MARRIAGE SERVICE VOWS

New Zealand Times, Volume L, Issue 11665, 1 November 1923, Page 3

MARRIAGE SERVICE VOWS

CAUSE OF REGISTRY OFFICE WEDDINGS?

There lias been a great increase in registry office marriages during the last few years. The quinquennial figures issued by Somerset Houso will not ho available till next year, but an official in the office of the Register-General of Births, Marriages and Deaths told the “Westminster Gazette” that since 1908 registry office marriages had been steadily growing in popularity. Various causes —the objection to the calling of ibanns, expenses, fuss, and differences of religion—are put forward in attempts to explain the problem. “MERE HYPOCRISY.” A personal experience was given to the “Westminster Gazette” by a woman novelist. “I was married some years ago in a registry office,” she said. “It was a poky little room in a back street. When we arrived a charwoman was still in possession, and we had to await the arrival of the registrar. Everything was made as miserable as possible, so that a sensitive girl might well be excused for shirking such an ordeal. “But I had to go through with it, I localise I refused to make heforo the altar binding vows which I knew I should be quite unable to keep. People are getting to realise that in many cases church weddings are mere hypocrisy.”