Thanks for all the info guys! We're certainly not rushing into it - but the approach of the end of what seems to be an never ending divorce has given us a kick in the pants to get organised! That and the problems and difficulties of life apart!! Up until recently I worked regularly in Malaysia and so it was easy to tag on a trip to the Philippines to the end of the trip, that or/and pay for Mea to fly to Malaysia while I was there - I was made redundant but luckily found a new job almost straight away - but no foreign travel Mea wants church wedding and the priest has given her this list of requirements:- 1. BAPTISMAL CERTIFICATE- FOR MARRIAGE PURPOSE 2. CONFIRMATION CERTIFICATE 3. BIRTH CERIFICATE-XEROX ONLY 4. 2X2 I.D PICTURE 2PCS 5. MARRIAGE LICENSE 6. CENOMAR-BRIDE 7. LEGAL CAPACITY TO MARRY Any thoughts on this? Firstly I'm not Catholic so thats the first problem, I believe I was baptised but no certificate exists - Im 100% certain no confirmation certificate exists, everythings else seems straightforward enough (although maybe time consuming) Anyone had any experience trying to track down a baptism certificate if such a thing exists in UK? A quick Google search leads me to ancestry sites at every turn, I'm not sure that will help me. Regarding the seminar - I seem to remember reading that it is necessary up to a certain age - after that her parents can vouch for us - up to 25 I think - but I cant find where I read that!!
I am not catholic either. They just registered me as C of E. but ours was a civil wedding, so dont know if that makes a difference? I recall that my wife was 23 when we wed so she had to go through with the seminar ( though we managed to avoid it as I said previously. I cant recall how we found that out but I think it was from the woman that initially tried to set our wedding up in the first instance.
stevepqr, my husband and I had a Church wedding here in Manila and if that's the case, you will need a lot of documents mandated by the Archdiocese. Which Church are you planning to get married? Depending of the Church, it will be covered a certain Archdiocese and Mea has to go to that branch and get the list of requirements. FOr an interracial and interfaith marriage, it is possible but there are a lot of paperwork on your part. My husband was baptized in the UK and there wasn't any certificate that they had on hand so what they did is that they wrote the Church where he was baptized and asked for a certificate. They were pretty helpful and send one through the mail. If you want to get married in Church, a pre-cana seminar is absolutely necessary whatever age you are or else they won't let you marry in Church. It's pretty easy to do this, our Church where we got married hold one every first Saturday and it is a whole day thing. There are more indepth ones that take from 2-3 days. Another thing that you would need is to let your local priest/pastor/cleric to sign a sheet about your personal background. We did this while we were in the UK. The same form was signed by my husband's parents. The forms will be issued when your fiance goes to the Archdiocese. Lastly, there is an interview with the priest. This has to be done at least 2 weeks before the wedding and it's basically the priest interviewing the couple. This can be a breeze or a horror story for some. Luckily, it was a breeze for us. The list seems daunting but in the end, it is all worth it to be married in Church
Am not advocating the use of a "fixer" but we really didnt have to think much about this part of the whole process at all as it was all taken care of. I still to this day dont fully understand what happened but it worked well. I recall having to whip across to city hall and stand like a numpty for about 10 minutes and sign a few papers on the Friday, but that was it. And fill out a few forms with the Reverend. Then we wed on the monday following.
^ A fixer can be hired easily in the City Hall but unfortunately, it is a totally different thing with the CHurch and the Archdiocese
Yeah you have to "fix" the Bisp We hired a Baptist Minister luckily my loverly ladies dont really know what they are as my father in law was a jehovas witness (failed) even xmas was not celebrated I dont think I could have coped involving the R & C the CNI Licence and Wedding were challenging enough
Lol! After getting fed up of me passing on messages Mea joined earlier today and I think maybe a civil wedding is now the way to go! Unfortunately me and bureaucracy have never been the best of friends, form filling and applications are usually second on my list of things I want to do behind eating broken glass. Still if its what I have to do... Ok so we've explored the wedding in the Philippines angle, anyone got any contributions on going the fiancee visa route?
There are pluses and minuses for each. The Fiance Visa allows the couple to marry in the UK which might suit the groom more than the bride. It makes life easier in terms of arranging the wedding (all on home turf) however there are negatives too. The Fiancee Visa route adds an extra expense at the FLR stage than those on a Spouse Visa do not incur. It also means that the groom may not be in a position to have met the fiance's relatives, looked them in the eye and convinced them face to face, before you whisk her away, that you are going to take care of their little girl. In our case, my wifes mom insisted on a Philippine wedding so we had no choice. Another benefit of the Spouse Visa is that you can have a bloody good holiday in the Philippines at the same time. A wedding in the UK is likely to be more expensive. Note: If you elect to have a civil wedding in the Philippines you can still have a great reception for friends and family after. Which is what we did.
we went the fiance route. It proved expensive though. noy only did it mean an extra visa, but we were also unsuccessful first time (due mainly to using a useless visa agency and believing what they said!). Wedding was dead cheap though. Forty quid. Registry office. Chinese restaurant. Thank you very much. We did look into the idea of getting married in the Philippines after the first time, but it meant taking too much time off work as there was a lot of delays. Plus the last thing I really wanted to do was get married in a Catholic church or looking like a total knob by being an Englishman dressed in one of those Barong things.
If you have got loads of time in the Phils, the church service will be doable. I remember reading so many stories of people who got snarled up in too much red tape and they eventually went for the civil one. My wife and I did the civil wedding there. Seems to me the fiancée route is also fraught with problems.
If your fiance wants a Church wedding, I think it would be nice if you can give it to her as most girls in the Philippines would want to be married in Church The paper work can be daunting but it would feel damn good to be able to accomplish that and not take the easy route of getting civilly married. UK vs Manila wedding can be tricky, a family friend of mine got married in the UK and had a 120 seat reception at the Berkeley and it was about £50,000. Whereas we got married here in Manila at the Mandarin Oriental for 300 pax and spent only £30,000.
Or, you can have a quickie civil wedding in the Philippinest, obtain the Spouse Visa and then have a church wedding in the UK. I believe some people do that.
Its been a short exploration I for one would say getting Married in the Fils is a good option at many levels its only the RC bit that for me is going a bit far. Blue is our new millionaire so dont worry to much about the wedding costs she mentions. You could have a very nice wedding 60-100 guests for between £1-3 k If your evidence of relationship is good ,have met preferably more than once ,have pics and chat logs phone bills, support reciepts etc and you are clearly in excess of the income requirements then its fine to spend the extra grand on fiance however with the hooray policies on immigration at the moment you really need to have all covered with only error on UKBA,s side to go wrong
Agree on the Roman Catholic going a bit too far. The CoE cleric who signed off my husband's forms is married to a Catholic and they never experienced such a thing in the UK. LOL how I wish we were millionaires! I guess our definition of nice is different I can share pictures or videos if you want. Plus we got back half of it because it is in my culture to give out cash gifts.
£30k!! I dont have 30k Pesos never mind pounds!! Thanks to the others there for pointing out that it isn't necessarily 'normal' to spend the best part of a years salary on a wedding
Thanks babes.. and Hi to all.. Thanks also for the Info,advice about visa and everything.. more power
