“To Everything There is a Season”

Many couples who planned to get married in traditional venues in 2020 or 2021 are now needing to rethink their options, for various reasons. Their venue of choice may have abruptly closed down, leaving them stranded, (and in some cases, with no refund).

Weddings should be a time of joy and inclusion. A time to bring together your community of love and friendship in a way that celebrates and honors your love and feels good for you and your guests.

But just as couples face changes navigating life in their relationship pre and post marriage, so many are now facing challenges in navigating the wedding process itself.

One or both members of the couple may have lost their jobs or business, due to the COVID-19 economic crash. Their friends and family, planned wedding guests and bridal party participants may have suffered financially to the point where travel, accomodations, formal attire, and all the expenses that go into participating in a wedding become a hardship, rather than a joy.

Travel to and attendance at a wedding, even after the state “opens up” may present a health risk to friends and family members and guests… All guests, but especially those with underlying conditions, who may be self-isolating until there is an approved safe and effective vaccine. At the moment, we are hearing 12 to 18 months is an optimistic minimum, and it may take 2 years or longer for development, clinical trials, and widespread availabilty of a vaccine.

Finally, aside from the health and financial concerns, couples who are sensitive to the current circumstances of losses of lives and economic well-being of so many may not feel that now is the time for a lavish, opulent wedding. Not that there’s anything wrong with big, splurgy celebrations, and please do not infer that I am of this opinion. I love all weddings and to each couple their own choices! However at a time when so many are losing or have lost loved ones, there is a change in climate that for some is prompting a sensitivity to tone.

Whether we are religious or spiritual/not religious, most of us can relate to the words, “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” And most of us have heard the song, “Turn, Turn, Turn! (To Everything There is a Season),” adapted from Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8 by Pete Seeger in the late 1950s and recorded by him and many others (notably the Byrds, the Seekers, Judy Collins, Nina Simone, Dolly Parton, and Wilson Phillips).

In weddings, we affirm life, love, hope, the strength of our enduring bonds of the love of the couple and the support of their community, and Love itself, our Higher Power in whatever way we conceive and experience it.

This is even more important in times when couples, their immediate community, and the larger community all face a common challenge to rebuild, as we might in wartime. One way to affirm our connectedness with larger community at this time is to keep it simple, affordable, yet joyous and unique.

Book a unique and personalized ZOOM wedding ceremony ANY date of the year and from ANY county of Virginia to keep your friends and family safe, save them resources, and save yourselves the cost of venue, food, drink, floral design, service fee and taxes. In Commonwealth of Virginia, this means you can have a personal and meaningful wedding ceremony and save yourselves about $29,000, the average cost of a traditional venue wedding.

To save your date and time, you can reach me at art4spirit@yahoo.com or (540) 577-8854.

Looking forward to talking with you about your wedding,

Kanta
Rev. Kanta Bosniak