For Matt Mesley and Emily Arend, love is green and white.

The afternoon of their wedding on Jan. 28, Matt Mesley, 27, watched MSU defeat Penn State at Nuthouse Sports Grill in Lansing, where Emily, 25, first gave him her phone number.

Their wedding photos were taken at the bases of the Sparty statue and Beaumont Tower, where Mesley, a 2000 graduate, proposed with the help of his dog "Izzo."

And later that Saturday night, the two exchanged wedding vows at the MSU Alumni Memorial Chapel just across the river from where they first met at a tailgating party. The couple now lives outside of Nashville, Tenn.

"We're very happy and thankful Michigan State has given us a place to celebrate our marriage," Mesley said before the ceremony. "Michigan State has provided us a lot with friends and family and events to go to and celebrate with them.

"I'm really excited; this is going to be a lot of fun."

Spartans in love have long found the chapel a fitting place to tie the knot. Tucked beside the Red Cedar River just west of Bogue Street, the nondenominational chapel plays host, mostly for weddings, to MSU affiliates, faculty, students, alumni and their children. During peak months, it commonly houses three different weddings in three different denominations in the same day.

"Every once in a while we'll get a mixed marriage — which is between a Spartan and a Wolverine," said chapel coordinator Bonnie Westbrook. "We always give them a hard time about that."

Down the aisle

With a nod from Westbrook, her assistant Jenn Houghton quickly made her way up a set of narrow steps to cue the string quartet in the balcony.

It was time for the wedding to begin.

Passing a clipboard, Westbrook and Houghton, a James Madison College freshman, teamed up to move everyone into their places. The chapel fits 190 people.

One by one, Westbrook sent the bridesmaids in burgundy gowns and their groomsmen escorts up the aisle of the candlelit chapel until it was the bride's turn.

"You can come up now, hon," Westbrook called to Arend, who graduated from Albion College. Arend walked in front of her waiting guests.

Westbrook has spent 14 years pulling together the controlled chaos of marriage ceremonies in a place where the Spartans fight song is the favorite recessional and the mascot Sparty makes regular guest appearances. No two weddings are the same, Westbrook said.

The chapel is like an emergency room in some ways, Houghton said.

"You really get some really interesting emotions from people," she said. "You go to rehearsals, and sometimes people are really happy and sometimes they're very organized. Sometimes they're a little less organized and they need your help and sometimes they feel so useless just sitting there.

"There's this immense joy and immense frustration all combined into one great day."

Run by Housing & Food Services, students and MSU affiliates can rent the chapel for prayer or memorial services. Due to the noise of football fans, weddings are no longer held on game days, Westbrook said.

One student group called the MSU House of Hope began holding a nondenominational Christian service on Sunday evenings in January.

A small group of students attend the service, which has contemporary music and ministry, said Bob Davis, a Lansing resident who leads the ministry. The group chose the location and time so it would be convenient for students, he said.

"It's a beautiful place," Davis said. "It'd be nice if it'd be used more for students. A lot of times it's there, but people don't realize it."

Built for the fallen

When it was completed in 1952, the chapel was alone on the bank of the Red Cedar, where Owen Graduate Hall and the Business College Complex now stand nearby. It was built from donations to honor MSU alumni who were killed in combat since the university was founded in 1855.

Today a stone wall stands in the foyer of the small building, etched with the names of 478 soldiers, dating back to the Civil War.

"We have a few more to add of boys we lost in Iraq," Westbrook said, looking at the wall during a midweek afternoon. "One was married here not long before.

"That was hard to take."

Colorful shadows cast down upon the pews and across the floor from stained glass windows — each unique to MSU.

In blues and greens, yellows and reds, the windows illustrate the history of the university, dating back to the Morrill Act of 1862 and the establishment of MSU as a land-grant university. Among the windows are pictures for the sciences, for creativity and a window marking the entrance of women into academic fields.

Light shining through one window highlighted a football player and the importance of student activities.

"On a sunny day with the snow, it just glows in here," Westbrook said. "I've told people they're the hidden jewels of MSU."

Westbrook said she's seen just about everything at the chapel, including wedding crashers and groomsmen sneaking alcohol into a dressing room located in the basement.

The chapel staff keeps a written logbook about their experiences from weddings, chronicling adventures with angry bridesmaids, Mardi Gras and cowboy and western-themed weddings and even a groom who was escorted from his wedding to the hospital to pass a kidney stone.

Only a few weeks ago, a northern section of MSU's campus lost power during a night wedding, knocking out the lights in the chapel as well.

"I panicked and ran for the flashlights," Westbrook said.

The wedding finished by candlelight, and the headlights of a police car through the chapel doors.

"They left just as married," Westbrook said. "And I guarantee no one at that wedding will ever forget it."

Some days are difficult, however, such as one summer when Westbrook helped a family who was holding a funeral for a young baby before setting up for a wedding that directly followed.

"I put a smile on my face that day, but it was the hardest day I ever had here," Westbrook said.

Other days, Westbrook finds herself wrapped up in helping joyous occasions come off without a hitch or showing young couples and older alumni the building.

Many couples who were married at the chapel return to have their children baptized or to hold memorial services.

"People will come back and tell us they were married here 25 years ago," Westbrook said. "It's nice to see they made it."

Celebration bells

As the wedding neared its end, Houghton waited for her signal in a hidden room.

Finally, the minister pronounced the couple married.

"That's my favorite part," Houghton said with a smile.

Following chapel tradition, she lifted her arms over her head and grabbed a small rope in front of her, pulling down with the weight of her body. A bell high in the steeple of the building began to ring.

The sound marked another Spartans couple beginning their lives together within the little chapel at MSU.

"It's a great place," Mesley said. "It's a Michigan State family, and we thought, why not come back to where we all started?"

Tina Reed can be reached at reedtina@msu.edu.