7 Amazing Officiant Speeches That Will Seriously Inspire You

Your wedding ceremony is a moment you will remember for the rest of your lives, and choosing the right wedding officiant to run your ceremony and your wedding vows it is a crucial part of the planning process. Your wedding officiant is the person who leads your ceremony script and, ultimately, marries you! They can be your childhood priest or rabbi, your sibling or a professional celebrant like The Vow Whisperer.

Not only do you want to find someone engaging and entertaining, but you also want a wedding officiant who will be able to showcase who you are as a couple and why your love story is special and unique to you. And don't forget, your wedding officiant must be legally recognized in the state in which your wedding takes place in order for the marriage to be legal, so if you choose to go with a loved one, make sure they get their certification with plenty of time before the wedding.

And if you're reading this article because you've been asked to officiate a wedding, you'll want to make sure you come up with a wedding ceremony script that makes the couple happy and wows their guests. Read on for examples of a great sample officiant speech!

Below we've rounded up 8 of the most inspiring wedding officiant speeches from our huge library of real wedding videos. We hope these videos will help you with your own wedding ceremony and wedding vows.

When deciding who you want to officiate your wedding, don’t let traditions keep you from creating the experience you want to have on your big day. Shalyn + Evan asked Shalyn's grandmother—the owner of the lavender farm where they had their ceremony—to be their officiant! She writes “here, where we gather today, is the heart of our land." Watch this proud, eloquent grandmother at the altar as she leads the ceremony.

Watch Shalyn + Evan’s wedding video here.

It's easy for couples to fall head over heels for each other while sharing extraordinary moments together. Melissa and Matt's wedding officiant has the best advice for keeping love alive long past those exciting first few dates. "Love the ordinary." His officiant speech continues, "love making dinner, love going shopping, taking a walk together. Ironically, if you love the ordinary, you can make some of your days extraordinary. Do you not want to send this to your wedding officiant right now??"

Watch Melissa + Matt's wedding video here.

Molly and Mike's wedding officiant gives a beautiful speech telling the story of how the couple met. It's important to make sure your wedding officiant knows your backstory so you can have moments like this in your ceremony that make it feel more personal and more YOU.

Watch Molly and Mike’s wedding video here.

Matt and Justin's wedding officiant begins the ceremony with a powerful message that directly addresses LGBTQ couples. "If I can be a representative of the Episcopal Church, I think we owe you, the LGBTQ community, an apology. Because it's too late, it's been too slow, and I think that you have taught us how to be a better church." The wedding officiant's honesty and humility is inspiring—moving is an understatement.

Watch Matt and Justin's wedding video here.

Elopement weddings call for a wedding officiant that is able to make the couple feel super comfortable—it's only the three of you up at the altar, after all! May and Mitch searched high and low for an officiant in Kauai to find the perfect person to deliver their wedding vows. It wasn't until they saw a bunch of wedding videos with Kelvin Ho happily cracking coconuts throughout his speech that they knew they found their guy. His happy, easy-going personality totally sold them. Watching Kelvin perform his seashell hand-washing ritual on top of a Hawaiian cliff for major ceremony inspiration.

Watch May and Mitch's wedding video here.

One way to think about your wedding officiant speech is like ten minutes of amazing life advice. Kaylee and Jason's wedding officiant gave a speech that could basically be pinned to every quote board on Pinterest. "There's a time in your life when you begin to measure time in terms of decades. When you look back upon them, you realize that your time upon this earth is really short, and so each moment that you are given on this earth is a time to celebrate." Well said.

Watch Kaylee and Jason's wedding video here.

Find your inner stand-up comedian and work the room with various LOLs. Thinking the wedding officiant's romantic remarks were coming to a close, Heath tries to skip the rest of the wedding vows and kiss Erika—and totally gets called out. While his eagerness is beyond adorable, the way Erika and Heath's wedding officiant playfully teases the couple will have you in tears.

Watch Erika and Heath's wedding video here.

We hope you found these wedding officiants inspiring and you've gotten some great ideas for your own ceremony script and wedding vows. Don't forget to check out our vendor directory to find a professional wedding officiant, speech writer, or vow coach near you who can help you with your big day.