An Urban Roman Catholic Minimony at St. Athanasius Church in Brooklyn, New York

When the COVID forced Jacqueline and Joseph to postpone their large wedding celebration, the couple decided to move ahead with tying the knot on their original wedding date with an intimate minimony at St. Athanasius Church in Brooklyn, New York. The church wedding day was filled with vintage glam and an elegant Old Hollywood-esque feel, thanks in part to Jacqueline's short wedding dress and the antique Cadillac she arrived in. 

"Our wedding was actually split up into two days," explains Jacqueline. "Due to COVID, we had to postpone our reception but since we have been together for over a dozen years, we decided we wanted to get married on our original date anyway. Both Joe and I are Roman Catholics and have gone to Catholic schools and churches our whole lives. Every couple in our families got married in church so it only felt right to get married at St. Athanasius Church in Brooklyn. Joe grew up in Brooklyn, so St. Athanasius has always been his parish. It meant a lot to his mother that we got married there. Their family also has a great relationship with Monsignor Cassato, so we were lucky to have him marry us. Although we were not able to have our reception that day, we still wanted our families to see us finally tie the knot. We invited about 60 people to the church but 100 actually showed up! It was so touching to see all our family and friends, especially during a pandemic, come out to see us on the most important day of our lives. I don't know if our wedding had a specific theme but we definitely wanted our native New Yorker families to feel like this was a classic Brooklyn city wedding. We wanted to stick to our roots and just be who we were. We are also Italian, so we also hired a garlic knot food truck to give out garlic knots after the church ceremony."

Jacqueline goes on to share that "the fact that we had to postpone the reception and create a new idea of a wedding day for ourselves, actually gave us the chance to reinvent the wheel a little bit. I am more of a casual person so the fact that we were able to make this a more 'intimate' day ended up being amazing. I was able to actually speak to my guests, take photos with everyone and just hang out and eat garlic knots! After the ceremony, we went to dinner at Quality Italian (one of our favorite restaurants in NYC) with just our immediate families. We would have never gotten the chance to have a private dinner with them if we had the reception on the same day. It was really nice to have some calm and peace after the ceremony and just spend time with our parents and siblings."

In addition to sharing an intimate family dinner with their parents and siblings later in the day, Jacqueline shares that an especially memorable moment took place with her father earlier in the day. "I have a great relationship with my father, so being able to have him walk me down the aisle was a moment we have always been waiting for," she recalls. "My dad is always making me laugh. Literally, right before the doors opened for us to walk down, he said 'Jac! I'm chewing gum! What do I do with it!?' and attempted to stick it on a pillar that was holding holy water! I had to grab it from him and give it to my aunt who luckily was standing off to the side. Even during a time like this, he was still cracking me up. And the fact that he and Joe get along so well is very important to me. Joe is just as much of a goofball as my dad. I loved seeing them shake hands at the altar with tears in their eyes. I am an only child, so my father finally gained a son that day."