Church / ceremony question

Hi Nicola! welcome to hitched.

Im not sure about how you go about weddings if you want it in a church, we have decided to have a civil ceremony as neither of us are religious. we had to register out wedding at our local registrar and book it with the venues local registrar - it was £30 each for the 1st bit and its gonna cost us £270 for the 2nd bit - and then £7 each for the certificate!!

Im sure the ladies on here will be able to offer advice also.

Congratulations on your engagement xxx

Woah! Sounds like you need to take a step back & understand whether you want a religious or civil service. If its the former then there are no hard & fast rules - it really depends on the church. Some churches would make you attend a certain amount of Sunday services & marriage lessons before hand. The charges to get married in a church outside your parish are generally higher too. I *think* you can wed in a Catholic church if one of you is a baptised / confirmed Catholic.

I am sure there are regular church goers who resent those that chose to get married in church but aren't church goers, but I personally wouldn't let that put me off if that is what I wanted / believed in and thought it was the right thing for my H2B & me. A lot of my friends have religious beliefs & wanted a church ceremony but don't regularly attend church.

If you get married outside a church then you would have a civil ceremony conducted my a registrar not a priest.

If you go for a civil ceremony - there are lots of different types of buildings licensed to hold these - not just hotels - castles, barns, stately homes, museums, pubs, football grounds etc etc. We are having a civil ceremony in a barn type building & have organised the registrar ourselves, my cousin is getting married in a hotel & the hotel made the first contact with the registrar for them but my cousin had to then speak to the registry office to confirm things.

Whereabouts are you based? I'm in England & just occurred to me that the rules in Scotland are slightly different.

Hope that helps & welcome to Hitched!

You could also have a humanist ceremony which has a bit more 'meat' to it than a civil ceremony ? As far as church goes, if you're not religious why would you want to get married in one? (Not a dig, but maybe something to think about) If it means a lot to your H to get married with a catholic service then he really needs to speak to the local parish priest and find out what's involved.

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Hi Welcome to Hitched!

I am Catholic and getting married in church, my OH is not Catholic ( he doesn't have a denomination). Yes you can get married in church if one of you is Catholic (or Church of England if you are that denomination, not Catholic). It also doesn't matter if you are not a regular church goer but some priests do like couples to attend church for a few weeks leading upto the ceremony, also you will probably have to attend marriage lessons; the number of these vary from church to church. All they entail, amongst other things, is the priest asking a couple of questions to make sure you understand you are marrying and therefore receiving a blessing before God. Also if you decide to choose a church outside of your parish, ie, the local area where you live, the priest may need to 'ask permission' (for want of a better phrase) from you local parish priest.

Hope this helps

Mel

Hi Nicola,

Thought I'd comment as I'm familiar with your viewpoint! I have not been christened however I went to Sunday School for years and up until the age of about 12 considered myself a Christian. I haven't attended church (apart from when attending friend's weddings) since then & didn't feel that it would be appropriate for me to get married in a church.

Lots of friends of mine got married in a church despite not attending regularly/ being Christian. My OH would love to get married in a church and my Mum wants me to get married in her village church - gorgeous venue. I have always said if I could get married in a church but take out all the religious connotations I would be quite happy!

My family are disappointed I'm not having a church ceremony but everyone accepts my wishes - we are getting married and having our reception in converted barns and it is a beautiful location.

On the other hand, my cousin is getting married next month and she is having a super-religious ceremony as she is very, very Christian - she will be having approx 8 hymns and tons of readings - perfect for her but not my cup of tea!

In conclusion (sorry for going on and thank you for reading my waffle) do what YOU want to do - if you want a ceremony in a church then do it - if you want a civil ceremony then do it! I just didn't want the religious ceremony as I'm agnostic.

Waffle over!!! x

I'm not sure what I / we want, that's the trouble. Think it sounds easier to get married at a hotel. Will have to have another think, I'm just confused with the whole process.

I've started our guest list today - cos don't want to fall in love with a venue and then realise they can't accommodate us. So far 224 people - oh joy! (Not all for the day obviously).

Hi

My 1st marriage was in a christian church, my local parish, i'm not a church goer but the vicar did request that we attend for 3 sundys before wedding to hear the banns being read. (we didn't though), my h2b was catholic but not practising so we didnt even consider telling his church or his local parish church. However 3 days before wedding we went for rehersal and to pay the fees, we were asked for h2b's banns certificate!!! To cut a long story short we were told we couldnt marry without this certificate. We then had to contact his local vicar (we didnt dare say he was catholic) who rang the bishop (i think) who precided over our town we then had to go and get a letter from him saying we were allowed to marry (this was miles away and neither or us could drive at the time) we got the letter the day before. We didnt dare tell my mum or she would have panicked so much.

All that was 16 years ago so dont know if anything has changed but i dont think it has. So check about the banns thingy! In hindsight i blinkin wish i didnt pick the letter up!!!!! ha ha we did manage 13 years and 2 fab kids though!!! This time its a hotel for me and i cant wait x

Hi

As H&S said - if you are marrying out of your parish, you do need to make sure that you have your banns read at the church you are marrying in and the one in your parish. The ones in your parish need to be read first and a certificate gained (cost about £30!) to say they have been read.

This is what we are doing. I do not regularly attend church, but I do have my beliefs and for me personally I can't imagine marrying any where other than a church.

My advise would be to do what is right for you and your h2b, not what you feel is easiest!

It really depends on how much you want a religious ceremony. It is definitly easier to have a civil ceremony, plus you wouldnt have the hassle of getting somewhere else for the reception. however it cannot have any readings, speaches or songs with any religious content, so you have to be happy with that. it depends from church to church on their rules for getting married there, check out their website if they have one as it is listed there sometimes, but usually you will have to have a tie to that church, i.e. you have lived in the parish for 6 months or more or a member of imediate family was born/buried/died there, on top of this you may have to attend classes, a collegue of mine had to go to the church for a whole year every sunday! so if you cant commit then have a civil ceremony and a blessing after. me and OH are not fully decided but will probs go for the civil ceremony as it is less hassle, even though we are both christian ( though dont go to church regularly), i was a bit upset though that there can be no religious aspect to the ceremony.... :-(

H2B and I are going for the happy medium. Both of us are Christian, baptised, attended church until we left home. After this, however, we have not been to church once and therefore would feel uncomfortable getting married in one.

We both believe in God, though, and want our ceremony to be a religious one, so we asked my old minister (who baptised me as a baby) if he would conduct the ceremony in a hotel. So we are having a religious ceremony in the same hotel as our reception.

It might be worth looking into this option! ?

Hi there, welcome to hitched! The Church of England have a new website about getting married in church - you can even look at a sample service with your names in:-) They recently changed the rules about where / how easy it is to get married in different churches as well. Not sure if Roman Catholic church have anything similar? http://www.yourchurchwedding.org/ Good luck! Neph x

If you are confused with it ask your groom to be both of you should decide on this matter, well when you chose to get married on church you have to attend several meetings or seminars then the church will explain to you every detail you need to know well this may depend on the church. in hotel it is up tp you if you would invite a priest or just chose a civil wedding, well most of women chose to have church wedding for as what they had said you can feel the harmony of getting hitched in the church LOL!!!!