Rev. Bill Mercer of Wesley United Church on Patrick Street in St. John’s has become familiar with delivering sermons to near-empty churches since the COVID-19 pandemic restricted large-scale gatherings.
“We’ve had to keep the numbers down, of course. Churches now are only allowed to hold 50 people,” he said.
Because of this, he’s received a lot of calls from people looking to reschedule weddings to next year.
“Then out of the blue, I get this call from a couple asking me if I would perform one,” Mercer said. “I basically jumped at the chance.”
As she fed Clare, her 14-month-old daughter, Tara Barry (nee Thistle) told The Telegram why she and her new husband, Richard Barry, decided to tie the knot on Saturday when so many others were looking to postpone their summer wedding plans.
“We just got engaged over Christmas, so we were planning on getting married next summer,” she said. “When the (COVID-19 pandemic) happened, everyone started canceling their 2020 weddings and pushing them to 2021.”
This, in turn, she said, would have pushed their own wedding back a year. But the couple didn’t want to wait until 2022 to walk down the aisle.
“We didn’t mind keeping it under 50 because we just really want our family to be there. That’s the most important thing,” she said.
Tara said she was never one to fantasize about a big wedding, so a small and intimate gathering worked perfectly.
“I only started planning this four weeks ago,” she said. “Everything has come together really smoothly, fortunately.”
There was social distancing between pews in the church and hand sanitizer for their pandemic pair up. But those distinctions didn't matter for the couple who are now husband and wife.
However, some of the restrictions were less than ideal, especially when it came time for the reception.
“There’s no dancing, which is kind of disappointing because there’s only like 20 of us and we’re really all in each other’s bubble anyway,” she said. “We’re not allowed to have a guest book or dessert table.”
Tara said her husband was a little apprehensive at first, saying he wanted more time to fit into a smaller suit. But he quickly got over that.
“Some people are just like, ‘No, I want the big wedding, I want the whole thing … but (we) just want to get married,” she said.
And Mercer, for his part, was excited to perform the service.
“It’s strange (but) it’s exciting at the same time,” he said. “After six months now of doing worship services from an empty church, it’s nice to actually have people back in.”
Twitter: @AndrewLWaterman
