Ceremony

A marriage is usually formalized at a wedding or marriage ceremony. The ceremony may be officiated either by a religious official, by a government official or by a state approved celebrant. In many European countries, any religious ceremony must be held separately from the required civil ceremony. Some countries - such as Belgium, Bulgaria, France, the Netherlands, Romania and Turkey - require that a civil ceremony take place before any religious one. In some countries - notably the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, Norway and Spain - both ceremonies can be held together; the officiant at the religious and civil ceremony also serving as agent of the state to perform the civil ceremony. To avoid any implication that the state is "recognizing" a religious marriage (which is prohibited in some countries) - the "civil" ceremony is said to be taking place at the same time as the religious ceremony. Often this involves simply signing a register during the religious ceremony. If the civil element of the religious ceremony is omitted, the marriage is not recognized by government under the law.

Selection of partner for marriage

Partner selection for marriage is very crucial step because it’s not an easy task to do right? It usually involves the selection by couple themselves (as in case of love marriages) and or it can be arranged by the couple's parents (as famous in India) and or by a matchmaker. Arranged marriages are easier to make and involves some formal procedures by some family members and or by group politics. A responsible person (mediator) is asked to encourage the marriage by enhancing the degree of trust and removing doubts by finding answers to questions that came to mind of couples relatives or parents. Also a professional matchmaker can be asked to find a suitable spouse for an unmarried person or for divorced person too. In Indian villages, child marriage is also practiced which by law is completely illegal in India. Such marriages are fixed even sometimes even before the child is born. This practice is completely illegal under the Child Marriage Restraint Act but in India no one cares about the law and such cases can be seen now a day too. In some regions in India and abroad the custom of bride kidnapping still exists, in which a woman is captured by a man and his friends (recently a movie have been made on this issue in India). In previous times, raptio was a larger-scale version of this, In which a groups of women were captured by groups of men (this was also very common during war time in old historical time period); the most famous example is The Rape of the Sabine Women, which provided the first citizens of Rome with their wives.