The interwebs have been going gaga for weeks now about the British royal wedding, and this morning Twitter and Facebook are bursting with comments as this spectacle is broadcast live around the world.

There seem to be two primary types of online responses this morning. First, there are the adoring. They got up in the wee hours of the morning (US time) to watch on TV. People who are usually sleeping in until mid-morning were posting ISN’T IT ALL A FAIRY TALE OMG SQUEEE! at three AM. It is, as I read somewhere yesterday, sort of the ultimate in reality TV, and these folks were up to enjoy every minute of it.

On the flip side of the noise are the cynical. Not content to simply ignore the hoopla, they tweeting regularly about how they couldn’t care less, about how it’s so wasteful and unimportant in the grand scheme of things, about how they wish the TV stations would get back to talking about “real news”. Even those in my Twitter feed who aren’t typically cynical seem to have cynicism drawn to the surface by this event.

Now, from the pictures I’ve seen (I didn’t get up to watch it), the wedding was a beautiful, colorful spectacle, full of pomp and pageantry. The bride was beautiful, the groom impressive in uniform, and the service fittingly solemn. I wish for William and Kate what I wish for any newly married couple: decades of faithful love for each other, and true and personal knowledge of the God in whose name their marriage was performed.

That all being said, I’d like to encourage some moderation in the whole thing. (Stances like this are why my blog doesn’t have many readers!) The up-at-three-AM crowd need to take a grain of truth from the cynics, and remember that fairy tale dreams are fleeting and quickly replaced by the troubles of the real world. But the cynics need to heed some truth from the breathless and rapt: that God made us to appreciate beauty, to treasure love, and to celebrate the union of a man and a woman in marriage. (All those “bride of Christ” statements in the New Testament only work because of the metaphor, folks.)

So let’s give it a rest, friends. Rejoice with those who rejoice. Celebrate love and beauty. But keep your feet firmly grounded in the truth of who you are and who God is making you. It’s also OK to keep your mouth shut sometimes. God doesn’t award merit badges for cynicism.