We want to create a ceremony that is the most enjoyable and appropriate for you and your guests. We will create a ceremony that engages the guests, touches their hearts and is meaningful to you, the couple. Couples can inadvertently make that harder to achieve, hence the need for this page.
Our role as trained Celebrants, is to conduct a unique, emotional and perhaps spiritual ceremony with the freedom to include any words and traditions you wish and any beliefs you have. The ceremony is required to bond/unite a couple in marriage.
The role of the registrar is to conduct a legal transaction. The legal service is required for the state to uphold your union for the purposes of pensions, your estate and so on – that is it's primary role. (Some couples choose not to have the legal recognition of their marriage; some couples choose to have a marriage that is legal, but without further recognition or celebration).
It's important to understand the differences between the role of a civil registrar and a celebrant.
"You can't hang a person twice for the same crime" and you can't get married in a full ceremony twice for the same marriage. As you will already be aware, we do not conduct Handfasting Weddings along side any other spiritual or non-spiritual ceremony, including humanist. That would be having two ceremonies for one wedding/marriage. It is simply redundant – an unnecessary repetition in expressing ideas. More importantly, it confuses the guests and sometimes the couple. Guests go from one gathering to the next, congratulating you twice, etc.
If you intend to have your marriage legally registered by the state before (or after) your Handfasting Wedding Ceremony we recommend the following:
Do not include poetry or readings or make a “ceremony” of the Civil service, as that dilutes the “ceremony” aspect of the Handfasting Wedding.
Note: Some of our couples call this a “Jeans and T-shirt Service” as that is how they turn up to the registry office, with only two witnesses and have their marriage legalised with the council registrar hours, days, weeks, months before (or after) the Handfasting Wedding.
Many couples have said that they do legal aspects without even telling their family/friends. Then on your Wedding Day, you have your Handfasting Ceremony with all of your family and friends present.
Your guests
Your Vows
All Poetry and Readings
Any Ring Exchanges
Any Family / Friends Involvement
The Binding Of Your Hands
Any Other Ceremony Options Of Your Choice
Celebration drinks (if any) to follow
The actual Handfasting Wedding Cermemony will take 15 to 20 minutes usually – not including guest placement and arrivals, etc.
Two / four witnesses only (no other guests)
Your Names, address, legal status and your legal declaration of marriage, all required by law.
Signing the legal document, “schedule of marriage”.
The Legal Service will take about 5 minutes.
At this point you might be wondering why we don't conduct the legal aspect of a wedding. It's very simple. In order to do that, we would need to join a “church” or “body”, or become a council employee, none of which would permit us to offer you a ceremony of your choosing. That's why couples come to us for the uniqueness, the Scottish traditions, the spiritual expression of their own choosing. In Europe, the “separation of church and state” in performing a marriage is the norm.
If you wish to combine your Civil Service and your Handfasting Wedding Ceremony differently to this, then we will need to discuss your reasoning before we agree to perform the ceremony, to see if we can accommodate you.
Questions and comments are welcome before you decide whether Handfasting in the Scottish Tradition is for you.
We hope to have the honour of performing your ceremony and bringing pleasure to your wedding.
Scot and Samantha
