The wedding will take place on September 13th, 2003 at 1:00 PM at the St. George Ukrainian Church (Українська Католицька Церква Св. Юра). We will be married by Father Philip Sandrick. The address is 30 East Seventh Street in Manhattan, on the corner of Taras Shevchenko Place.

While Seth comes from a Jewish background, Nataliya (Наталія) comes from an Ukrainian Greek Catholic background. Since Seth is not religious and Nataliya's faith is important to her, the decision to get married in church was an easy one. Nataliya first introduced Seth to Father Philip at her brother's wedding and we both hoped he would be able to marry us. We asked him if he would perform an interfaith marriage in April 2003, and he was amenable to the idea. He did, however, request that we first take pre-cana classes which we both completed on Wednesday, June 18th. (Pre-Cana is a marriage preparation program that covers topics such as communication skills, decision-making on the use of time and money, attitudes about sex and sexuality, and the spiritual and sacramental dimensions of the marital commitment.) Afterwards, we set up a date for Saturday, September 13th.

Even though the invitations were for our reception on Sunday, everyone is welcome to join us on our wedding day on Saturday, September 13th. We just want people to know that this joining will be a relatively quiet one, and that we hope people don't feel obligated to join us on both days.

Finally, for those of you who are superstitious, the first Friday the 13th anniversary for us will be in 2013 on our 10th anniversary. If you'd like to keep track, this will happen again in 2019, 2024, 2030, 2041, 2047, 2052, 2058, 2069, and again in 2075 (when Seth turns 108).

For our Catholic friends and family, the 13th day has special meaning: The six Fatima Apparitions occurred back in 1917, from May to October - all on the 13th day of the month. September 13th, 2003 marks the 86th anniversary of Fatima's fifth appearance where more than 30,000 people had gathered to witness the event. The Lady appeared and told the children to continue praying the Rosary to bring about the end of World War I. The children were also told that in October "Our Lord and St. Joseph would come" also. This gathering was surpassed one month later on October 13th where 70,000 people gathered.

70,000 baseball fans would easily fill Fenway Park, the stadium where the Boston Rex Sox play, to capacity twice! (Then again, many more than 70,000 Boston Red Sox fans watch the New York Yankees get into the World Series 25% of the time and yet these witnesses still insist that the Yankees suck...)