Where can I get married?

There's a lot of uncertainty among the public about who can marry in which church. And it's getting more complicated.

An important change in the regulations which govern who may marry in a parish church are about to come into force. I've spent most of the afternoon working my way through the 40-page guidance notes and the 8-page form that couples are asked to complete if they have a "significant qualifying connection" with the parish. I've updated our basic information leaflets to reflect the new situation.

The changes mean that couples will find it possible to marry in more than the church in the parish in which they live or worship. So if someone has previously lived in Oadby, or if they parents did, or if their grandparents were married here, it might be possible to marry here. The rules and regulations are pretty complicated and there's a whole lot of questions to work through each time, so we'll see how we get on.

I would be sorry if the opportunity to get to know those whose weddings we are conducting will be lost. I really enjoy weddings ministry and it's an awesome privelege to be with a couple as they pledge their commitment and make their vows to each other. I try hard to make each wedding personal, and that's really only possible if we've had the chance to meet on several occasions.

If we get more enquiries from far away, or if we 'lose' local weddings to other churches, this kind of personal touch will be harder to maintain. And the opportunities for evangelism that come from the requirement of couples to regularly worship with us in order to qualify for membership of the electoral roll might also be harder to find.

Still, our enquiries for weddings are quite buoyant just now and I'll look forward to seeing how the new system will work in practice.

An introduction to the new Church of England Marriage Measure is on the CofE website.