Weddingbee boards

While the boy and I are excited and thrilled to be getting married, there is a part of us that is really disappointed that we're allowed to get married while some of our friends legally cannot.

So, we'd like to make some sort of statement at our wedding about our support for LGBTQ marriage.

We were considering making a charitable donation in our guests' names (not individually, but in the name of "the guests of the myname-hisname wedding") to a local animal shelter, and put little cards at each place setting that said "In lieu of favors, a donation has been made, blah blah blah." But then I had the idea to donate instead to an organization that works towards the civil rights of the LGBTQ community.

But the boy is worried about the reaction of his parents and grandparents. (I am happy to say that my entire extended family supports same-sex marriage and all of our friends do as well). And while I don't want to offend them, I think this is really important. We could always donate the money without making it clear to our guests, but I want our guests to know our stance. Not so that they can be "Oh, how cool, they donated to a charity," but because the point of making a statement is to be heard, right?

If we were having programs, we could put a statement on them, but I don't think we're going to have them. We're also considering speaking a bit to our support of same-sex marriage during the ceremony.

What would you do if you were in our situtation? Would you risk offending your future in-laws for the sake of the statement?

(And to be clear, while my future IL's might be a bit uncomfortable by the gesture, I don't think they'd do anything like make a scene or get angry or walk out. They don't support gay marriage but they are, for the most part, classy, polite people who treat everyone nicely.)

I also support same-sex marriage and wanted to in some way incorporate my belief into the wedding. However, I have a lot of old-school Italian Catholic family members and any blatantly pro-marriage equality messages would ruffle a lot of feathers with the old birds. My solution: I chose an officiant who is a lesbian and regularly officiates same sex marriage ceremonies. That way I'm giving my money to someone who supports (and lives) what I believe in. At the same time I'm not opening myself up to any sort of bulls**t from the older stuck in their ways crowd.

We're in something of a similar position, and decided the best way to get around it was to give guests the option of politely ignoring the donation bit by providing another favor.

We're doing a treat bar and are providing our guests with small jars and bags to fill as they see fit.  Each bag or jar will in some way incorporate a white ribbon, either as a decoration or, in the case of the bags, a tie.  On the bar near the candy will be a small sign explaining that, in honor of our marriage, we have made a donation to whiteknot.org (hence the ribbons).

While we don't want to actively offend our more conservative family members, we're also inviting a number of same sex couples to our wedding and feel that it would be both disingenuous and hurtful to pretend as though for some of them it's not a bittersweet occasion because the law is discriminatory.

We directly mentioned it in our wedding ceremony and asked everyone to observe a moment of silence. they were quiet anyway since it's a wedding ceremony, but you know.  It sounds like your IL's are able to take it, even if they don't personally agree, so do what feels the most right to you.

Agree with Archana that wording is important.  Our sign specifically reads that the donation was made by us to honor our marriage - not in the name of our guests.