Finding a Church

One of Mr. Camrah's only requirements for our wedding is that we have the ceremony in a church. He was very involved in the church he attended growing up, but since he moved up to college, he hasn't found a church to become a member of.

In an ideal world, we would find a church close to the Hotel Monaco and fly out Mr. Camrah's minister from New Mexico. We also want to find a church that we feel comfortable in. We want to get married in a place and by a church that has similar beliefs to our own.

We have gone to the three closest churches to the hotel for their Sunday services. The first one was Seattle First Baptist.
It is a very pretty church. Probably the nicest we have gone to so far, but it had a few problems. They do not allow outside pastor's to preform the ceremony. They are allowed to stand at the front with one of their pastors and say prayers, but they are not allowed to preform the ceremony. The other snag was the price to use the church. It was $3,000. So First Baptist was out.

We also went to Seattle First Presbyterian Church. They had a lot more families and younger members at their service than either of the other church. The younger members helped to make it more comfortable. However, the church is a little small since it is in downtown. I'm not sure if all of our guests would be able to fit.

Lastly, we visited Plymouth United Church of Christ. The nice thing about this church is that we got a chance to talk with the pastor about everything and really get a feeling for the church.

We still have a few churches to visit, but I think that we still have time to visit more and make a decision.

Are you having your ceremony in the same place as your reception or are they in separate locations? Which one did you find first? Was one harder to find than the other?