Spain has always been a country of Catholic tradition, and this has clearly been reflected in, for example, the traditional way of marriage that Spaniards have mainly chosen since the beginning of democracy in the 1970s. Before 1981, the only valid marriage in Spain was the church wedding, but, after the legalization of civil ceremonies, an overwhelming majority of couples still decided to continue with the tradition and preferred the Catholic marriage.
Well, nowadays the trend has changed and since 2009 more and more couples are deciding to make their declarations of love at Court instead of going to the church. One could think that the increase in the number of civil ceremonies would be due to the legalization of marriage between people of the same sex in 2005, but it is just partly true; since the year 2000 the number of church weddings has been falling significantly while that of civil marriages has been increasing (all this taking into account that the number of marriages now is lower than in the past three decades).
The general picture, however, varies greatly depending on the Spanish province. In Catalonia, the Islands (both The Canary Islands and The Balearic Islands), The Basque country, Valencia and Madrid the number of civil ceremonies exceeded the number of church weddings. Curiously enough, Melilla leads the number of civil ceremonies (with 80% compared to 20% of church weddings), whereas in Jaén the proportion is exactly the opposite.
Either civil or religious wedding, if you want to celebrate this special day in a beautiful country with wonderful places, please choose Spain.
Version in Spanish | Bodas por la iglesia vs. Bodas civiles en España
More info | El País
Photo | Rosa Clará
