We’ve said it before, inspiration can strike from anywhere. Recently, while looking through a wedding album on social media, we saw a koozie that said, “to have and to hold and to keep your beer cold,” or something along those lines. This typical Southern wedding favor got us thinking about the phrase, “to have and to hold,” which snowballed into a wedding vow rabbit hole. What are the different vow traditions of various religions and cultures? Do they have specific origins? And many more questions that came about during our deep dive.
Because of the vast number of beautiful cultures and religions around the world we’re turning this into a series. The first vows we are looking at are Catholic, Celtic and Cherokee. While these are just quick snippets of religious and cultural histories, we encourage everyone to take a look at their own backgrounds and family traditions when planning weddings or curating wedding vows.
What you often see in movies is typically a variation of Christian and Catholic wedding vows. These vows, or some version of them, were supposedly first written in Thomas Cranmer’s “The Book of Common Prayers,” which was written in the mid-1500’s, with a final revision made by James 1 in the 1600’s and is the version still used by the Church of England to this day.
The Catholic wedding has two Vatican-approved vow options:
I, (name), take you, (name), to be my wife/husband. I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love you and honor you all the days of my life.
I, (name), take you, (name), for my lawful wife/husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part.
In our Cultural Traditions series we’ve looked into the Celtic wedding tradition of hand fasting. Hand fasting is pretty self-explanatory, in that a couples’ hands are bound together as a sign of their commitment to each other. But while researching Celtic wedding vows, we think those – over hand fasting – actually might be the star of the show.
Our search found a few Celtic vows that a couple could choose from.
One The Knot magazine labeled as “traditional” read:
Today, we swear by love and peace to stand, hand to hand and heart to heart. Mark, O Spirit, and hear us now, this we confirm our Sacred Vow.
Another that we like – probably because it was partially repeated on the TV show “Outlander” – goes:
Ye are Blood of my Blood, and Bone of my Bone.
I give ye my Body, that we Two might be One.
I give ye my Spirit, ’til our Life shall be Done.
You cannot possess me for I belong to myself
But while we both wish it, I give you that which is mine to give
You cannon command me, for I am a free person
But I shall serve you in those ways you require
and the honeycomb will taste sweeter coming from my hand.
The third vow we found read:
I pledge my love to you, and everything that I own.
I promise you the first bite of my meat and the first sip from by cup.
I pledge that your name will aways be the name I cry aloud in the dead of night.
I promise to honor you above all others.
Our love is never-ending, and we will remain, forevermore, equals in our marriage.
This is my wedding vow to you.
After reading those, it’s hard to argue that the Celtic and Scottish people don’t have a certain flair when it comes to vows.
And finally for this part of the series, we’re looking at Cherokee wedding vows. There are many beautiful ceremonies and traditions Native Americans take part in, usually very spiritual, connected to nature in some way and involving multiple generations.
When looking specifically for vows, we actually found more prayers. We looked for an explanation on whether they could be interchangeable or are one in the same, but unfortunately not a lot is available online (that can be verified) about Native American weddings.
One prayer/vow we found said:
God in heaven above, please protect the ones we love. We honor all you created as we pledge our hearts and lives together. We honor Mother Earth and ask for our marriage to be abundant and grow stronger through the seasons. We honor fire and ask that our union be warm and glowing with love in our hearts. We honor the wind and ask that we sail through life safe and calm as in our father’s arms. We honor water 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 as we grow forever young together. Amen.
A site called the American Wedding Blog cited this as a Cherokee vow:
“Today, Great Spirit (Unetlanvhi) blesses us and makes us a family. May our love be as solid as the mountain, and as open-hearted as the sky. May our anger pass as quickly as a storm, and our joys shine upon our hearts like the sun. And may our love be powerful and ever-new as the river, carrying us home all the days of our lives. Here, before our friends, family, and ancestors, I pledge my love to you.”
Another site led us to something called the Rite of Seven Steps. This part of the wedding, however, will have to be its own post.
Want to hear more about certain religious or culturally specific wedding vows? Email us at LTEC@myneworleans.com!
