hi steve
your right its the churchs hold on the goverment,,,,,,,,,,,anyway it did not bother me one bit whether they married us in a church or not,,,,it was karen i was getting upset for as this was her fathers dream before he passed away,,even karens mum went to see the priest he told her yes we would be able to get married then the next week karens mum was giving him documents and he then dropped the bombshell on her ,,,now let me tell you my mum inlaw is a lovely woman who goes to her church every sunday,,and any other time she can get to it for mass,,,,she was really angry and this has put a real big dent on her views of the catholic church ,,,as she belives they told her lies,,,,anyway we had a christian marriage at the glass gardens events in pasig city ,,and we were married by a pastor who was recommend by the officials at caloocan city hall,,,,and all i can say is that we had a beautiful wedding the venue was set up beautiful and the price i'm not going to tell you but if it was held here in the UK i don't think karen and i would have change out of 20;000 pounds,,,,,,,we had everything including violins white doves games karens mum was very happy that we just had a civil wedding,,,,no red tape ,,,no one to tell us how we should run our lives ,,,,as my signature says,,,,,live and let live![]()