The loving cup ceremony in Irish tradition:Reflecting your Irish heritage in your wedding ceremony is not only a way to celebrate who you are individually, but also to share a romantic and beautiful tradition with those closest to you on your most special day. Many ancient Irish wedding traditions have withstood the test of time because they are among the most heartfelt and special.

The use of the Irish wedding cup or Loving Cup at a wedding is an ancient tradition. By the 15th century it was common for the Celtic people to toast each other with a ceremonial Loving Cup.
Today there are different versions of the Loving Cup. The traditional Irish wedding cup is shaped like a 2 handled bowl and often has an inlaid Celtic design. Loving Cups come in many designs, shapes, sizes and colors. Some couples choose to use a crystal wine glass and have their names and the date of their wedding etched in the glass.

The purpose of the Loving Cup ceremony is for the bride and groom to share their first drink together as husband and wife, and to show the coming together of the two families.

The Irish Wedding cup is then passed down from generation to generation, ensuring happiness and good fortune to all who drink from it. This is a very special moment for the couple to toast their love, devotion, and friendship and to include the entire family.

The typical loving cup ceremony goes as follows:

Priest: The years of life are as a cup of wine poured out for you to drink. This Loving Cup contains within it a wine with certain properties that are sweet and symbolic of happiness, joy, hope, peace, love and delight. This same wine also holds some bitter properties that are symbolic of disappointment, sorrow, grief, despair, and life's trials and tribulations. Together the sweet and the bitter represent "Love's Journey" and all of the experiences that are a natural part of it. For all who share the wine from this Loving Cup, so may you share all things from this day on with love and understanding. Those who drink deeply from the Loving Cup with an open heart and willing spirit, invite the full range of challenges and experiences into their being for themselves and the Bride and Groom.

Priest pours wine into the Loving Cup and holds it up.

Priest: This cup of wine is symbolic of the cup of life. As you all share the wine from the Loving Cup, you undertake to share all that the future may bring. It represents the blessing given and passed on to each participant in this ceremony. All the sweetness life's cup may hold for each of you will be the sweeter because you drink it together. Whatever drops of bitterness it may contain will be less bitter because you share them.
Drink now, and may the cup of your lives be sweet and full to running over. After family and friends have sipped wine from the Loving Cup, it is passed back to the priest.
The Priest then holds up the Loving Cup and says the following.

Priest: This Loving Cup is symbolic of the pledges you have made to one another to share together the fullness of life. As you drink from this cup, you acknowledge to one another that your lives, separate until this moment, have now become one. He then hands the Loving Cup to Bride and Groom.

Priest: Now drink to the love you've shared in the past. The Bride and Groom sip from the Loving Cup.

Priest: Drink to your love in the present, on this your wedding day. The Bride and Groom sip from the Loving Cup.

Preist: And drink to your love in the future and forever more! The Bride and Groom sip from the Loving Cup and hand it back.

Priest: As you have shared the wine from this Loving Cup, so may you share your lives. May you explore the mysteries of the Loving Cup and share in the reflection of love in one another's soul. From love all things proceed and unto love they must return. May you find life's joys heightened, it's bitterness sweetened, and all of life enriched by God's blessings upon you.