Catholic brides: problems with timing of ceremony and reception

Do you mean lunch in addition to your planned reception or does that mean you're not serving food at the reception? A daytime reception is pretty common. My friend had her wedding around 2 o'clock with a BBQ type lunch reception following the ceremony.

Im getting married in the catholic church and they didn't tell us we couldn't have our wedding after 2pm. In your case I would have it as close to that time as possible and move up my reception time.

Thanks! I live in a small farming town, and the reception is 30 min away. (I know! long drive, but most of our guests ate local and its totally the norm where I'm from. The reception will have dinner, drinks, etc.

In that case I would either move the reception time up to follow your reception or go with Samantha's idea to fill it with activities.

I'd move the reception up to be after the ceremony. For some of those guests, you're talking about almost a 12 hour day. It's too long.

Are you doing a full mass or only a Catholic ceremony? If you have your ceremony start at 2PM, it could end at 3 - 3:30 depending on your officiant. Then, that is only an hour of down time if you start your reception at 5PM. We are having 2 hours between our ceremony and reception & are giving our guests a tour of Key West and then time to freshen up.

The "rule" about having the ceremony before 2 is probably specific to your church. We are getting marred in the Catholic church & our ceremony starts at 3PM.

Is your reception location in a hotel, or somewhere were guests can easily find something to do? It doesn't sound like it, but I wanted to ask. I would have your reception start at 5PM at the latest.

I had the same problem! There is saturday mass at our church that is why our priest wanted a 1pm wedding time.

We are having a break... Cocktail hour starts at 4pm. All of our guests but a few are family so they will be involved in pictures. This is the first time we will all be together in years. The hotel has a bar and its a 30 min drive from the church so that will eat some time.

I don't think a small break is a big deal. Are you doing a full mass?

We had a 2pm Saturday wedding (because they have a 4:30pm evening Mass) and our reception started with cocktail hour at 4pm ... our guests had a little less than an hour to get themselves from the church to the reception venue which was about 15-20 mins away. As far as I know, none of our guests complained about waiting but I am sure that our venue allowed them to come inside prior to 4pm because they were a lovely place to work with. It was also a fabulous day weather wise so they were able to enjoy being outside.

Our ceremony is at 1 and our reception likely won't start until 5 or 5:30. our reception venue is about 30-40mins away from the church, so we're hoping this will give guests time to travel to the venue and get checked into their hotels (if they're choosing to stay in one). we're not planning any activities for our guests.

I'm not sure on this, but you might want to do a separate RSVP card for the reception if you are having a large time gap and a 30 minute drive. Like Celia said, for some guests that is a long day for them, especially those from out of town or with kids.

I grew up in a Catholic family where there were ALWAYS 1-3 hour breaks between the ceremony and reception. People just did their own thing. I didn't even realize that some people did NOT have breaks in between until I got to college and began to attend other peoples' weddings. FH and I are not having a break (because we are getting married at our reception venue and not in a church), but I think most people understand that there will be a break if your ceremony is early. They can go to a local bar, go back to the hotel, hang out with family, etc. I wouldn't worry too much about it.

We had a Cayholic ceremony at 3:00 and our cocktail hour started at 6:00. There was a 45 minute drive between church and reception site (we provided transportation), so I think guests had a little over an hour of downtime. There was a separate bar at our hotel (where we had the reception). Most of our guests just hung out at the bar for a bit.

It wasn't ideal, but we didn't have much of an option because our reception venue doesn't start cocktail hour before 6:00. Maybe on your website, provide a list of local activities for your guests to do.

My cousin had a 2-3 HR gap between ceremony and reception. Her parents invited people over to their house between ceremony and reception, and served drinks and light appetizers (just soda, beer, chips, dip, cheeses, etc).

Ok - I am doing the same thing - and I have gone to Catholic weddings all my life (as have many of our guests). I assume you have as well since it is your family's church and you are very adamant about getting married in this church.

It's just the way Catholic weddings are and people know that. I have never heard anyone complain about the gap at any of the weddings I have been to. In fact, this whole "reception has to start right after the wedding" was totally foreign to me until I started hearing about it here. Even non-Catholic weddings I have been to had a gap of at least 2-3 hours. Sorry - just never been to a wedding without one.

As far as suggestions - what we are doing to keep people "entertained" because we are getting married in a small town and there is almost nothing to do - we are having people over to my mom's for a mini-between time Cinco de Mayo-esque get together. If people don't want to go they don't have to (the hotel is only 1 mile from the ceremony site.