Church Wedding - Paperwork advice

Lord Trollington

Need some advice folks.

Getting married in December. Need the final bit of our paperwork from the Paris Priest where we live (we're both not from the parish).

I'm not nor have never really been a church goer. My Fiancé was until we moved to Dublin.

To cut a long story short the Parish Priest where we live has given various different reasons why he cannot complete the paper work for us.

I will point out that we are not getting married in his church and he is not the priest marrying us.

1. He doesn't know us and has never met us before.
2. We don't attend his church.
3. He's on his own and he's too busy
4. I am not giving him enough notice to carry out the paper work.

Has anyone experience of this. If it was left up to me we would never be getting married in the Catholic Church in the first place, but that discussion is for another day.

We need this paper work sorted.

cookiecakes

If I remember correctly, there is a section on the prenuptial enquiry which is required to be filled out 2 months beforehand. I'm not sure if anyone ever actually sticks to it but he could use that to refuse. I didn't get married within my own parish and our pp was a little prickly about having to fill it out but I've never heard of a priest refusing it.
Sorry I can't be of more help!

Bacchus

We had the exact same situation as you when my wife and I got married.

We needed the priest in the parish in which we lived to sign off on it and do a bit of paper work. This priest gave pretty much the exact same reaction as you are getting. It was a pain, he tried to shrug us off, told us to just get the priest who was marrying us to do it (which resulted in a lot back and forth between the priests).

Anyway, in the end we bent over backwards to find a time that suited him to do the paperwork. Once we got down to it then, he was very nice and helpful, wished us the best etc. My only advice to you is be persistent, be humble, friendly, accommodating etc. If you think it would help (though you probably don't have the time now) you could attend his mass, be seen to be making some sort of effort.

Mrs OBumble

So you're having a Catholic-church wedding because your fiance wants it? So surely your fiance shoudl be managing the relationship to get the paperwork done?

At very least your fiance should have made the effort to go to the church where you live a few times, to get to know the priest before asking for the job to be done. If she or he didn't, couldn't, wouldn't, then I have a lot of sympathy for the priest who you are essentially asking to provide information about you that he cannot possibly know.

When is the wedding date supposed to be? Is there time to rectify this now? If not, then I'd suggest you start investigating the requirements of a civil ceremony. Not what you want to hear I know, but it's the most honest approach.

neemish

Firstly, where are you getting married? And who is the priest for the Ceremony. If a family friend/relative, it might be easier to get him to do it.

You are cutting it fairly short timewise, paperwork can be done up to six months before the wedding. Approaching a priest the week before Advent will probably not get you a great response!


Anyway, it is the responsibility of the parish priest of the parish in which you are currently living to complete the necessary paperwork. I'd try another friendly phonecall. If you get no-where, ring the Diocese and ask them to assign you a priest to do them.

In the meantime, make sure you have all your own paperwork in order.
1. Baptismal Cert for each of you (dated within six months of the Wedding)
2. Confirmation Cert for each of you (dated within six months of the Wedding)
3. Letter of Freedom from any Parish where you ahve lived since turning 18. This states that you have not been married there. (dated within six months of the Wedding)
4. Cert from Pre Marriage Course
5. MRF from the State.


If there are complications (one of you is not Confirmed, has been married before, you have not done the course) there may not actually be time to complete the paperwork on time, and a Church Ceremony may not be possible. I'm not trying to scare you, just laying it out there.

Also, have you given three months official notice to the Church of your intent to marry. If not, you're looking at a dispensation from the Bishop and again, coming up to Advent that may be difficult.

biddywiddy

What paperwork are you looking for?

We got copies of our confirmation and baptism certs through our (different) parish offices. For me, this involved contacting the part time parish secretary. For my fiance, he dealt with both a parish priest (baptism parish) and a parish secretary (confirmation parish).

The letters of freedom started to get tricky as we have both lived several places since we were 18. In the end, we each got an affidavit witnessed by a notary public. Could this be an option for you?

neemish

Just thought of another thing - if you're living in Dublin, but getting married down the country, your papers have to be sent to Archbishop's House in Dublin, approved, sent on the Diocese in which you are getting married and then on to the priest. This normally takes four to six weeks.

Lord Trollington

cookiecakes wrote: »

If I remember correctly, there is a section on the prenuptial enquiry which is required to be filled out 2 months beforehand. I'm not sure if anyone ever actually sticks to it but he could use that to refuse. I didn't get married within my own parish and our pp was a little prickly about having to fill it out but I've never heard of a priest refusing it.
Sorry I can't be of more help!

Thing is these things don't move that fast. I first enquired 7/8 weeks ago to the parish of our postal address to find out only 2 weeks ago that we are actually not in that Parish we are in another. I spent another 2 weeks contacting our Parish, only got contacted back from the Parish priest today.

xebec

neemish wrote: »

Just thought of another thing - if you're living in Dublin, but getting married down the country, your papers have to be sent to Archbishop's House in Dublin, approved, sent on the Diocese in which you are getting married and then on to the priest. This normally takes four to six weeks.

Not my experience. We did ours with the local priest in Dublin (who we hadn't met before), he completed the forms and put them in an envelope addressed to the parish we got married in and then gave the envelope to us to deliver to save the price of a stamp... No mention of sending them to Archbishop's House or anything like that.

mrsbyrne

Lord Trollington wrote: »

Need some advice folks.

Getting married in December. Need the final bit of our paperwork from the Paris Priest where we live (we're both not from the parish).

I'm not nor have never really been a church goer. My Fiancé was until we moved to Dublin.

To cut a long story short the Parish Priest where we live has given various different reasons why he cannot complete the paper work for us.

I will point out that we are not getting married in his church and he is not the priest marrying us.

1. He doesn't know us and has never met us before.
2. We don't attend his church.
3. He's on his own and he's too busy
4. I am not giving him enough notice to carry out the paper work.

Has anyone experience of this. If it was left up to me we would never be getting married in the Catholic Church in the first place, but that discussion is for another day.

We need this paper work sorted.

Hes absolutely dead right. Why are you bothering this man? Hes busy and he doesn't know you from Adam. Why on earth do you want to get married in a Catholic church anyway?