165 thoughts on “Friday Challenge: Would You Rather?”

  1. At my Fundy grandpa’s funeral ( he was a GRBC pastor), the pastor closed with the following words. “This is the part of the service where we would normally go to the cemetery and say ‘ashes to ashes, dust to dust’ but Brother Mel decided to speed up the process – so we will just go downstairs to share a meal”.

    I couldn’t believe it. My grandpa was against cremation, until my mom finally convinced him to make pre-arrangements – even though he knew the rapture was going to happen before he died. Once he saw the cost of a traditional funeral compared to cremation – the frugal side one.

    1. It probably wasn’t meant to be funny, yet why do I enjoy graveyard humor? 🙄

  3. Spent WAY too much time pondering this over the past two days…

    I choose wedding. I’ve only been to a few negative fundy weddings. (One with a very long-winded preacher, one where the uptight IFB missionary lady behind me made a snide comment about the bride wearing white, and one where the virginity of the bride was discussed for an inappropriate length of time).

    I’ve had some BAD fundy funerals though. One in particular–a young man had died rather suddenly and unexpectedly, and the family was hurt and grieving. One of the preachers was very kind and compassionate. The closing act, however, was a guy who thought it appropriate to work his “church folks” (mostly non-family) into a shouting, laughing good time. Very inappropriate.

    There was also the funeral where the husband had tragically lost his wife in an accident. Two or three preachers–none of them talked about the deceased at all. One talked about himself for 30 minutes. There was also an inappropriate amount of screaming, hollering and praising the Lord. And the awkward moment when the pastor had every man come to the front of the church to surround the husband and pray, but then told said men to go and hug their wives, living sad husband all alone.

    Geez…I’m depressed just recalling all this.

    1. Also, this week, someone told me about attending a wedding where at the point when the pastor asked if anyone objected or else forever hold their peace, the maid-of-honor said, “I object. I’m in love with him.”

      From what I understand, it pretty much ended the wedding. Not sure what the final resolution. Pretty sure that isn’t covered in seminary, church basement or otherwise.

      1. I don’t think it works like that. I thought it was a last minute call for any evidence why they should not be married, ie, they are brother and sister or something.

        1. Well, that may be true, but the bride probably didn’t want to deal with the issue of this other chick being in love with the groom. If someone said that at my wedding I’m pretty sure the party would have ended right then and there.

        2. I think this goes back hundreds of years to the days when records were less accessible and divorce very rare and difficult. It’s an attempt to ensure against one of the partners already being married or too closely related. The novel Jane Eyre features such a scene.

      2. Most weddings nowadays (at least here in the U.S.) don’t even include that “Speak now, or forever hold your peace” line, but yes, it was originally a last check to make sure the couple weren’t ineligible to marry because one of them was still married to someone else or for some other reason.

        Couldn’t the bridesmaid have brought up her own little agenda sometime before the wedding ceremony?
        Or maybe she did, but the wedding went ahead anyway, and she decided to put a stop to it herself?

  4. Semp…

    I tried every way in the world to tell you what I meant when I said ‘I was leaving with a kind and sweet spirit’…I will try again…I was simply saying I was not mad at anyone, and I didn’t hate anyone, and that I was leaving with no hard feelings toward anyone here, is what I was trying to say. I have tried to stay calm and explain my beliefs as best as I could. I know I don’t have the words to express myself as others have, but I am certain of my beliefs and convictions. If I came across as being hostile that was sure not my intentions. The reason I said that you could take what I said anyway you wanted to was…every time I post here people seem to turn my words around and try to say something that I didn’t really say. I think it’s just best if I don’t visit here again.
    Now… I have no idea what you are talking about with the good bye. I was just saying good bye to all of you. About the movie part, I know you are just making fun of me because I don’t go to the movies. That is okay. If that makes you feel better I sure won’t try to take away your joy. Again Semp…let me say , I am not mad, or upset with anyone on here and I ask you to not be upset with me. We just have different beliefs. I don’t know how we are going to get along when we get to Heaven but I am confident that the Lord can work that out for us. Don’t you think? If I may, I will say it again…Take care, stay safe and stay safe.

  6. Okay, so I’m the only one who combined those words and pictograms into the question, “Would you rather get married or die?”

    1. I thought the same thing, Papa Bear.

      I suppose I could go to either a fundy wedding or funeral, as long as I could listen to my iPod inconspicuously.

      1. Not too surprising; just one more sign of the emptying of meaning in the average marriage ceremony.

  7. Jean, frankly I didn’t see you trying every way to explain. You blew me off and told me to interpret it whatever way I wanted, so I did. I saw you not answer valid questions and then constantly tell us you were leaving, but yet you came back to talk at us some more. I don’t see that as a kind, sweet spirit. You can say “I have a kind, sweet spirit” all you want, but when you say that’s not a self-assessment, that’s where you’re wrong. Do you see that? Re-read your posts.

    Now, let me explain what I said about leaving. You kept saying goodbye, but you kept coming back to say more. That is not what goodbye means. Telling us you’re leaving because you don’t like us but always commenting again (to say goodbye again) means that you’re not leaving. Leaving means leaving. Goodbye means goodbye.

    Your heaven will be perfect, Jean, because people like me won’t be there.

