Need Help Concerning Catholic Ceremonies and..

Where I can get married.....??

I am Catholic and so is my fiance. Granted we both haven't been to church in a while, but do I HAVE to get married in a church?? I really want to get married at the Reception Hall and have an outside ceremony. Will the church still recognize it as a Catholic wedding?? What do I do??? If I do get married in one Church, can I go to another for Pre cana, my sister is Paying $250 at our church...

This has been debated on the boards but my church insists you have to be married in the church if you want it recognized. You always could do a small ceremony there to have it on record and do the big one at the reception hall. Also you can do the pre-cana at any church. I live out of town so we have to do it here in California. Hope that helps

There was a thread about this just recently. The consensus was that the church will not recognize a wedding held outside of the church, but there are exceptions to that. I'll see if I can find the thread.

If you do decide to get married in a church, you can do pre-cana anywhere you want.

ETA: Here's the thread I was talking about.

Thank you SOOO Much for the info... I really appreciate everyone's help

I am Catholic and my fiance is not. On top of that, we live in DC but are getting married on LI. We wanted an outdoor ceremony officiated by a Catholic priest, but we were told that the priests won't do the ceremony outside. I am not sure if this policy is Church-wide, or depends on which parish you ask.

We then had trouble finding a church that would marry us in the church because we do not live on LI, so we do not belong to a LI parish. We tried asking churches in Port Jeff, where our reception place is, and they said no because they only do weddings for their parishioners. Then we went to my the church I grew up in and got my sacraments at, and they said yes.

The pastor of this church is really easygoing and is letting us do the pre cana in DC!

---

Posted by ckgmwedding

This has been debated on the boards but my church insists you have to be married in the church if you want it recognized. You always could do a small ceremony there to have it on record and do the big one at the reception hall. Also you can do the pre-cana at any church. I live out of town so we have to do it here in California. Hope that helps

---

I believe this is the case as well.