Ryanne and Tom | Church Ranch Event Center reception
Ryanne and Tom met at the University of Northern Colorado.
At the time, Tom wasn’t Catholic, but Ryanne came from a large Catholic family. He proposed on a Friday on a trail outside of Colorado Springs on Chief Mountain. Last year, he entered fully into the Catholic Church, choosing St. Bernadette as his confirmation saint.
On Sept. 13, the couple married at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Denver, our home parish — and a place we most often photograph in Colorado. Celebrating was Fr. Christian “CJ” Mast, a member of the Companions of Christ, a priestly association in the Archdiocese of Denver established in 2007.
As with most Catholic couples, Ryanne and Tom didn’t want to see each other beforehand, so we arranged for them to pray in the Lourdes adoration chapel, with Tom facing toward the altar and the Eucharist, and Ryanne entering through the door behind him. They briefly held hands and prayed before their nuptial wedding Mass.
After the Mass and family photos, we used the Church’s Grotto — a structure built by the original parishioners in the 1940s with a consecrated altar that allows for celebrating outdoor Masses (we’ve photographed an outdoor Catholic wedding in the Our Lady of Lourdes Grotto before). The parish regularly hosts outdoor events there during the summer months, inviting speakers and hosting gatherings for various parish ministries and groups.
For our purposes, it made for a perfect place for posing the couple and getting some photos as newlyweds. After a short session, we sped off to the Church Ranch Event Center in Westminster for the reception, capturing the couple’s entrance, first dance, toasts from Ryanne’s sisters and father, cake cutting and more.
