After an eventful morning, it was finally time for our wedding! (If you’re just joining the story now, you need to go back about 6 years to when I met The Penpal while I was living in Japan)

Our wedding ceremony was held at St. Theresa’s Roman Catholic Church in West St. Paul, just north of Winnipeg. We picked the location because of the priest, the fantastic Father Mike. The small town prairie church also fit with our modest, sensibly sized wedding. Neither one of us wanted a lavish, fairy tale ceremony with hundreds of people. We ended up with a humble, intimate gathering of about 100.

Father Mike had known me for years, and when he learned that I was engaged, he insisted that he perform our wedding. I was raised Catholic, but I’m not what anyone would consider “active” in the church. The Penpal was not raised anything close to being Catholic. I brought this up with Father Mike, but he was not deterred at all. He even promised to learn Japanese if we asked!

During our marriage prep Father Mike contacted Catholic priests in Japan to get recommended readings and suggestions for a good bilingual bible. BTW – bible translation is a subject big enough for its own blog post. We didn’t end up making him learn Japanese, but we did teach him how to say “stand”, “sit”, “kneel”, and “pray” in Japanese to help The Penpal’s parents through the ceremony.

The ceremony itself was short and meaningful. We had readings in English and Japanese, and then Father Mike gave a brief speech about how The Penpal and I could share love with the world by being a good example for others. A common criticism of Catholic weddings or funerals is that the ceremony can be more about church and not enough about the people. Father Mike is an excellent speaker, and his sermon was just right for the occasion.

Other than being surrounded by family and friends, one of my favourite things about the wedding ceremony is that our photographer managed to capture what is possibly the only picture in existence of my father-in-law smiling. We obviously did something right 🙂