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Church wedding -
Is it Christian or Western?
Samuel Dowuona,
Ghanadot
Accra, April 19, Ghanadot.com - In my African Traditional
Religion class some time in the 1990’s I learnt that
marriage rites was both culturally and religiously based and
that every race or tribe or people - African, Asian,
Australian and European and American, have their own
marriage rites based on their own cultures which might have
evolved over the decades.
Indeed on all these continents there are different
countries, which are also made of different tribes and
ethnic groups, clans and families, all of which have
different marriage rites, even though there are similarities
in several cases.
There are for instance, the Indian marriage rites, where the
bride’s parents rather pay groom price, if you like, to the
groom’s parents to ask for the latter’s son’s hand in
marriage to their daughter, which is different from the
Japanese marriage rites, even though both countries are in
Asia. You would surely have some difference in marriage
rites in France and Germany for instance, and yet they are
both in Europe.
The break does not only stop at countries, it even goes all
the way to ethnic groups. For instance in Ghana, Akan
marriage rites are different from that of the Gas. Even
among the various ethnic groups, individual families have
difference in marriage rites.
In effect there is nothing universal about marriage rites,
except that it brings two people together for procreation..
The difference lies in the different cultures and that is
it!
But I believe God in heaven, the author of the institution
of marriage, in his Divine wisdom, created all the
diversities in cultures and for that matter rites of
marriage for all different people’s across the world.
The common thing in all of these diverse cultures however,
is that the result should reflect the approval of the
family, the state and the divine, which usually depends on
the faith of one or both parties in the marriage contract
Until the advent of Christian missionaries in Ghana, the
practice was customary marriage, which in its modern form,
involves paying a brides worth to the parents of the bride
in a marriage ceremony and registration of the marriage
contract with the state, where both parties and their
parents sign the certificate with an ordained religious
minister serving as a witness.
The practice, which is actually a complete marriage ceremony
has been reduced to mere engagement and in its place the
western form of church wedding has been adopted as the only
ceremony that completes the cycle of a marriage ceremony.
In effect most Ghanaians today never consider their marriage
legal and moral until they have gone through a formal church
wedding, which in its entirety is a western introduction.
In fact, in most western cultures, the engagement is when
the man meets the woman one on one and proposes marriage.
Some offer the lady an engagement ring at that point, some
offer necklace or some form of a condiment as a symbol of
their promise to marry (wed) the lady.
In the western world, weddings are conducted outside the
walls of the church than inside it. In fact it used to be a
taboo to conduct marriage ceremonies in the church. But in
Ghana today people are deceived into thinking that without a
flashy wedding in the church, it is not of God.
Before anybody thinks of me as a destructive critique of
church praxis, let me state categorically that I had a
wonderful church wedding five years ago. In fact we insisted
we wanted to have a simple customary marriage, signing
ceremony and then invite a minister either to the signing or
the customary marriage ceremony to bless the marriage. But I
insisted on a big church wedding because I thought then that
my fiancée deserved that honour so we did it.
But come to think of it, before western culture invaded
Africa, we had our marriage rites intact and it was not
faulted as incomplete until the white man came and faulted
it.
I remember when I got “engaged” to my wife (customary
marriage), I had to travel to Australia the next day. Her
parents insisted that she left their house and spent the
night with me in my house before I left. Their argument was
that as far as they were concerned we were married.
And rightly so because, there was a pastor at the customary
marriage ceremony who prayed over the ring and put it on my
wife’s finger and blessed our marriage, even though in my
absence. In certain cultures in Ghana, the man puts the
“engagement” ring on the woman’s finger himself after the
pastor’s prayer and that should be enough, especially if
they have signed the marriage certificate.
When I was very young, a Christian the pastor of one of the
first churches I attended, punished a couple for sleeping
together after their customary marriage, prior to their
church wedding! And that is not exclusive to that pastor,
because in Christendom today you dare not think of your
spouse as your wife or husband if all you have done is state
and customary marriage. You need to do a church wedding
before the church would recognise and consider your marriage
as blessed by God.
The question I ask myself is this, is there controversy or
contradiction in God? Why would he give a people one culture
and force another culture on others before he blesses them.
I once heard a pastor caution a couple in his church with a
curse for attempting to live together after their customary
marriage. And yet the pastors show up at the customary
marriage ceremonies and bless the marriage anyway.
Ridiculous, I can hear you say!
And mind you, customary marriage is a very expensive
ceremony too. In some cultures in Ghana some families demand
scores of cattle as bridal price before the ceremony itself
takes off.
What is the fuss about the expensive church weddings that
make people borrow money and become debtors after compelling
themselves to undertake flamboyant church weddings.
I am not questioning the performance of a ceremony that
allows the blessing of God and the recognition of the church
for our marriage. But should it be a full blown, flamboyant
and expensive wedding?
Marriages are performed in Japan, India, Israel, Fiji
Island, Samoa and all kinds of places in the world. These
are places where we have Christians. Do they also undertake
such huge and expensive church weddings just to seek the
approval of the church and God’s blessings on their
marriages?
I think what I am asking is this: “does God and for that
matter does the bible state or even suggest anywhere,
whether by implication, interpretation or direct quotation
that without church wedding our marriages are not of God”?
Why on earth do people compel themselves into this tight
corner even when they obviously are not in the position
financially to do so
There is this couple in the United States of America, who
now live together after their customary marriage, which was
attended by a pastor who prayed for them at the event. They
got customarily married before they joined their current
church and the pastor refused to acknowledge their marriage
because they have not had a wedding in the church.
In their bid to do “the right thing by the pastor” they
bought wedding rings on credit for US$5000. Now the wedding
hasn’t come on yet, because they have no more money to do
it. They now want to buy a house but they have messed up
their credit so badly no one is willing to give them a loan
for their house.
That is a deception from the pit of hell. I believe we must
advise our people to drift more towards our ways of doing
things and stop this mental slavery, making people think God
only shows up in your marriage if you do a church wedding.
I know lots of people, who signed marriage certificate,
witnessed and blessed by a pastor and then did customary
marriage and they are moving on great with their marriages.
You see, I am only concerned .
Samuel Dowouna, Accra, April 19, 2007, Ghanandot
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