ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, December 10, 1996 TAG: 9612100083
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: ORLANDO, FLA.
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH has told priests nuptials belong in a church, not Disney World.
The Roman Catholic Church has banned its priests from performing marriage ceremonies at Disney World, where hundreds of couples have been married in style this year.
It's not that the church has anything against Mickey Mouse or the Magic Kingdom. It's just that the nuptials belong inside a church, Catholic officials say.
For Catholics who want to get to the only one kingdom that matters - the eternal one - the church says there has to be more to the holy sacrament of marriage than sunset ceremonies in front of Cinderella's Castle, complete with royal trumpeters, a horse-drawn coach, rings in a glass slipper, and Tinkerbell.
``In the Judeo-Christian tradition, all special moments have been celebrated in the temple or the church,'' said Sister Lucy Vazquez, chancellor of the Diocese of Orlando. ``Marriage is a sacrament, and we believe that all sacraments must be celebrated in a church setting.''
Also out are drive-through quickie marriages in Las Vegas, she said.
To get the message out, Vazquez has written her fellow chancellors in every diocese in the United States advising Roman Catholics of the Orlando policy: No local Roman Catholic priests will marry couples at Disney nor will visiting priests be granted permission to perform the rite.
The policy has caused isolated problems among couples who arrived in Florida expecting marriage by a Roman Catholic priest, said Bill Warren, a Disney spokesman.
``We've had some misunderstandings; people planned weddings, then they were disappointed,'' Warren said.
LENGTH: Short : 42 linesby CNB