    1. Another Hotel California commenter: Always checking out, but never leaving.

  8. Easy…wedding. A funeral at my Fundy church was just about the last straw and was whenI mentally checked out. My husbands cousin had just passed away at the age of 32 very suddenly. When I asked the pastor’s wife if she would like to know the details, she stated, “No that’s ok, Preacher is pretty busy this week.” At the last minute he decided to come to the funeral because the associate pastor who was a close friend showed up at the church in his suit and stated that he would be attending. Not to be out pastored by an underling, he suddenly made room for it in his schedule and got ready. The funeral was long as many family and friends had things to say. Little did I know that my pastor had left early. Two days later I attended a funeral for one of our fundy church members. I don’t think my pastor thought I would be there because I work and it was a mid-week funeral. Well I WAS there and listened in horror as he copied just about word for word the funeral of my family member. I was sickened, not so much that he had plagiarized a funeral (that wasn’t uncommon for him). The sick part was that this man was a member for over 10 years, and he had NOTHING original or personal to say about him. No one had even arranged paul bearers and they were trying to scrounge up men after the service to do it. That was it for me. We left about a month later.

  9. I have experience with both, but I’m going to pick wedding.

    Fundy weddings are a dull affair: no drinking, no dancing… no drinking. Weddings are bad enough: since shelling out a chunk of change on clothes and a gift are usually the minimum cost involved. The least the bride and groom can do is cough up some dough to give the guests a free buzz in return.

    But dull isn’t anywhere nearly as bad compared to my grandmother’s fundy funeral.

    My grandmother died a few years ago, and I swear to gods, her pastor did an altar call. AT THE FUNERAL. With my grandmother’s body in front of everyone, he invited us to come to know Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior. And in true fundy form, HE HELD OUT FOR THE BETTER PART OF FIFTEEN MINUTES. Yes, come toward the body to the pastor and proclaim to a bunch of grieving family the glorious news that you have a new life in Jesus!

    It was tacky, abrasive, and insanely offensive.

    I honestly don’t know what my grandmother would have thought of that, but I can tell you that it didn’t go over well at all with the most of the family.

    (And no, no-one chose to upstage my grandmother’s funeral with a fundy conversion. Because everyone but the pastor had a sense of common decency.)

    1. “And in true fundy form, HE HELD OUT FOR THE BETTER PART OF FIFTEEN MINUTES.”

      Yes, but he was just taking advantage of the opportunity when “people’s hearts are tender”. 🙄

  10. At a fundy funeral I attended a few years ago, the preacher turned the whole solemn occasion into a giant youth rally. This should not have surprised me, because his (so-called) worship services were also shallow, irreverent, torturous youth rallies as well. It was obvious to me that the preacher was giving excruciating and patronizing lip-service to respecting the deceased because so many of her family members were there in the service. From start to finish, the funeral was a “sales pitch” replete with “One, two, three, repeat after me” promptings to receive the Lord as “friend and Savior.” I felt sorry for the family, even though I knew they were probably clueless that their mom’s funeral was turned into an obligatory exercise where their mom’s name was only invoked to bolster the deranged preacher’s preordained utterances. Bible? Wasn’t really referred to at all. I hope the family didn’t pay this preacher for his “services,” because they didn’t get their money’s worth. If they thought his demented lunacy was biblical, it’s not for me to set them straight.

  11. Funeral, but only if I’m the guy in the casket.

    Actually I’ve not been to too many funerals and the last one wasn’t bad. The weddings are cheesy and long, but the food is usually good, and the couple is (ostensibly) happy.

    If, hypothetically, there was a funeral and a wedding scheduled for the same day, and I was loosely acquainted with both the deceased and the bride and/ or groom, I’d probably go to the funeral. At least there I could be a loner and nobody would bother me.

    1. You bring up an interesting point. If the wedding & funeral were the same day, I also would choose the funeral. In my case, because I know the grieving are in need of some non-Fundy comfort.

  12. Well, I have never attended a fundy funeral, but I did attend one fundy-lite wedding. It was soon after we’d moved down here to NC, and I hardly knew the bride (a colleague). Didn’t know the groom at all. The church was SBC but on the extreme conservative edge of SBC…that’s why I’m guessing it was fundy-lite.

    The ceremony was nice enough, but the reception took me by surprise. I guess I should have anticipated “no booze,” but the utter boozelessness still unnerved me. I mean, dang it (semi-joking here), I’d paid good money for a gift for someone I hardly knew, and all I was getting in return was some sticky-sweet pink punch. 👿 Plus, since I didn’t know anyone (except my colleagues), it was so boring…no dancing, not even any seating to speak of; we just stood around aimlessly, feeling uncomfortable, and then we left.

    Later I learned that the real reception had been held later that evening, for immediate family and close friends only, and it had involved LOTS of, er, liquid refreshments. Coming from a Yankee Irish-Italian family where open-bar weddings were the norm, I just thought that was kind of tacky. IMHO, don’t invite people if you’re not going to wine and dine (or hors d’oeuvre) them. If you’re just trying to maximize your gift count by inviting as many near-total strangers as possible for punch and cake…well, that’s a tad tacky. Sorry; hope I’m not offending anyone. Let’s just say that this was the last fundy wedding I ever attended, LOL.

    My favorite wedding reception ever remains my brother-in-law’s up in Milwaukee. Open bar, great band, lots of tipsy dancing, including of course the polka….Milwaukeeites know how to party! :mrgreen:

  13. I’d take the Fundy funeral over the Fundy wedding.
    At a funeral, the deceased person’s race has been run and his/her song has been sung, so Fundamentalism cannot hurt him or her any more.

  14. I would have to pick wedding, with some qualifications:

    1. I’d have to go with my also-former-Fundie sisters
    2. We’d have to sit in the back and put our cell phones on vibrate because we will snark-text all through the ceremony :mrgreen:
    3. I’d bring a flask and spike the punch, a-la the prom scene in “Grease”. 😈

  15. Fundy Wedding! For sure! I love weddings and all the different wedding traditions of various cultures – even American subcultures. Not even ironically – I’d go for the pure enjoyment of social observation and analysis and honestly wishing the couple a happy life ahead. Besides, I’ve already been to a fundy funeral.

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