Saint Margaret's Hornby
Saint Michael the Archangel Whittington
Saint John the Baptist Arkholme
Saint John the Evangelist Gressingham
in the Lune Valley in north Lancashire

Three months before the wedding

It is now time to organise either banns of marriage or the alternative known as a Common Licence

It is your responsibility to organise this, and you cannot get married unless it is completed in time - so do it now!

If you are both British citizens living in England (or Wales), you have the option of getting married ‘by banns’

For everyone else, Common Licence is the only option

(Common Licence is actually an option for everybody, if you prefer)

To organise a Common Licence, contact the diocesan registrar - there is a charge for this service, payable to the diocesan registrar

Getting married ‘by banns’ is the more traditional method, where your forthcoming wedding is announced in church three times, both in the parish where you are getting married, and in the parish where you live

To get married by banns, you need to contact the vicar of the parish where you live

If you are living in England, you can find out which parish it is, and usually find the vicar's contact details, using achurchnearyou.com

For Wales, enquire locally or try churchinwales.org.uk

There will be a small fee to pay locally (£46 in England in 2021)

Once the banns process is complete, you have to arrange to collect the banns certificate and get it to me (or arrange to have it sent to me) at Station House, Arkholme, Carnforth LA6 1AZ

We also need to call your banns here, and to do this, we need to know the name of the parish where you live, so once you have found out the name of that parish, contact us with that information, and to confirm your current address

The fee for calling your banns here is included in the standard charge that you already paid when you booked

If you are living in two different parishes, you need to arrange to have your banns called in both of them, as well as here, and you might decide that a Common Licence is easier

Of course if you are both living in the parish where you are getting married, you only have to have the banns called here, but do contact us to confirm this when the time comes

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