Day 1
Weddings in Secular Venues a Missional Opportunity – Synod Urged to Explore Marriage Outside Churches
The Church of Ireland has been asked to explore the possibility of allowing its clergy to solemnise marriages in secular venues.
Motion No 3 was introduced to members of General Synod meeting in Naas today (Friday May 9). It proposes that a working group (to include members of both the House of Bishops and the House of Representatives) be established by the Church of Ireland’s Standing Committee to investigate the possibility of allowing Church of Ireland clergy to solemnise marriages in secular venues as part of the Church’s outreach. The Motion calls on this working group to bring its final report and recommendations to the General Synod of 2027 at the latest.
Proposing the Motion, Canon Lesley Robinson (Dublin & Glendalough) said she was aware the issue of solemnising marriages in secular venues had come before Synod before. But she pointed out that each year at Dublin & Glendalough’s Diocesan Synod her colleagues lamented the missed opportunities of outreach due to the general prohibition which remained in place.
She added that having been on the Pioneer Ministry Hub in the dioceses she was more convinced than ever that not being allowed to solemnise marriage in a hotel or other secular wedding venue flew in the face of the spirit of pioneer ministry which seeks to reach those with little or no connection to church.
“Couples choose secular wedding venues for many reasons – perhaps for the convenience of having everything in one place, or perhaps because of the lack of accessibility, comfort, parking or toilet facilities in many of our churches. While it is true that some couples may have no wish to have a religious ceremony, undoubtably there are others who would opt for a religious ceremony if it were an option in their chosen venue,” Canon Robinson suggested. “To be able to provide such an option could be a wonderful missional opportunity for clergy to bring God’s Word and Spirit into ceremonies and places and congregations currently off limits, as if somehow God’s presence is confined to our beautiful church buildings.”
She pointed out that in our increasingly secular society, pastoral services in churches such as baptisms, weddings and funerals were regularly attended by people who were not regular worshippers. These provided a wonderful showcase for Christian liturgy and pastoral care and result in positive spiritual experiences, even for those who have come with little expectation of them, she said observing that weddings performed in secular venues could be similar vehicles of Christian witness and outreach.
The Motion was seconded by Nuala Dudley (Derry & Raphoe) who pointed out that God is present everywhere and His presence is not confined to church buildings, even for special occasions like weddings.
According to the Central Statistics Office (CSO) in the Republic the number of Church of Ireland marriages solemnised in the last 10 years had decreased by more than 50%. She said that in Northern Ireland the trend was similar. But civil ceremonies were growing in popularity with about one third of all marriages in the Republic of Ireland being conducted as civil ceremonies. Mrs Dudley said reasons for this included declining religious affiliation, personalisation, venue flexibility and cost considerations.
“The widening gap between church and contemporary culture is increasingly evident. I believe this motion has the potential to provide the Church with an opportunity to engage with those who are currently beyond our church buildings, to offer to those who have fallen out of the way of regular church going, an opportunity once again to engage with Church, within a more suitable setting for them. It also offers the Church potentially, a relationship with couples that might otherwise have decided on a civil ceremony, if using a church was their only option. Is our Pioneer Ministry not about engaging people where they are, instead of them coming to us? Are we not about trying to be alongside people and finding new ways of doing things?” she asked.
Mrs Dudley said she valued the Church of Ireland’s liturgy but said the Church was nothing without people. She suggested the motion would provide the option to continue the solemnisation of Christian marriages in churches as well as the option to have Christian marriages solemnised in other contexts.
Speaking to the motion Bishop Pat Storey said she had been converted on this matter from a place of pragmatism. She said she had come to the point where she thought the Church had the choice to have no presence at a ceremony or to have its presence at a ceremony. She said she would love the Church to discuss it further and supported the motion.
Dean Cliff Jeffers said he was delighted that it had come up as a motion and hoped Synod could take it forward. Church of Ireland services accounted for just 1.1% of marriages in the Republic of Ireland last year. By not having the option to solemnise marriages in secular venues the Church was leaving it open to other options such as spiritualist and humanist celebrants. He encouraged a discussion on this to open up the option.
Canon Jen McWhirter (Clogher) said the inability to marry people other than in church has meant that she had to refuse to marry her brother and two other couples recently. She said she understood that other clergy would prefer not to conduct marriages in secular venues but she would like the Church to consider it so those clergy who wished to do so could have that option.
The Revd David Bowles (Dublin) said he felt very strongly that if you turned someone away from the church there was a strong chance you would never see them again but if you welcomed them with open arms that there was a possibility to evangelise them. He hoped the Church of Ireland was a church without walls and encouraged members to at least set up a committee to study this and give it a chance.
