have any and therefore don't realise how annoying it can be. Particularly if the wedding is a weekday and babysitters are all at work. (I have not experienced this yet but have been invited to a childfree wedding next year, when bump will be 11 months old. Can't wait.)

PS I didn't actually want children at my wedding as generally, I don't like them. But DH said I had to and I wouldn't even notice them. 5 glasses of champagne later and he was right.

Wamster/Chaotic - CofE vicars are legally obliged to marry (non-divorcees) in their parish because as someone else pointed out, it's an established church. They don't marry atheists because they're wishy washy or after the money, but because those atheists have a right to marry there if they choose.

Re the OP's original point - I don't think a church wedding is more about children; Christianity has an element of considering the Church family, but that's a broad community of faith thing, not a kids thing. Plus Churches have amazing acoustics and children have loud voices. I too have had to grind my teeth as small children were left to cry through, and drown out, vows and for that reason when all the in-laws claimed our wedding 'was not just your day' and refused to contemplate no-kids, we asked that any grizzlers be taken into the vestry. And my lovely sister-in-law (other side) did just that with my neice.

And then those who had said their kids MUST be allowed to stay all evening (despite venue license) left at about 9.15 anyway. Grrr...

If I was doing it over again, and if there had been many kids (there were only a couple of nephews), I'd have asked the lovely Sunday School teacher to run a creche in the hall during the service. Actually, I think my SIL would have been glad to have her pair off her hands for an hour or so - looking back at the photos she looks quite harrassed.

I go to a church with a lot of children and early on I thought my children were the only ones to get upset in the service! Our minister told me, mid-sermon not to leave one day and I started to realise I wasn't the only one, just the only one I'm aware of.

CoE isn't the only one obligated to marry people. Churches with centre in their name will also be and they will do it free too. It's not easy to get approval to change your name to centre and you have hoops to jump through to get and keep it. Those churches though are generally honoured to be a part of someone's wedding day and happy to do it which is why they'll jump through the hoops. I always laugh when people complain about the cost of weddings whilst maintaining that a church wedding is important to them as it's in front of God but they won't marry anywhere else because of their pictures. What's important? God or your photographer?

Speaking as an atheist married to a creative director, I would always say photographer...