How to have friend marry us?

cookiej84 · June 2012

Does anyone know what steps we need to take to have our friend perform our ceremony? We are from out of state (MA), as is our friend, and we are getting married in Greenland NH. Any help is appreciated.

GoodLuckBear14 · June 2012

The biggest step is contacting the clerk's office in the county in which you will be married and finding out what they require. Some do not recognize on line ordination.

futuremrsbruno · June 2012

There was a post about this yesterday, I forget what the name of the thread is...

Anyway, it's not as easy as it used to be to get ordained and then marry people. You would have to check with whatever state you are getting married in. Some states allow it, and others only allow a marriage to be performed by a judge, or a member of the clergy. It's different for every state.

I do think I read that some states allow a friend to marry a couple with a member of a clergy, but I don't know which ones.

m tulli · June 2012

I'm from NH. Go on the secretary of states site. There's forms and it cost 25.00 if they are already ordained. If there not ordained I'm not sure. I was on the web page yesterday. They listed all the different situations. So I would start there.

annie912 · June 2012

You may have to do a bit of research on this. Like PPs said, start with the county clerk, or whoever issues marriage licenses. But, be prepared because while the laws should be consistent statewide, the information you get can vary from county to county within your state, and person to person. We thought we were in the clear with this, then logged onto our county's website to print up what we needed to get our license only to see a warning that basically it "might not" be legal, but they couldn't give us advice so if we had a question to contact an attorney. None of the attorneys I contacted knew either, but after talking to county clerks in a few other counties, it appears that some of the more religiously conservative counties put a disclaimer on their websites to try to discourage this, even though it is completely legal. I also got confirmation from a judge in another county.

While the county issues the license and can put the disclaimer out there, they can't ban something that is permissible by state law. I think some of the counties just hope that people will get discouraged and go the traditional route.

Look up your state statutes, do some calling around and be prepared to do a little more research than you had planned.

CharlestonWeddingPhotographers · June 2012

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_ceremony-ideas_how-to-have-friend-marry-us?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:10Discussion:5ec95bd2-5e80-40fb-9990-6b91e99c9307Post:f7b0a58b-ace0-4810-8549-4add6950c206">How to have friend marry us?</a>:
[QUOTE]Does anyone know what steps we need to take to have our friend perform our ceremony? We are from out of state (MA), as is our friend, and we are getting married in Greenland NH. Any help is appreciated.
Posted by cookiej84[/QUOTE]

1. Is your friend coming in to NH? You did not make that clear. If he will be with you in person, he can read the ceremony vows, but a preacher or such must sign the wedding license.

How to have friend marry us?

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