Readings
You can personalise your ceremony with a piece of verse or prose , a selection of which is below . This could be read by you or one of your guests . You can choose your own readings , something more meaningful to you and your ceremony , please note they cannot have any religious content .
You can include your reading choices when you submit the online ceremony planning form in advance of the ceremony .
A Walled Garden k
Unknown ‘ Your marriage ’, he said , ‘ should have within it , a secret and protected place , open to you alone . Imagine it to be a walled garden , entered by a door to which you only hold the key . Within this garden you will cease to be a mother , father , employee , homemaker or any other of the roles which you fulfil in daily life . Here you are yourselves , two people who love each other . Here you can concentrate on one another ’ s needs ’. So take my hand and let us go back to our garden . The time we spend together is not wasted but invested . Invested in our future and the nurture of our love .
A Marriage k
A marriage … Makes of two fractional lives a whole ;
Mark Twain
it gives to two purposeless lives a work , and doubles the strength of each to perform it ; it gives to two questioning natures a reason for living , and something to live for ; it will give a new gladness to the sunshine , a new fragrance to the flowers , a new beauty to the earth , and a new mystery to life .
I promise kt
Dorothy R Colgan I promise to give you the best of myself and to ask of you no more than you can give . I promise to respect you as your own person and to realise that your interests , desires and needs are no less important than my own . I promise to share with you my time and my attention and to bring joy , strength and imagination to our relationship . I promise to keep myself open to you , to let you see through the window of my world into my innermost fears and feelings , secrets and dreams . I promise to grow along with you , to be willing to face changes in order to keep our relationship alive and exciting . I promise to love you in good times and in bad with all I have to give and all I feel inside in the only way I know how . Completely and forever .
Where there is love kt
Where there is love the heart is light , Where there is love the day is bright , Where there is love there is a song , To help when things are going wrong Where there is love there is a smile To make all things seem more worthwhile , Where there is love there ’ s quiet peace , A tranquil place where turmoil ’ s cease- Love changes darkness into light And makes the heart take “ wingless flight ”.
Helen Steiner Rice
Extract from Les Miserables kt Victor Hugo You can give without loving , but you can never love without giving . The great acts of love are done by those who are habitually performing small acts of kindness . We pardon to the extent that we love . Love is knowing that even when you are alone , you will never be lonely again . And great happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved . Loved for ourselves . And even loved in spite of ourselves .
Look to this day kt
Look to this day for it is life the very life of life .
Unknown
In its brief course lie all the realities and truths of existence ; the joy of growth , the splendour of action , the glory of power . For yesterday is but a memory . And tomorrow is only a vision . But today well lived makes every yesterday a memory of happiness and every tomorrow a vision of hope . Look well , therefore , to this day .
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