Complete Book of Wedding Vows (33 page)

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Authors: Diane Warner

Tags: #Family & Relationships, #Marriage, #test

BOOK: Complete Book of Wedding Vows
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Page 71
dark time in my life. With a love that will never falter and our abiding faith in one another, I vow to take you, _________________, as my husband/wife, to love you, honor you and cherish you now and forevermore, so help me God."
"God sent you to me, ________________, as a precious gift, to heal my broken heart. You have brought sunshine to my soul, joy to my days, and love to my life. I thank God for you and I take you this day as my husband/wife. May every day of our lives be full of an awareness of our existence for each other. My heart is open and my soul rejoices this day as we become one."
"_________________, you are the sunshine of my life after the storms, my sweet nectar after the bitterness of my days, and my joy after the painful seasons of sorrow. I will love you always and forever, my Godsend, my sweet husband/wife, my miracle healer, my lover, my friend. What grace God bestowed when He gave you to me, and I come to you today joyfully and without reservation, to take you as my lawfully wedded husband/wife, to hold and cherish forevermore. I promise to be faithful to you and to care for you in all circumstances of life, in good times and in bad, in joy and in sorrow, in sickness and in health, so help me God."
 
Page 72
Up Close and Personal
Kathy Welch, a single mother of two children, was reasonably happy with her life in Belmar, New Jersey. She says, "I had been divorced for four years and the last thing I ever wanted was to get remarried. I had made a pretty good life for myself and my children, working as a logistician/secretary for an Army hospital, and although money was really tight, we didn't think we were missing anything. The three of us were very happy. That is...until Joe came along!"
Kathy met Joe McLaughlin, a divorced father, through her children's Cub Scout and Little League baseball activities. They were friends for over a year before Joe finally asked her on an official "first date"; he was being honored at a Boy Scout dinner and asked if she wanted to go with him. After a year of dating, he proposed in a unique way: They had attended his secretary's wedding and stopped at his home between the ceremony and the reception; he asked Kathy to sit down in a swivel chair and close her eyes, which she did. Then, he spun her around and told her to open her eyes to see a huge banner on the wall that read, "Kathy, will you marry me?" He was down on his knees by this time and Kathy started to cry. Of course, she said yes.
Although Joe was a construction inspector/engineering technician, he was also a volunteer fireman, so their wedding had a fireman motif, from the reception to the bride/fireman wedding cake topper, to the little fireman hat place cards, to their wedding invitations and ceremony programs.
Their invitations read like this:
 
Page 73
Please join
Kathleen Mary Boyd Welch
and
Joseph Henry McLaughlin
as they take two flames
and
make them one
Friday, the ninth of June
Nineteen hundred and ninety-five
at six o'clock in the evening
Saint James Episcopal Church
605 Fourth Avenue
Bradley Beach, New Jersey
Their ceremony programs incorporated fire-related words from the Song of Solomon in the Bible:
Love bursts into flame and burns
like a raging fire
Water cannot put it out;
No flood can drown it.
Kathy says of their vows, "We knew our wedding had to be more personalized than our first ones had been. We knew that the traditional vows were nice, but we needed to say something more personal." And so, they wrote these beautifully worded vows, although the opening was borrowed. from a traditional Jewish veil-lifting ceremony:
 
Page 74
"O God, who has ordained marriage as the sanctification of the love of man and woman, I turn to Thee in prayer at this solemn moment. I thank Thee for him/her who is about to become my husband/wife and for our love for each other. Enable me to be a worthy wife/husband unto her/him. Grant that our marriage be marked by happiness and mutual devotion.
"Joe/Kathy, these words come from my heart with all my love; with everything I am and everything I have. I love you for what you are to me and what you are to others.
"I will be your wife/husband and your friend, showing pride as both. I will love you when we are together and when we are apart: to stand beside you through life's good times and bad; through sickness and health. I will show compassion when you are sad and joy when you are happy. I will encourage and support all your endeavors. I will give you honesty and sincerity. And I will accept and love your family as my own.
"I give my love, my soul, myself, only to you, starting today, until we are separated by God.
"Joe/Kathy, I give you this ring with all that I have and with all that I am. It represents my love for you and as that, it shows no beginning and no end. I ask that you wear it as an outward symbol of my love and that it may remind you and to show others, how much you mean to me."
By the way, their children served as their attendants and had a very important part in the ceremony.

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