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This was a tough area for my fiance and I as well. We called a few people and found that anyone that is affiliated with a church is MUCH more money than a standard Justice of the Peace. We ended up going with a JP that our friend used. After talking to him on the phone to go over how he runs his ceremonies, we met him in person to make sure we were comfortable with him. He gave us a list of options to choose from for our introduction, wedding vows, readings, how he will introduce us as husband and wife... he let us pick it all! I really like how we are designing our wedding and getting to choose what we would like to say/have said. I think it is important to ask how the ceremony is set up, learn what will be said, how he/she sets everything up that day, what he/she will wear, and most importantly, if you are comfortable with the person. Good Luck!
Thanks Krissyb! How much is an average estimated cost for an officiant? And I've heard that some people tip them as well - how much?
My uncle is our first choice, more because I think it will mean a lot to him. He's a pastor and a nice guy.
If it wasn't for him, though, we'd go non-religious. Probably either a justice of the peace, or have a friend get ordained. I don't know why, but I could totally see FI's uncle doing it!
We went though a list of people that we know well who would be good public speakers and might enjoy doing it. That our officiant know both of us well was our biggest criteria.
We wound up asking my new uncle (he married my aunt last year) and he was perfect! He was close but not too close, comfortable speaking publicly (he's a college professor) and has the perfect mix of seriousness and humor. We then worked together to come up with the script. Because we were in Colorado you can marry each other and thus he didn't have to get ordained or anything. Another perk is that all it cost us was a gift certificate to a nice restaurant! MUCH cheaper than the hundreds of dollars that seems common for an "official" officiant and MUCH more personal.
We are getting married out of state and ended up getting a list of people from the local wedding association. We went through the list, read the testimonals and did some research. I also have a thing about peoples voices when the speak or read outloud so I listened to each, got a feel for their style and we both quickly agreed on who we liked best. He is really down to earth and listens to us in order to make the ceremony as personal as possible. We even had a chance to meet up with him when we were in the area.
I would just check out the ones that you are leaning towards and then talk with them or meet up and see who you click with.
Use someone that's important to you. Depending on your states laws a friend/family member may only need to pay for the license!
If that's not an option, a JP is fine! Someone who isn't necessarily a FT wedding officiant.... and here's why.
A bride of mine (I'm a photog) once hired a guy who had a whole service. Beach wedding, he provided himself, tiki torches, sound, and whatever else I guess was needed. He had already given the bride a strict, you must be on time, speach at booking. MOB was LATE. When the bride arrived at the time of cutoff, already stressed about the time because her mom was late... the minister asked the groom (who had been standing next to him for 40 min!) for the license. They forgot it at home! HE REFUSED TO MARRY THEM! He refused to do a non-legal "ceremony" for the guests. He almost started pulling torches up and leaving. Twice the money later, a bride in tears, a groomsmen made it across town and took a picture via cell phone to send to the officiant. The groomsmen MISSED the wedding. Luckily, things worked out in the end.. and I was able to keep the bride occupied, but no one deserves that kind of drama! He was only in it for the money, not the happiness of his "clients." Shameful.
So, be careful! ;-)
KLP2010 - OMG! What a horror story! I thought this part was suppose to be one of the "easy" decisions! Thanks for sharing! I had no idea that could happen!
We had two officients, one Independent Catholic who is associated with a church (but we didn't use the church) and a Jewish Cantor.
They each cost about $800.
It was a lot but they each had to travel 1-2 hours.
Don't know what the rules are in Washington, but in California, the state allows anyone to apply for an officiating license for ONE day & legally marry you. My FBIL did this at his wedding - officiant was an old family friend and neighbor of FSIL - and he did a great job! They aren't affiliated with any church, but didn't want just any stranger to marry them, so they picked someone important to her. We're doing this for our second ceremony (getting married in the Catholic Church, but also want an outdoor wedding, so doing that second); one of FI's childhood friends (whom I love, too!) will officiate our outdoor ceremony. If this is an option for you, you'll get to pick someone who is personally important & what a great way to invite someone to be part of your wedding! 
KLP thats HORRIBLE!!
I was late to my wedding b/c of my Mom and our priest had to leave an hour after the ceremony began to get to another wedding. We weren't sure how long it would take b/c we'd never done a complete run-though. My husband was txting me and telling me that the priest needed to leave at 4. In the end, I was only 10 minutes late and there was plenty of time. We were well aware of the priest's schedule before the day so my frustration was directed at my Mom! UGH!
Peacock - Don't stress... just do research and be careful. I really do think that you should check our states requirements and have someone family or friend officiate. It's always going to be more personal if the person doing your wedding actually knows at least one if not the 2 of you :-)
KLP: THAT horror story is the exact reason i've told everyone the ceremony starts at 3:00 but booked the officiant @ 3:30. I'm sorry, but if he's ready to go at 3:30 and a VIP person from my party (besides the groom of course :P) isn't there, (be it my mom, sister, of BFF) that's too bad. People i know are always late and i just didn't want to take that risk...
KLP~ OMG! That is really aweful! Picking up the tiki torches out of the ground! He needs some anger management!
We used the internet to find someone for our out-of-state wedding. I basically wrote the whole ceremony so I wasn't too worried. I found out later that my 6 year old niece was very upset that the officiant pronounced my name, Colleen,with a long "o" instead of "ah". Funny but I didn't even notice! Probably because I've heard it pronounced that way off and on my whole life. Our officiant had sample ceremonies for us to choose from if we didn't want to write our own. Also check to see if their fee includes the rehearsal.
My FI and I have asked a friend to perform the ceremony. We are religious but thought it would be very special to have a friend and then my dad will say a blessing over the marriage.
