Cross posted from https://lemmy.ca/post/70884233
Cross posted from https://lemmy.ca/post/70884231
It's a little after nine in the morning in Provo, Utah. And this morning, in a county government building here, a man sits down at a desk and opens a laptop. He isn't a bishop. He isn't a judge. He works for the county clerk. And according to his calendar, he is marrying people today. A lot of people. Nobody is in the room. No bride, no groom, no parents, no flowers, no mormons. There are two witnesses, because Utah law insists on two adults over eighteen. Then he clicks "join". A couple appears on the screen. It's already evening where they are. Nine hours ahead. Before he can marry them, the State of Utah now requires him to read them a sentence - one that was written into the law this year. "A marriage solemnized according to the laws of the State of Utah through online remote appearance may be invalid in the country where the parties to the marriage reside." Which seems weird and unromantic, especially on a wedding day. Unless you know where the couple is. They are not in Utah. They are not in the United States. They're in Tel Aviv. He marries them anyway. They say yes from Israel, the certificate is issued in Utah and posted across the Atlantic. Then the next couple appears. Also from Israel. Then the next. And the next. This one clerk's office has married couples from China, Kenya, Azerbaijan, Madagascar. But Israelis are the biggest foreign group using it by a distance: about three thousand couples in 2024 alone, roughly one in every three foreign couples Utah County marries. So: why are thousands of Israelis, every year, getting married by a government clerk in the most Mormon corner of the most religious state in America - over a video call, in a country most of them have never set foot in? And why does the State of Israel have to recognize their marriage when Utah does?
Marriage in Israel is exclusively religious, so if you do not want (or do not qualify for) a religious marriage, then you are forced to seek marriage abroad, which Israeli courts have ruled must be recognized. This seems like a loophole where couples are not forced to travel.