STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

Uh, I'm annoyed on your behalf. That wouldn't sit well with me, and I'd be stubborn about it. Although, it is probably good of you to suck it up to maintain good relations w/ his parents.

Dude, that's so not cool .  Deciding for everyone that you all need to go to church?  For a religion that you don't even follow?  For your SO's birthday getaway?  That they've just been invited along on?!

Can you guys politely decline in a Thanks for the invite but we've already planned to do XYZ sort of way?  I can see how it could ruffle some feathers on their side, but that's no worse that feathers being ruffled on your side IMO.

This is just the sort of thing that would really get my goat, as I feel much the way you do about organized religion and quite dislike others foisting their beliefs of on people against their will.  If I had to go, I'd probably hide a book in my purse and excuse myself to the restroom about 5 minutes into the service ...

Oy.

See my concern isn't necessarily for this one incident, but this one seemingly-small thing could set the precedent for the rest of your relationship.  I don't know how serious you guys are, but my fear would be that if you guys stay together and eventually get married etc, the boundaries w/ his parents would be blurry and you'd have to deal with more and more shit. 

I don't think it has to be a big deal, but I'd go now as you intend to proceed.  If you're not a religious person, best for them to make their peace.  It doesn't mean you aren't a perfectly lovely, respectful person in general!  Again, if it were me (which it clearly isn't, so grain of salt and all that) I'd politely decline but leave no room for negotiation on the subject. 

'Thanks so much for the invite!  We already had plans to sleep in a bit and go have brunch at Fabulous Restaurant, but you guys have fun!  See you around 1 then?'

It really shouldn't be any skin off their backs if you don't go, but it would really cut into the short time you guys have if you did go.  I just wouldn't want to get in the habit of conceding, and then having it be expected down the line.

ETA:  Share a room?!?  MORTIFYING!  I am also amused that they would be fine sleeping in the same room with you (gasp! unmarried!) two in bed together, but can't miss church while on vacation.  Maybe they hoped to be able to police you .... do they know you paid for their room?

-- Edited by Elle at 14:09, 2007-08-17

brazilian wrote:

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I'm catholic and I try to go to church as much as I can. But, I dont go while I'm on vacation. On the other hand, if I were with my Dad he would expect me to go to church regardless of where we are. So, i can see it from your BF side too. Maybe you could suggest going to night service? That way you guys can sleep in, and you all can go to church...

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I agree w/ Brazilian that if you happened to be visiting his parents and staying with them, it might be more appropriate for them to ask you to church and have a reasonable expectation you'd attend.  If you're not 'on their turf' so to speak, it's every person for themselves IMO!

brazilian, we'll be on our way home by early evening, so that wouldn't work. And Saturday night we have plans to go out.

Elle, we are planning to get married- no official engagement just yet, but plans to buy a house, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, I think you're probably right. Neither SO nor I are super-religious or attend church of any kind on a regular basis despite the fact that we were both raised that way. They never ask us to go to church at home (and we live 5 minutes from them), so why should we go to church on vacation?

I think I'll talk to him tonight and hopefully, we won't have to go. Like you said, it could set an unwanted precedent.

XtinaStyles, no, he's actually not superclose to his parents. Not in a weird way anyway. He comes from a big, Italian family and so their close and have family dinners often, but he doesn't talk to them everyday or anything. I'd actually say that he's closer to his dad than his mom.

The reason he wanted to share a room was to save them money becauses they don't have much of it and he was just trying to help them out. I can see where from the outside and not knowing him and his family at all, that it may sound creepy, but it really was financially driven. It's not creepy at all. I'm actually much closer to my mom than he is to anyone in his family.

He also invited them because we are going to see a baseball game and his dad is a really big fan of the team we're seeing and the city we're going to. Yeah, parental units are usually my first choice of who take along on a weekend away, but it's not nearly as strange or creepy as you may think it sounds.

The only real issue is the church thing.

Hehe. Sfvclinevandy, I thought of that. I'm prone to migraines, so it would be believable.

That stinks - I'm Catholic, but I never *expect* other people to go to church with me, especially on a vacation they invited me on! Still, I understand that for a lot of people that's just *what you do* on Sunday, and it wouldn't even *occur* to them to have a Sunday morning any other way, so I doubt they're really trying to force you into something. It just didn't occur to them that you wouldn't go to church with them (even if they know you don't go on a regular basis)

I understand why it seems like this would set you up for expected complacence in the future, but honestly if they've never invited you to church before, even though it's very strange and forceful to do it on vacation, I wonder if it actually *would* become a big deal later on down the line.

Still, it's not right. Do they already think you're going? I mean, if you guys were talking and they said "blah blah blah, when we go to church on sunday blah blah blah" then it would be easy for you to say, "well, we were really planning to do XYZ but we'll see you when you get back to the hotel." But now that it's presumably been a day or two, bringing it up again just to say that might create a bigger deal than you'd want to, you know?

This is a sticky situation. Personally, if I were in your shoes I'd just go. But I'm not very confrontational in person. And I wouldn't want to piss off people who I have to spend all weekend with.