Assalamu alaikum,
I am a Shia revert, I have been Shia for years but a while back I lost my way and I met my now partner and we have a son together and also my older son sees him as his father. He was not Muslim at all but since I have started to find my way back to Allah subhana wa’tala, alhamdulillah, my partner has learnt a lot about Islam and I explained that I have to find my way back to the right path and unfortunately I will have to choose my faith over my relationship. After he learned some more about Islam he said he wanted to revert, like I had done, and I’m really happy and excited about this. He has reverted now and I know we have to get married - in an Islamic way - because I do not want to live in this disobedience of Allah subhana wa’tala and I want to show my two children how to be good Muslims.
Sorry for the background information! I’ll get on to my actual question now: we live in a city that has no Shia mosques. I’m not joking. There’s like only a couple of mosques here and I’ve actually never been them because I was anxious, the Muslim community here is small and not many reverts and I have been looked down upon by the Muslim community here and really not accepted even when I was practicing and doing my best. We need to get married, I would like a permanent marriage because we were going to get married legally anyway before, we are already engaged in a western sense, but I don’t really care about that so much at the moment. But without a mosque to go to and without a sheikh, can we even get married?! Permanently and validly? I looked on Sistani’s website and I was confused. I was in a mutah marriage before with a man who really did introduce me properly to Islam, this was a long time ago now, and now I don’t even know if that was valid - we didn’t have witnesses. But I was told then that for mutah we didn’t need them. But for permanent marriage it’s my understanding we do? Do they need to be Muslim? My family is not Muslim. Do we need a religious leader like a sheikh to make a permanent marriage valid or not & to do the contracts…? I feel silly asking these things like I feel I should know it but anyway. I’m hoping someone can help me out.
What does a couple do if there is no mosque or sheikh…? Like I said there’s a couple of mosques but they are not Shia. Can a permanent marriage & ceremony be done without this? And like I asked also for witnesses, can they be non-Muslim because my family is not Muslim and neither is my partner’s family.
Thank you for reading and I hope I don’t sound really dumb and I hope I can get some clarity and we will be able to get married inshallah!