If heard it mentioned that if a Mo couple get a civil marriage they have to wait a year before the sealing.

Does anyone know why this is?

It seems like it could be a great way to include nonMo/"unworthy" Mo family members to feel included on their special day if they could go to the courthouse in the AM and then hit the local temple.

Some "family friendly" church.

but their are countries that require a civil marriage so the church allows this.

I still say if it is that big of deal for you, get sealed in the morning in the temple, and have a civil wedding in the afternoon, don't tell your bishop etc as he does not need to know, just do it. I know plenty of families that did this but called it a ring ceramony, but why not do it all.

In the US aren't the sealings also legally binding? And can't you not have a legal marriage twice?

If I were rabidly TBM and my mother not "temple worthy" for whatever reason, screw the church, I'm not gonna make her miss out.

Stupid church.


...
Edited for punctuation error.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/13/2011 07:57PM by GoneNative.

In the U.S., the "legal marriage" part is when both people sign a slip of paper (two witnesses also sign it) and an authority of the state also signs the paper. That paper is called a marriage certificate and that's what makes people "married."

No paper, no married.

The piece of paper has f**k all to do with whatever rituals the couple decides to do. There are no documents involved with the sealing, so it is not legally binding... until the couple signs the marriage certificate and files it with their local courthouse.

You could have 14 weddings in 13 different states and that has nothing to do with anything. In the State's eyes, only that one piece of paper matters. Generally people do not make signing the marriage certificate part of the wedding ceremony, so it's not likely -- if you had 14 different weddings -- that you'd try to sign 14 different documents.

Temple sealing ceremony, civil ceremony, wedding on a golf course, wedding in the backyard, justice of the peace in the courthouse: doesn't matter, it's all the same to the state, as long as the courthouse gets ONE marriage certificate filed. I know couples whose families lived on different sides of the country (or like my cousin: his family is in Ohio, her family is in China) who had one ceremony in one state for one side of the family and another in another state for the other. They filed their marriage certificate in their home state, where neither of their families were and where neither ceremony took place.

People conflate religion-sanctioned marriage with state-sanctioned marriage. They are not one and the same.

I know "church" weddings aren't the same as civil weddings -- my aunt had a church wedding two weeks after her civil wedding. I just thought the man doing the sealing also had the authority to make the marriage legal. So all those temple married couples aren't really legally married?

It isn't about the ceremony or who conducts it. It's about filing the proper paperwork with the state after the ceremony.

And, yes, various Mormon leaders have the state sanctioned power to file that paperwork.

Course, anyone can get the same sanction by becoming a minister on line. I've had friends do this so they could perform weddings for their friends.

Temple weddings in North America are legal. At some point (I don't know when) before the couple leaves the temple the legal paperwork is signed. In Europe, a marriage ceremony isn't considered legal unless it is performed in a public venue. That rules out the temple.

My ex and I did that. Got married in Vegas and then went to be sealed a year later. I dunno why we had to wait a year, we just did. I was too stupid to ask why.

We didn't get married in the temple because my ex was still in the throws of getting her first temple sealing cancelled. You don't wanna know what that entailed.

Ron