Catholic gap..

Are you planning to have a cocktail hour? An hour or hour and a half long cocktail hour will help to entertain your guests without much of a gap.

The dinner could be served at an early hour if people have planned their eating schedule for the event. I also wonder how fast meals would be served since guests need time to arrive and probably relax a little. Also, you could have hors d'oeuvres or cocktail period before the dinner.

I would do cocktails and hors d'oeuvres from 3:30-5:00, then dinner after.

I would have the cocktail hour start for 4 and then the reception would begin around 5ish after intros and if you are doing dances I would think dinner wouldnt start until after 5:30/5:45ish. But honestly if dinner was earlier it would not bother me as a guest as long the food was tasty. Good luck!

I am not Catholic, but had my ceremony and reception at the same place and we only got it for 9 hours. So, that may mean you can "extend" your party, if that's something you're interested in. My day went so fast... even with 9 hours!!!

2-3pm ceremony.

3:30-4:30: cocktail hour

4:30pm: first dance, toasts, speeches, cake cutting etc.

5pm-10pm/11pm: dinner/party!

Allow time for a receiving line to greet all guests before you leave the church which will take 15minutes max. What is traffic like at that time on that day? Is reception parking easy to find? Are you planning to take any formal pictures after the ceremony or get them all out of the way before the ceremony? Do a cocktail hour as soon as you arrive which is 3:30/45-4:30/45. Then dinner is served at 5pm after everyone grabs their escort cards to locate tables.


There is a big misconception that a Catholic ceremony automatically means a 1-3 hour gap. Usually guests are encouraged to sightsee in formal clothes or nap/shower in their hotel room, which many people don’t do in between events. There are many venues available for a reception that do not require you start at 5 or 6pm when you need a meeting area at 3pm. Eventective.com and venuereport.com both list venues that have 10-15 hour rental spaces that don’t require you to start at a specific time that is inconvenient for everyone. That also means that vendors can not set up or decorate until that time as well. Parks department websites have venue rentals as well.
A number of our relatives have had Catholic ceremonies and no gap at all without any issues in planning. So it is possible to eliminate them, even though some people will say it can’t be done without sacrificing the ceremony. It’s all about priorities.

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My fiance and I are Vietnamese which means we do a tea ceremony at our parents house which starts around 9, long day ahead lol!

We had a 2:30 ceremony with a 30 min drive. Ceremony y ended at 3:00(no mass). We just started cocktail hr around 3:45 and the reception at 5. Dinner was served after 1st dance so by 5:30. It worked out perfectly.

My brother's wedding (we're also Catholic) was at 1pm. It was a full service mass as well as the wedding ceremony so we were done around about 2:30/3. He had an extended cocktail hour and we ate around 5, I believe by the time we actually had plates in front of us.

As long as you give people a heads up about the timing - it'll be fine. Just put something in the invite (a details card for instance) that gives a breakdown. That way people will know.

For my brother's, for instance, we were out of the venue at 9pm, so my mom invited everyone that had traveled together from our town on a party bus (it was about a 40 minute drive) back to their house for coffee and a second round of dessert. It was lovely (then again the Red Sox were playing the Yankees so we really just sat around eating pastries and watching the game!).

Do you have to be out of the church by a certain time and are you planning on doing a first look/ knocking out portraits before the ceremony? You could do a receiving line afterwards to buy some time. Depending on how many people, that would put you around 3:15/3:30. If it's a 20-30 minute drive, I'd plan as if it was 45 minutes to account for people getting into cars/ calling an Uber, setting a GPS/ waiting for an Uber, taking a wrong turn, finding parking, walking in, etc. That would put you at 4:00/ 4:15. Then you could have cocktail hour for an hour and a half (just make sure there's snacks or hors d'oeuvres so people aren't just filling up on booze on empty stomachs). Then you'd have 15-20 minutes for everyone to find their seats, and by the time you'd do your grand entrance, it's 6. If that's still early, you could plan on doing your first dance, father/ daughter dances, etc. before dinner is served.

Hi, congratulations and good luck! I don't think that's too early for dinner, but most often in weddings I've attended, there are usually a couple of hours at least between the end of the ceremony and the beginning of the reception. Unless your invitation says something like, "dinner/reception immediately following", plan your dinner for after 5PM. You'll need that time for the receiving line at church after the ceremony, and taking photographs. If there will be a cocktail hour, that shouldn't start before 5PM. If it's just a wedding dinner at a nearby restaurant, "immediately following", you can plan that for 4PM on - again to allow for receiving line, photographs, rest, and travel time to the venue. I do suggest you allow ample time after the ceremony so that nothing is rushed. Best Wishes!