"Friendor" officiant stories

I'm not married yet, but the most important thing to FH was that his uncle marry us. I do know that his uncle has married many people in their family, and his sister said she had no issues with him derailing the ceremony or anything like that.

I met with him before and went over what we're looking for in a ceremony and I think it will be a good fit for us.

My FH officiated my MOH's wedding 2 years ago. We realized at the rehearsal that he needed to tell everyone to stand for her entrance. We forgot to realize he needed to tell everyone to be seated. Everyone was standing for a solid 5-10 minutes before we all realized. Not the end of the world and everyone laughed about it later. That's the worst I've got though sorry.

My uncle is officiating our wedding so I may have another story after Saturday if something going wrong, we'll see! hahaha

I've witnessed both successes and major failures with this. The truth is, pros can flub and mess up too. But at least I know a pro will make sure my marriage is valid and legal. You can't guarantee that with a friendor. If a pro does fuck up, they're held accountable through the contract.

My FH really wanted one of the guys he knows at his hunting camp to do it for us. I agreed only because he is a judge local to the area that we are getting married and has done many weddings so I have faith that he will be good for us! Plus he loves us as a couple!

A story now! My cousin had her H's and her friend officiate the wedding for them and he did a fabulous job! I did not know till after the wedding that he has never officiated a wedding before! Sorry I do not have a horror story!

There is a lot to be scared of. Not just the legalities, but the way the day is run, the performance, the cold feet, the inappropriate stories and the general lack of expertise. People tend to think that just anyone can do this as long as they're legal, but they forget that this is a very specific type of writing, storytelling and performance. You just can't get it right the first time around; by the time I'd done my first wedding, I'd been preaching in a pulpit for years. By the time my first fellow officiant did his first very small elopement, he had been to at least 200 of my ceremonies. My second lead offiiciant was an actress in the Disney system. It's expertise, and while people want to think it's transferable from one arena of public speaking to the next, that's not true, and even when it is, it doesn't take in all the other aspects that a good officiant brings to the table.

My observations, from weddings I've spied on and anecdotal evidence from my colleagues at venues (which they are all too happy to share....) ?

Most non pro officiants talk too fast, too low, don't project, don't use inflections that are appropriate to the story part. They pretty much just want to get through it.

They don't know how to use a mic, nor do they pre-plan sound with the venue, musicians, guest readers or dj's. They don't know how to transistion with guest readers who join them, or differentiate, vocally, different moods within the ceremony. Your prayer shouldn't be delivered the way the personal story is....

Their ceremonies run either too short (this is more frequent) or too long. This makes venue staff insane and your cocktail hour out of whack; either not ready or cut short. They don't know how to interact with photographers/video/venue staff so this part of the day goes smoothly.

If there are glitches, faintings, unexpected missing items, they have no idea how to handle them.

They don't really know how to get your license, fill it out and/or fix things that are wrong. The wrong part happens more often than you'd think. Sometimes they forget to file it all together.

They can pull out at the last minute because you KNOW you won't get a contract. Then you or your venue will call us. This happens about once a month here.

They don't really know how to write a ceremony, so your 'personal' ceremony will be cobbled together from bits and pieces from the net. It will probably not have any flow, it might include embarrassing items you had no intention of including.

They will probably dress inappropriately for an officiant, which is not the same as being dressed as a guest.

They will not know how to orchestrate your processional.

And the worst? You won't even have any idea until it's too late. Or it may go moderately well and you think it was all fine because you don't know it could have been fabulous.

Go binge watch wedding videos or wedding shows. You'll see exactly how bad things can be.

We technically don't have "officiants"- at least not just one at our religious ceremonies. My friend's husband's father was one of the priests at their wedding and both he and the groom started crying and unable to speak through one of the parts. It was honestly one of the sweetest things I've ever seen. Her dad is also a priest and we thought he would start bawling but he held it together during the ceremony.

My dad is going to marry us- or at least will be one of the clergy officiating out wedding. He's going to handle all our paperwork and I know I can trust him to do it because 1. he's my father and reliable and 2. he's done probably thousands of these. Not sure yet if he'll cry.

No horror story here, sorry, but we had my MIL's cousin officiate our wedding. He is a retired judge so he was legit. And the stuff he said at our ceremony was beautiful / perfect!

Thank you Celia for your thoughtful response!!! That is a lot to think about! A lot of what you said I know doesn't apply to my cousin, or our venue, or are things that our coordinator will handle, but there is a lot in there that I would not have even known could be an issue

Not a horror story, but my BIL and SIL had a friendor officiant and I was not impressed. He thought he was funny but did not hit the right notes. It didn't feel romantic or special and I am not certain why but it felt impersonal/alienating. The ceremony is normally my favourite part.

I hired a professional and it was by far my favourite part of the day.

I watched a wedding in Mexico, his officiant & friend, announced they met on tinder and hooked up the first night. my skin was literally crawling.

We're having a friendor marry us. He's done 4/5 ceremonies before, and he's very eloquent. He has a "script" but I plan on writing most of our ceremony myself.

My son has done a few ceremonies and enjoyed them.

He is an attorney with a booming voice and used to speaking.

At his own wedding, his vows started with "Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury..."

eta to add photo of pastor lol'ing

I guess our officiant was technically a friendor--MIL is a retired judge, and our ceremony was performed by a friend of hers who is also a colleague and currently a judge. MIL had performed his son's wedding and he wanted to return the favour. he did an incredible job--he had done many ceremonies before and worked with us to craft a really perfect, short, sweet, and personal ceremony. there was one hiccup--he had our witnesses sign the wrong line on the certificate during the signing at the ceremony, so it had to be re-signed and dated the next day at brunch--whoops! i have no regrets about it but obviously every situation is a bit different. in our case we felt really confident because of his experience and enthusiasm.

We asked one of our best friends to get ordained online and officiate our wedding. He was so honored and it was hands down one of the best decisions we made of our entire wedding. He did an absolutely fantastic job and we had guests pull us aside all night and tell us what a beautiful, personal and emotional ceremony it was. It was perfect and we wouldn't change a thing for the world.

Sorry, no horror story here, either. I never would have asked our friend if she weren't used to public speaking but she's a professor so she is.

All legalities were checked by her and me and BIL and SIL (both of them are lawyers).

We wanted a very short ceremony and that's what we got. 9 minutes total, including pro- and recessionals. She spoke just about 3 minutes about marriage and then introduced our vowing and ringing.

Oh, and heckled me when I forgot which hand was which...but as just about everyone in the audience had made fun of me for the same reason, it was all good.