Is the Holy Spirit calling you to choose a Catholic wedding favor for your guests? Are you worried your Catholic wedding favors will cause a scene between your new husband and your extended relatives (especially your cantankerous rich great Aunt); do you envision all of the non-Catholics in the room storming off in a huff from the reception hall, so offended that a Catholic may dare give them a Catholic gift?
Be at peace. Do not be anxious. Be prudent. Whatever wedding favor you choose, be joyfully and authentically Catholic.
My husband and I gave each of our 250 guests blessed rosaries that we had spent our entire engagement making (and praying). They were made with various colors of glass beads, with either Saints Therese of Lisieux, Teresa of Calcutta, or John Paul II connector pieces, nicely tied together in a bow with a navy blue ribbon and sitting around our simple red rose centerpiece (the picture below shows one of our tables). Accompanying the rosary wedding favors were beautiful homemade bookmarks. These explained how to pray the rosary, the significance, and the importance of the rosary to me and my husband. None of our non-Catholic friends or family members had any issues with it. Yes, some looked curiously and took it home, and others left the gift on the table not interested.
Here are some of the rosaries that we made (now the extras are used by my husband and I and our children during our family rosary together):
When you are thinking about giving your guests a Catholic wedding favor, here are some things you may want to consider:
What is your budget? In order to be financially prudent, you may want to lean towards something homemade. In addition to saving money, guests are more likely to appreciate something that you made, as opposed to something you bought that was purchased cheaply such as a “made in China” plastic rosary. Since homemade favors tend to be more labor-intensive and time-consuming, you may also want to consider delegating specific tasks to your bridesmaids or groomsmen early in your engagement.
What Catholic prayers or devotions have been spiritually beneficial to your relationship with your fiancé? How can you share this with your guests as a gift so they, too, can benefit spiritually? My husband and I met participating in Saint Paul Street Evangelization, which involved praying with people and passing out rosaries in the streets of downtown Columbus, Ohio. So, it was an easy decision for us to give our guests rosaries and to share in the prayer that had so shaped our relationship. You may consider giving your guests prayer cards about how to pray your favorite devotion or other physical item related to it. This can be a great moment of evangelization to share a physical and spiritual gift with each of your guests. Giving such a personal gift will surely be received well, be remembered, and cherished as having been given on your wedding day.
Guests appreciate special mementos of the wedding day. Consider customizing small holy water bottles, traditional holy family prayer cards, refrigerator magnets, or a small prayer candle. Each could include your names, wedding date, a prayer, and most importantly, an exhortation to pray for you and your future marriage. Such items are a helpful way for the guests to continue to remember to pray for your marriage after your wedding!
As an example, here is a personalized prayer card that my sister-in-law recently received as a favor from a wedding (found on the Shower of Roses Shoppe):
Consider your wedding favor gift prudently and prayerfully with your fiancé. We placed the rosaries and explanatory bookmarks around the centerpiece as part of the decoration so that each guest could choose the color of their rosary and bookmark, or they could choose to just leave it all alone. You may consider making, as we did, a bookmark-sized explanation in your own words about the personal nature of your gift (whatever it may be) and its spiritual significance. This helps any curious and open hearted non-Catholics better understand the spiritual aspect, it helps everyone to get to know you better, and it makes the gift more personal. Prayerfully consider other ways to explain your gift in a way to help non-Catholics understand its value and importance and help Catholics cherish it as well. For example, you could ask your priest to help. We invited the Dominican priest who presided at our wedding mass to the reception, allowing him the opportunity to give a short explanation of the rosary using the huge rosary he was wearing at his waist as an example.
Here is a picture of the bookmark that we made as an explanation of our rosary favor. (I enjoyed reminiscing on the great number of beads and time spent making all of the rosaries).
I hope this encourages you to be authentically, joyfully, and courageously Catholic in your wedding favor gift. As we heard in today’s second reading at mass, do not be afraid nor be troubled, but do be ready to explain your Catholic wedding favor. It may be an evangelical opportunity for you and your fiancée. Explain your gift with gentleness and reverence, ready to suffer for doing what is good (cf. 1 Peter 3:13-16). Be assured of our daily prayers for you as your wedding approaches.
Anna at Cana
Married December 15, 2015 at Saint Patrick Church in Columbus, Ohio
Mother of three on Earth and 1 in heaven
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