A quarter of all marriage ceremonies in Galway are civil, and are not traditional church weddings.
The new marriage figures for Galway, however, show a large urban rural divide – city couples are twice as likely to marry in civil marriages compared with rural couples who still favour the traditional Catholic Church nuptials.
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) report reveals that 26% of the 988 weddings in Galway last year were civil marriages. The vast majority of weddings (656 or 66%) were Catholic weddings.
However, some 73% of the 656 marriage ceremonies in County Galway in 2015 were Catholic weddings, and just 20% were civil marriages. The remainder were ceremonies in Church of Ireland, Presbyterian, other religious denominations, Humanist and the Spiritualist Union of Ireland.
There were 313 marriages in the city last year and 39% – double that of the county – were civil marriages and just 51% were Catholic weddings, according to the statistics.
Nationally civil marriages accounted for 28% of all ceremonies and 58% were Catholic.
Galway men marry a little later in life, according to the report which said that the average age of Galway grooms was 35 whereas the average age of brides in the city was 34 and it was 33 in the county.
There were just seven teen brides who married in Galway last year, and ten brides who were aged 60 or more also got married in 2015.
There were only two teen grooms in Galway last year and there were 29 grooms who were over the age of 60.
See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.
The post More Galway couples opt for civil ceremonies appeared first on Connacht Tribune - Galway City Tribune.