Civil Wedding Ceremonies

A Civil Affair

Civil wedding ceremonies are the alternative to the traditional church ceremony. Many couples opt for these nowadays because they feel that the religious ceremony is outdated or they simply do not follow any particular religion. Indeed for some the civil ceremony offers more of a personal ceremony, allowing them to pick readings that they feel reflect their feelings and suit them compared to passages from the bible.



For a civil ceremony you can have any reading or piece of music so long as it contains no reference to religion, depending on the individual Registrar of course as all readings etc are at their discretion. The ceremony must be approved by the Registrar conducting the ceremony, both as a matter of respect, but also as a matter of legality. If you do not have readings etc approved then they may not be willing to marry you.
Often finding readings that "fit" the occasion can be a trial, so be sure to make use of the internet, there are many forums online that offer help and support, Wedding Chaos has been a great help in the run up to my own wedding. But why not look into buying books on readings and speeches? They are often a good idea and can be passed on to a friend after your wedding to help them out too!



Popular choices for readings include poems and lyrics of songs. Some couples often write their own passages about their feelings towards their partner and a lovely gesture is to ask members of the bridal party to read them out at the ceremony. Unlike a church wedding ceremony where it is often the minister who does readings, you can ask just about anyone to do a reading at a civil ceremony, in our case the father of the groom, godmother of the bride and a close friend of the bride will be doing the readings.

A few of the approved readings from Aberdeenshire Registrars include:
· True Love;
· Eskimo Love Song;
· Apache Blessing;
· On Your Wedding Day;

If in doubt, just ask the Registrar for the district you intend to marry in if they have a reading list of suggested readings, most of them to and are more than happy to email or post it out to you.



Music choice is different for a civil wedding ceremony; there are no hymns like there are in the church ceremony. The Bridal March can be the traditional "Wedding March" (from The Marriage of Figaro), or it can be something more contemporary, think President Obama’s inauguration, "At Last" by Etta James.
Some very proud Scots couples hire a piper to play during their ceremony, “Highland Cathedral” makes a beautiful bridal march. And the piper looks great in the pictures!



Always remember to check that the Registrar has no problems with the ceremony being filmed if you decide to have a videographer present. Most do not mind, but again ask to be on the safe side.

What to do & when to do it!

Technically there is no correct answer to this, you can do whatever you like in any order if you so wish, but I would recommend taking a logical approach to planning your wedding.

To begin with we sat down and decided what we wanted:
* Civil or Religious - Civil
* Big or small - since we have very little family it's a small affair
* Budget - realistically how much would we be thinking we should spend?
* When - We opted for April 2010 (originally we wanted the 10th, but someone else had booked the hotel that day!!)
* What style of wedding - this was primarily my area, bless him but my other half has no idea and lets face it I don't think I would have trusted him.
*Guest list - List A, then list B and then anyone else we could think of lol
* Attendants - Who do you want as bridesmaids, best man, flower girl, pageboy?

Once some of that is out of the way you are well on your way to planning your wedding. The trick is to keep a list or even a notebook of ideas that you can look over and discuss with your other half.

And girls, note that sometimes your other half might just say "uh huh/whatever you think/ you decide...etc etc" it's not that they aren't interested, it's that you are often more excited about the day than they are. To them it doesn't need to have ice sculptures and a dove release, all that matters to them is that they are marrying the woman they love, whereas we girls want EVERYTHING to be perfect and do not in any circumstances want to give our future mother in law anything to moan about!!

I would advise booking your venue and registrar/minister as soon as you can to avoid disappointment. When we booked ours it was roughly a year and a half till the wedding (maybe more I just can't count!) and there were so many things booked already!

There's nothing to stop you asking for quotes with over a year or more till your wedding, just explain that you are merely making inquiries as you are working out your budget and would like a rough figure to work from. But do remember that prices are likely to rise year to year so things may not be the exact price you were quoted 9 months previously.

I'll make up a short what to do and when to do it list and stick it up here to act as a guide to work from, just remember that no one list is perfect or right, there are so many out there and they are only what one person feels is the best for them. You should do what you want to when you want to, so if that means you want to be like me and well organised then good on you it will save you stress and aggravation closer to the wedding. However if you prefer to wait till later to start your planning there is nothing wrong with that, everyone is different.

The Technical Stuff

A wedding ceremony in Scotland requires you to lodge your Marriage Notice forms (or M10s) with the Registrar for that district 3 months before the wedding. You will also need to lodge a separate sheet with additional information - ie the names of your witnesses and their addresses etc. A lot of this information can be found on the Registrar's website. In our case it's the Aberdeenshire Registrar that will be marrying us likewise you can just abuse good ol' Google for this information.

Another good place to look for the technical bits is the General Register Office for Scotland (GROS) where you will be able to download the M10s and read EVERYTHING about marrying in Scotland - both civil ceremonies and religions ceremonies.

Don't forget to check if your venue has a license for a civil ceremony, or is approved. Thankfully ours is so that's one less thing for us to worry about!!