Wedding invitation wording: Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Christian

Search for wedding invitation wording and you get American templates. Together with their families, requesting the pleasure of your company, black tie optional. None of it fits a card where the invitation comes from the parents, the ceremony has a name that means something, and the line at the very top is a prayer.

This is wording for the four kinds of wedding most Indian couples are actually planning, plus the interfaith card, which is the one nobody writes about and the one couples get stuck on for weeks. Everything in a copy block below can be lifted and edited. Everything religious has been checked against a source, and where a source did not settle it, we have said so rather than guessing.

The part that is the same everywhere: who is inviting

The Western card is issued by the couple. Most Indian cards are issued by the parents, or by the grandparents, or by an uncle who has held the family together since 1998, and the couple are named in the middle as the reason for the gathering. Getting this line right matters more than the font.

Two conventions worth knowing. First, when the two families print separate cards, each family names their own child first. Second, the guest is invited with their family, which is what sapariwar means, and leaving it out is how you end up with a headcount problem.

If the couple are hosting themselves, which is increasingly common when both sets of parents live in different cities, say so plainly instead of borrowing a parental voice. Together with our families, we invite you. It reads as a choice rather than an omission.

Settle this line early. It is the one everybody has an opinion about, and the invitation timeline leaves less room for that argument than you think.

Hindu wedding invitation wording

Most North Indian Hindu cards open with an invocation to Ganesha, who is asked to clear obstacles before anything auspicious begins. The short form is three words:

The longer form is the Vakratunda Mahakaya shloka, the verse recited before undertakings of any significance. It fits on a card in two lines.

Which invocation belongs at the top of your card depends on the family and the community, not on a rule. Households devoted to Vishnu, Krishna or Shiva often open with their own. Some print only Om. Some Bengali, Tamil and Maharashtrian families follow forms of their own that look nothing like a Delhi card. If you are unsure, the family priest will answer this in thirty seconds, and he would rather be asked than corrected later.

Below the invocation, most cards say Shubh Vivah, then the host line, then the functions. Print the muhurat time exactly as the panditji gave it, because guests will use it to decide when to leave the hotel. If the date itself is still open, the shubh vivah muhurat dates are worth settling before anything goes to the printer.

Muslim wedding invitation wording

Muslim invitations open with the Bismillah, the phrase Muslims say before beginning anything. It is recited before every chapter of the Quran except the ninth, which is why it opens so much else besides a wedding card.

Many families also carry a verse about marriage, Surah Ar-Rum, verse 21, which speaks of spouses created so that you may find comfort in them, and of the affection and mercy placed between you. English translations of the Quran differ from each other in wording, so take the exact text from the translation your family reads rather than from a card design.

Two ceremonies, two cards, usually two hosts. The nikah is the marriage contract itself. The walima is the reception that follows, and its costs are generally borne by the groom or his family, which is why the walima card so often comes from the other side of the wedding. Say who is hosting on each card and guests will not have to work it out.

The functions around the nikah vary a great deal. Mehndi is near universal. Beyond that, names and customs differ across communities, so use the names your own family uses on the card rather than the ones a card shop suggests.

Sikh wedding invitation wording

Sikh cards open with Ik Onkar, written as a single character in Gurmukhi. It is the opening of the Mul Mantar and the first words of the Guru Granth Sahib, and it holds the belief that God is one.

Many families use a longer invocation than this. The exact wording differs between families and between printers, so take yours from a card your family has used before or from the gurdwara, rather than copying a version off the internet.

The ceremony is the Anand Karaj, introduced by Guru Amar Das. Its heart is the four Laavan composed by Guru Ram Das, which appear on Ang 773 to 774 of the Guru Granth Sahib. The couple walk around the Guru Granth Sahib once for each Laav. Naming the ceremony as the Anand Karaj on the card, rather than as the wedding, is both correct and a small courtesy to the guests who know what it means.

Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa, Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh is a greeting introduced by Guru Gobind Singh. It works at the top of the card, at the bottom, or on both, and plenty of families do all three.

Christian wedding invitation wording

The wording here depends on the denomination more than on the region. A Catholic wedding celebrated during Mass is a Nuptial Mass, and the card should say so, because it tells guests the service will run longer and what to expect inside it. Church of South India, Church of North India and most Protestant churches word it as the solemnisation of Holy Matrimony, or simply as the wedding service.

Two practical notes. The banns, the public announcement of an intended marriage read out in the parish, are still read in many Indian churches even though the Catholic Church removed the general requirement in 1983 and left it to each national bishops' conference. And Christian marriages in India are solemnised under the Indian Christian Marriage Act, 1872, which is worth knowing when the church asks for paperwork you were not expecting.

Couples often print a verse on the card. Choose it with your priest or pastor, and take the text from the translation your church actually uses, since the wording differs between translations and a familiar verse in an unfamiliar version reads as a mistake to the people who know it by heart.

Interfaith wedding invitation wording

Here is the situation almost every interfaith couple describes. There are two ceremonies on two days, two sets of relatives who have never met, two invocations that cannot both sit at the top of the card, and a mother on each side reading the draft with a pencil in her hand. The wording problem is real, and it is not solved by picking a neutral font.

Three approaches work, and one that everyone tries first does not.

The approach that fails is two versions of the card, one for each side, each carrying its own invocation and quietly omitting the other. It survives until the two cards meet on somebody's dining table, which they always do, and then the omission is the only thing anyone can see.

What works, in rough order of how often couples land on it. Print both invocations at the same size with nothing between them but space, side by side on the card if the design allows and stacked if it does not. Or print neither, and open with a line of your own about two families meeting. Or give each ceremony its own card, both issued by both families, so the nikah card and the pheras card carry the same host line and differ only in what is being celebrated.

Say what each ceremony is, in plain words, next to its name. Half of your guest list has never attended the other half's wedding, and a single line explaining that the pheras are the ceremony itself, or that the nikah is the marriage contract being signed, spares hundreds of people the awkwardness of not knowing when to stand.

If the two ceremonies have partly different guest lists, work out who is invited to which function first. Do not print a card that invites everyone to everything and hope people work out which parts are theirs. On Shagun Studio you can send per event invite links, so the relatives coming only to the reception open an invitation that shows only the reception, from the same site, with no second version to maintain.

How the four compare

The lines that go wrong on every kind of card

Names must be spelled identically everywhere: the card, the website, the hashtag, the hotel booking. Pick one spelling of Sanjana or Sanjna at the start and write it down somewhere, or you will be correcting it in three places at midnight.

Write dates with the day of the week attached. Sunday 14 February is unambiguous in a way that 14.02.27 is not, particularly for guests who read dates month first.

If you are putting a dress code on the card, keep it under the function it belongs to rather than in a block of its own at the bottom.

Give a real RSVP instruction, not a phone number floating at the bottom. Say who to reply to, by when, and how. And put a number that someone will actually answer during the wedding week, which is almost never the couple's own.

Last, the line about gifts. No boxed gifts is understood in North India and completely opaque elsewhere. If you mean it, write what you mean: we would be grateful if you would skip gifts, or your blessings are the only gift we need.