5
ISSUES: Marriage
Chapter 1: Marriage
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any venue approved by the local
council, e.g. a stately home or
hotel
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a
religious
premises
where
permission has been given by the
organisation and the premises
approved by the local authority.
The Home Office has a list of all
approved civil marriage and civil
partnership venues.
10 April 2017
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The above information is reprinted
with kind permission from GOV.
UK.
© Crown copyright 2017
Religious vs civil marriage:
untangling the knot
By Marilyn Stowe
S
ay the word ‘wedding’ to most
Brits and you can be pretty
sure it will bring certain images
to mind: walking down the aisle, the
bride in white arm in arm with her
father, a vicar waiting for the happy
couple with a wry smile. In other
words: a church wedding – I think it is
fair to say that is the default image in
most people’s minds.
The details differ, of course, for those
from
certain
backgrounds.
The
particulars and traditions of Jewish,
Muslim and Hindu weddings are all
distinct but the fundamental message
is the same: getting married is a
religious as much as a social and legal
event.
But of course that is not necessarily the
case. It is perfectly legal in this country
to turn marriage into an entirely
civil affair by marrying in a registry
office, although even then, marriage
is given a unique status through the
compulsory exchange of vows. It is
this element, more perhaps than any
other, that distinguishes marriage
from civil partnership and which
arguably fuelled the drive towards
the legalisation of same sex marriage.
Civil partnerships convey the same
rights but are essentially a form-filling
affair, lacking the special ceremonial
allure and magic of marriage. It was
no surprise to me or many others that
same sex couples would want the
latter too.
You can marry in hotels and similar
venues provided these have been
approved by the local authority. Sadly,
for the more adventurous amongst us,
it is not legal to marry in the open air in
England, by a waterfall or in a flowery
meadow, unless the happy couple also
conduct a legal ceremony in a ‘fixed’
structure licensed for the purpose.
Oddly, this is not the case, however, in
Scotland or Northern Ireland!
Yesterday, I received an interesting
question from a reader of the blog. A
gentleman calling himself ‘urtly’ wrote
to ask:
“Hello, I want to ask because it is not
very clear to me yet.
“I have done a wedding ceremony in
the UK in a Pentecostal church but
has never registered my marriage,
after one year she have abandon me.
I always thought that the marriage is
not valid so I moved abroad to a Dutch
Caribbean Island.
“Overhear I have med a young lady
and we have married, but now she
is stating, that what I am doing is
polygamy and that I can face the jail
and that she wants her divorce. She
wants me to go and divorce the other
lady first and then come back to get
married with her. Because she is a
Christian. But where does she wants
me to go and divorce that lady while
we have never registered our wedding.
“Can you please help me and tell me
the truth, if my first wedding ceremony
was legal to the UK law or I am not
legally married and can not face jail
sentenced over hear in this Island.
“Hope to hear very soon of you.”
I thought urtly’s dilemna raised several
interesting points.
At heart, marriage is a legal contract
and signing the certificate a civil
process. That’s why it’s perfectly legal
to tie the knot in a registry office
and go away just as married as the
participants in a full white wedding.
But in recognition of tradition, special
dispensation is made for some
religious traditions.
As establishment organisations, the
Churches of England and Wales both
have the automatic right to conduct
legally valid marriages without the
involvement of a registry office, as
long as both parties are residents of
countries in the EU. If not, then 28
days’ notice must be given.
At this point, things start to get a
little more complicated. Ministers
and priests of other Christian
denominations, as well as rabbis,
imams, and representatives of other
religions are not given an automatic
