Today, I admit it: I joined a lot of you in viewing the Royal Wedding of HRSs William and Kate.
NOT live: that’s why God allowed DVRs to be invented. I do also have a 10 year old granddaughter who wants to see what a “princess wedding” really looks like, but not at 3 AM CDT. Picture me scheduling a “wedding watching party” for sometime this weekend.
Having done something in excess of 400 weddings in my pastoral life, I have a few opinions. Having now seen this one, I’ll offer a personal assessment of why half the world got up/tuned in/DVR’d this wedding:
1. The world LOVES spectacle. As I write this, much of this nation, and Alabama in particular, is cleaning up after record numbers of tornadoes, record death totals and communities flattened. Does “The Royal Wedding” offer any counterbalance that we also need to par-TEEE? Do we miss spectacle when we don’t get it….at a rock concert, in worship, in a Friday night get together?
2- Americans are still fascinated with the British. Even our flags have the SAME THREE COLORS! We don’t have official royalty, but we almost wish we did as we watch our Mother Country go pomp and circumstance all over the world.
3- For all their reputed “properness” the Brits still throw a great party! For women, it has now become about the HATS (eat your hearts out, Kentucky Derby debs!). Grab a bouquet, potted plants, or a four course salad—whatever fits on a head tray “glams” you up. And for guys? It is so now about the UNIFORM. Both William and Harry look like they’ve been basted in medals and ropes. Any military types reading this, PUT your dress uniform on TODAY and wear it somewhere. Or go get a hat. We will gawk admiringly.
4- Black remains forever “in” and “cool.” On suits, dresses, cars (Car and Driver Magazine, please do an article on the royals’ limos, SUVs and trucks!). Black also counterbalances the radically over-stitched clergy garb. I mean, would Jesus really do that much gold brocade? Or, honestly, am I just a bit jealous that I have no cape, no block-your-view hat and not even one liturgical weapon to point at people when I need order?
5- This wedding made media sense. Did I see a big screen at least NEAR Westminster Abbey?! LOTS of trumpets, a great choir, hymns with grit to their lyrics that people SANG, enough horses and carriages to add texture to the long lines of vehicles. Next time a praise band? If this be Anglicanism, maybe there’s hope for the (my tribe) Presbyterians yet. And the wedding prayer, in part composed by the Royal Couple, sounded almost like….wow, a PRAYER: thankful, honoring love and marriage and addressed to a God and to His Son who seemed invited as Supreme Officiant. Just as wild was the chairs set up in part where family armies faced each other. How refreshingly radical.
6- Conjecture here, but I think THIS marriage may mean more than just the wedding day. And may last. While I might wish a do-over on some of the living arrangements’ history, I’ll tip my wished-for-British-white-wig to the royals for getting to know each other, know a bit of royal expectations, pressures, and privileges. I hope they also nurture the faith, conflict skills, dreams and comebacks that go with all those sobering wedding vows.
7- [Ah, biblically perfect number!] I am glad that we are still fascinated with weddings even as we remain mystified by “marriage” and how to make marriage more durable. In a day where “a relationship” seems the measure of all things without a warranty, to fasten on two people half a world away saying out loud to millions the words that indicate I want to do life with you, I see a future with you, I am even committed to grow old with you, those markers signal deeper stuff at work here.
So, now Duke William and Duchess Kate, Mr. and Mrs. Royal Couple, you other marrieds, you “in relationships” and you “in recovery,” I wish you all God’s incredible wonder, guidance, safety, forgiveness, challenges and hang-on-ness to the True Royal who shows up frequently at weddings as the Prince of Peace.
Quite a lure, this wedding, and I’m glad I can now view it at my somewhat tech savvy leisure.
Oh, and thanks be to God.
Good insight…If you’ll check CNN today, you’ll see nothing but wedding (hard to find anything about tornadoes). Foxnews is the exact opposite. Go Fox!!