They Were Still Married to Other People

Amanda shares a unique wedding scenario where she conducted a non-legal commitment ceremony for a couple who were still married to other people. Let's explore the ethics and practicalities of commitment ceremonies versus legal marriages, unpacking various reasons couples might choose this path.

• Couples requested a budget ceremony on the opposite side of Pennsylvania
• They revealed they wanted a non-legal commitment ceremony via Zoom
• Both individuals were still legally married to other people but in the divorce process
• Amanda carefully explained the non-binding nature of the ceremony
• Commitment ceremonies serve many purposes beyond cases like these
• Financial considerations often drive decisions about legal marriage
• Immigration status can prevent couples from legally marrying
• Amanda conducted the ceremony via Zoom as they stood by a lake with candles
• The podcast theme "We listen and we don't judge" guided the approach

If you have a question you'd like me to answer on the podcast, email theweddingwherepodcast@gmail.com. For officiating services inquiries, reach me at officiatingbyamanda@gmail.com.

Chapters

• 0:04 Welcome to The Wedding Where
• 1:12 The Unusual Booking Request
• 2:57 Why Choose a Commitment Ceremony
• 6:41 They Were Still Married to Others
• 10:39 The Candlelit Zoom Ceremony
• 12:24 Not Judging Others' Journeys
• 14:04 Episode Closing and Contact Info

Transcript

Amanda: 0:04

Welcome to the Wedding Where, with officiating by Amanda. the Wedding Where.... They were still married to other people. Hi, everybody, welcome back to the wedding where you know now in a theme of the podcast where we listen and we don't judge. So the last two episodes I did before we Verlyn on on, were all centered around this theme of "we listen and we don't judge, like when the groom has a black eye or when the mother of the bride is drunk. Just looking into some of the more unconventional, eyebrow-raising, plain surprising weddings that I've been a part of and really have had to remind myself we listen and we don't judge. We were hired to sign their paperwork or officiate their ceremony and not cast any judgment. So this one it's definitely a funny one. You'll find I do it with a lot of them. I you'll find I do it with a lot of them.

Amanda: 1:23

Some things seems just a little hinky or a little off from the booking process and I call my mom Always happens, and this one they were still married to other people. So many questions were had by my mother and I, but we kept them between ourselves and we got it all taken care of. So let me tell you a little bit more about what happened. The couple reached out and asked if I would be willing to officiate a ceremony on the other side of Pennsylvania in December. I'm like, hmm, that's a lot. I mean, I would gladly do it for the right price, but the logistics running around, the travel, the time making it work for my schedule I was, you know, really trying to crunch the numbers. They said that they really wanted like under $200. I'm like, oof, oof, that's not going to be possible. We talked a little about maybe Zoom as an option and then they drop in. The little caveat that really kind of changed all things and made me not run out there to do this wedding is that it wasn't going to be a legal marriage. They just wanted to have a commitment ceremony and they wanted it as quick as possible and they didn't mind if I did it over Zoom or called them. Just say the pretty words and help us celebrate our love together.

Amanda: 2:54

Having just a commitment ceremony is not at all unusual. It's not as seen as often as it was before same-sex marriage was legalized, but it still definitely happens. I've done a few that have just been commitments. They did not apply for a license, they don't plan to apply for a license. They have no paperwork for me to sign and there's a lot of different reasons for that. Sometimes there's still financial benefits coming in from a previous marriage, like alimony, that there's a clause, you know, if the spouse got remarried they would have to give up the alimony separately. There's different paperwork there.

Amanda: 3:47

Maybe if one person has oh, I don't know a small officiating business and they want to keep the taxes a little separate out from their spouse just for protection levels, there's student loan debt, medical debt, a whole bunch of things in the debt category that you don't want to sign your spouse up for. And if you're not legally married you don't want to sign your spouse up for. And if you're not legally married especially in Pennsylvania, which does not recognize common law marriage, which is just like cohabitation for a period of time used to equal a common law marriage and equal division of property and assets yeah, pennsylvania doesn't recognize that anymore and hasn't for many, many years Similar things with debts. You can live together 25 years, 30 years, you can share a house, you could buy your cars together, raise your kids together. If you're not legally married, there's not a lot that can be done from a debt or collection side of things.

Amanda: 4:41

Sometimes commitment ceremonies happen for individuals who are immigrants and they are not able to get a marriage license. Maybe the visa hasn't processed, green card hasn't, whole bunch of lots and lots of paperwork, and they just want to again still celebrate that they love each other and that intention is there, that they would marry if they could. But now is not the time, the opportunity isn't there, and I know for a lot of women there's conversations about name changes and if you already have an advanced degree or medical license, cool, I'm not changing my name and I still want all my college debt under me and I own my stuff. I don't need anything from him, he doesn't need anything from me. Why get legally married? Let's just say that we love each other and do it publicly, in front of people, and perhaps do unities that are again not legal. Hand fasting was the olden days version of marriage and now it doesn't legally count for a thing. But for couples who want to do commitment ceremonies, that could be really, really cool. I understand Legal marriage sometimes isn't what a couple wants and you can have weddings without having marriages and you can have marriages without having big to-do.

