Where I Trained in Celebrancy

The Celebrant  Foundation & Institute 

The Celebrant Foundation & Institute is a non-profit educational institution dedicated to helping individuals, families, communities and organizations personalize celebrations that mark life’s milestones, opened its doors in June 2001.  Celebrants officiate at virtually every life event, including weddings and commitments, funerals and memorials, and baby namings and adoptions.  With a focus on personalizing each ceremony to reflect the needs, beliefs and values of the couple or family, Celebrants are trained in the art of celebration, symbolism and tradition. 

The United States  and Canadian presence is a new chapter in a thirty-year old worldwide phenomenon.

The History of Celebrancy

The concept of Celebrancy began in Australia in 1973 by the then-Attorney General Lionel Murphy.  At the time, Australian law authorized only clergy from the Lutheran and Catholic churches to perform weddings.  For those couples who did not belong to either church, the law provided only for a marriage at the “Registry,” a civil office where couples lined up in a hallway to await their minutes-long ceremony, over which they had no input or control.

 Murphy’s vision was to bring dignity to and personal choice to wedding ceremonies for those couples who did not wish to be married in one of these three ways.  He changed Australian law and authorized the appointment of civil Celebrants, who would perform individualized ceremonies approved by the couples, incorporating their wishes and focusing on the arts.  

 Today, wedding Celebrants perform over half of all wedding ceremonies in Australia.   The 4,000+ worldwide celebrants have officiated at over one million weddings – unprecedented growth in a thirty-year time period.  Other countries which have embraced the Celebrancy concept include New Zealand and Great Britain, and now the United States and Canada.