45 minutes. It was at a Mennonite Brethren church, and the pastor used a lot of the time to sermonize. I was in the wedding party so had to stand there for the whole time. Worse, I was wearing a kilt (groom was Scottish) and the elastic in my underwear was loose. I could feel them starting to slip.
I think 15 minutes is probably enough, maybe half an hour.
While most of the weddings I’ve attended were pretty short, a Catholic wedding can include a Mass, and can thus run 45 minutes to an hour.
It’s not just Catholic weddings. I once attended a Jewish wedding that was an all-day affair (counting the pre-wedding festivities – with tons of appetizers and music, followed by the ceremony, followed by a nine-course meal. It ended at 3 in the morning. The actual edding ceremony, which had lots of bells and whistles and ceremony, lasted 45 minutes or more.
I think my longest sitting-in-the-pew ceremony was about an hour, most of that was the pastor rambling on. 20-25 minutes seems to be about normal for my friends’ (mostly secular) weddings.
Shortest wedding was about five minutes. This happened twice. Both couples, at different time, simply had the vows read during a regular Sunday morning service. Stood up, said their “I do’s” sat down again.
I went to a Hindu wedding ceremony years ago. The ceremony was several hours long. There was a buffet dinner served simultaneous with the ceremony, so the guests were eating and chatting among themselves while the ceremony was being conducted. I was about the only one watching the ceremony, I guess everyone else had already seen it.
Same (except I only watched a part of the ceremony since it was all in Sanskrit). The actual ceremony probably ran between 3-5 hours (not counting the half-hour lining up waiting for the horse), but the simultaneous party lasted until midnight.
The longest wedding I’ve been to was also a Catholic wedding. Full Mass with communion and had a lot of things I’ve never seen in a wedding before. Their reception also wins the award for the longest. I left at 9pm, seven hours after it started. The bride and groom expected to be partying several more hours before they took off for the honeymoon.
The shortest ceremony was the most recent one I attended. I clocked in at under 10 minutes including processional and recessional. This was good because they had it in a park with no chairs for the guests (except the grandparents and parents.)
I like to see them last about half an hour. Short enough that the pews aren’t that uncomfortable yet, but long enough to give the ceremony some weight and importance.
Just over an hour and a half: a full, sung Latin nuptial mass.
I’ve no idea. If it’s what the bride and groom want, and it takes that long, then so be it. I’d prefer a long ceremony to a long reception any day though.
Getting to this a trifle late, but I think this is not really Cafe Society material – it’s kind of a stretch to think of it as arts or entertainment. I’m moving to IMHO.
I’ve been to an awful lot of Catholic weddings with a full Mass, which is pretty funny because I come from a bunch of heathens. The only time we *ever *go to Mass is to get married. It’s kinda funny to watch everyone flounder through it, the motions only dimly remembered from the last wedding.
While allowing for cultural traditions, honestly I think anything over an hour is waaaaaaaaay too long. It’s your wedding, it should be however you want it to be, but I have no desire to sit through it, and since you don’t really need me here for this, I’m out.
I went to a Catholic wedding where the mass was well over 2 hours, and there was some hymns before the mass started (not practice, in the program) so we were at the church for a full 3 hours. I honestly don’t remember why it took that long, the priest was a family member and gave a long sermon but it wasn’t that long.