The Revd Jack Kinkead also spoke in favour of the motion. He said he was sure many colleagues had been invited to take part in weddings – where one part of couple is opposed to religious wedding but willing to allow the other partner to have religious input. The presence of the Holy Spirit is stronger – it is preferable that people would be in the church buildings but in the practical reality if the clergy cannot conduct a wedding in a secular venue there would be no religious input. He suggested that no members of the clergy would be forced to conduct a wedding in a secular venue.
The Revd George Okikiolu (Dromore) acknowledged the challenge and changing tides and increasing push for flexibility. He said he believed that this threatened solemnity of Christian marriage. He noted that the church was sacred ground and marriage was a covenant before God which should take place on sacred ground. He suggested that marriage in civic venues would subtly reduce a sacred audience to a personal celebration. He said the Church was called to uphold God’s standard. Since the early church, weddings were conducted in presence of the faithful and with the clergy. To have weddings outside the church risked severing the historic connection. To move it beyond the walls of the church was a shift in theology and a compromise.
Archdeacon Mark Harvey (Dromore) said his parish has been out of their historic church, Shankill in Lurgan, for a number of years because of structural issues. One of the things he had found most difficult was not being able to conduct funerals, baptisms and funerals in the church. It has reminded him that their consecrated building was holy ground. The establishment of the working group, he feared was lowering the bar to which the Church should aspire. He said the solemnising of marriages in places like hotels did not feel right to him. He stated that when a couple asks him to marry them he insists that they attend church regularly in the run up to their wedding which would be a missed opportunity if they were married in a secular venue, he suggested.
The Revd Jonny Campbell Smyth (Connor) said this was a challenging area and welcomed the private members motion regarding the establishment of the working group. Back in 2018 this issue was raised at Synod and a request was made for the House of Bishops to bring forward recommends and those recommendations came through in 2019, he said. They suggested reviewing the efficacy of campaigns in other churches to encourage church based weddings but also encourages the Marriage Council to explore a complete wedding package. The question that was raised was where would Jesus be He said that he knew where Jesus would be regarding connecting with couples but suggested that Jesus would not want to see any compromise or distillation of the Gospel. He hoped any working group would not seek to change the service to suit the venue.
The Revd Sean Hanily (Dublin) said that in his line of work it could be hard to quantify. He said clergy were charged with going and seeking the lost. Last year a couple came to him asking him to celebrate a wedding. Their reception was in a venue far away that it was not logistically possible to travel from the parish in Rathmichael to it. The couple were married in Rathmichael and the wedding day took place a week later and he was invited to give a blessing. Mr Hanily said he gave a message that was not something he would have been able to do in the church but over the course of the day he spoke to at least 75% of the guests – people were coming to ask him about this faith he talked about. He later heard from the bride and groom that several young people had actively gone and sought out a church to attend afterwards.
The Revd Anne Skuse (Cork, Cloyne and Ross) said that having worked as a school chaplain she was often asked to officiate at weddings of former pupils. She said it broke her heart to tell them that she couldn’t do it off site. It was important for the Church to be in the market place and any place could be a sacred space, she stated.
Andrew Brannigan (Down) spoke of the necessity of a working group. He said the Church came up with wording in 2021 that the Church of Ireland could solemnise marriages in churches unless exceptional circumstances necessitated otherwise. He said that the Church’s regulations stated that if there were exceptional circumstances people could go to their bishop to ask for permission. Are we missing something to form a working group on something that has already been permitted, he asked.
Bishop Michael Burrows (TLK) encouraged candid argument on the issue. He said he knew many people whose marriages were recognised by lay but for whom the Church offered no liturgical recognition of their marriage. He said the Church said to a particular group of people “you can’t be married in our church while we race off to hotels and exotic venues in pursuit of people who don’t want to come into our churches”. He recognised that this was a difficult topic – talking about outreach but continue to estrange a goodly amount of godly people who he said the Church had treated appallingly over the centuries.
The Revd Clive Atkinson (Down) asked what effective outreach looked like. He had spent almost 20 years in the Diocese of Europe and had led services in many locations that east Belfast could not offer. But he suggested that they were not an effective form of outreach. “For me effective outreach requires a deep connection to a worshiping faith filled community,” he said.
Canon Robinson responded to the speakers and said that debate showed the need for a working group so people could sit down and talk through the pros and cons. She agreed that the church was sacred ground but all the world was sacred ground and it was an affirmation of our theology that God is everywhere, she stated. The idea would not be to change the liturgy and regulations it would simply to do it elsewhere, she added. She agreed with the sentiment of Bishop Burrows but stated that this motion was not about that. Marriage in secular venue could lead to meaningful outreach, she concluded.
The motion was passed by members.