First: a vow renewal is a celebration
A renewal does not create or change a marriage. It needs no license, no registrar and no officiant's credentials, and anyone you choose can lead it. Swear Again never asks for any of those things, and the "declaration" in the Ceremony Runner is a few warm words, not a legal pronouncement. If you want a religious or civil ceremony, ask the people who hold those.
The Vow Studio
Twelve sentences, written by us, in four parts: Then, Since, Now and Next. You finish any of them; the ones you leave blank are left out. Each "I promise to" line becomes its own sentence. Your opening and closing go first and last.
Spoken time assumes 130 words a minute, an unhurried pace, and 110 words a minute for a slower reading. Both are our own working figures, rounded up to the second. The reading card puts one sentence on a line and breaks sentences longer than 14 words at their commas.
The Studio stores nothing: your text goes to our server, comes back put together, and is not written to disk or to the database.
The Ceremony Runner
Each part has a starting length (0 leaves it out, 30 minutes is the most). Parts run in a fixed order; up to two parts of your own go just before the declaration. Start times are the start time plus every part before, so the minutes always add up to the total.
Sealed Vows
- Each of you claims a side from the Renewal Book. Claiming makes a private vow link and shows it once. Only that link can read or change that side.
- Write and save as often as you like, then seal. The Book shows only whether a side is sealed, how many words it has and how long it takes to say.
- Both vows open when both sides are sealed and the renewal day has begun at midnight in the Book's time zone, or when both of you press "I agree to open early". Once opened they stay open and can no longer change.
- While either side is sealed, the renewal date and time zone are locked, so nobody can bring the opening forward from the Book alone. To change them, both of you unseal first. A sealed side, or opened vows, cannot be reset from the Book.
- A lost vow link cannot be recovered. The Book can reset that side, which deletes the draft unread so the side can be claimed again.
Vow text and yearly promises are stored encrypted with this site's own key, so a copy of the database does not show them in plain text. The site holds that key on its server, so this protects the stored copy rather than hiding the words from the server itself; the site's code only opens vows by the rule above. Free sides hold up to 250 words; the Keepsake Pass raises that to 1,200.
Anniversary Math
Years, months and days are counted calendar-style from the wedding date to today in US Eastern time (the Book uses its own time zone). A February 29 wedding is counted on February 28 in years without a 29th. Day milestones are every 5,000 days up to 30,000.
The Renewal Book
A private link holds your names, dates and place, the checklist (12 steps counted back from the renewal day: our suggestions, not rules), one ceremony plan, both sides of the Sealed Vows and a promise a year. Our database keeps only a fingerprint (SHA-256) of the link; the web server's access log, which is not public, does record the addresses visited, links included. A Book not opened for 400 days is deleted with everything in it.