Our Holy Mother, the Church gives us rubrics for this. It’s none of the above.

The rubrics have everyone processing in together in one procession. It eliminates the “when to stand” confusion.

It goes your usual Mass procession with the thurifer (sometimes accompanied by the boat boy to his right), followed by the crucifer winged by the acolytes, followed by the MC, followed by any additional servers, followed by the lector (if there is one), followed by any other clergy attending in choir according to rank in ascending order, followed by the priest celebrant (in a solemn Mass, there’s also the subdeacon and deacon), followed by the two witnesses (optional next are the parents and the attendants walking together) followed the couple processing to the altar together last.

The custom you speak of is permitted, but it is rooted in Protestantism and patriarchal society when women were considered property. It was introduced by the Protestants and isn’t a particularly good representation of the Sacrament of Matrimony.

Some Christians and Traditionalists say that it’s a transferring of headship of the daughter from the father to the groom, but if the daughter is 18 or older, the Church considers them (and sons) not morally obligated to obey their parents regardless of marital status. In fact, the Church teaches that at times they should be disobedient to their parents when it comes to choosing their vocation/spouse if it would be detrimental to their salvation.

The rubrics are a more appropriate sign for what the Sacrament of Matrimony is compared to the Protestant custom of the father giving his daughter away. The couple are the ministers of the sacrament and process to the altar together as equals who are mutually consenting to marry each other freely, wholeheartedly, withholding nothing back from the other (also why prenups aren’t permitted), and to form an indissoluble covenant with the other person until death.

Patrick works in an FSSP parish as his handle implies and I have more thoughts having finished a successful wedding today.

This is how the FSSP does it at my church when the couple opts to follow the rubrics rather than local custom.

There also is no crucifer even though custom usually means that there is.

There is when they have sufficient servers.

But as far as the entrance goes coming in together is contrived and I am rubbed the wrong way when I see it: people make it about them by showing off how much of a church nerd they are.

That’s rather judgmental. It’s literally the rubrics and the norm in other countries. We had a priest from the FSSP who would suggest it to couples. My grandparents walked down the aisle together, my parents walked down the aisle together, and I have witnessed numerous couples at our Latin Mass walk down the aisle together. The only thoughts I had were of joy and happiness in seeing happy couples who did right and didn’t shack up together for years beforehand going together to marry each other.

I basically reject all of Sponsa’s analysis for now but I will work through my thoughts later.

That’s fine. It’s not my analysis.

I can't speak to anything except the the prenup comment: Canon 1102 of the Church’s Code of Canon Law says that “marriage subject to a condition about the future cannot be contracted validly.”

However, I found an article that suggested that "in certain cases, they can be quite valid and helpful. When a widow marries a widower, for example, and they both have children from their previous marriages, a prenup is a legitimate way of determining what is common property and what is separate as a basis for determining the inheritance rights of each spouse’s children." (Fr Kenneth Doyle, The Arlington Catholic Herald)

I have had other things to do.

@SponsaChristi, you’re wrong. Full stop.

I don’t really care what the FSSP does elsewhere, but the rubric is for the NO, and it’s not hard-and-fast, because for once the authors had some common sense and knew how entrenched the bride’s entrance had become in the culture.

The Roman rite does not call for a crucifer. It is a custom, but technically an abuse, to have a boy (it’s always a boy, isn’t it?) carry a processional cross, except when there is a liturgical procession, namely on the Rogation days, on Corpus Christi during the procession (or on the following days within the octave, although other than on the external solemnity, this procession is less solemn), and on Palm Sunday and Candlemas, on Good Friday going to and coming from the altar of repose, on Holy Saturday for parts of the vigil, as well as after the Requiem Mass. In some or all of those cases, the crucifer is a lay acolyte only in the absence of the subdeacon of the Mass; otherwise, it is a second subdeacon (or a lay acolyte if only one is to be had).

Frankly I don’t care that you think I’m being judgmental about how the couple enters— when a handful of FUS grads (I am one, so I’m calling balls and strikes) with a theology and catechetics degree do the entrance together, and no one else in my life did, I think that it’s showing off. It is not exclusive of other reasons (but it amounted to dealing with family dynamics and this avoided hard conversations and insults…)

It is, unfortunately, your opinion, and you’re wrong in insisting here.

Marriage as a sacrament is governed by Canon Law, but as a legal contract by civil law. Since the essence of both is a promise made to each of the parties by the other, the procedures necessarily vary from place to place, and since they have done so from time immemorial the rite follows local custom. In England (Scotland is completely different) the civil law was formerly the canon law of the Church of England [by law Established]. Consequently until the beginning of the 20th century England was dispensed from the necessity of having the Church witness a marriage, which evades any suggestion of a pre-nuptial agreement.

As I understand it, the actual Marriage rite in the EF varies between countries.

Imposing uniformity in these matters would be unwise, in my view. It is a matter of regional variation.

Why not just ask the priest who is in charge of the actual rite of marriage is and what the local custom is specifically for your location?

It can reasonably be surmised from the context of the forum itself (Church Music Association of America, with postings required to be in English), my username, and my use of the term Solemn High Mass, that the context under discussion is an English-speaking traditional Latin Mass community in the United States. I know of nowhere in the country where it would be customary for the bride and groom to exit the church and re-enter between the rite of marriage and the nuptial Mass. More specifically, I asked about when the clergy, servers, groom, and groomsmen should be in place if they're not part of the entrance procession, and when the congregation should be expected to stand and/or the bell rung. I'm not at all interested in further discussion of prenuptial agreements. There are enough Catholic sources available on the internet stating they are not forbidden in all circumstances and sometimes even advisable.

You, @SponsaChristi, took up the claim of Holy Mother Church giving us rubrics requiring the bride and groom to enter together, without citing any source. Now you have said, "No procession is even required."! Could anyone please just answer the question: If the clergy, servers, groom, and groomsmen are not part of the entrance procession, when should they be in place? Do they look at the clock, listen for a musical cue, peek out the sacristy door, check a monitor screen, get a notification from the coordinator, or what? And does their appearance at the front of the church affect musical and processional cues at all? My pastor is simply trying to standardize procedures and cues among priests, wedding coordinators, and organists, including visiting priests and substitute organists, so that we're all on the same page. We are not trying to reconfigure the order of the bridal procession down the main aisle of the church.

I have seen a lot of different practices, and I also agree that there is room for a variety of approaches here. At our parish, when the bell rings, the groom and groomsmen and clergy enter from the sacristy, with the clergy making something like a procession that is normal at Mass, while the groomsmen just enter and line up by the communion rail. There generally follows a bridal procession ending with the bride; this procession comes from the narthex. Sometimes she is accompanied by one or both parents.

Usually, we have organ music for all of this. This seems the best way to be flexible with time and to accompany the different parts of the ceremony suitably. I have done it with improvisation, which is maximally flexible, but I have also used a variety of previously composed marches. Sometimes brides or their families request choral music for these parts, which I have sometimes tried to accommodate when reasonable.

I have often read about the dual entrance of the couple, but I have never seen it in my many years of singing at Roman Catholic weddings in the USA. That could certainly be a consequence of a regional preference.