Wedding Guest Etiquette Question

Bubs711

Just out of curiosity, when you are invited to a wedding, do you go to both the church and the reception?

 I would never have thought about doing otherwise, but DH's family often just goes to the reception.  I feel like if you're invited to a wedding, you are invited to be a witness at the ceremony.  We had a disagreement about this earlier.  We are invited to his cousin's daughter's wedding today.  The ceremony was at 2:00.  The reception isn't until 5:00 (so I'm home in between).  DH refused to go to the church so I went by myself.  It was slightly embarrassing when his aunt (the bride's GM) asked where he (and everyone else) was.  I realized that there was nobody from DH's immediate family group there besides me - my FIL/StepMIL and SIL and her family are apparently all only going the reception as well. 

What do you ladies think?

AndyKit724

To be honest... I don't like that.  If I'm invited to a wedding, I attend both.  Unless something gets in the way.  I can understand if something comes up and you speak to them ahead of time.  Not showing up to the wedding and just the ceremony, sends the wrong message to me.  But, that's just my opinion. 

KellyA724

I agree...if I'm invited, I go to both. I feel like just going to the reception (without a good reason) is like saying that you're just there for the party.

 However, I couldn't tell you who was at my wedding ceremony. Aside from the people that I could see in the pictures afterwards, my focus was solely on getting down the aisle and getting hitched :-)

JMU_Bride09

I would agree that that is a little odd.  At our wedding, we had a few people attend the Mass who were unable to make it to the reception, but they had spoken to us about it prior to the wedding.  I suppose that if someone was unable to make it to the ceremony but could still attend the wedding they could speak to the bride and groom beforehand about it, although I think I would feel a little weird coming to the "party" and not the marriage rite itself (unless I was family).

l337Jacqui

i have heard of this happening, but mostly if the wedding is like on a friday, and people can't make the ceremony because of work, but they still attend the reception. also, if there is a huge gap in between the ceremony and reception, it seems like people will usually attend one or the other because it's such a huge time waster in the middle. i've never done it though!

Amerbutt81

I think this is a complet a-hole thing to do.  That's basically saying "I'm here for the free food, and that's it."

 Just my opinion though.

tailspin430

I definitely would never do this, and I would be offended if anyone did this to me. Really, I enjoy going to the ceremony, especially if I know the couple well. I think that only going to the reception sends the message that you only want to party on somebody else's dime. I think that getting invited to someone's wedding means that they want you to witness their marriage, not buy you drinks.

GracefulMeadow86

i agree with everybody else. that's super sh!tty.

a few people in ziggys family (extended) wanted to do this for our weddign and when i found out about it, i FLIPPED OUT. im pretty sure ziggys mom told them how much it hurt me that they wanted to do this, because they ended up showing up to both lol.

i just think its totally rude and the WEDDING is to witness the marriage. its not just for the free booze...thats just an added bonus.

i would, however, consider comign to the ceremony only and skip the reception if i didnt have tiem for both (but id let them know that i so they wouldnt be paying for seats for us at the reception). the ceremony is the more important part to attend IMO

lburkey21

I would never even think to go to just the reception and not the ceremony. As a guest, you're invited to both, because the bride and groom want you to be there witness their marriage. If they didn't, they'd just get married at the courthouse and have a reception some other time. People tend to forget that the whole point of the day is the actual marraige - so without the ceremony, there is no reception.

DH and I actually had to miss a ceremony once. The wedding was Friday and DH had a basketball game and there was no way for us to get to the ceremony. We let the bride and groom know and they insisted that we still come to the reception - the whole time I felt so bad about it though.

SweetCFly

GracefulMeadow86:

i just think its totally rude and the WEDDING is to witness the marriage. its not just for the free booze...thats just an added bonus.

i would, however, consider comign to the ceremony only and skip the reception if i didnt have tiem for both (but id let them know that i so they wouldnt be paying for seats for us at the reception). the ceremony is the more important part to attend IMO

Agreed.  With all the above PPs.  I would be so pissed if people skipped my ceremony and came straight to the reception.  IMO, the ceremony is absolutely the most important part.  In fact, in the past DH and I have been to wedding ceremonies only, when we weren't able to go to the actual reception.  One wedding we went to we drove an hour to go to the ceremony only; it was the same day as my HS reunion.  I still wanted to go see my friend walk down the aisle though and was honored she invited me to be a part of her day.

It is 100% sh*tty  to only attend the reception (ETA: unless like LBurkey said above, it's a special situation with which you have spoken to the couple about personally).  My opinion.