Close Encounters of the Mormon Kind

A friend I’ve known for 45 years invited me to attend his daughter’s recent wedding reception. I was in Iraq when the announcements went out, so I missed the mailing, but he told me about the wedding when I returned to Idaho. He said he’d send me an invitation, which was kind of funny and important because he had related a long story about how painful it was to get the invitations out.

The invitations were hand made, hand cut, hand folded, as were the envelopes, and very labor intensive. Of course, all that hand work tended to be imprecise, so the invitations sometimes wouldn’t fit into the envelopes, which delayed the process and threatened the wedding timeline. I was looking forward to getting such an invitation.

But it didn’t come. One day I talked to my daughter about holiday plans. Her mom had received an invitation, and as I talked to my daughter I found that the wedding was the next day. I called my friend and his wife and asked about it, accusing them of trying to sneak the wedding past me. They assured me they’d sent an invitation, told me when and where the reception would be, and said they’d hand me an invitation at the reception.

Good Mormons like to get married in an LDS Temple because they can get sealed to their spouse “for all time and eternity”, i.e., they will be together after death. They believe that if they do things right here on Earth they will receive certain rewards after death. It’s not 72 virgins like a Muslim martyr, but it is meaningful to a Mormon believer. To get into an LDS Temple, you have to have a “Temple Recommend.” Your Bishop – a lay person appointed into a leadership position for a while, perhaps a few years – will give you a Recommend if you live the appropriate life.

Well, non-Mormons don’t get Temple Recommends, so aren’t allowed in the temple. My friend’s daughter wanted a temple wedding, and she got one, but my friend isn’t Mormon (his wife is), so he couldn’t go. He had to cool his heels in a waiting room just inside the temple door while his daughter got married. In order to give dad a chance to walk his daughter down the aisle, they held a ring ceremony and a normal LDS church.

As I talked to my friend’s wife, I asked her if the reception would be in the LDS church next to the Boise Temple, and she said yes. She also said that I could come a half hour early and attend the ring ceremony. I live a ways away, so I left early enough to ensure I got to the ceremony on time. Traffic was unexpectedly light, so I ended up getting there almost a half hour early. After rattling the doors on the LDS church and finding them all locked, I sat in the parking lot and waited, figuring I was just early. As I sat there, I watched car after car enter the temple parking lot, but none came into the church parking lot.

I thought that perhaps the temple has some room set aside for non-Mormons and that the ceremony might be held there, so I kind of barged into the temple. Inside the door I saw the waiting room on the left, and a few stairs ahead. At the top of the stairs, behind a podium, two elderly men were checking ID’s, looking for Temple Recommends. These men were dressed entirely in white; shoes, socks, pants, belt, shirt, tie, and jacket. They both had white hair and had white name tags (with black letters). I asked them about the ring ceremony, and drew blank looks. I mentioned the name of my friend’s daughter. They consulted a list and then informed me that she had been married about eight hours earlier. Meanwhile, people were streaming past me into the temple.

I left and called my daughter to ask for the address of the church. It was a few blocks up the road; there are lots of Mormon churches out here. I took off and got to the church on time, as they say. My friend was impressed by my sticktoitiveness; despite the efforts to misdirect me, I found the reception.

Dad walked his beautiful daughter down the aisle, the bishop read a few phrases, and the kids recited a nice statement to each other and they exchanged rings. They did not exchange vows. The bishop did not say “I pronounce you husband and wife” or “You may kiss the bride.” That was all done earlier, I guess.

The venue in the church was not the chapel; it was the gymnasium. Most such receptions are held in the gym, on a hardwood floor, and literally below a basketball hoop, as was this one. And that’s how Mormons get married in Boise.