Donations in lieu of gifts ?

Hi all,
I’m a bridesmaids in an upcoming wedding and me and the other bridesmaids are in charge of the shower, which fast approaching in June. We have been getting the invites together, which were going to include a separate slip with registry information, per request of the bride. We told the bride we needed the slip with the registry information so we could mail everything out by the end of the week. Well sometime between two months ago and this past weekend the bride decided she no longer wanted a registry and gave us slips with 3 different charities to donate to, and a “Charity of you choice” option. Apparently, she and her fiancé talked and they already have everything they need. This puts us in a tight spot. The invites say “Bridal Shower” and she will not be “showered” with gifts. We tried making suggestions for themes like “Stock the Bar” or we found something online where everyone gives you a recipe and they give you one ingredient to get the recipe started with the card. Nope. “We don’t need anything else”. One of the other bridesmaids flatout said, “If you’re not getting any gifts, you shouldn’t have a shower then. Maybe a tea or a luncheon instead.” but the bride was very adamant. “No, I want a shower. I’m just doing it differently”.
I’ve been to a wedding before where in lieu of favors, the bride and groom made a donation in everyone’s names and people felt like that was a little tacky. Does that also apply in this situation? I’ve mentioned it to a few people invited and their general response has been, “Oh, well I’ll probably still get her a gift anyway. It’s a shower”. I don’t know if we should try to change her mind or just let it go, but what’s are some of the opinions on this? All of the BMs seems to feel like this might not go over well and she’ll probably end up getting a lot of random gifts or money anyway. With such a tight dead line(These invites need to be out by Friday, Saturday at the latest), should we just let it go?