Hired to photograph a lesbian wedding

[PetraG]

I also said I told the couple that I had other obligations that I’d be attending to during that month so I can’t do the wedding. The Opus Dei numerary member said it’s pretty much a little white lie, not a grave matter lie that requires confession.

Lies are a bad way to handle interpersonal problems. You don’t have a business integrity and a personal integrity. You only have one integrity. Guard it closely. Give no one a reason to suspect your truthfulness. Even the pagans understand the difference between lying and telling the truth, and even they don’t buy much into rationalizations when they are being told the “white” lies (called “white” even though they are told to protect the speaker, not the hearer) instead of telling them. (Everybody is human, that way.)

Having said that, saying that your reason was a family obligation was not the biggest stretch of the truth I could imagine. Had you said you had “personal reasons,” that would have been undeniably true. Now that you have spoken that way, I would advise you make certain that you have a family obligation that day, however.

It is suspect when someone tells you that a matter that you thought long and hard about is not a grave matter that requires confession. Most of us would go to confession very rarely, if we saved the sacrament for offenses that required it. At any rate, it is also a bad habit to commit offenses with the intention of avoiding any mention of them in confession. The slight offenses we commit out of neglect or impulse are one thing. The ones we choose deliberately are another.

In the end, I’m glad you found a way to extract yourself from the situation. That is a very good outcome. I hope you find that you are totally free to turn down photography work in your jurisdiction because the event isn’t one you want to have anything to do with. It should be that way everywhere, but there are movements in many places to force artists to accomodate every client regardless of what art they are going to be asked to turn out. That is a VERY bad thing for society, and I’d say that even if it meant that none of the best photographers would ever do a Catholic wedding. Let’s face it: we’d live with the black-balling and no skin off our backs. I’d rather protect the artists.

 

[exnihilo]

Now I suggest coming up with a plan for how you can avoid this situation in the future. You need a screening process before you accept clients. You never know when someone may try to extort money from you in our upside down world.

 

[exnihilo]

If you were a photojournalist, instead of a wedding photographer, would you have any qualms about photographing the leader of a country known for its disregard of human rights and persecution of Christians? You would not be recognising his regime by photographing him, so why do you think you are recognising lesbianism by photographing a lesbian (or any same-sex) wedding as part of your job? It’s the same objective reporting of an event. (I’d draw the line at photographing sexual acts for pornographic websites, however. But that’s not objective reporting.)

The wedding is an event. To make it similar you’d have to be agree to photograph a leader while he persecutes Christians. There isn’t anything wrong with simply photographing a gay person or a tyrant. But helping commemorate a celebration of something immoral is immoral.

 

[Jordo]

Personally, I wouldn’t do it. I believe that what our Mother Church meant by respect was that we can’t deny people who struggle with homosexuality things like healthcare, legal services and religious rites such as confession. However, photographing their wedding is not a right persay and they would not in any way be harmed either spiritually or physically if you were to cancel. They would probably just look for another photographer. I think praying for them and you know, being kind about canceling would be good. However, I also understand that this is your livelihood. I saw a post telling you to do a bad job, but don’t do that. If you do it and they pay for your services that would not only be wrong, but it would make your business look bad. Ask your priest when you go to confession

 

[GerardAubyn]

Thank you, and I’ve prayed for them and also made plans. God bless you too.

 

[Loud-living-dogma]

So, the couple who hired the photographer for their wedding understood when she said she wouldn’t be able to do it. And even asked her for a recommendation. Sounds like all’s well that ends well. I have attended gay and lesbian weddings of friends and family members. If they are not going to heaven than I and my other friends and family members will gladly join them wherever they are.

Be careful what you wish for.

 

[PetraG]

So, the couple who hired the photographer for their wedding understood when she said she wouldn’t be able to do it. And even asked her for a recommendation. Sounds like all’s well that ends well. I have attended gay and lesbian weddings of friends and family members. If they are not going to heaven than I and my other friends and family members will gladly join them wherever they are.

It is possible that they are invincibly ignorant and therefore not culpable, whereas possibly you are not, and therefore culpable. When we know better, we are bound to do better, even if those around us who do not understand and who therefore may be forgiven for their lack of understanding scorn us at the time.

