Whats your opinion of Court Marraige?

CrystalSenne

My fiance and I are getting married in May of this year. For personal reasons, we were weighing the idea of having a court marraige the day BEFORE our wedding, and then having his dad do the vows for us at the actual wedding and reception. His dad happens to be a pastor, (an unordained pastor) so it would be nice if he could do our vows.
We aren't extremely worried about having our anniversary be the day before our wedding, however I would like some advice, or your opinions and thoughts on this.
We will still have a full wedding, with wedding dress, ceremony, reception. The only difference is we will ALREADY be married as of the day before.
Have you  or anyone you known ever done this same thing? Why should, or shouldn't we do this?

Is this a good idea?

TheVirginians

You put this same post on Attire, on Budget, on Reception, and on Ceremony. Just like you, we go board to board so there was no reason for starting four threads. I think you should do it all at one time.

GoodLuckBear14

I answered you on Receptions.

AddieCake

I don't understand the point of this at all. At least most people have some reason they try to sell with these things.

misshart00

I also answered you on attire, but I'll post here too: I don't know how it is there, but in my state, you have to pay for the marriage license and then the JOP at the courthouse on top of that. So, if you can't afford it the next day, you won't be able to afford it the day before.

reppunzel

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_ceremony-ideas_whats-your-opinion-of-court-marraige?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:10Discussion:339bfc28-8a0d-44ee-9f57-4026d9421cd8Post:7227295e-7341-467f-98e6-5f24d79473bb">Re: Whats your opinion of Court Marraige?</a>:
[QUOTE]I don't completely understand how FFIL is a pastor, but not ordained. Do you mean like a lay minister? Have one wedding. If you want it to be in the church, have it in the church and not the court. If you want FFIL to officiate even though he's not ordained, see if there is some way to have him as officiant. A couple thoughts: Some counties will deputize people for a day or allow officiants with online ordinations (though an online ordination could be a problem with your religious affiliation). The County Clerk's Office will be able to tell you who can officiate a wedding in their jurisdiction. <strong>Another option may be to have an ordained pastor at your church co-officiate the ceremony and do the paperwork. Whether this is okay would be up to the pastor.</strong> If it turns out that there's no way for FFIL to officiate, perhaps he could do a reading during the service (if it doesn't feel like a consolation prize).
Posted by Schatzi13[/QUOTE]

The only reason I can imagine you'd want to do court the day before (from what you've told us) is so that FFIL could lead your vows in the religious ceremony even though he's not a licensed officiant.  If that is the reason, then I ditto the bolded above.

A friend of mine was in a situation where she wanted one of the ministers at our church to marry her, but he couldn't be licensed (our church is led by a board of teaching elders and the clerk of court limits how many persons from a single fellowship may be licensed to perform weddings).  So the minister she and her FI were closest to did their ceremony/vows and another elder handled the legal paperwork (he attended the wedding, but didn't stand up at the front, etc.)

Do it all in one day.

MonsterNessa

I would first like to state that I completely understand court wedding. My mother got married in a courthouse several years ago and the judge officiated it beautifully. That said, I agree with everyone else here, in that I can't see why you would want to get married before your ceremony. We are going to be common law married several months before our wedding, but it's for reasons to do with our school financial aid and we will still be able to fill out a marriage license on the day of our ceremony. If I showed up to a ceremony and found out the person had actually gotten married the day before I would be pretty bummed, especially if it was someone I felt I was close to.