Wedding Officiant Question

chescam

My fiance wants his pastor from NY to officiate our wedding. Under Florida laws can he perform our ceremony? He's ordained in NY

Kettinger

Im actually ordained for the State of Florida, and when I have requests to perform a ceremony outside of the state, I have to contact the state and find out what documentation they need in order for me to validate a marriage.

A pastor can always perform the religous aspects of the ceremony no matter what state they are in, however, the officiant portion of the ceremony must be recognized by the state.

With that said, with enough notice many states have provisions for out of state clergyman and laypersons to be granted permission to marry a couple in the state, on a couple by couple basis.

I would suggest contacting the state, or your local office where you would file your marriage certificate, and get the full details of what may be needed. It varies state by state. I usually have to produce my credentials and appointed certificate from the church.

Hope this helps!

chescam

Thanks! This is exactly what I was looking for. We'll just have to switch around who does what. We have 3 pastors conducting the ceremony, one of which is our pastor. We'll just have the out of state pastor do a sermonette and then have our pastor do the other part.

julie21homes

I believe so, my friend is ordained in TN and will be conducting ours...she called FL to verify too!