I cannot say with any certainty that attending the wedding was in itself a deciding factor, but the fact that she was confident of her family’s love and support certainly made it easier to admit her mistakes. I don’t know if she would have done that if she had felt judged and condemned.
Love is such a powerful tool.
I would like to suggest though, that one can choose to not attend a wedding, and ALSO not show judgment and condemnation. And while this won’t be true of every situation, it is also possible for the person receiving the “we can’t come because…” message, to hear it in love, and to either not feel judged and condemned right away, or to come to understand that they are loved, in time.
In the case of the weddings that we didn’t attend, we still communicated our love. The first one was a cousin with whom we weren’t and never would have been close. In this case, it wasn’t the cousin, but a different family member (dh’s mother, the aunt of the bride) who became irrationally angry, probably out of fear of conflict or fear of us making a scene. When the dust settled, and we never made a scene, and our absense didn’t seem scandalous, she got over it. A year or two later, we were thrust into the same situation again, but this time with dh’s sister - a closer relative with a local wedding, that you would actually expect us to be more excited about (than an out of town cousin who we weren’t close with anyway). Throughout our conversation with the couple about why we wouldn’t be attending, there was a sense of mutual respect and love. We were able to explain our position, and they explained theirs - all without getting angry or doubting that respect/love. Interestingly, dh’s mother, who should have been MORE upset this time, since we were avoiding the wedding of her own child, didn’t fret at all. My belief is that she, and the other family (who was aware of both decisions) learned after the first situation that it really wasn’t the end of the world for us to not go to a wedding, and for us to have different beliefs. Our lack of attendance was pretty much a non-issue to them, and our relationships went on as usual.
My point is that not attending a wedding is not the same thing as judging and condemning, and not every situation where you don’t attend leads to the loss of love. And sometimes, even when there ARE hurt feelings or anger at first, they don’t last. Sometimes it takes some uncomfortable moments before understanding and even curiosity about what makes you think the way you do sets in. In our case, I am content with our choices. We have had a couple of indications since then, that people in the family consider our moral standards to be of note. That’s not a bad thing, and who knows what that could spark in the family who sees us that way. Of course that isn’t the reason why we chose not to attend those weddings, but rather just to avoid celebrating something we believed to be wrong, and to avoid scandalizing our children and other family members.
Thanks for sharing your experience. I also like your emphasis on considering your relationship with God and the state of your soul when you need to make important decisions. Reminds me of the phrase “leap of faith”.