Who''s Officiating Your Wedding?

[SoonIHope]

Our wedding isn''t until June 2007, but I am already freaking out because we have no idea who''s going to officiate our wedding! Neither my fiance nor I are remotely religious, so I really don''t want a religious officiant, which leaves a justice of the peace/judge type person, but I kind of don''t want some random stranger who doesn''t know us to do it, but I can''t think of any good friends/family members who would be willing to get ordained online and do a good job that way.......

So my question is, who did you choose to officiate your wedding? Please answer the poll question, and also let me know how you came to that decision!

 

[appletini]

My FI & I are not regular church goers so we are having our ceremony & reception at the same location and chose the minister they said did the best ceremonies. I have talked with him on the phone and he sounds delightful. We have a meeting with him next week.

 

[laurel_aurelia]

we''re getting married in richmond and, while we aren''t religious, we decided to find an officiant through richmondweddings.com lol.. there was only one public officiant on there that was male, and for some reason we wanted a male. he just happens to be a retired baptist minister. we like him very much.

 

[SoonIHope]

Thanks appletini! I feel like this really is the norm, so I don''t know why the idea bugs me so much of having it be someone I don''t know well already. One idea we had was to just make it legal at the courthouse and do the ceremony ourselves, but we still need SOMEONE to sort of direct the order of things and I just can''t figure it out!!!!

We might just end up getting some random judge or something to do it though...that doesn''t seem like a bad idea even though it''s not exactly what I want....

 

[bopitaddict]

while we are religious, our church can''t hold the amount of guests we''re going to have, so we found a church in the city... only stipulation is that the pastor of that church has to be the officiant... our pastor is going to give the homily.

 

[SoonIHope]

Oops, Laurel posted while I was replying! Didn''t mean to not thank you too!

I think maybe just hearing that people meet officiants for the first time around the time of their weddings and end up liking them is going to make me feel better about this.... And that''s cool that there''s a website for that! I''ll have to check out our area now...hehe...

 

[Caribou]

My FI and I are not at all religious, so we decided to have my best male friend get ordained. It''s a little nerve racking because I''m afraid that he''ll get super nervous on that day and not be able to speak (which is what would happen to me, if I were doing it) but at the same time, I think it will make our ceremony even more special.

My MOH is catholic and I''m considering having her read something to put a little bit of God into our ceremony. I found this, it''s called ''two souls unit'':

There were two lonely souls looking for their place;
But one day their seeking hearts would embrace.
They began to walk that journey of Love;
That was brought together from God above.
Hand and Hand, Heart to Heart they come to unite;
May they go on as one shining God''s light.
May they go through each and every day of this life;
Cherishing that love that has made them man and wife.
May they remember who brought them together this day;
That He would sustain the love and guide their every way.
May their Love and compassion for each be a beautiful story;
That in all its wonders, God would receive the Glory.

Goodness, makes me wheel up just reading it.

 

[laurel_aurelia]

we found ours and went down to richmond to meet him like two weeks later. (about 6 months out from the wedding; now we''re at about 4.5 months.)

we LOVED him. and he gave us a huge thing of like 50 ideas for vows and stuff!

i can send you the vows list if you want.. be sure you like EXACTLY what he is going to say!!

 

[XChick03]

I guess I'm the only person using a judge they knew previously.

We haven't made it official or anything yet, but I really want my favorite professor, who is a judge, to do it.

ETA my wedding is also in June 07

 

[griffitk]

We''re having my uncle re-ordained online by the ULC. The funny thing is that he was actually ordanded through the universal life church ~30 years ago to get out of being drafted for the Vietnam war. He isn''t a real minister at all, just a tuxedo salesman!

Because he''s doing the ceremony,we have to write it ourselves. I found the best book. It''s called "the Wedding Ceremony planner" by Judith Johnson. In the book she talks about how to stage the wedding (who should stand where) and how to write the ceremony. Then she breaks the ceremony down into sections (opening prayer, vows, ring exchange, unity candle, etc) and gives 5-10 examples of text for each part. We''re basically going to cut and paste sections from the book into a ceremony that suites us.

I *really* didn''t want to get married by a stranger. Choosing a name out of a phone book and paying them $500+ dollars for 20 minutes of their time seemed like such a ripoff. Many of the ones I saw advertised don''t even do the rehersal. I''m really excited to have my uncle do the ceremony. Both my FI and I agree that he''ll do a great job!

 

[SoonIHope]

XChick - that is exactly the type of thing I wanted to do! But we just don''t happen to know anyone like that...

