- San Diego       Wedding Officiant -

Marriage Blessings

 

Traditional Marriage Blessing

Bless their marriage, O God, as they begin their journey down the road of life together.

We don’t know what lies ahead for the road turns and bends. But help them to make the best of whatever comes their way.

Help them to continue to enjoy each other as they did when they first met. Help them to realize that nothing nor no one is perfect and to look for the good in all things and all people including themselves.

Help them to respect each other’s likes and dislikes, opinions and beliefs, hopes and dreams and fears even though they may not always understand them.

Help them to learn from each other and to help each other to grow mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

Help them to realize that no matter what happens to them they will hold on to each other and know that things have a way of working out for the good.

Help them to create for their children a peaceful, stable home of love as a foundation on which they can build their lives.

But most of all, dear God, help them to keep lit the torch of love that they now share so that by their loving example they may pass on the light of love to their children and to their children’s children forever. Amen

 

Torch of Love

Bless this marriage, as BRIDE and GROOM begin their journey down the road of life together. May they respect each other’s likes and dislikes, opinions and beliefs, hopes and dreams, and fears even though they may not always understand each other. May they rest in the knowledge that no matter what happens by holding on to each other things will work out for the best.

Most of all, dear God, help them to keep the torch of love burning with the fire that they now share in their hearts. Amen.

 

Cherokee Wedding Blessing

Great Spirit, God in heaven above
Please protect the ones we love.

We honor all that you created
As we pledge our hearts and lives together.

We honor mother earth
And ask that our marriage be abundant
To grow stronger through the seasons.

We honor the fire beings
And ask that our union be warm,
Glowing with love in our hearts.

We honor the wind beings,
And ask that we sail through our life safely,
Calm as in our mother’s arms.

We honor the water beings,
To clean and soothe our relationship
That it may never thirst for love.

With all the forces of the universe you created
We pray for harmony and true happiness
As we forever grow young together.

 

Aztec Indian Wedding Blessing

I know not whether thou has been absent:
I lie down with thee, I rise up with thee,
In my dreams thou art with me.
If my eardrops tremble in my ears,
I know it is thou moving within my heart.

 

Wings of Love

It was love that brought you here today.

It’s love that make yours a glorious union.

And it will be love that makes your marriage endure.

Love has given you wings, and your journey begins today.

Wherever the wind may carry you, you will stay by each other’s side.

I therefore join with everyone gathered here today in extending to you our love and support, and our wish for your relationship to flourish and grow throughout a long and happy life together.

 

Nature Blessing

Deep peace of the earth be to you. May serenity and strength be with you.

Deep peace of the air to you as you breathe its goodness. May the wisdom of old flow to your ears.

Deep peace of the sun to you. May you feel its warmth on your faces and in your hearts.

Deep peace of the waters to you. May the streams of your lives flow unimpeded

and the stillness of the deep pool reflect in your souls.

Infinite peace to you all, now and forever.

 

Strength of Love

May your days and years to come be filled with the kind of integrity and joy, that will enable you to live through those times ahead which may be tough. And may your affection for each other grow, thus enriching and strengthening all of us.

 

Blessing of the Apaches

Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter for the other.

Now you will feel no cold, for each of you will be warmth to the other.

Now there will be no loneliness, for each of you will be companion to the other.

Now you are two persons, but there is only one life before you.

May beauty surround you both in the journey ahead and through all the years.

May happiness be your companion and your days together be good and long upon the earth.

 

Treat yourselves and each other with respect, and remind yourselves often of what brought you together.

Give the highest priority to the tenderness, gentleness and kindness that your connection deserves.

When frustration, difficulties and fear assail your relationship—as they threaten all relationships at one time or another—remember to focus on what is right between you, not only the part which seems wrong.

In this way, you can ride out the storms when clouds hide the face of the sun in your lives – remembering that even if you lose sight of it for a moment, the sun is still there.

And if each of you takes responsibility for the quality of your life together, it will be marked by abundance and delight.

 

Peace and Love

Go now in peace and love, and may these things touch your hearts, and be with you through the days of your life together.

 

Art of Marriage

A marriage must be created.
In marriage, the little things are the big things.
It is never being too old to hold hands.
It is remembering to say “I love you” at least once a day.

It is never going to sleep angry.
It is at no time taking the other for granted;
The courtship should not end with the honeymoon.
It should continue through all the years.

It is having a mutual sense of values and common objectives.
It is standing together facing the world.
It is forming a circle of love that gathers in the whole family.
It is doing things for each other, not in the attitude of duty or sacrifice,
but in the spirit of joy.

It is speaking words of appreciation and demonstrating gratitude in thoughtful ways.
It is not expecting the husband to wear a halo
or the wife to have wings of an angel.
It is not looking for perfection in each other.

It is cultivating flexibility, patience, understanding
and a sense of humor.
It is having the capacity to forgive and forget.
It is giving each other an atmosphere in which each can grow.