Amanda: 6:13

Typical weddings like elop, like oh yes, it was our wedding day, but you get a marriage at the end or vice versa. You can have a very large party, invite everybody, a cake, the dances, the hoopla, that's a wedding. But, as we talked about in a previous episode, if you didn't get your license or you forgot to bring your license or you are too drunk to consent to saying I do and I do not sign the license, you can't say you have a marriage, so a couple. Things kind of all go into play After adjusting a little bit of like. Okay, so you don't need me to come all the way out six hours to the other side of the state. You just want a commitment ceremony, you just want to have a little celebration. You want me to print you off a little document from Staples that is not legally binding in any sense. It's like a participation certificate. Essentially. That I can do.

Amanda: 7:20

And they didn't initially tell me why they didn't want it to be legal, or rightly so, why it couldn't be legal. And then they clued me in. They are both already married, not to each other. We listen and we don't judge other. We listen and we don't judge so. And I've just binge-watched a lot of Sister Wives, so knowing that bigamy is illegal in the United States, meaning you cannot be married to more than one person at a time and polygamy as well. If you have legal marriages, you can't have that. That is no bueno.

Amanda: 8:12

This is not at all what the couple was aiming to do. They're in the process of getting their respective divorces, but they didn't want to wait for the courts to kind of pick a day and say this day is important to us and maybe they could have celebrated the day in a different way than hey, we want to get ceremonially married and you know, won't you help us with the wedding? And you know, won't you help us with the wedding? You know, call it your engagement date, call it something really special. But, alas, that is what they wanted to do, and so I really kept reiterating at now understanding, okay, they are married to other people, this is not just oh, you know, maybe they'll get married later on at some point. Like, no, they legally could not even get a license because their licenses are already valid with other people. So I had to keep really reiterating more. So, for my side of things, just to cover my back, make sure all was good is I can't legally marry you.

Amanda: 9:28

However, I can do a symbolic commitment ceremony. There's no legality, there's nothing behind it. You can't use anything I say or any certificate of participation I provide to you as grounds for a legal name change or, you know, potentially adding one another on insurance, because your spouse is already perhaps on your insurance. There's a lot of murky, murky, gray water here and all states are different, how places are different, so each is best researched independently and on their own of what would be allowed. Nothing would be binding outside of your words. If your words have the intention and meaning that you want them to and you both put good faith into your words, as you always should, then, yes, I will gladly do a commitment ceremony with your own vows and you can mean it in your own way and celebrate the day as you see fit, that this is what mattered to you and that is exactly what we did. In the middle of the night, I zoomed to them as they stood in the cold in December by a lake and candles lit all around them. I could barely see them in it and they said some great words and I said some great words and I mailed them out a certificate. And that's the life that they're living.

Amanda: 11:09

We listen and we don't judge and we don't know everybody's story. Maybe their marriages were long over emotionally. Maybe things are held up for reasons that we don't know or can't understand. Maybe they just wanted to be able to start, you know, a new year with some love and support and celebration, some brightness of saying hey, no matter what's coming our way, we just committed ourselves to each other and we're going to do this, we're going to get through this year. They just don't have the marriage license to make it all legal yet. Suffice it to say, I'll be really intrigued and excited if, in you know, six months, a year, a few years from now, I get contacted by them again and get asked to make it legal, legal. You know, we have the paper, we are ready to go. Obviously can't backdate it or anything, but I don't know. There's a lot of ways we can make that really, really cute and have some good tie-ins to the first time. If they wanted to.

Amanda: 12:16

What would you do in this situation? Or rather, if you've got your friend, your friend is married. You know, imagine whatever situation you want between them and their spouse and they are talking to you on a Monday morning and they're like oh yeah, I got married over the weekend. What would you think? What would you say to them? Would you instantly be like picking up the phone, calling the cops and being like I think my friend just married another guy while they're already married? Would you clarify, like wait, how does one do that? How do you marry two people? Would you really dig in or would you just, oh, sounds cool, man, sounds, sounds cool.

Amanda: 12:55

I think it's really important that we just we always pause. There's always something more to a story, there's a reason, there's a method to a madness. I don't always need to agree with it, I don't always need to only know it or understand it, as long as, at the end of the day, in my world, x plus Y equals Z, or one marriage license is provided, one plus two equals three. One marriage license plus two willing participants equals a wedding Well, a marriage, because we talked about that. So I'm kind of really loving this we listen and we don't judge aspect. I did think of another few, so we're gonna have to dive into those in the coming weeks, and some of them actually inspired me for my own wedding plans. I know, I know I thought I had it all set and then I went to one wedding and went oh, I don't like that, no, thank you. So thank you so much for listening and I will catch you guys next week. Thank you for listening to the wedding wear with officiating by Amanda. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and found some inspiration or insight for your own special day.

Amanda: 14:14

This podcast is hosted on buzzsprout and can be found on all major platforms. If you haven't already, please subscribe, like, comment and share to help us reach even more listeners who might laugh a little at the wedding wear. For the links referenced in the show, visit Linktree at Officiating by Amanda. You can also follow the business on Facebook, weddingwire and the Knot to stay up to date on everything going on. If you have a question you'd like me to answer on the podcast, just send an email to theweddingwherepodcast@ gmail. com, and if you're ready to inquire about officiating services for your own big day, you can reach me at officiatingbyamanda@ gmail. com. Thank you so much for tuning in and until next time. This has been Amanda.