Charge for the Couple #1

Bride and Groom, you have made a very serious and important decision in choosing to marry each other today.

You are entering into a sacred covenant as life partners.

As in tending the flowers in a garden, the quality of your marriage will reflect the effort you put into nurturing this relationship.

You have the opportunity to go forward from this day to create a faithful, kind, and tender relationship.

We bless you this day.

It is up to you to keep the blessings flowing each and every day of your lives together.

We wish for you the wisdom, compassion, and constancy to create a peaceful sanctuary in which you can both grow in love.

Groom, do you understand and accept this responsibility, and do you promise to do your very best each day to create a loving, healthy, and happy marriage?

Groom: Yes, I do.

Bride, do you understand and accept this responsibility, and do you promiseto do your very best each day to create a loving, healthy, and happy marriage?

Bride: Yes, I do.

Charge for the Couple #2

Bride and Groom, by entering into the covenant of marriage today you are declaring your faith in each other.

You have indeed earned this faith and trust by creating a sound foundation for this marriage.

Your task now is to build on this solid  base.

Imbue your loving  partnership with the caring, trust, vulnerability, and kindness that are essential to a healthy marriage relationship.

In dedicating yourselves to these values you will create a marriage that is a source of joy, in which you may both grow in love and find fulfillment.

Know that you will be tested by the routines of daily life, by chance and circumstance, and by the full cycle of the seasons of life.

Know that together you must encounter life’s sorrow no less than its sweetness, its frustration along with its grace and ease,   its disappointments along with its fulfillment.

Enter your marriage confident in the love and trust you have already created between you.

As you go forward in your journey together as husband and wife, devote yourselves to living according to the vows you share today.

Keep your love alive with your openness to each other and your enthusiasm for each other.

You hold each other’s hearts in the palms of your hands.

Be gentle caregivers, honoring this trust.

Let this be a marriage that enhances your individuality and allows you to know the greatest gift that God has given us— the ability to love one another and to be loved.

Is  it  in  this  spirit and for this purpose that you have come here to be joined together?

Bride and Groom: Yes, it is.