Weddings
“Mahalo nui loa, Pili, for blessing the best day of our lives! The marriage ceremony was just perfect.” - T & D
“We want you to know that we loved the ceremony so much and are very glad we found you. We appreciate your passion and the dedication you put forth for our wedding... It really means a lot to us that you gave us a meaningful ceremony... Thank you again. Aloha! Mahalo!” - R & N
“We apreciate all the time and energy you obviously committed to get to know us, to listen to our goals and dreams, and to integrate your experience and creativity into the day. Our joy, excitement, and love for each other, our families and friends was expressed with honesty and warmth through your words, music, and actions.” - P & J
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Pili (Lyn ‘Unihipiliowailelepualu Moreno Hilliard) works with couples to create heart-felt, personal, joyous, inspired, and memorable wedding ceremonies that uniquely reflect their personalities, heritage, worldview, and aspirations.
Pili is frequently asked to perform weddings based on Hawaiian culture and tradition, including Hawaiian music and chant. He has also performed weddings with elements honoring Japanese, Mexican, Jewish, Italian, Filipino, Buddhist, Hindu, Earth-centered, and other traditions. He is always eager to expand his knowledge of the world’s rainbow of cultures, and looks forward to learning about your traditions from you and incorporating them into your ceremony.
Pili is happy to perform wedding ceremonies for same-sex couples, and hopes that their fundamental right to full, legally-recognized marriages will soon be restored under California law.
“I can help you make your wedding an inspired and lovingly crafted gift that you give to yourselves and to your friends and family. I encourage you to call upon your imagination and creativity as you plan this life-changing event. Make your wedding something that you will always remember, that will express your authentic selves, and that will set your marriage on course for a lifetime of growth and joyful companionship.”
Blessings
One Hawaiian word for blessing, ho‘omaika‘i, also means to thank, congratulate, praise, or improve. A variation, ho‘opōmaika‘i, includes the understanding that the things we bless, as well as our power to bless them, are gifts from Spirit.
When we express our gratitude, affection, approval, and aspirations in the form of a blessing, we are calling upon Spirit to echo our intentions and amplify our mana (spiritual energy or life-force)—to resonate with our authentic good will and appreciation of the gifts we have received and will continue to receive.
Pili will perform blessings for births, birthdays, anniversaries, homes, gardens, businesses, goals, intentions, classes, animals, voyages, and vehicles—beings, ventures, objects, and ideas of all kinds. He will also lead memorial services designed to celebrate the life of the departed and create a sense of community, continuity, and renewal.
He Ho‘ola‘a Hale (A House Blessing)
A blessing ceremony appropriate for a family home is presented here. Blessings for businesses, births, vehicles, healings—and of course weddings and memorials—draw from the same traditional elements and follow a similar pattern.
E Komo Mai (Welcome and Introduction)
❧ The family and guests are welcomed to the blessing ceremony with the Mele Ho‘okipa (chant of welcome).
❧ Pili explains the purpose of the ceremony and the Hawaiian values that keep Aloha alive in the home.
❧ The introduction concludes with a Hawaiian song appropriate for the blessing (vocal accompanied by guitar).
Ho‘ola‘a Hale (Blessing the House)
❧ The house blessing formally begins as the pū kani (conch shell trumpet) calls to the four directions: East, the rising sun—we greet the light that renews life; West, the setting sun—we offer thanks for the gifts we have received that day; North—we look to Hōkū-pa‘a (North Star) for guidance on our way; South, from where our ancestors journeyed to Hawai‘i—we honor those who came before us.
❧ A series of oli (chants) welcome the ancestors and release the house from the limitations of the past, filling it with Mauli Ola (the Breath of Life), and freeing the people it shelters to live in balance, harmony, and Aloha.
❧ Pī kai (blessing with ti leaves and salt water): Pili, along with the family, visits each room in the house, offering specific blessings for each room.
❧ Pili and the family rejoin the guests, and a special blessing is offered for all those present, conveying wishes of health, friendship, wisdom, courage, adventure, happiness, prosperity, and most importantly, Aloha.
❧ Finally, the hosts offer their guests small portions of banana and sweet potato, embodying the masculine and feminine principles which are now free to manifest in balance and harmony in the newly-blessed house.
The complete blessing ceremony typically lasts 25 to 40 minutes, depending on the size of the house or business, and the number of guests.