Two Weddings and a lies - Should we attend?

That's a tough one. I don't know all the details, but if your son and your niece are close then he should probably go. If not then he should support his wife. I wish the separate wedding wasn't happening- weddings and marriage should be about the union and the bringing TOGETHER of two families... not the separation of two religions.

Best of luck

I'm familiar with Catholic weddings and know they would have had to lie through their teeth to the priest to have this happen. I'm not even Catholic but I would find that very off-putting.
I think all the lying and deception would be too much drama for me and I would likely decline the invitation. I think you need to allow your son to make the decision he is comfortable with.

I would respect your son's wishes to not go. When people deceive their loved ones, they run the risk of alienating them. If you try to pressure him to go, I think you will just cause tension either between you and your son, him and his wife, or you and your daughter-in-law. Your niece shouldn't have lied to her family, so she is in the wrong in this situation.

I couldn’t do the Catholic wedding because I’m still not sure when we have kids if we’ll bring them up Catholic or not which is a requirement. It’s tough, but live seen people get married both Muslim and Hindu so maybe they were trying to appease both families?

Your son is an adult (I'm assuming), so I think you should respect his decision to support his wife on this matter.


The lying and deception is not ok, and this is one of the consequences. I would be angry to that they were keeping a secret. As someone else said, a wedding is a union of two families. I also can't imagine this bodes well for their future. My husband is Catholic and I am Jewish. We opted to leave religion out of the wedding because of the near impossibility of a Catholic priest agreeing to do a ceremony with a rabbi.

Honestly, it's really difficult trying to appease both religions when planning a wedding. I sympathize with them. I don't feel they are going about it the right way but I personally don't think that's anyone else's business. If they found some loophole in their religions that allow them to have 2 separate marriage ceremonies (that are valid) then great.
What would be a happy resolution for your son? That they chose a Catholic wedding and invited everyone to that? Well, that would be unfair to your niece as she is Jewish. Would the other solution be to have only a Jewish wedding and invite everyone to that? Well, that would be unfair to him as he is Catholic.
It's a really tough situation. Perhaps the happy medium would have been to have a non-denominational wedding without religion. But, alas, they are not doing that.
I would go.
A wedding is about supporting a couple in their love. Based on that alone, i would go.

That just seems like a lot of work, to have two weddings, not to mention the stress of lying to literally everyone they know! I would support your son in any decision he makes, as I'm sure he'll support whatever you decide to do!

I am with the majority both that your son should be allowed to make this decision without pressure to change his mind "the keep the peace" and that lying is a terrible way to go about celebrating a marriage.

Assuming there's no ulterior motive to their plan, I don't see what's really that wrong with it. People lie all the time about things bigger than weddings. And I can bet most of us have been to weddings that were lies. How many weddings do you know of that started because someone was pregnant but they didn't tell anyone or lied about it? (Or vice versa, where a person lied and said they were pregnant when they weren't.) How many weddings do you know of that were shamefully done in secret and they couldn't tell anyone until after they were married? It's also super common for people to get married by a JoP or at a courthouse first and then have a big wedding later and not tell anyone about the first wedding. Isn't that also 2 ceremonies and a lie?

It's so passé to have to lie about these things, or deceive others, yet people still feel the need to do so. They do that because they're afraid of other peoples' reactions. If, as a community, we were more forgiving and as easy going as we said we were, people wouldn't have to be ashamed and could just be honest all the time.

I feel terrible if they genuinely felt they HAD to lie - it could mean they were afraid. Whether or not you support their decision is up to you. Being understanding of their situation and seeing the bigger picture is what could separate you from other people who haven't been so empathetic to their decision.

I'm going to ignore all the two weddings/lying issues, because that doesn't factor into my response. If your son is married, I'm assuming he is an adult. If he's an adult, he should make his own decisions to attend or not attend social engagements. To me it doesn't matter what his reasons are for going or not going, he's a grown-up and should make his own decisions. If I were in your shoes, I'd accept his decision and move on. If you want to go to the wedding for whatever reasons you choose, go and have a great time. He and his wife can and should make their own decisions.