The Death of the Author and the Life of the Ceremony: A Guide for the conflicted Celebrant

By Stuart L. Morris

It happens to every celebrant...

You are sitting in a consultation. The coffee is warm, the connection is real, and you can see the shape of the ceremony forming in your mind. You are ready to tell their story.

And then, they make The Request.

Maybe they want a reading from Harry Potter about loyalty. Maybe they want a poem by an artist whose personal behaviour makes you recoil. Maybe they want a scripture that, to you, represents a history of exclusion.

You feel it in your gut. It is "The Pinch."

It is the collision between your personal values—your commitment to inclusion, justice, and kindness—and your professional duty to serve the couple sitting in front of you.

In that moment, you have a choice. You can Drift, or you can Choose.

To drift is to react. You might judge them silently. You might lecture them on why that author is "cancelled." Or, worst of all, you might swallow your integrity, say yes, and deliver the words with a fake smile, tainting the ceremony with inauthenticity.

We do not drift. We choose.

To handle this moment, you need more than just good manners. You need Rigour. You need a philosophical framework that allows you to separate the art from the artist, and a safety framework to ensure you never cause harm.

You need to understand the "Death of the Author" and the "Architecture of the Vessel."

Part 1: The Philosophy (The Death of the Author)

To navigate this, I want to introduce you to a tool from 1967. It is an essay by the French literary critic Roland Barthes titled "The Death of the Author."

Barthes argued a radical idea: The meaning of a text is not determined by the person who wrote it.

He believed that once a book, a poem, or a song is released into the world, the author loses control of it. The author is "dead" to the text. The meaning no longer lies in its Origin (the writer); it lies entirely in its Destination (the reader).

Think about that. It is a liberation.

When a young couple asks for a quote about friendship from Albus Dumbledore, they are usually not making a political statement about gender. They are not endorsing the author’s Twitter feed. They are not signing a contract with her worldview.

They are connecting with a memory. They are remembering the feeling of reading under the duvet with a torch at age ten. They are connecting with the concept of light fighting against darkness.

In that moment, the text does not belong to J.K. Rowling. It belongs to them.

As a Celebrant, this is your permission slip. You are not channeling the author. You are channeling the couple’s intent. You are elevating their meaning, not the author's biography. By stepping back and letting the author "die," you allow the ceremony to live.

Part 2: The Role (The Vessel)

However, philosophy is not enough. You also need to understand your role.

You are not the water. You are the cup. You are the Vessel.

If the cup is full of its own opinions, its own triggers, and its own rigidity, it cannot hold the client’s story. A rigid vessel cracks. A full vessel spills.

Your job is to be a sturdy container.

When you stand at the front of the room, you are performing an act of service, not an endorsement. Reading a line from a book is not the same as agreeing with the writer's entire philosophy.

If a text speaks of love, and the couple feels that love, your job is to hold the space for that love to land. You must set aside your personal "pinch" to witness their joy.

Part 3: The Safety Check (Audacious Safety)

But—and this is the most critical part—there is a floor.

My philosophy is built on Audacious Safety. The "Death of the Author" is a tool for liberation, but it is not a free pass for hate speech. We do not drift into complicity.

The only thing we do not tolerate is intolerance.

If a text explicitly shames, excludes, or harms a person in that room, the Vessel cannot hold it. It will crack the cup. You cannot claim to create a safe space if you are reading words that demand someone in the front row shrink or translate themselves to be there.

So, how do you decide? How do you balance the "Death of the Author" with "Audacious Safety"?

You use the Hello, I Love You, Goodbye framework to audit the text.

Step 1: Hello (The Audit)

Look the text in the eye. Do not skim it. Apply the "Separation of Art" test. Ask three questions:

1. Is the text a Weapon? Do the specific words on the page cause harm? (e.g., "Wives submit to your husbands"). If yes, it must go.
2. Is the text a Bridge? Does it connect the couple to the moment? If the text is benign (e.g., a quote about bravery), but the author is controversial, the text is a bridge. Barthes applies.
3. Is the Context Toxic? Is it a "dog whistle"? If reading it makes the room unsafe for your LGBTQ+ guests or neurodivergent family members, the author’s shadow is too long. The Vessel cannot hold it.

Step 2: I Love You (The Witnessing)

If the text passes the audit (it is not a weapon), you must then validate the couple. You say something like: "I see why you love this. I see that this connects you to your childhood/your grandfather/your values." You witness their intent. You acknowledge that their love for the words is real, even if your love for the author is non-existent.

Step 3: Goodbye (The Release)

This is where you make the decision.

• Scenario A: The Text is Safe, The Author is Not. You say "Goodbye" to the author. You let the author die so the text can serve the couple. You read it with warmth, knowing you are serving the couple's memory, not the author's bank account.
• Scenario B: The Text is Unsafe. You say "Goodbye" to the text. You gently guide the couple to see that the words will not land the way they intend. You offer Alchemy—finding a different way to honour that feeling without breaking the safety of the room.

Part 4: The Script (What to Say)

Sometimes, you will run the audit and find the text is safe, but you are not. Your personal conviction is so deep that you know you cannot deliver the words with the warmth the client deserves.

If you flinch, you fail them. They deserve 100% of your warmth.

In this case, use Brave Honesty. Do not shame the client for their taste. Own your own boundary.

Say something like this:

"I want your ceremony to be delivered with absolute warmth and conviction. Because of my own personal stance regarding [Author], I worry I wouldn't be the best person to deliver that specific reading with the sincerity it deserves. I don't want to short-change you.

Would you be open to having a guest read that piece? That way, you get the words you love, delivered by someone who can fully embrace them."

Summary

The ceremony belongs to the people living it, not the people who wrote the source material.

You are not a stenographer. You are a guardian.

If you allow intolerance into the space because you are too polite to challenge it, you have failed. You have chosen comfort over safety. And I do not care about comfort. I care about Audacious Safety.

We do not tolerate intolerance. We do not dead-name. We do not ask wives to submit.

We hold the line.

We build a vessel where an atheist, a believer, a trans teenager, and a traditional grandmother can stand side-by-side and feel something true.

That is the work. That is the choice.

Stop performing the ceremony. Start holding the space.