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Your Guide to Unity Ceremonies

A unity ceremony is a ceremony within a wedding ceremony that symbolizes two families joined into one. Most people are familiar with the unity candle, which is an example of a unity ceremony. There are many other unity ceremonies that you can choose from making your ceremony not only unique, but also a representation of you, as a couple. Typically, unity ceremonies that represent the combining of two into one go best after the vows and ceremonies involving the hands have a greater emotional impact after the ring vows. That's just a guideline, however, they're beautiful anywhere within the ceremony. Here are some examples.

Unity Candle Ceremony: Most people are familiar with this one. The bride and groom light one large candle together from two smaller candles, typically lit by family members before the ceremony. The three candles then represent the couple as an individual and the larger candle is their life together.

Sand Ceremony: The bride and groom pour different colored sand from smaller containers into one larger containers. This can also be done with non-colored sand and each person adds a shell representing themselves to the mix. This is particularly beautiful at a beach wedding. It's also perfect for the blending of children as well since you can add more colors or more shells to represent them as well.

Wine Ceremony: Each person first drinks from their own individual wine glass, then the wine is mixed and the couple then drinks from that goblet together. To avoid any dress mishaps, you can use white wine or simply water, it's the symbolism of what it represents that's important.

Flower Ceremony: This ceremony is particularly beautiful. Each person in the family is given a flower prior to the ceremony. One by one, they add their flowers to a vase creating a large floral arrangement. This can be done using several types of flowers thus bringing home the point that each person is a unique individual, but together they create a beautiful masterpiece.

Rose Ceremony: This accomplishes two things, first it creates a unity among the couple and then honoring their mothers. The couple first exchanges roses with each other and then gives the rose, a symbol of love, to their mothers and any other people of importance to them that day.

Hand Ceremony: This is a very personal ceremony that usually involves a reading to the couple. It's an acknowledgement that these hands are what will build a strong marriage.

Hand Fasting: This is a ceremony in which the bride and groom have their hands tied together with either a ribbon or a decorative cord. This is to symbolize their spiritual and emotional connection.

This is by no means a comprehensive list of the types of unity ceremonies out there. This is just a primer to the basic types of ceremonies there are. Research the different customs of your own culture and see what pops up. Or, you can modify any of these to create your own ceremony. Either way, the ceremony is supposed to represent that together, you are more than just the sum of the parts. This is just a sampling of the many types of ceremonies out there.