Terry & Doug's Wedding: The Ceremony

Words of Welcome

Welcome. We have joyfully come together this afternoon as family and friends to witness and celebrate a new union -- the marriage of Terry and Doug. This wedding today is a public celebration of the commitment that has already taken place between them.

Rumi said it well:

“The minute I heard my first love story
I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was

Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere,
They’re in each other all along.

I am Mayuri, Terry’s Diamond Heart teacher, and am very honored to be officiating this afternoon.

I want to welcome family who have come from afar, Doug’s Dad, Grant, and sister, Robin. Both Doug’s children, Sam and Abby are here, as is Terry’s son, Boma.

Terry's sister, Tammy, is here, and she and Terry’s other siblings are sending Terry and Doug on a trip to a spa in Bodega Bay.

But whether you are friends or family, each one of you here is special in the lives of Terry and Doug. Your presence here is very important to them and the greatest gift you bring them.

Marriage is the soul saying “Yes” to another soul. It is the public expression of a personal desire to move and walk beside another. And it is the beginning of an exploration of intimacy and union, not just with another human being, but with the Divine.

Terry and Doug want you to know that their deepest aspiration is to live truth in both it’s personal and ultimate sense, that the love of truth is at the heart of their union.

They see their union as a journey of unfolding into a truer life, individually and together, and that means living and expressing that in their daily lives -- with each other, their families, and their communities. So look out!

They know that marriage is a mystery. It will be a journey of unfolding and discovery of themselves and each other. But although it is a mystery, they know their union has infinite possibilities for intimate expansion.

When Terry and Doug stood up in their Diamond Heart group with over 200 people present and announced to Hameed, the founder of our spiritual path, that they were getting married, Hameed said he felt something was going on, that it was very shiny around them. And, when Doug said, “Terry is always shiny,” Hameed’s response was “That’s a very good reason to marry her”!

"Looking for Your Face" by Rumi

Here is a video of this next segment of the ceremony. If you are unable to see the video, following is an audio file (remember to press the start button twice, slowly), as well as the words and pictures.

From the beginning of my life
I have been looking for your face
but today I have seen it

Today I have seen
the charm, the beauty,
the unfathomable grace
of the face
that I was looking for

Today I have found you
and those who laughed
and scorned me yesterday
are sorry that they were not looking
as I did

I am bewildered by the magnificence
of your beauty
and wish to see you
with a hundred eyes

My heart has burned with passion
and has searched forever
for this wondrous beauty
that I now behold

I am ashamed
to call this love human
and afraid of God
to call it divine

Your fragrant breath
like the morning breeze
has come to the stillness of the garden
You have breathed new life into me
I have become your sunshine
and also your shadow

My soul is screaming in ecstasy
Every fiber of my being
is in love with you

Your effulgence
has lit a fire in my heart
and you have made radiant for me
the earth and sky

My arrow of love
has arrived at the target
I am in the house of mercy
and my heart
is a place of prayer

Invocation

So we welcome you to bring your full attention to being here with Terry and Doug. Take some gentle breaths into your hearts, smell the sweet fragrance of the air as you breathe, feel the blessing of the sun and feel our home, the earth beneath your feet. Take a moment of silence to connect with yourself and your surrounding and the circle of friends and loved ones here.

"The Tao of Marriage"

Our Diamond Heart Small Group teacher, Rosanne Annoni, read this inspiring piece to us. We were very touched by the truths in this reading, and by Rosanne's heart-felt delivery.

The deepest intimacy with the beloved becomes possible when we have experienced intimacy with the self. Intimacy with the self means awakening to our true nature. The old Zen stories say, about a Master’s enlightenment, “Suddenly he was intimate”.

“Go deeper than love,” D.H. Lawrence wrote, “for the soul has greater depths.” The willingness to go deeper than love itself is a kind of love. A desire to meet the beloved beyond desire, in the luminous darkness where there is no self, no other. For this meeting, a man and a woman must be whole enough in themselves to step out of themselves, into the place of mutual transformation. They are able to surrender everything they know, everything they love, with the abandon a Master has at the hour of death. Transformation is a death. It is also a birth, and can be as painful as any physical birth. Painful or ecstatic, it requires fundamental trust. “Into your hand I commit my spirit.”

A man and a woman who enter into this depth of intimacy find themselves standing in the garden where Adam and Eve stood. All things are possible for them. The ancient Chinese sage Tzu-ssu said, “For the mature person, the Tao begins in the relation between man and woman, and ends in the infinite vastness of the universe.” They have traced their love for each other back to the root of love, the radiant non-self, the bodhisattva’s serene compassion. Like a wedding ring, it has no beginning, no end.

