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Beginner April 2015

Please help - Catholic priest being unhelpful and wedding is in 3 months!!

a-cheap-date, 4 of January of 2015 at 16:27 Posted on Planning 0 1


We are supposed to be getting married in our local Catholic church on 18 April this year. Before we got engaged I had become a lapsed Catholic, but still a believer. We started going to church and a few weeks later approached our priest about getting married. We are not doing it for it to be a pretty mass. Our reception venue is actually much prettier. It means a lot to me to be married in the church, as I still believe. My fiance doesn't (though he will pretend he is agnostic).

The priest has been very rude with us. He asked what date we had in mind - we told him, he then said "well it has to work for us too". I said I understood that. Anyway, we eventually got him to agree on a date. He was nothing but rude on the phone - so abrupt. He said to come back in October. I then emailed him a few months later and said that I was worried that our insurance was not valid unless it was confirmed in writing. I asked i there was anything that we should start doing. He said actually I should get my certificates together and have a preliminary meeting. During that meeting he said we didn't need to do anything until the new year.

We have been going regularly to mass as requested in the meantime. During this time my fiance has been getting evils from a parishioner who does the collection (no word of a lie - he literally stares him down).

We then approached him today and said we wondered what we should be doing as the wedding is just 3.5 months away. His response was "there's lots to do" and just left it. We then pushed and said well what shall we do. He then asked if we had "completed the forms". He bloody did the meeting with us!! We politely pointed this out. He said we should meet on Saturday at 12. I've looked online since and I'm worried that there is not enough time. We will need a dispensation from the bishop for me to marry a non-baptised person, to do pre-marriage counselling and I don't think he has even given notice to the registry office (I assumed he did this but it turns out we needed to give notice too!).

I am now really stressed and worried that I may not even have a wedding at all. I know that registrars get booked up a year in advance so if he cancels it or something we will have like a 6pm wedding or maybe none!!

Can anyone give any advice as to what I should do next? I don't feel I can challenge him on being rude. However, I want to be reassured that the wedding will go ahead, as it seems like he's 100% not bothered and had forgotten us.

Any help will be greatly appreciated!!

1 replies

Latest activity by Scottish_Sarah, 4 of January of 2015 at 19:03
  • M
    Beginner August 2016
    McHelenz ·
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    I dont think that wanting to get married in church is worth this. I am a believer but haven't been to church for sometime (fell out with the vicar) and I believe that I am a good person and god will know that.

    Anyway, my other half doesn't believe and said that if we married in church it would be like we weren't married at all to him coz he wouldn't believe it. We are having a civil ceremony at 11.30 am then at some point in the afternoon having a blessing in the woods at the venue on the same day.

    Maybe this could be something you could do? I'd get on to the Registrar tomorrow you could be in luck. I just think that if he's like this now he'll ruin your day and no one deserves this. Sometimes the christian community can be so judgemental for no reason, they should be welcoming you, seeing as they are struggling for numbers!!!

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  • S
    Beginner June 2015
    Scottish_Sarah ·
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    Regarding giving notice - this needs to be 28 days in advance so you still have time there but would need to arrange soonish - only C of E you don't have to give notice as you have banns read.

    So you have a meeting with him this coming Saturday?

    He may be just rude or he may have had a lot to do just after a service so may have been distracted - speak to him at your meeting and explain your worries with regard to timings, some churches have become slightly more relaxed so you might not need the dispensation from the bishop.

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