Do you even Celebrant bro?

So for my first blog I thought I'd write a little about what inspired me to become a celebrant.

I have ALWAYS loved a good wedding. There's nothing quite as pleasing as the wonderful, tangy-sweet feeling of seeing two friends make a public declaration of their love. I always cry at friends weddings (don't worry, I've tested it and I'm fine when I'm working ;) ) because I think it's just such a beautiful and noble thing to do.

I also love that in a time where our sense of community and connectedness are under constant seige wedding bring people together in a way that is rare. There are whole sub-sets of friends that I pretty much exclusively see at weddings because the winds of fate have taken us far away from each other. For that chance to rekindle and refresh long term friendships I'm so very grateful.

So love of weddings is reason one. Reason two is as Liam Neeson would say 'a very particular set of skills'.

My degree is in Theatre and I was performing constantly from age 10-22. My work took me away from it but it remains baked into who I am - a flash of the performative, a sense of event and a flair for storytelling.

Nowadays I'm an adult learning professional so delivering training has taken up a lot of my career. I'm used to being at the front of roomfuls of people (sometimes LARGE roomfuls) and holding their attention in the right way.

Reason three is all about what I believe. I'm a humanist and have been for a long time. I think it's great that people find peace, resilience and meaning in ceremonies and rituals. But why should that only be the case for people who have a religion? We could all use a little of that action and it's important to me that non-religious communities can access those major life events - weddings, funerals etc - in a way that makes sense for them. In my own little way I'm trying to give something important to those communities.

So there you go - the three main reasons I chose to become a humanist celebrant. I'd love to hear how you feel about humanist ceremonies or the role of humanist celebrants for you so hit up the comments with your thoughts.

Love always,

Dan Mossman