How to get ordained online

In some counties, this won’t even be allowed so your first step should be to make sure you can do it where you’re getting married. Other counties will allow it, but will have very specific guidelines to follow.

Don't. The whole point of an officiant is for them to have the right training to file your paperwork. A good officiant will also get to know you and your partner, and make the ceremony very personable as if you knew them for a long time.

With a friend or family member, regardless of how outgoing or stage fright free they may be, they should either be standing next to you in your Bridal party or in the seats watching you. Here is where I really wish Ceilia was still able to comment.

And to answer your question, every state has different rules for getting ordained, so you'd need to check your state laws, however, I'd strongly advise against it.

I have no experience and got ordained online. I performed my sisters wedding last summer. It was a very special experience for us. As for paperwork I didn’t think it was hard at all to file. This was in Iowa.

I agree with this. Certain paperwork has to be filed as well. Plus some places won't allow the wedding to happen if you have someone ordanded online. Ask around and find someone a friend/ family member knows to do it.

Just hire a professional. Some things you wouldn’t think about until you get into planning the ceremony is our officiant has done so many she had tons of ideas to personalize our ceremony that I had never thought of. She gave me confidence in writing my own vows that it wasn’t as hard as it seems and she is going to proofread/give us tips and print both of ours before the ceremony on presentable card stock. Sooooo many things I didn’t think about.

I'm having my best friend marry us. She's very articulate and has sent me a few drafts of her outline already. You can get ordained at the Universal Life Church: https://www.ulc.org/

Just call the Town Clerk of the town you're getting married in and ask if your family member, who is ordained through the ULC can sign the marriage license.

I did, and they walked me through the process, easy as pie. Then the person who performs it has 10 business days to return the license to the Town Clerk for it to be processed.

You can get ordained online here: https://theamm.org/

We had a cantor marry us for the ceremony, but since my husband also wanted to take this opportunity to change his name, and since his name change would not go through by our wedding date, we got legally married a few weeks after our spiritual wedding ceremony. The legal marriage was performed by my dad, who was ordained on the American Marriage Ministries site above.

(edited by admin to remove link to blog)

I think some of this advice needs to be taken with a grain of salt. Up until recently vendors could post and reply in the forum and they would tell scary stories (that were true, but unusual) about how you should always hire a professional.
I am not going to say there aren't plenty of reasons to hire a professional. There are. I can also understand not wanting a stranger to do it.
Research this heavily. Some states don't allow family to perform marriage ceremonies. Some counties have complicated paperwork.
FH and I had this conversation today. He has no preference and I prefer a religious officiant. So, Episcopalian wedding it is!

I got ordained online through Universal Life Church. Getting ordained was free but I ordered their wedding package, which I think cost me $40. It had a booklet that gave me all the information I needed to perform the ceremony. The officiant is required to fill out the marriage license and mail
it back within a certain amount of time (5 days). Every state is different but the Universal Life Church website provided links to each state website where I could get information. They also advised calling the county where the couple was getting married to see if there were additional requirements, which I did. It was super easy and I performed the ceremony with no issues. I mailed back the license in the required time frame and my friends received their official marriage license in the mail within a few weeks. My advice is to choose someone you trust and who you feel is responsible. Meet with that person to go over how you want the ceremony to go and had detailed you want them to be. There are actually only two things that need to be done for a marriage ceremony to be legal so the ceremony can be as short or as long as you want it to be. Most of the things we see in ceremonies are just tradition but not required. Each state, county and city can be different so just make sure you are aware of the rules where you are having the ceremony. As long as you do your research, it can be a wonderful experience.

My dad is going to be our officiant. This will be his 2nd wedding performed since he was ordained online. He did check into my county and register something (I don't know, he was just sitting drinking coffee and clicking on his tablet) and he said we are all good to go.

Our friend/officiant was ordained online through the ULC and that is legitimate where we live. My grandfather performed my first ceremony.

In DC and Pennsylvania you can marry yourself...in case you live in or near one of those places! I felt the way you did, but really good officiants make things go smoothly and are good at personalizing the ceremony.

There is a reason the veterans on this forum recommend hiring a professional. Creating a beautiful, unique, personalized ceremony is a lot of work and time-intensive. It is a lot to ask of a friend or family member, or you may have to write the ceremony yourself. Also, even someone who is a seasoned public speaker may be stressed because there is so much more pressure on wedding officiants to have a seamless ceremony than other types of public speaking.

There is also the legal aspect of the ceremony. Every state (and even individual counties in state some states) have different rules for who can officiate, what words are necessary to make the marriage legal, and how the marriage certificate is filed.

The ceremony is the MOST important aspect of your wedding day. Why would you want to risk having a ceremony that is not legal or having an inexperienced officiant not be able to handle something that comes up during the ceremony? For example, we forgot our marriage certificate. There was no way we could get the certificate to the wedding site for us to sign the day of the wedding.

I also am speaking from personal experience. We had a friendor officiant, and our ceremony was wonderful—we received a lot of compliments. However, if I could do it again, I would have hired a professional. I wrote most of our ceremony (except the homily), and while I LOVED our ceremony, it was an extra stress I wish I didn’t have. In addition, my awesome friend who has tons of public speaking experience was so worried about messing up our ceremony that she refused to bring a date because she wanted wanted to focus before the ceremony. I was pretty surprised how stressed she was given her experience and background. I wished I had not put her through that stress.

I would strongly recommend hiring a professional.

I am having one of my closest friends perform the ceremony, thankfully he's done multiple others as well, and he is ordained online. Check your local requirements though. Some states require the officiant to be registered through a church and some do not. If you need to make sure or have questions, you can always call the office (I cannot think of the name right now, I'm so sorry) that processes the marriage licenses and they should be able to help you out. But there's also a lot of resources online.

Put me squarely in the camp that says have whoever you like perform the ceremony.

Full disclosure, I was ordained online to perform my brother's wedding. I am now a professional wedding officiant with over 2,000 weddings under my belt. I was ordained by a small outfit called Wanderlust Bay Ministries instead of the usual ULC.org.

I'm often a spectator to both first-time and seasoned ministers performing ceremonies. And a lot of the "professionals" are lackluster at best. And some of the first-time family members are wonderful.

Obviously you'll want to check with the county court about the requirements. Which is to say, give them a call and ask what's required. This isn't complicated stuff.

Again, I wouldn't be detered by anyone that says to hire a professional. Hire someone you like and are comfortable with.