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Catholic Weddings
Legal marriage before church marriage
It is possible that my fiance and I may need to get married legally about 2 months before our actual Catholic wedding because I may be losing my jog and I may need to join his company's health care plan. Does anyone have experience with this and have a sense as to how our priest might react? We definitely see the church wedding as the true wedding - the legal marriage would just be a slip of paper in order to afford health care.
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Re: Legal marriage before church marriage
but here's somethign that might help you out. i'm an HR person so i know the law on this.
let's say you lose your job on January 1. You have 60 days to decide whether you want to elect COBRA coverage. At any time during that 60 days, if you need to elect coverage, you can, and it becomes effective the date you lost your insurance - in your case, January 1.
So if your wedding is set for some time during that 60 day period, you could forego the insurance covearge, and then if somethign should happen to you during that 60 day window, you could then elect the covearge, pay the 1 or 2 months fee, and be safe.
also, does your FI's company cover domestic partners? if so, you could qualify that way to go on his plan without marriage. as you'd be losing your coverage, that constitues what's called a "qualifying event" and it would allow you to enroll on his plan outisde of the open enrollment period.
your wedding date also qualifies as a "qualfying event" so you'd be able to go on your FI's insurance as of the date of your wedding.
AKA GoodLuckBear14
Beyond that, most churches do not view this favorably.
Our own parish wasn't going to marry us WITHOUT the marriage license.
What you propose to have isn't a marriage ceremony - you're looking for a Convalidation. And while that can be lovely, it's not something that many priests/churches view as something that holds the same pomp and circumstance as a wedding.
And I think you're also lying if you say that you don't consider yourselves married that way. You want SOMEONE to consider you married. You just don't want EVERYONE to consider you married.
I'm from Mexico and people do this all the time here. Being a 90% catholic country, I know many people who have had their legal wedding weeks or months prior to their Catholic wedding, for legal or visa purposes, and the Church is OK with that(you can't live together before the Catholic wedding though). I would speak to the priest and see what he says.
[QUOTE]I'm from Mexico and people do this all the time here. Being a 90% catholic country, I know many people who have had their legal wedding weeks or months prior to their Catholic wedding, for legal or visa purposes, and the Church is OK with that(you can't live together before the Catholic wedding though). I would speak to the priest and see what he says.
Posted by mariadperezg[/QUOTE]
This is true, but in Mexico, legally you must have a legal wedding separate from the church wedding. In the US, the church wedding can be the legal wedding. I have a feeling that the difference in the legal rules changes the views of how the church weddings should go.
I think that many US priests feel that the wedding industry has become overblown, where more focus is put on the reception than on the actual lifelong marriage, so they discourage people from civil marriages that take advantage of certain marriage benefits (health insurance, military pay, etc.) followed by convalidation, especially when the couple is expecting the convalidation to look like a wedding. My priest does not do wedding ceremonies if the couple is already legally married (he also refuses to perform weddings if he feels that the couple has no intention of having God front and center in the marriage). I haven't heard of a convalidation at the church either.
i'm pretty sure european countries are like Mexico - they need the legal and religious. but most of the times ive seen this, the legal is done the day before - not months ahead - and for the sole reason of it being required by law.
(my quote function doesn't work properly)
I just want to clarify that it is not the chuch's rules that differ between the United States and Mexico (and other countries where legal marriages are seperate from religious ones), but the rules of the countries themselves. In the United States all religious leaders can perform legal marriages (within certain rules set by the states). In those other places no religious authority can perform a legal marriage (barring a weird exception). I imagine the Catholic Church would like the legal authority to peform all their weddings around the world, but accept the jurisdictions of the countries in which they exist.
[QUOTE]I am currently in school. I have been for a year and paying for COBRA. I have a friend that is encouraging me to do this, but I told her that this is def. not for me. (My COBRA runs out 7/31) Well her and her BF are getting ready to move to Cali and she said that they will probaly JP it and have a ceremony and all that later and not tell anyone that they are married. I know it is not me, but I hate that, but to each his own I guess. I know she is someone who would get married in a church. She is doing it for insurance and so she can go to school and get paid b/c he is in the military. I guess I am doing it the hard way and using every cent of savings I have, I have a year of school left.
Posted by Kate504[/QUOTE]
If you're in school full-time, can you buy a basic group health insurance policy through your university? I remember buying insurance as a grad student 2 or 3 years ago for about $400/semester -- which was far cheaper than COBRA from my previous job would have been. It was pretty basic coverage, catastrophic only, really. But that plus the free access to the student health center got me through.
FWIW, someone will eventually find out even if your friend doesn't tell anyone she's legally married. The church she wants to get married in will find out when she can't present them with a marriage license.
Good luck.
[QUOTE]"It's crazy how the same church "rules" can change from country to country. " (my quote function doesn't work properly) I just want to clarify that it is not the chuch's rules that differ between the United States and Mexico (and other countries where legal marriages are seperate from religious ones), but the rules of the countries themselves. In the United States all religious leaders can perform legal marriages (within certain rules set by the states). In those other places no religious authority can perform a legal marriage (barring a weird exception). I imagine the Catholic Church would like the legal authority to peform all their weddings around the world, but accept the jurisdictions of the countries in which they exist.
Posted by bibliophile2010[/QUOTE]
Got it bibliophile! I didn't know that either! Thanks!
[QUOTE]my Fl and I elopped in 2008 and having our church wedding in 2011. He is catholic and I am becoming catholic. We didn't want to get married by church until i felt i was ready to become catholic. We have two kids and the church is fine with it.
Posted by wifeandmommy0609[/QUOTE]
The church is "fine" with people getting married in the church, returning to the church, and converting.
The church is NOT "fine" with people purposely turning their backs on the church for a civil marriage which would not be considered valid. I'm not saying that is what you did, but the way you put it makes it seem that it is an acceptable choice, which it isn't.
However, we recently decided to go ahead with the legal marriage prior to the church wedding so that he can go through with his green card application before July, when his extension will be up. It makes the transition easier, makes certain he won't have to stop working when we get married (while his application is being processed) and gives him the freedom to actually leave the country if he needs to (right now it isn't guaranteed they'd let him back in, because it isn't a work visa).
We talked to our priest and he had absolutely no problem with us getting the legal part done in a few months. As he pointed out (and as FI and I feel) it's just a slip of paper. The real wedding for us isn't until the church ceremony-- it isn't being treated as just a convalidation. We're not having a full Mass, so maybe that makes a difference, but our priest said a legal marriage now (since we're mostly done with our marriage prep already) wouldn't change anything about the ceremony in July.
But we're awfully liberal up here in Seattle, so maybe I'm alone on this.
"I'm from Mexico and people do this all the time here. Being a 90% catholic country, I know many people who have had their legal wedding weeks or months prior to their Catholic wedding, for legal or visa purposes, and the Church is OK with that(you can't live together before the Catholic wedding though). I would speak to the priest and see what he says. "
From Where I'am from , people do this ! I will say 90 % of people do this all the time ...The church even encourage you to do this even if they know you were legally married in court years ago ...and it is what we are going to do next year in the US ! and Our priest finds nothing wrong with it ! For many reasons, (especially financial ) people would get married legally ( in court) years before they got married in church , and we just call it religious wedding or something like that ( translating from French ) ...Like people said , ask your priest , but I don't think you should feel bad about it !! It's still as beautiful and valid , as if you were doing it the same time you were married in court ...Some people even consider this very meaningful for older couples , as the grow well within the catholic community with all the ups and downs , and as their faith has grown .
GL