For all the foreigners reading, yes…we do NOT have civil marriage laws. The only way to get married without a religious organization is to travel to other countries (Cyprus being the most viable and cheap option) to get it done. And apparently it’s the ONLY thing religious figures agree on preventing!
P.S there is one additional way to get married in Lebanon without a religious institution and that is to cross out your religion from your identification papers. But the drawback in doing that is you lose a lot of your governmental rights as will any children you have! Which is why we NEED civil marriage laws and not find loopholes in existing ones! People shouldn’t get married because of loopholes, but should have the RIGHT and option to get married by clear civil laws.
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Another problem with the loophole way some are using to get a civil marriage in Lebanon is that the marriage needs approval by the ministry of interior affairs, which is something that the current minister isn’t doing mainly because of the religious backlash especially given his background. There was a protest a while back from Bliss St. up to his office at Sanayeh to highlight specifically how he’s not signing those marriages into approval, especially that they are – for all purposes at least – legal.
Elie, I have a feeling with the power that religious figures have over here, those papers are never going to get signed unfortunately.
Like I said, getting married according to a loophole is NOT the way to go. You need REAL laws.
Hey, I don’t have a girl avatar.
Sad but true.
Indeed
one day, one day *insert optimistic smiley here*
*fingers crossed*!
There is also a legal dispute over whether the marriages performed using these “loopholes” are legal at all. It is not (only) about pressure from religious institutions, it’s also about the prerogatives of “Ketib al-Adel,” which is not supposed to perform any marriages.
However, of course the Parliament has refused to approve a civil personal status law mainly because of the pressure from religious institution.
A very modern law has been in the parliament’s drawers since March 2011.
With the way things are going, that modern law is going to collect a LOT of dust in the parliament’s drawers!
“…But the drawback in doing that is you lose a lot of your governmental rights as will any children you have! …”
Funny, I didn’t know we have governmental rights? I was under the impression that those are only rights of the heirs of sitting government officials.
Hah, you got me there…
We had a reverse problem. My wife and I got married in a church in Cyprus, as it was impossible to get married in Lebanon at the time, due to the war in 1990. The challenge was trying to register our religious marriage in Lebanon, as the authorities were only used to civil marriages from that country. It took us 10 years and three kids to finally register our marriage here, after major intervention from our local church and having to redo much of the paperwork. Go figure.
That’s insane Hani! I can’t believe that happened with you! How idiotic is this country?!
Lol, it’s the only time I wish they didn’t!
Most of the Lebanese people are going abroad in order to get married. I don’t think that what the religious parties are doing is affecting people’s decisions.