“But all that wasn’t enough, for some reason?” said Kurt. This was turning into precisely the kind of grilling session that I had been trying to warn Kurt against. Did he want Naomi to ever talk to us again?
“It’s not that,” Naomi replied levelly. “I started to have doubts about the church itself when I started asking questions about polygamy. I knew what my father taught us, but it was so different from what Mormons in our ward believed. No one could give me straight answers about polygamy’s place in the church. Some people said it was wrong and had nothing to do with being Mormon. Other people said it was the law of the celestial kingdom—I mean some people who aren’t even polygamists believe that.” She shrugged. “So I started reading to see if I could answer my own questions. The more I dug into the history of the church, the more problems I saw in it. There were so many situations besides polygamy where the church refused to apologize for mistakes in the past, or even to admit them at all. The Mountain Meadows Massacre. The Martin and Willie Handcart Company. The Adam-God Doctrine. Blood Atonement. On and on.”
Well, she had certainly done her research. I couldn’t disagree with her on any of those examples. They were all unjustifiably wrong and tended to be buried rather than talked about.
“The church belongs to Christ,” Kurt said. “Even if the apostles or prophets make mistakes, apologizing sounds like apologizing for Christ Himself. But even so, the church has admitted to mistakes. Not allowing blacks to hold the priesthood, for instance.”
“And how long did that take?” Kenneth interjected. “More than a hundred and fifty years after the Civil War.”
This was surely not the place for this fight between Kurt and Kenneth about the pros and cons of the church. It was too public and Naomi shouldn’t have to deal with that.
“Let’s get practical about the wedding day itself,” I said, as cheerily as I could manage. “How many people should we plan on your side bringing to the wedding? What kind of venue have you and Kenneth thought about? Do you have plans for a photographer, a florist, or a caterer? Do you want live music or a DJ?”
Kurt leaned back against the bench and looked at the menu as if it were hieroglyphics.
Kenneth cleared his throat. “It’s up to Naomi, really. She’s the bride.”
I wished he wouldn’t say that. I was trying to help and I didn’t know the bride at all.
“We’re working on pinning down a date and a venue. I don’t have anything else decided on,” said Naomi, more graciously. “Though I’m open to suggestions.”
“I’ll ask around. It’s been a few years for us, and of course it’s not the same when you’re planning a non-church wedding,” I said.
“Are you really all right with marrying without any religious covenant?” Kurt asked Kenneth. “It seems so cold, so contractual. Not to mention the fact that there’s no guarantee you’ll be together after this life.”
I wished Kurt could be more politic about this, but I could see how deeply he had been hurt.
“We don’t feel like we need a divine blessing on our marriage. It’s all about us living up to our promises,” said Kenneth. “And besides, a lifetime of love is plenty for us.”
“And a lifetime is longer than most people manage,” I said as smoothly as I could. “So if you do, it will be something to be proud of.” Please let this be the end of this topic, I thought, but apparently, Kurt was not reading my mind.
“But your children won’t be sealed to you,” Kurt went on. “Have you thought about that at all, Kenneth?”
Naomi was sitting up very straight and I wondered if that was what she did when her own father stuck his foot in something.
“Dad, I don’t believe in an afterlife. I’m not so sure about God, either,” said Kenneth.
There was my answer to the question about Kenneth’s belief system. It seemed very lonely to me, as someone who had once been an atheist and had come back to faith. But I shouldn’t close any doors on Kenneth’s behalf.
“Well, maybe you shouldn’t be getting married while you’re unsure about something so important,” said Kurt.
And maybe Kurt should shut up when it came to other adult’s decisions—even his son’s. I could see from the set of Kenneth’s jaw that he was finished letting his father poke and prod inappropriately. Good, I thought.
He said, “Naomi is the one surest thing in my life, Dad, and if you don’t want to be part of our wedding, that’s fine. We can move on without you.” There it was, the gauntlet thrown. Kurt could keep his mouth closed about the eternities or he could get himself disinvited from his third son’s wedding.
Kurt was, after all, a grown-up, and kept his mouth closed.