This will be fabulous!!! or a total disaster...

I'm setting off for Scotland tomorrow to attend my little brother's wedding!! I'm thrilled because I hardly ever get to see my family, and we always have a fantastic time when we get together!!!

The potential disaster comes in because this wedding party contains a an explosive mix of different religions and other persuasions. But our family has a fantastic track record of putting family first -- before faith, etc. -- so I expect that everything will go just fine. (famous last words...)

This is going to be a big, formal Scottish Catholic church wedding. My brothers -- the groom and best man -- are being fitted for kilts as we speak!!!

The bride is a bright and charming young woman from Scotland. The groom is my younger exmormon-atheist brother. Apparently the Catholic church used to be more picky about insisting that both the bride and groom be Catholic in order to have a Catholic wedding (the bride is Catholic), but they've lately taken more of a "well, better than nothing" attitude. According to my mom, my little brother and his wife passed a special Catholic church wedding prep course, which Mom explained was "like a temple recommend" (except that it's just for the bride and groom, not the entire guest list).

Then, to make things more interesting, the best man (my older exmormon-atheist brother) is gay. It's funny how this is sort of the converse of the dilemma Cynthia faced over on Mormon 2 Catholic. In our case -- despite the Catholic church's hateful stance towards homosexuality -- my older brother is perfectly willing to stand by his younger brother and feels nothing but unreserved joy for his little brother on this happy occasion. I expect the Scottish Catholics in attendance will be no less noble in their celebration of this loving union.

Then -- because everyone knows "the more the merrier!!!" -- my older brother John is also bringing along Mike (of MikeAndJohn.com fame) and Leandro. Both Mike and Leandro are "cultural Catholics" and both are very, very gay.

Next up on the religion roster is my Evangelical dad. I don't see that his religion should pose much of a problem unless he starts telling everyone his pet theory about how Protestants and Catholics are fundamentally the same thing (unlike Mormons) since they're all the same "body of Christ". That should go over very well with some Catholics and very badly with others (as discussed here), so let's hope he chooses wisely.

Then we can't forget the Mormon contingent: my mom and my two sisters. They're very tolerant of other worldviews, and happy to be respectful of the beliefs of others as long as they are shown the same courtesy. So I'd be really surprised if they made any trouble.

I'll be sharing a hotel room with my sister who is a mom like me, and we've both arranged to leave the husband home with the kids (because it's an expensive trip, dontcha know), which means we both get an extended "moms' night out"!!! Yay!!!

In my case, my husband has invited his mother to help him supervise our two little rascals in my absence, and the kids are psyched about it!!! Psyched because Grandma is bringing "Toby" and "Duncan" to add to their collection of "Thomas the Tank Engine" toys. We'd been explaining to them that Mommy was going away and Grandma would come, and they were pretty much okay with that until they heard that Grandma was bringing Toby and Duncan. As soon as Nicolas heard that, he immediately turned to me and said "Mommy, can you go to work?"

I'm not joking here or exaggerating -- there was not one second of hesitation between Nicolas learning that "Mommy gone = new trains" and "Bye Mommy!" Well, at least I don't have to spend my trip feeling guilty that my kids are pining for me or something...

In my sister's case, her husband is not only single-handedly watching their three little kids, he's also babysitting all of the family dogs. That includes their own dog plus the dogs of other family members who will be in Scotland attending the wedding. So for all my friends discussing men and housework over on fMh lately, here's an example of an LDS guy who's perfectly willing to step up to the plate in a big way!!!

The only possible glitch is the ribbing I'll surely be getting from my sister after I stagger back from the reception in the middle of the night, wildly drunk.

Now I know many of you will be saying "But Chanson, the solution is simple -- just don't drink too much!!!"

Now, on the surface that seems like a good plan. But think about it. I'll be at a big Catholic wedding reception with my exmo-atheist brothers, and my kids will be safely in the care of someone responsible. So in theory I might say "Okay, I'll try not to drink too much," but in practice, who am I kidding? And besides, my little brother got roaring drunk at my wedding reception, so the least I can do is return the favor.

It's going to be quite a trip!!!!