Since many of you have wanted to know why our "Hands of a Bride and Groom" has been taken off our site, we are providing the background information for this decision.
May, 1997: We wrote our interpretation of what we had been told was a copyright free blessing for brides and grooms. The original seemed a bit sexist to us. We were thanked often for posting it on our site.
- "Thank you so much for the beautiful interpretation of the classic. We will be reading it to couples in our marriage preparation groups from now on. It oozes with the love initially intended and later interpreted. Thank you Sheri and Bob!!" from D & D G.
January, 1998: We were notified that the correct title of the original blessing was "The Meditation: Hands of Matrimony", and that the authors were Larry and Mary Sue Eck, 317 W. Ogden Ave., Westmont, IL 60559. Phone: 630-968-5268 or 630-968-4684.
- They stated in an email, "The Hands of Matrimony meditation has been sent to pastors across the country as part of the World Marriage Day packet. There were not the official meditations on parchment that are sold through Medjugorje Magazine and it was illegal to copy this meditation and send it out.... In 1990 we copyrighted the meditations for Medjugorje Magazine."
- The Ecks also wrote us that we had to remove our rewritten version from our website. "That old classic you refer to on your webiste, sexist tone and all, is hands of a Bride and Groom which was copyrighted shortly after we wrote it for our daughter's wedding. It was printed and sold through Matrimiony Magazine and later, Medjugorje Magazine. You are in violation of our copyright and anyone who uses your version will also be in violation of our copyright... We have always given permission for our meditations to be "read". We emphasize that the meditations may be read -- never copied, altered, or reproduced. We insist that you immediately remove the meditation from your website and cease using your version on Engaged Encounter weekends, or anywhere else."
November, 2003: According to minutes from the Engaged Encounter, District 3 Meeting, "Hand Prayer by Larry and Mary Sue Eck and Father Tom Burr - The prayer is copy write [sic] protected and cost $1.00 each. All the money collected for the prayer is used to fund orphanages in Chicago, El Salvador, and Bosnia."
Some have held the belief that the hands of matrimony cannot be legally copyrighted since it was originally generally distributed before it was copyrighted and anything that is public domain cannot be copyrighted. However, the Ecks state that they wrote the meditation in 1987, and by virtue of their names being on it as authors, it was protected by copyright.
Due to the controversy surrounding the blessing, we have made the decision to remove our own Hands of a Bride and Groom blessing. We are sorry that we cannot provide copies to those who request it.
