So many questions come in on this hot topic. It’s one of those weird ones as it’s almost like an unspoken transaction but it very much exists. As standard, when a priest performs a wedding ceremony, it is expected that some form of donation would be made. Some parishes have very direct pricing so couples know exactly how much they need to provide and others don’t suggest any amount so couples are left scratching their heads. For couples getting married outside of their own parish, there will be a church hire fee and this is prominent across so many of the churches within a short distance of the main wedding venue venues in the country.
Some were absolutely in shock that there would be a charge to get married in a church but i’ll put it to you this way, if you get married by civil / non religious ceremony, you will pay for your celebrant and the venue. Essentially, to open the doors and get the wedding moving, people have to come in allow that to happen and you have to remember, it’s not just that hour ceremony for the priest, they have their meetings with you and the paper work to coordinate for you.
I ran a poll on the 11th of March to ask you all how much you are all paying and I have almost 3,000 responses…..and yes I have read through all and worked out the numbers based on your responses. It wasn’t a clear cut ask as there are many different variables that appear to affect couples in different ways but here I am doing the lords work breaking it down for you all.
The headline is…..as a majority, €200 appears to be the going rate. But lets dig in to these numbers….
There were different ways that people pay in to their church:
- Just Priest (at home in their own & others to travel to another church)
- Just Church Fee (own home church and then hire of an out of parish church)
- Priest & Church Fee
- Priest & Sacristan
- Just Meal Invite
Apart from the meal invite, I’ve tallied up all combinations to be a central fee so for those who mentioned (example) €150 for priest and €50 for sacristan, that was combined to €200. Same applied to those who had a church hire and priest hire. I combined the total. To note, 12% of the total answers stated that they paid a separate amount to the sacristan and that was mainly between €50-€70.
Here is the combined breakdown and the range of answered spanned between €50 to €800, so it was very varied.
Top Sums:
€200 – 38%
€300 – 26%
€100 – 9%
€250 – 8%
€150 – 6%
€500 – 5%
€350 – 3%
Rest 4% (€50, €400, €450, €600, €700, €800, €900 – the €600-€900 were combinations of outside of parish weddings for church fee plus priest to travel or priest in that actual parish had a separate fee) & Invite to meal
There were some that are lucky to have a priest in the family so had no fee.
As you can see, whilst €200 appears to be the majority fee, there is a big out there and if you intend to get married outside of your parish, expect to spend more!
I hope you found this helpful.
Sara xx
IMAGE CREDIT: Real Wedding of Carlha & Brian
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