As for having a friend/family member ordained, that is by far my 2nd choice, but we just can''t decide who would do it!!! I have one friend from high school who I haven''t stayed super close with, but I thought she might be good at doing it, but we are both bridesmaids for another friend''s wedding this summer and she revealed her psychotically passive aggressive side during planning of the bridal shower so she is OFF THE LIST! (Not the invite list, but no way do I want her to officiate now) For everyone else, I feel like they would get nervous and/or laugh and not really be able to do it in an appropriately serious way. But I hadn''t thought of someone like an uncle really...I''ll have to go through my whole list of invitees now and ponder a wider range of guests!

 

[appletini]

For a long time my FI said he wanted a church wedding, I told him that if he were a regular church goer I would respect that, but since he only goes for Easter, Mother''s Day, & Christmas b/c his mom makes him, I told him that a church wedding wasn''t necessary, but we can still have a religious ceremony at another location.

 

[SoonIHope]

Oooh can whoever picked the next to last option please tell me who''s leading your not-legal ceremony?? I think that''s the most appealing option to me at this point, but I still can''t think who that person would be!

I''m really enjoying hearing how everyone decided, though, please keep it coming!

 

[regalada]

Hi Albicocca, I picked the last option. We were married in Vegas last month and will have our "real" destination wedding in October back home. We have not told anybody (parents, close friends, etc.) with the exception of the maid of honor because we needed her to help us find somebody who could "marry us" without really marrying us. She found a minister, a friend of a friend, who is willing to officiate the ceremony, filling out all the paperwork and stuff, without actually turning in the paperwork after the fact. Even thought it''s technically lying, he is on board because he undertands why we had to get married ahead of time.

I owe my MOH big time!

 

[SoonIHope]

Thanks for replying regalada!

I do remember your story from your earlier posts when you were originally trying to decide if you should do that. In your case that totally makes sense, but since the 2nd minister would technically have been able to perform the ceremony legally if you weren''t already married, it doesn''t exactly apply to my situation.

But I am feeling better just seeing the variety of ways that people handle this issue now! I''m starting to feel we won''t necessarily be freaks no matter what we end up choosing!

 

[FireGoddess]

I voted ''other'' because we had an interfaith officiant (Universal Life Ministries) that we found off the web marry us. We met with her a a few times, got along well, and we hired her to marry us.

 

[regalada]

Albicocca:

I know about feeling like a freak!

On top of being already married when we get to our wedding, we are getting married on a Monday. Every time somethings else threatens to fall outside the norm (i.e we'll need to do simultanenous translation English-Spanish-German for the benefit of our parents), I start wondering Why can't I have one thing be normal!

My hubby quickly answers because normal we are not. And he's right. But I just love the way we are not normal together and that keeps me going, in spite of the We're freaks! feeling.

Good luck with your decisions!

 

[ChargerGrrl]

Both ministers we met with were recommended by the folks who own the winery where we we''re getting married.

We''re not religious at all (both of us are "recovering" Catholics), but we did want to make at least a couple of references to "God", and include a reading from the Bible. So a minister associated with a non-denominational (sp?) Church was the way we wanted to go.

We ended up going with a male minister- he was more professional & progressive than "Rev. Judy", who was a bit grandmotherly. Plus, we had the option of putting our ceremony together ourselves (with direction from our minister). So, it seems a bit more personal.

Honestly, we didn''t think twice about the fact that we had no connection with the person who will marry us. The thing that mattered to us was that we liked them, and they listened to our "vision".

 

[leeenie]

We're non-religious too, but we'd like to have a ceremony. However, I think that the whole "officiant for hire" think is kind of hokey. No offense to anyone who is doing this, but it just seems weird to pay some random stranger who's decided to perform weddings as a profit-making enterprise hundreds of dollars for 10 minutes-one hour of them saying some stuff. It seems like the person marrying you should be more than a regular vendor or service provider...either someone who has a relationship with you (religiously or a friend who gets ordained) or some other type of authority (like a judge). I don't know what we're doing yet.

 

[froufrou]

we aren''t technically engaged yet but we were both talking about wedding stuff, so my family is Jewish and his is Christian but neither of us are religious so we were probably going to pick one of our mutual friends to do it, and ask them and hope they will want to. i think the "pay a stranger to do it" seems bogus too, id rather have someone who knows me.

 

[MINE!!]

We were torn... I am United Methodist. My father is a minister and my step-mother is as well. His father was an Angelican Bishop of Canada. God is a very important part of our life and our relationship. And I cannot help but to mention that Jesus is my best friend.

But, we did not know what church to get married in. My DH goes to an Episc. Church and I a United Meth. We decieded to get married at the Episc. Church with the priest blessing the marriage. However, he is new to the church, he was just transfered here, so DH does not know him that well. BUT... although the church is beautiful, I feel that it is very cold (I have a difficult time with the Episc. distance from God, I just feel it is less intimate and more rigid.) Therefore, we agreed to get married in the Episc. Chapel instead, It felt more like my ''home'' church.

