By Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY

	AP
	Gift of giving: Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones asked for philanthropic gifts at their wedding.

In lieu of ... please donate to ... . The phrase calls to mind funeral flowers and memorial gifts to charity. But today it's taking a celebratory twist. Enclosed in Holly Atkinson and Galen Guengerich's 500 Tiffany-engraved invitations to their wedding this month was a card stating, "In lieu of gifts, please consider a donation" to two human rights organizations.

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Five years ago, Tiffany & Co. had never heard of such a thing. Now the company gets monthly requests for similar enclosures. The same is true for Copenhaver, stationer to the social elite in Washington, D.C., and Julie Holcomb, the California fine printer and invitation trend-spotter often quoted in Martha Stewart Living.

Weddings aren't the only happy occasion at which private joy is being marked with public generosity. Charitable contributions are popping up in place of traditional gifts for anniversaries, showers and religious rites of passage — and even now at Christmas and Hanukkah, when charity is fundamental to faith and presents are expected.

Patti Summerville of Austin, Texas, told her vast extended family that "if you absolutely must give me something for Christmas, I'd prefer a charity gift so that I can send it to one of the three children's charities in Austin that I care about."

"To me, that's a gift that gives twice," she says. "I get the pleasure of giving it, and they feel they gave as well."

To inspire them, Summerville began giving all her personal and professional gifts as charitable contributions last year.

Do-good giving is a growing movement. Americans' donations to charity rose 41% between 1990 and 1995 and reached a record $190 billion last year, President Clinton said in his radio address Saturday.

The link between giving and good times is ancient, and today's boom economy makes it feasible for more people than ever.

Philanthropy experts also credit the trend to later marriages and successful singlehood: More people have the goodies that once were gift-list staples. They feel freer to focus beyond themselves.

"It's a wonderful act of generosity and vision to link the most personal commitment with a commitment to people of the world," says Atkinson's friend and wedding guest Leonard Rubenstein, executive director of Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), one of the couple's designated charities.

Jill Rapier of Lafayette, Calif., used Charitygift.com, one of several Web sites that allow people to steer a donation to the charity of their choice, when organizing a baby shower for her sister-in-law. As favors for 27 guests, she ordered personalized gift certificates that fold up into festive gold paper boxes. Each certificate told guests how to activate a $10 donation, given by Rapier in the baby's name, to a local crisis nursery or one of 600,000 charities of their choice.

When Elissa and Aaron Vinick of Washington, D.C., each reached the age of bat and bar mitzvah, they asked the 70 children invited to their celebrations to bypass gifts in favor of donations to the cancer center in Seattle that has cared for their uncle.

"It felt good to do it," Aaron says.

Instead of the usual opening-night good-luck and congratulatory gifts, many Broadway players are sending CareCards, gift notes signifying donations to Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. An opening for a smash show like The Full Monty can pull in 300 donations from friends, fans and cast members such as Jason Danieley, who sent CareCards to the entire company.

The number of shoppers who go with the charitable choice is growing in part because the Internet makes it easier, with more online gift registries and shopping malls adding a charity gift option. (Donations still add up to relatively small change out of the $19.1 billion that Bride's magazine estimates is spent on gifts and registry choices for 2.4 million weddings a year, far behind fancy china and crystal carafes for newlyweds.)

Carrie Suhr, cause development director at iGive.com, an online mall where 2% to 12% of each purchase is contributed to the charity of the shopper's choosing, says the site is "closing in on $1 million raised this year, our second Christmas. People are choosing worthy causes, from global disasters to the local animal shelter, but most name causes close to home and heart."

Anne Bradley, a member of All Souls Unitarian Church, where Guengerich, a co-minister, married Atkinson, was delighted to write checks to their charities.

"Usually, for my peers who all have their households up to par already, I just get them something really nice from a place they can easily get to exchange it. I like this better," Bradley says.

Brides typically list four or five charities along with traditional choices or perhaps a cool kayak or hot stock, says Hans Hsu, president of gift registry Felicite.com.

He expects 7.2% of customers to register a donation to charity this year, up from 4.3% in 1999. Randi Shade, founder of Charitygift.com, says 10% of the site's gift and event registrations have been for personal celebrations. (Both companies deduct 4.9% of donations to cover their operating costs.)

Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones asked their wedding guests this month to give to a philanthropic foundation established in the name of their infant son, Dylan.

But the trend extends beyond the too-much-is-not-enough crowd.

Bill and Heidi Higgins of San Francisco, marrying in their 30s "with no need for four more salad bowls," decided they'd rather share their joy with four charities dear to their personal experience, he says. That led to more than $8,200 in donations in honor of their wedding in August in Carmel Valley, Calif.

"We picked a few programs that strike a chord with us, places we may give to all our lives. And checks are coming in still," she says.

"Friends in our peer group were much more in touch with the idea," says Bill Higgins, who notes that most of those who attended the wedding made donations, following click-by-click instructions for Charitygift.com on their invitations. Still, 25% to 30% of those invited sent traditional gifts, mostly friends of his parents.

Atkinson, a physician, journalist and vice president of PHR, and Guengerich, whose church supports social justice efforts by the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC), chose causes that expressed their values.

A week after the wedding, total contributions surpassed $25,000, and more checks come in daily.

"They actually asked me if it would be OK!" recalls Valora Washington, executive director of the UUSC, which has relied solely on individual contributions since its founding in 1939.

"We'll use the money for programs that empower women in emerging nations. This is the spirit of generosity that really distinguishes us as Americans and our national culture of volunteerism."

However noble the purpose, the doyennes of do-right social behavior object to celebrants dictating gift choices. On the rules-to-the-wayside Internet, no one seems remotely shy about directing their guests' selections. But brides such as Atkinson, who choose old-fashioned engraved invitations, are on their own. There's no guidance in the hefty tomes by Miss Manners, Emily Post, Letitia Baldrige and Martha Stewart.

The recently revised Bride's Book of Etiquette does suggest passing the word through friends and relatives but cautions: "Remember, don't print your gift preference on your invitation. Some guests will prefer to give you a present anyway. Accept it graciously."

Registering with charities is "a great option for honoring a new beginning," says Bride's magazine editor in chief Millie Bratten, the book's author. "But you don't solicit party guests in the invitation. Even if your intentions are good, you are still telling guests you expect them to give me something. People want the gift to be their own idea."

Hsu read an online discussion in which one person called a bride's charity choice distasteful. Another "thought it was presumptuous of the bride to assume she wanted to make a donation and instead bought a toaster for the couple."

Holcomb, whose invitation albums are in 80 stores nationwide, can see their point.

"Gifts aren't only intended to set up a household for lifestyle rookies," she says. "They are to appreciate and signify the meaning of the event. We get married as a community activity. It's a way of people binding together."

Atkinson and Guengerich concur. "We're in middle life. We are very blessed, very fortunate. We don't need a lot more stuff," Atkinson says.

"What will make us happy is contributing, getting people to serve people. This is what we are all about. People who know us know how much we want to make a difference in the world.

"You don't have to be a millionaire to make a difference. It would be lovely if other couples followed our lead and did the same."

The couple, married Nov. 18, timed their wedding well aware of the season — close to their favorite communal holiday, Thanksgiving, and December's full-throttle holiday shopping.

"In the season of giving, we wanted to say something about gratitude," Atkinson says.