Jewish/Catholic Ceremony

Have you spoken with the Catholic priest yet? Some won't do an interdenom wedding and/or not in a church. I'd get that one nailed down ASAP.

Hey Allison! I'm Catholic, so I can't help much on the Jewish side of it. But, you cannot have a Catholic ceremony outside of a Catholic church unless under extreme circumstances. This *may* be one of those because you and your FH are of different faiths, but it's always best for you or your FH to check with his church or your local archdiocese.

Good luck!

My mom wanted me to have a catholic ceremony but I wasn't too excited to marry inside a church. I wanted an outside wedding, and you can't have a catholic wedding anywhere except the church. So you may want to look into that and maybe explore some different options.

Oy! Ok - thanks!

Actually, you CAN get married outside of a church, but the priest needs to agree to it. Some are more modern than others.

This will help:

http://www.foryourmarriage.org/catholic-marriage/faqs/

I think it's more likely that you will have to have a Jewish ceremony and then have your marriage convalidated by the Catholic Church, or you will have to have a Catholic ceremony in a Catholic Church. They're pretty picky about that.

Also! Something we're doing that maybe an option. We were civilly married on the 25th by a Justice of the Peace. In the next month or so, however, we'll be heading into my church to have a convalidation ceremony performed by my priest. We went through all the prep and requirements normally needed to be married in the Catholic church. So, it could be an option for you all!

ETA - I'm speaking from Roman Catholic standards, which I have never understood to do marriages outside of the church unless for extreme circumstances.

For the ceremony to qualify for the sacrament of marriage in the Catholic church, it would have to be held actually in the church. Sometimes couples can get a dispensation from their bishop and have a priest perform one elsewhere, but it is rare.

You could have a Catholic priest "witness" the marriage, though. I've usually only heard of this happening in a church or temple of another religion, but some may witness weddings held outside or in non-religious settings as well. It wouldn't qualify as the sacrament, but if that doesn't matter to your FH then there's nothing wrong with it. But this is one of those things that you need to talk to a priest about ASAP.

We went to a wedding who had a priest and rabbi - it was an hour.

Our wedding Saturday had an officiant who incorporated both Jewish and catholic religions. We did the stomping on the glass at the end. It was 19 minutes.

I went to a Jewish/Catholic ceremony of a cousin of mine. It was held at a country club, but I believe your FH needs to speak to his priest right away because typically there are prohibitions against having a Catholic ceremony outside of the church. It does happen though -- I've seen it.

The Jewish parts of the ceremony that were included involved all four of the parents standing next to the bride and groom at the altar (as opposed to Catholic ceremonies in which the parents are seated in the front row). There was a chuppah they all stood under. The rabbi (she actually wore a rhinestone yarmulke) read from the Old Testament and incorporated traditional Jewish readings. The bride was at the right side of the groom, not the left as is cutomary in Catholic ceremonies, and they did do the Kiddushin (cups of wine). They also did the breaking of the glass under the groom's foot, and I'm sure a Ketubah was signed. I remember hearing Hebrew.

Honestly, I think the Jewish traditions took more time that the Catholic traditions. The priest read from the NT, talked about the meaning of 1 Corinthians 13, spoke about the meaning of marriage and faith. There was no wedding mass or eucharist.

If you're going to do a mixed faith ceremony, a program is really helpful. For your Catholic guests, the origins and meanings of the Jewish customs are a mystery, and they'll appreciate understanding the significance of what they're seeing. Likewise for the Jewish guests who are unfamiliar with the Catholic ceremony. It will be beautiful, I'm sure.

Some (read most) Rabbis will not perform an interfaith marriage - Jews are all about maintaining the religion and all that jazz. You might get lucky with a super liberal reform Rabbi or cantor, but even that might be difficult depending on the time of your wedding (before sundown? forget about it).

I think a really great option is to have a non-religious officiant incorporate certain parts of each religion's traditions. Can't help much on the Catholic front (maybe read a few important prayers?), but to incorporate the Jewish parts of the wedding you can have a Chuppah, share a glass of wine during the service, break the glass, and present the ketubah.

Thankfully, I work for a temple (reform) and the Rabbi actually came up to me and assumed he was marrying us (it was really sweet). He was the one who spurred this post by asking me to start thinking of which Jewish things we want to keep and which we want to get rid of.

Sorry this is long but this is copied from what my Catholic priest told me about Catholic marriages: If you are both Catholic, you can only get married in a Catholic Church or Chapel. If you were marrying a non-Catholic, you would be allowed to get married in the protestant Church to Chapel if it is their home parish or has a significant reason (such as, the pastor is a relative, and he is doing the ceremony). But even if one is non-Catholic, you would not be allowed to get married outside (in a park, backyard, garden, beach, etc.) or in another meeting that is not a church or chapel. According to the laws of the Church and the regulations of the bishop, a priest cannot celebrate any ceremony outside a church, or even be present at a ceremony outside of a church that involves a catholic.

@Allison, that's wonderful. My Rabbi (also reform) will not marry us because we are getting married before sunset on a Saturday. I get it, but it stinks because I really don't want to wait until 8:15 PM (we're getting married in August) to start our ceremony.

As a civil officiant, I frequently get the couples of mixed faiths and incorporate a bit of each into their ceremonies.

In fact, DH & I were married by a civil officiant because he was raised Jewish and I was raised Lutheran. I figured if it worked for us, it would work for other couples and so got into the wedding biz!

@8815 I am sorry! So archaic - I wish organized religions would buckle down and get with the modern times! Sometimes I want to eliminate all organized religion from the ceremony because they make it difficult. Catholicism and Judaism should be more approachable, IMHO. (end rant).

I had a Catholic/Methodist wedding. I'm not much help on the Jewish traditions but I would think you need to decide whether you're going to be married in the Catholic Church (priest would be officiant but many times will allow another religious party to say blessings, etc) or somewhere else. I would be very surprised if a priest came as a co-celebrant at a ceremony led by a rabbi unless you were very close to him.

Not sure how active this group still is...

http://www.jcdg.org/home.asp