Our Vows

We composed our vows seperately, and neither one of us knew what the other was going to say until the ceremony. We both experienced joy and love writing our vows. We recited them aloud (when the other wasn't around!) and were each moved to tears.

Doug's vows began by playing for Terry the song "Make You Feel My Love" by Bob Dylan. He knew the first time he heard it that he wanted to play it for her at the wedding.

Here is a video of this segment. Again, if you can't see the video, following is a music plug in, plus the lyrics and pictures.

Here are the lyrics:

When the rain is blowing in your face
And the whole world is on your case
I could offer you a warm embrace
To make you feel my love

When the evening shadows and the stars appear
And there is no one there to dry your tears
I could hold you for a million years
To make you feel my love

I know you haven't made your mind up yet
But I would never do you wrong
I've known it from the moment that we met
No doubt in my mind where you belong

I'd go hungry, I'd go black and blue
I'd go crawling down the avenue
There's nothing that I wouldn't do
To make you feel my love

The storms are raging on the rollin' sea
And on the highway of regret
The winds of change are blowing wild and free
You ain't seen nothing like me yet

I could make you happy, make your dreams come true
Nothing that I wouldn't do
Go to the ends of the earth for you
To make you feel my love

Here are Doug's vows:

Today, before our children, family and friends, and with these spacious skies and hills as my witness, I dedicate myself to you, Terry – the outpouring of my heart – and to the life that we share together.

Today, and from this day on, I take you as my wife, and give myself to you as your husband, and will give myself to no other for the rest of my life.

I commit myself to you fully and completely, without reservation, and with unbounded love and joy.

I promise always to be open and honest with you, and to have no secrets.

I promise to bring perspective to our trials, and to make you smile and laugh, as you do, with every cell of your body, even when you least expect it.

I promise to respond with all of my heart, body and soul to your intoxicating heat and passion.

I promise to dedicate myself whole heartedly to my soul’s journey, and I promise to encourage and inspire you on your soul’s journey. Our life together will express and celebrate our love of the truth.

I promise you my love, my fullest devotion, my tenderest care -- in good times and in bad, when life seems easy and when it seems hard, when our love is simple, and when it is an effort. Through all our times together, I promise to cherish you and to hold you close.

Today, and for all the days of our lives, I celebrate with you the birth of a new union.

Here are Terry vows:

Well…… I have made my mind up…….

From the first day we met, love has been directing my course. I’ve had little to say about the depth and breadth of my love for you. The more I see who you are, the more my love for you expands.

As our relationship deepens, the feelings of limitless compassion, joy, delight and love challenge my ideas about how much connection there can be with another. I welcome this challenge.

I commit myself to growth, truth and discovering who I am. And I will celebrate your discovery of yourself.

I am committed to a lifelong expression of our deepest nature.

I will keep myself open to you, to let you see my innermost fears, joys, secrets and dreams.

You have entered my heart and I have watched the walls around it fall. So I say to you today that I will love you in good times and in bad, when life seems easy and when it gets difficult, when understanding is simple, and when it is an effort.

I will stand for you, care for you, laugh with you, hold you in the highest regard and love you.

I will spend my days at your side. We will share a lifetime of eternal, immeasurable love.

I give myself as I am and as I will be, and I do it for all of life.

Be my husband. And I will be your wife.

The Ceremony of the Rings

Terry, I give you this ring, as the pledge of my love, and as a symbol of
our unity.

Doug, I give you this ring, as the pledge of my love, and as a symbol of
our unity.

Pronouncement

You have chosen each other, have joyfully declared your love and purpose before your loving friends and family, and have made your pledge to each other symbolized by the giving and receiving of rings. I pronounce that you are man and wife.

May your love be everlasting. You may seal this union with a kiss.

Benediction

My blessing for you is
Wherever you go, may you always return to one another in your togetherness.
May you two find in each other, the love for which all men and women yearn.
May you grow in understanding and compassion.
May the home that you establish together, be such a place of
sanctuary, that many will find there, a friend.
May there come a time in your union when your spiritual practice and your marriage feel one and the same.

I have paraphrased a Hafiz poem as my prayer for this marriage:

May you be like
Two falling stars in the day sky.

Let no one know of your sublime beauty
As you hold hands with God

And burn
Into a sacred existence that defies—
That surpasses

Every description of ecstasy
And love.

I present you Doug and Terry as Husband and Wife.

Acknowledgment

We wanted to acknowledge our guests and thank them for bearing witness to our wedding. We were touched and moved by the support they gave us, by their presence, and their love. There is first a video of our acknowledgment and the following celebration. Once again, if you are unable to see the video, we have included a plug in as well as some pictures.