Marryin’ Ron
August 21, 2005
I married a couple today. A couple of what, you say?
As some of you may know, I occasionally officiate at weddings. I’m empowered to do so as an ordained minister of the Universal Life Church (which asks only that I believe in doing that which is right — who could argue with that?), and occasionally I’m asked to do this by someone (usually a friend) who would like somebody completely non-religious to officiate. Since I’m a pretty practiced public speaker (it’s my freakin’ day job, OK?), and am willing to do a personal ceremony that’s about the individuals involved rather than about some vague abstract notion of Marriage, I think it usually works out pretty well. I’ve married friends. colleagues, and once in a while just random people. As I posted here, I also got to do my first legal gay marriage last fall in Massachusetts (see the post Gay marriage: “I will survive”).
It’s mostly pretty cool. I get to be at the very inside of a nice moment in people’s lives; I get to use my bit of skill at public speaking to do something happy and nice; and I get to do something that people usually assume has some kind of religious content, and completely strip it of the religious bullshit. I don’t make it about anti-religion; I just make it about the people and their relationship. If somebody’s used to religious weddings, they might find that alone a little jarring. But other than the little sideways dig I usually insert toward those who think some bullshit “blessing” has some force or power, it’s all about the couple. And even that “dig” is pretty damn gentle. From yesterday’s ceremony:
No one who has the good fortune to share in these events as officiant has any real power to make a bond or create a commitment. There is no “power vested in me” or in anyone else to do anything other than act as a kind of official witness and town crier. The power in virtue of which XX & XY are joined resides in them, their choices, and their promises to each other.