I would recommend getting a referral from someone (anyone) else. When we chose our church the minister there could not perform our ceremony because he was out of town that weekend. So the church referred us to two other ministers that worked their part-time. We had one meeting with the minister (6.5 months before) and he seemed nice enough. At that meeting we scheduled our pre-marital counseling sessions with him in the months leading up to the wedding.
Then he flaked out and didn't show for our first pre-marital counseling session. We rescheduled. He flaked AGAIN!!! This was 4 weeks before our wedding and I was a nervous wreck.
I contacted my grandmother's minister and he agreed to do it for us but we had to really squeeze in all our premarital counseling. And he was more than a little "disagreeable".
I wish I would have gotten a referral from a friend or family member.
I would either reccomend getting a referral of a non-religious officiant or JP, or since you live in the States (I am presuming) you could get a friend to marry you. I so wish I lived in the States for that reason only. It would be so meaningful to have a close friend marry you. In Canada this isn't allowed however :(
Similar to you, me and FI are non-religious and didn't really want any religious aspects to our ceremony. We actually ended up asking FMIL to post an ad on Songha Announce, which is an email newsletter in the Shambhala Buddhist community. We are not Buddhists (although FMIL is a Shambhala practioner and my FI is to a certain extent) but they would do an excellent non-religious ceremony, which is really what we want.
Goodl luck finding an officiant!
Check out TheKnot.com and WeddingWire.com for officiants in your area, too. There are a lot of officiants / celebrants who specialize in creating non-religious but personal ceremonies (like me!) out there, but many people don't realize that we even exist! I started doing weddings because my best friend asked me to officiate her wedding (as her friend!), and I loved it so much that I decided to make it my career choice.
KLP, there are some nutso officiants out there. I think there's something about the job itself that can attract kind of flaky and flighty people. There's always a big argument going on one of the mailing lists I'm on about what to do if a couple doesn't bring the wedding license - I actually have a clause in my contract that I go on with the wedding ceremony, as established, but I have the couple sign a waiver saying they are aware it is not a legal ceremony, and, if they want to make it legal, there's a time frame for us to get together to do so. I wouldn't imagine ruining someone's wedding like that because you left a piece of paper at home!!
Good questions to ask a potential officiant:
Do you write our ceremony? Can we choose readings / vows / pieces to include? How much can we personalize? What are the legal requirements to include in the ceremony (I Do's, etc)? Are there additional fees for travel or rehearsal? How are you ordained / able to legally solemnize the marriage? What do you wear? What time do you arrive? How many weddings have you done? Can we write our own vows?
You want to find someone who you BOTH connect with and are comfortable with. It really depends on the style of wedding officiant you are looking for as well.
As for rates - it's a huge range. If you're looking for a full, custom ceremony, where the officiant will work closely with you to write a complete ceremony from scratch, in consultation with you, in my area (New Jersey), that can go from $600-$800. If you're just looking for someone to do a more standard ceremony or read a ceremony you wrote - $300-$500. I know it looks like 20 minutes of work, but there's a lot that goes into the WHOLE prep for the ceremony, travel time, research, rehearsal, etc.
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me! I'm more than happy to help.
We hired an ordained minister our Wedding Planner (crebre80) suggested to us. He is $250 and it is up to us of how long the ceremony lasts depending on readings and whatnot. The travel time and rehearsal is included in the $250. I think we got a good deal! (And he's super nice and we love his humor!)
I enjoyed reading through these! We are having my best friend's husband perform the ceremony. Really happy with the personal element it will bring! My grandparents are strict Catholics and don't know this yet, so we'll see how that goes! ;)
We asked our close friend who has done the commitment ceremonies for the same sex couples in our circle of friends.
Depending on how secular/liberal you are, one thing you may want to do is contact your local LGBT center for recommendations. Someone there will probably know every liberal and secular officiant with experience in the area.
I'm having a hard time finding an officiant, too. We'd originally asked a friend of ours to get ordained online and marry us, but that might not happen. We're on a very strict budget and I really don't want to spend more than a couple hundred dollars on someone.
We're not religious at all so we don't want someone in the clergy, but we also don't want a stranger.
I talked to a few Christian ministers and they were all too pushy with their religion, so I ended up sending a mass email to all the Unitarian Universalists in the area looking for someone who was available. I finally found one a couple weeks ago who is charging $200 plus travel (he's 2hrs away). He seems cool with leaving most of the "Christian-y" stuff out and will let me write as much of the ceremony as I want. Hopefully he'll work out!
Good luck!
We had a non-denomination ceremony and found an officiant online to perform the ceremony. Neither of us are religious so we didn't want a religious ceremony.
We got some names from the internet, interviewed them, nothing. Then we got some names from my future mother-in-law. One was a minister and when we went to meet her we just clicked!
I have to say the most helpful resource I've had is the vendor reviews, both here and at the knot. There is usually a good volume of reviews to give you a complete picture, and people on the boards are usually happy to discuss pricing. I think alot of people are using officiants since so many people have destination/not in the city where they live weddings.
I went down the list of my venue's preferred vendors to look for an officiant. I picked the one that had non religious ceremonies detailed on her site. Then I read reviews on weddingwire which were glowing. Then I called to talk to her and booked her right away. I told her we're atheists and eventhough she is an ordained christian minister and studied theology, she officiated many atheist (and other religion) ceremonies. Just look at your venue or nearby venue websites for list of preferred officiants. For us, we knew we wanted someone with experience not just a Friend who filled out a paper.
@Cola262: This is the way to go!
Just do a simple research and talk to your officiant by phone or in person before committing. Best of luck!
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Hello bees! My fiance' and I aren't part of any church or specific religious group. I was wondering how to go about finding an officiant in this situation. And what kind of things should I be looking for / asking them about? This is basically the ONLY thing we haven't really planned yet! Thanks!