I publish the banns...

Well, perhaps not for much longer - the Church of England is considering doing away with the requirement to formally announce forthcoming marriages as part of the church service on three consecutive Sundays.  At the moment it's part of their responsibility as ex officio registrars to ensure that couples seeking to marry have that fact advertised where they live, so that if there's anything "iffy" about them marrying, someone will come forward and tell about it.  But of course this relies on everybody knowing everybody else locally, and their family's histories and so on, and everybody regularly attending church.  And whereas this was the case way back when reading the banns was first introduced, it certainly isn't the case today, and given that all forthcoming marriages are in any event posted on the message boards of registrars' offices, reading the banns seems to have outlived any usefulness.