It’s okay, I already live in a very warm climate!

What will the temperature be in Hell when a wise person finds that their friends and God are in disagreement about what is a wise course for the perfection of a human person and the wise person chooses what their friends think over the wisdom of God?

God’s laws are never arbitrary. They always reflect the love and justice of God, which are never in conflict. The great considerations are only in conflict from our limited perspective, not from the infinitely wise perspective of God. (After all, if we do not believe God’s wisdom far surpasses our own, in what sense do we believe in God?)

 

[anon64350612]

I don’t want to raise an alarm, but there is always the possibility the couple could file a complaint against you anyway, right away or in the future. This thread and any other documented statements you have made about the situation could possibly be discoverable in an agency hearing or at court. Discovery expands all across computer files, electronic communications, and social media. I would shut down this conversation if possible.

 

[Bluebright]

It sounds like your priest has provided good advice, obedience is a good idea here. You walked into this one unintentionally and you do learn a good lesson here about finding out more in future. It’s easily done when you live your life away from such things as this, to be surprised by these things. Be careful not to get pulled into any more like events by their friends at the event.

I think if you do do it, or not, actually, pray a lot for guidance and God will give you assistance on the day and before. I’d suggest leaving it all in God’s hands now. I do that when I can’t decide what is best.
God bless you and offer all your suffering and distress on this matter to God, He truly knows your heart.

 

[Wolfie]

Were photojournalists like Chris Hondros or Tim Hetherington that published conflict photos also victimizing Jesus? Are historians writing about stuff besides sunshine and flowers being bad to Jesus? Or is it only the gay people getting married?

 

[Wolfie]

Are you a lawyer?

 

[Edward_H]

You forgot about one itsy bitsy teenie weenie thing…free will. And of course a well phrased question, one that really asks a question rather than try to force fit a (bad) point.

but tks.

 

[Wolfie]

Nah, it isn’t a bad point at all. Your argument was that the subject matter being documented mattered, and you cast moral judgement on the photographer based on that content. I think I guessed correctly that you don’t feel the same in the case of conflict photographers who publicize and make money off documenting things that aren’t strictly Catholic.

 

[TheAdvocate197]

For all of you who think it isn’t a big deal, consider that a Catholic photographer would have to behold and capture a gay couple kissing and embracing. And wedding photographers typically direct their subjects on what to do. “Now hold her hand…tilt your head toward her…look into her eyes…” I imagine a Catholic photographer would be less involved with those aspects (?)

 

[josh98765432]

 

[Rau]

But you don’t have the right to break any discrimination laws in the jurisdiction in which you presently have your business.

The law is not the ultimate guiding light in our life. A better statement would be: If you break the law you have no right to avoid the consequences.

 

[Edward_H]

No, my argument isn’t an artistic one; it’s not about the so called “subject matter” of photography…my point centers on the moral object of the event, and one’s contribution to it. You need to see more with the eyes of God, and less with secular eyes.

The photographer who films pornography or a homosexual public coupling is memorializing an immoral act, enabling and completing the act, extending the “pleasure” of the immoral act for others, is adding a sense of (false) legitimacy to it. In short, one is participating in it.

One doesn’t add pleasure (to future viewers of it, including in particular the “couple” in question) to an immoral act voluntarily and for remuneration.

It’s not about photography; it’s about heaven and hell, and souls are at risk. Raise up and perfect your viewpoint, make it supernatural.

 

[SugarMagnolia]

If he chooses to cancel, he can do so without going into detail about why he is canceling. All he needs to say is that he thought he would be available, but it turns out he is not available. People cancel things all the time without giving overly detailed reasons why. If pressed with the question “why,” he can simply add that he has a personal committment. This is true. And it would be rude of anyone to insist to know exactly what his personal commitment is.

 

[Axsenex]

I’m going to let you slide but you got to work on the art of trolling if you wanted to be a better troll artist.

 

[Loud-living-dogma]

FYI - you know that the patriarch has been involved with the KGB and Is a puppet of Putin.