It is finding room for the things of the spirit.
It is a common search for the good and the beautiful.

It is establishing a relationship in which the independence is equal, dependence is mutual and the obligation is reciprocal.

It is not only marrying the right person,
it is being the right partner.

 

Celtic Wedding Blessing

May you both be blessed with the strength of heaven,

The light of the sun and the radiance of the moon.

The splendor of fire, the speed of lightning,

The swiftness of wind, the depth of the sea,

The stability of earth and the firmness of rock.

 

Blessing for A Marriage

by James Dillett Freeman

May your marriage bring you all the exquisite excitement marriage should bring,

and may life grant you also patience, tolerance, and understanding.

May you always need one another not so much to fill your emptiness, as to help you to know your fullness.

A mountain needs a valley to be complete; the valley does not make the mountain less, but more;
and the valley is more a valley because it has a mountain towering over it.

 

May you need one another, but not out of weakness.
May you want one another, but not out of lack.
May you entice one another, but not compel one another.
May you embrace one another, but not out encircle one another.

 

May you succeed in all important ways with one another, and not fail in the little graces.
May you look for things to praise, often say, “I love you!” and take no notice of small faults.

If you have quarrels that push you apart, may both of you hope to have good sense enough to take the first step back.

May you enter into the mystery which is the awareness of one another’s presence—no more physical than spiritual,
warm and near when you are side by side, and warm and near when you are in separate rooms or even distant cities.

 

May you have happiness, and may you find it making one another happy.
May you have love, and may you find it loving one another.

 

Kahlil Gibran on Marriage

Then Almitra spoke again and said, And what of Marriage, Master?
And he answered saying:
You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Ay, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

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 not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a 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.

 

Reflection o f Souls

The love of God, unutterable and perfect, flows into a pure soul the way light rushes into a transparent object.

The more love we receive, the more love we shine forth; so that, as we grow clear and open, the more complete the joy of loving is.

And the more souls who resonate together, the greater the intensity of their love for, mirror like, each soul reflects the other.

God in heaven above please, bless BRIDE and GROOM with your love and grace, as they begin their life together.

 

Mind and Heart

May the blessing that rests upon all who love, rest also upon you, and fill you with all spiritual grace.

May the bond that unites you ever be strengthened. May you so love and work together in the days that are to come,

that your lives will be enriched and ennobled by a true and deepening union of mind and heart.

 

The Prophet

Love one another, but make not a bond of that love.

Let it rather be like a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

And stand together, and yet not too near together.

For even the pillars of the temple must stand apart; and the oak tree and the cypress will not grow in each other’s shadow.

Remember that love gives nothing but from itself.

Love possesses not, nor would it be possessed, for love is sufficient unto love.

And think not that you can direct the course of love.

For love, if it finds you worthy, will direct your course.

 

Celebration of Marriage

Marriage is a supreme sharing of experience.

An adventure in the most intimate of human relationships.

It is the joyous union of two people whose comradeship and mutual understanding have flowered in romance.

Today (GROOM) and (BRIDE) proclaim their love and commitment to the world, and we gather here to rejoice, with and for them, in the new life they now undertake together.

The joy we feel now is a solemn joy, because the act of marriage has many consequences, both social and personal.

Marriage requires “love,” a word we often use with vagueness and sentimentality.

We may assume that love is some rare and mystical event, when in fact it is our natural state of being.

 

So what do we mean by love?

When we love, we see things other people do not see.

We see beneath the surface, to the qualities which make our beloved special and unique.

To see with loving eyes, is to know inner beauty.

And to be loved is to be seen, and known, as we are known to no other.

One who loves us, gives us a unique gift: a piece of ourselves, but a piece that only they could give us.

 

We who love, can look at each other’s life and say, “I touched his life,” or, “I touched her life,” just as an artist might say, “I touched this canvas.” “Those brushstrokes in the comer of this magnificent mural, those are mine.

I was a part of this life, and it is a part of me.”

Marriage is to belong to each other through a unique and diverse collaboration, like two threads crossing in different directions, yet weaving one tapestry together.

 

The secret of love and marriage is similar to that of religion itself.

It is the emergence of the larger self.

It is the finding of one’s life by losing it.

Such is the privilege of husband and wife—to be each himself, herself and yet another; to face the world strong, with the courage of two.

 

To make this relationship work, therefore, takes more than love.

It takes trust, to know in your hearts that you want only the best for each other. It takes dedication, to stay open to one another, to learn and grow, even when it is difficult to do so.

And it takes faith, to go forward together without knowing what the future holds for you both.

While love is our natural state of being, these other qualities are not as easy to come by.

They are not a destination, but a journey.

 

The true art of married life is in this an inner spiritual journey.

It is a mutual enrichment, a give and take between two personalities,

a mingling of two endowments which diminishes neither, but enhances both.