Weddings are a special day for guests, too, and with over 40 per cent of people attending a church wedding every year the Archbishops' Council's Weddings Project has drawn on extensive feedback from more then 700 vicars to develop new resources to optimise guests’ wedding day experience.

A special card, to be given to 135,000 guests as they arrive at church this summer, is being launched so guests can, as a congregation, make their own promise to the happy couple with gusto. And keep that promise in prayer as the years go by with the card at hand – perhaps even by their bed or kitchen sink.

The Bishop of Bradford, Rt Revd David James, said: “In my experience guests are sometimes nervous at a church wedding and don’t know the drill. Yet they are an essential part of every wedding and need to be made comfortable so they really enjoy themselves and remember it for the rest of their lives. They, especially, should be looked after properly as our research tells us that when guests have a great day, the couples have a happier wedding.”

As well as a prayer, the guest card contains the address of a new website section for guests to find a church near to where they live by visiting www.yourchurchwedding.org/guests.

This page is launched at the same time as a new guide for vicars at www.yourchurchwedding.org/project, Seven Heavenly Ways to Welcome Wedding Guests, containing the advice passed on by other priests:

1. Introduce yourself with a smile

- some people are surprised to find how relaxed and friendly vicars really are.

2. Make those practical 'housekeeping' notices about confetti and phones before the bride comes in

- so the theatre of her arrival starts the service with style.

3. Make them in a permissive, friendly fashion

- how about: "make sure you turn your mobile back on after the service"?

4. Encourage everyone to make themselves at home

- let people know where they are free to move about, let children come forward or stand on a pew for a good view.

5. Practice the promise the guests will make

- some people think they have to whisper in church, but when you rehearse the guests 'we will' before the bride arrives, it really breaks the ice.  

6.  Have a paparazzi moment

- make sure everyone gets a good angle for photos or video, even if you have to restage the big moment at the end of the service.

7.  Help guests keep their promise with prayer

- give a promise and prayer card to every guest. They can keep it by the bed or the kitchen sink and pray every day for the happy couple.

The prayer on the guest card reads: “Dear God, pour out the abundance of your blessing on them. Let their love for each other be a seal upon their hearts and a crown upon their heads. Bless them in their work and in their companionship; awake and asleep, in joy and in sorrow, in life and in death. Amen.”

Notes

Members of the Weddings Project team were guests at 46 weddings in 2009 to compile ideas for resources aimed at guests’ enjoyment of weddings.

The team has also presented training to 712 clergy in nine dioceses since January 2010 to gather feedback and communicate its learning from the research.

The guest cards will be used by 135,000 wedding guests in 2010 before being launched nationally in 2011.

Statistics from Opinion Research Business national polls 2009.