Do you like attending ceremonies? If so, which do you find particularly enjoyable or moving?
I am not a fan, whether they are professional, religious, civic, or academic. I don’t even like going to my own ceremonies. I do look forward to and enjoy the after parties or receptions a great deal.
We can define a ceremony as a formal religious or public occasion, especially one celebrating a particular event, achievement, or anniversary (Oxford).
I hate ceremonies. I have a passionate dread of mindless pageantry in all its forms
Has anyone involved actually enjoyed a wedding? These are the most nerve-wracking money-sinks that most families ever put on, and I don’t think any of the principals really enjoy it. There’s the occasional uncle who gets drunk on the free booze and has a blast, but the participants are stressed to the max.
To that end, my wife has offered our daughter the option of skipping the whole ceremony and pocketing the amount we would have spent (for their house down payment or whatever).
I wonder if there’s a study somewhere that maps wedding expense to marriage length. I’d bet a few large it’s an inverse correlation.
To answer the OP: “No. I can’t think of any ceremonies I actually enjoyed.”
Ditto.
I’ll gnaw my own leg off to avoid a ceremony. Fortunately, I didn’t go to my own high school graduation. I continue to utilize that precedent to avoid going to others, and I’m utterly shameless about it.
Some are worse than others. Quinceañeras are interminably dull and essentially pointless. I try to arrive several hours after the “start time,” because even then the food still isn’t ready and nobody has arrived.
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No, I don’t.
My son had a rather expensive wedding. It was basically so his FIL, a car dealer, could make a big splash. It didn’t affect their marriage though. They are still married, apparently happily so, celebrating their 21st anniversary this week.
Some yes, some no. If possible I’ll pass on weddings and religious ceremonies. But when the event is to honor someone for an acheivement I’m all over it. Military ceremonies in particular. Back in the day several high school and college buddies joined and a few stayed in for their 20 (or longer). I looked forward to their promotion events, rare medal awards and of course the retirement ceremony. You known what they say: “I love a man in uniform.”
I tend toward this view, but I kinda see why ceremonies are done. They’re people’s way of making a big deal about something to show that they consider it important.
They’re a form of magic. A wedding ceremony, for example, turns two separate people into a married couple. A graduation ceremony turns people who don’t have a degree into people who do. An inauguration ceremony turns a person who doesn’t hold a particular office (like POTUS) into one who does.
I think it’s easier for people to believe such things have happened if they’ve done something elaborate to make them happen.
My last speeding was on our back deck. We had about 70 guests. Everyone had a great time.
Of course, it really wasn’t a “ceremony” in the graduation all sense. No minister, a few songs our kids sung, and a quick exchange of vows. Then straight to the food and wine
Yes, I like ceremonies, although I don’t have many to attend. I do like a wedding!
Not really, no.
I don’t know if you would call it a ceremony, but when one of my bosses died young (30s, cancer) I liked the photo collage they put together to honor him.
I love weddings provided both parties are freely consenting and the cost is not a serous financial hardship.
There is such a study (follow the links near the bottom of that page to read the full text in PDF format). You’re right that there is an inverse correlation between wedding spending and marriage success. Perhaps surprisingly though there is a positive correlation between the number of wedding guests and marriage success. I guess you’re supposed to invite a lot of people but not feed them.
And to get back to the topic of the OP, no I can’t remember every really enjoying a ceremony. When I don’t weasel out of them I attend only because it’s required or expected.
No particular favorite other than Sunday worship but yeah – I do enjoy most of the ones I attend.
Every year, our local Bar Association runs a “Call to the Bar” ceremony, where the newly minted lawyers, having finished undergrad, and a law degree, and a year of articles, and carrying Gawd-knows-how-much student debt, are formally presented to the judges of the Court of Appeal, Queen’s Bench and Provincial Court.
The new barristers get to wear their robes, sit in the jury box, and stand in turn as their names are called and their principals from articling introduces them to the Court, outlining all their accomplishments and something about them as individuals.
Moms, Dads, husbands/wives/girlfriends/boyfriends get to sit in the big courtroom and hear all the wonderful things about their new barrister-in-the-family.
Then the reps from the Law Society and bar associations speak, followed by a speech of welcome from judges from each of the three courts, with the final speech from the CJ of the Queen’s Bench, as an exhortation to the new lawyers to get out there and practise justice for their clients.
Then the whole group adjourns to a nearby hotel, for a slightly different call to the Bar.
I’ve occasionally helped to organise it, and the number of new barristers and parents who have come up to me afterwards to thank me has been high. Parents in particular have said that it’s very satisfying to see all that hard work recognised, and the professional duties of their new lawyer explained, as they start their new careers.
Well, within narrow limits, okay. There are ceremonies and then there are ceremonies. There’s a tradition in certain circles that when a student pilot solos (flies by himself for the first time), the others will cut the back of his shirt off. Then everyone involved autographs it. The shirt backs are hung on display in some public space in the flight school.
I can get all into a ceremony like that. Not the big bash ceremony like OP has in mind.
(In an alternative ceremony, the student pilot gets a bucket of water dumped over his head. I’ll leave it to the reader to google up some YouTube videos of this. There are plenty.)
Some pics Google found:
http://www.dskelly.com/flight/images/solo/1st_solo%200052.jpg
http://www.pilotschoice.com/ChoicePilots/tabid/85/currentstrip/4/Default.aspx
The political junkie in me enjoyed the State of the State address many years ago back in college. I’d certain attend the State Opening of Parliament should I ever be so lucky.
I never want to attend another wedding or graduation. They’re hours of misery. I don’t need to see octogenarians dancing the Macarena nor pretentious students lecturing me on the greatness of John Ashcroft ever again.
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I hate them. I managed to avoid my college graduation, my master’s graduation, my PhD graduation, my wife’s college and Masters graduation. And given we avoided those we could harldy insist our son attend either of his as he didn’t want to.
I like rituals. Rites of passage and other such celebrations which are solemnly and properly performed and participated in are holy things of great importance. Rituals are created by the focus and attitude of the participants in it. In fact that is all they require. Everyone who is a witness is a participant.
Many modern human beings have never experienced a true ritual.
I dislike ceremonies. Ceremonies are planned-out events with the intention of impressing an audience. The need for a ritual might have been the seed of a ceremony but the magic of the ritual has been blotted out by pomp and parading, and almost invariably, people standing on their hind legs and giving speeches of paralyzing boringness. They are a big fat waste of time.
I did think of one ceremony I like. The “crossing over” ceremony in which a Cub Scout crosses a little wooden bridge brought up on stage to show he is ready to join the Boy Scouts.
The Cub Scout walks up to the bridge with his parents, gives his Webelos neckerchief and slide to his parents, then walks alone to the other side of the bridge where his new Patrol leader (a Boy Scout) gives him a Boy Scout neckerchief and welcomes him to the troop.
It is symbolic because the Cubs are adult/family led while the Scouts are boy led. It is especially moving when the boy looks over his shoulder at his parents after crossing the bridge- going from dependent to independent.