 

[BrightSpot]

I''ll find out when I get to Jamaica! LOL...

 

[icekid]

albicocca- My fiance and I are in the exact same situation, so thanks for bring up this topic

 

[Tybee]

I think the only reason why we didn''t elope was because my FI was so dead set on having his brother marry us.

 

[chickflick]

My FI''s twin sister is a Presbyterian minister so that was an easy choice. We''re getting married on a cruise ship, not in a church, so she gave us total flexibility on the ceremony. We stuck with the traditional Presbyterian marriage covenent with minor changes (I''m Methodist, Jim was raised Presbyterian but had some bad experiences as a teen-ager and young adult that turned hm off religion).

 

[aljdewey]

Neither my husband nor I are terribly religious, and we were getting married at an outdoor park.

I didn''t really want a JP for the same reason - I didn''t want a stranger who didn''t even know us participating in the most significant day for us.

We had a close friend (one who performs regularly, so we knew she''d be solid at it) solemnized by our state to legally marry us. I wrote the entire ceremony, start to finish, so I knew it would be exactly what I wanted.

I took her to dinner, and we did a run-through of the entire ceremony. I printed the whole thing out in fairly large type (easy to read), and stuck to 10 pages into a small 15-page magnetic photo album. I then covered the photo album so it would blend nicely. (I also made an extra that stayed with our license, etc. in case she forgot her copy).

Not only did this make the ceremony VERY personal for us....we still have the entire ceremony book.

 

[tanyak]

Date: 4/21/2006 2:40:19 PM
Author: teagreen
We're non-religious too, but we'd like to have a ceremony. However, I think that the whole 'officiant for hire' think is kind of hokey. No offense to anyone who is doing this, but it just seems weird to pay some random stranger who's decided to perform weddings as a profit-making enterprise hundreds of dollars for 10 minutes-one hour of them saying some stuff. It seems like the person marrying you should be more than a regular vendor or service provider...either someone who has a relationship with you (religiously or a friend who gets ordained) or some other type of authority (like a judge). I don't know what we're doing yet.

I couldn't agree more. My fiance and I are lucky, I guess, because my step-dad is an ordained minister and he will be performing the ceremony. MY FI and I were both brought up in the church (he's Catholic, I'm something similar to Baptist

), and we both still believe...we're just too lazy to get up and go to church on Sunday. So if we didn't have my step-dad, and I don't know where we would turn. But I just think, and this is my opinion, that there is something weird about hiring a random officiant. I know a couple who did this, and it just seemed like such a cold business transaction. Like hiring the DJ or photog. I feel like the officiant should have a bigger role in your life. I want someone who will remembering marrying us five years from now.

 

[JulieN]

I''m hoping my dad''s foster dad... if he''s willing to do a non-religious, that would be great. He''d do non-denominational Christian, which would be ok, too.

 

[tmdblue]

My FH and I want to be married sooner rather than later so we have choosen to go the Justice of the Peace route. Also with me being in gradschool and him getting ready to apply/start at the same gradschool money was a factor. $34.50 for a JP is a heck of a lot cheaper than the thousands it takes to pull off a traditional wedding. I am a Christian and he is a Muslim (causing a firestorm in my family

). We are getting married September 5th

. We do of course want to have a traditional wedding in the next year or so. Our vows include the mentioning of God which we both find of the utmost importance.


tmdblue

 

[ellaila]

I am actually SO excited about our officiant! To be honest, I'm not even sure what she is - JP or minister - but she specializes in interfaith/nondenominational marriages. I had read absolutely amazing reviews of her on the Knot, and I knew that she was the one I had to have for our wedding. I spoke with her yesterday for about 30 minutes, and within that phone call, we both made each other cry happy cries! I made her cry by reading the reviews to her -- she hadn't seen them before; and she made me cry by talking about some elements of the ceremony

I am Jewish but not religious, my fiance is Venezuelan and Catholic but not religious. I think one thing we are going to do -- an idea that I love -- is that the JP is going to read a blessing for us (not a religious one but one of those "May such and such happen in your life" things), and then my Dad will repeat it in Hebrew and my fiance's Dad will repeat it in Spanish. How cool is that?? Also, she involves the guests by having them give their blessing for our marriage (she asks them and everyone says "we do!") and then has everyone proclaim us husband and wife together at the end -- awesome.

By the way, some states -- at least, Massachusetts I know for a fact -- allow anyone to register for an officiant license for a day. We thought of having my Dad do that and be the one to marry us, but unfortunately Rhode Island (where we're gettnig married though we live in Boston) doesn't do that. So that was a bit of a bummer. But he loves the idea of being personally involved in the ceremony, which is why I think that blessing I mentioned above is so fabulous!