I Was Asked to Officiate My Sisters Wedding ... And This Is What I Wrote

I recently officiated my sisters wedding. Officiating a wedding is no easy task, so I took some inspiration from the great philosopher Alan W. Watts. Those of you familiar with his work will recognize his influence. I had a hard time finding ideas for structure and content online, so thought I would publish my ceremony for others to use. Enjoy!

Friends, new friends, family, and soon to be new family, we are joined together today to celebrate the union of James and Rebecca in marriage. In the years they have been together, their love and devotion to each other has grown and now they have decided to live their lives as husband and wife.

To our friends and family: This moment would not be possible without each and every one of you. The integrity, kindness, and respect which they bring to their life together had its roots in the love, friendship, and guidance you have given them. So thank you.

James, Rebecca: the time has come to forget all the stress of planning this day and to simply enjoy it together. So take a deep breath with me, and soak up a moment that has been over six years in the making.

For those of you who don’t know me, I am Rebecca’s brother. And while James and I are technically just moments away from actually becoming family, he has also been my brother for a long time now. James and Rebecca asked me to marry them today because they wanted something personal and with undeniable meaning; they wanted someone close to them to pronounce their union. And while I am absolutely terrified to be speaking in front of so many of my closest family and friends, it is among the greatest honors of my life to share this moment with you two. So thank you.

I told Rebecca that this ceremony would go one of two ways: that I would either deliver a very coherent wedding or that I would be a mess, crying the entire time, and that I wouldn't know which it would be until I started talking. So here we go …

Marriage is an extraordinarily special union shared by two people who both see that their own potential, their own goals, and their own aspirations as individuals are far greater when they share their lives together. Marriage is about establishing a relationship in which independence is equal, dependence is mutual, and devotion reciprocal.

James, Rebecca, you are about to embark upon the greatest adventure of your life. And today I’m going to share with you five pieces of advice that I hope you will take with you along the way. When you meet with challenges in your new life together, as you undoubtedly will from time to time, try to reflect back on this moment. Don’t ever forget the qualities you love most in each other, the reasons that brought you here today, and the feeling you have in your heart right now.

1. Love requires faith.

Faith is about openness. Openness to truth, to reality, to vulnerability, to letting go and trusting each other completely—whatever or however it may turn out to be. If you fall into the water and you have nothing to hold on to and you try to behave as you would on dry land, you will drown. But if, on the other hand, you trust yourself to the water and let go, you will float. And this is exactly the situation of love. So let yourself go completely, trust each other unconditionally with every ounce of your heart in every moment for the rest of your life together, and you will float.

1. Marriage is a journey and never a destination.

The purpose of your journey together is the journey itself. By the time you arrive at where you are going, that journey will have already ended. If the story of your life together was a song, it wouldn't be defined by the end of that song, but instead by the verses, the chorus, the melody, and the instrumental solo which together make up the composition. Don’t ever allow yourself to think of marriage by analogy to a destination, which has a serious purpose at the end, and the goal is to get to that end: children, expectations, success, whatever it may be. Marriage is like a song--so don’t forget to sing, and to dance, while the music is being played.

1. Plan for the future, but live always in the present.

I've spent enough time around the two of you to know that your love for each other is very real and your happiness together is something special. Take a moment each day to recognize how lucky you are to have found each other and how rare true love can be. Live always in the present. Don’t rush through any moment of your life together. And remember, no moment is more important than this moment, right now.

1. Surprise each other often. The best part about the rest of your life together is that you don’t know what’s coming next.

I’d like everyone to join me in a brief exercise of your imagination. Let’s suppose that you were able, every night, to dream any dream you wanted to dream. And that you could have the power within one night to dream 75 years of time, or any length of time you wanted to have. And naturally, as you began on this adventure of dreams, you would fulfill all of your wishes. You would have every kind of pleasure you could perceive. But after several nights of 75 years of total pleasure each, you would start to lose interest in always knowing the outcome. So you would choose to have a surprise. You would choose to have a dream which isn't entirely under your control. Where something is going to happen to you and you don’t know what it’s going to be.

And with time, you would get more and more adventurous, and you would make further and further gambles as to what you would dream. And finally, you would dream where you are now. You would dream the dream of living the life that you are actually living today. You would dream that you are sitting here, or standing here, in the Smog Shoppe in Los Angeles, listening to me share this story. That would be within the infinite multiplicity of choices you would have. And maybe, that’s exactly what you are doing.

In this way, there is no difference between reality and fantasy, between what you want, and what you already have. So when you awake from this dream and embark upon the next, don’t forget to give each other the adventure of surprise along the way.

And finally … 5. Embrace the challenges.

Polarity is the principle that opposites are not in conflict but are instead different aspects of one in the same system. An electric current will not run without both positive and negative poles. They do not oppose each other but instead work together to create a powerful force. In this way, we can accept that black implies white, good implies evil, life implies death, and harmony implies conflict, or should I say, conflict implies harmony. You would not know the true meaning of harmony without knowing conflict. Conflict gives meaning to harmony in much the same way that darkness gives meaning to light. There cannot be one without the other. So embrace the challenges that give rise to the harmony in your life together.

Wedding vows represent the commitment you make to each other on your wedding day. This spoken commitment began silently long before today and will continue long after this ceremony’s end. James and Rebecca have chosen to write their own vows which I will ask them to share with each other now.

Traditionally, the creation of the titled status of husband and wife is marked by the exchange of rings. These rings, circular in shape, are a symbol of your unbroken commitment. Love freely given has no beginning and no end. Let these rings always remind you that your love for each other is present, even when you are not.

James, do you take Rebecca to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part? Please place your ring on Rebecca’s finger.

Rebecca, do you take James to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part? Please place your ring on James’ finger.

James, Rebecca, I’ll ask you now to please hold hands. The warmth you feel between your fingertips is the feeling of all your dreams, and all your hopes, and all your desires. No longer yours as individual, they are now yours together.

These are the hands of the most important person in your life.
These are the hands of your best friend, young and strong, and full of love for you.
These are the hands that will work alongside yours as you build your future together.
These are the hands that will be holding yours as you travel the world together.
These are the hands that will accompany you through the most important moments of your life.
These are the hands that will care for you when you are sick.
These are the hands that will hold you tight and comfort you when fear or sadness fills your mind.
These are the hands that will countless times wipe the tears from your eyes, both tears of sadness, and tears of joy.
These are the hands that will hold your children in their first moments of life.

And in your final years, these are the hands, that even when wrinkled and aged, will still be reaching for yours.

There are several reasons why it is customary to break a glass at the conclusion of a wedding ceremony. For James and Rebecca, the tradition symbolizes the breaking down of barriers between people of different faiths; the shattering of the old—as in your old lives as individuals, and the beginning of the new—as in your new life together. The breaking of the glass also symbolizes the permanent nature of your commitment. Once the glass is shattered it can never be reassembled in exactly the same way. So now, if for nothing more than the sake of tradition, James will break the glass. Let it signify, once and for all, that James and Rebecca are husband and wife and that it is time to begin the celebration of their marriage!

James, Rebecca, by the power vested in me through the Universal Life Church, I now pronounce you husband and wife. James, you may kiss the bride.