To ask my brother and family not to go to church when we visit

[Trifle]

I plan on visiting my brother, sil and their 2 children for a weekend in September with my 2 ds's. All the children get on fabulously and really enjoy eachothers company although, due to distance apart, we dont meet up as often as is liked.

My brother and sil are deeply religious to the point of fanaticism. They read the bible every day, pray religiously, attend church at least 2 if not 3 times a week, sometimes twice on a sunday (obviously the message doesnt get through first time).

Now, if we visit at the weekend and stay overnight, would IBU to ask them not to go to church on a sunday morning as the whole thing takes about 3 hours and we just end up hanging around waiting for them to come back. This defeats the object of the whole trip if we are there to see them plus I also think it is rude to abandon your guests.

The Beast.

I like the passage you've got there on alternative ways to keep the Sabbath holy. There's clearly room for flexibility and who knows, maybe God is dealing with a few folk who blindly stick to their rigid routines, folk who may be wondering why they're bearing no fruit.

"One of the Ten Commandments was 'Keep the Sabbath Day Holy'. Presumably these prople are Christians and their sabbath is Sunday."

Jesus said, Mark 2:27-28

27 Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."

Presumably these people are Christians and acknowledge scripture as the word of Jesus?

There are several passages in the Gospel where Jesus criticises the status quo at his time, about how the the Pharisees regulated the Sabbath. In the passage you've quoted, he was saying people should be allowed to pick ears of corn. In other passages, he argues that he, the Son of God, is OK to perform miracles and heal people on the Sabbath. It doesn't mean that the Sabbath doesn't count anymore and you can basically do what you want. It means that Jesus is the boss, not the Pharisees. You can argue if you want that the clergy of today are modern-day Pharisees or whatever, but that's a matter of opinion. You can go to church and pick ears of corn by the roadside, you know...

You know, I don't think this discussion should have anything to do with religion. Basically, when people come to visit you it is good manners to look after them well and enable them to do what they would like to do to enjoy themselves. Don't we teach this to our children? 'Share your toys with Ben, that's how we play when our friends visit. Let Polly have the last cupcake because she's our guest.' This thread is not about religion, it's about good hospitality.

Actually, Speedy, that's why it is about religion: because religion appears to justify behaviour that in most other contexts would be rudeness. Although some people have, unconvincingly, claimed that were the entire family they were visiting to decamp to the footy when they came to visit they'd be mellow and relaxed about it, one suspects that (a) their heart isn't in it and (b) in reality, very few families decamp en masse anyway.

If I were visiting family or friends and the whole host family decamped for half a day to pursue their interests, I'd be pretty pissed off, irrespective of the reason. Other people here are claiming either that they wouldn't be pissed off, which may be true but I personally doubt it, or that it matters what the interest they're off pursuing is, ie that religion is preferable to, say, going to the cinema.

Actually, there it is: "AIBU to regard it as poor manners if the family I'm visiting announce they're going to the cinema to see Inception, when they know that I'm not interested in pretentious films with a misguided opinion of their own intellect?" Responses could involve "just cook them dinner for when they get back", "go along, you might enjoy it (even though you know it's rubbish really)", "people who truly have faith in Leonardo have no choice, even though they know he hasn't made a decent film in years", "live and let live", etc.

I think it's also about being a good guest, which can mean 'don't think you're going to be able to monopolise your hosts every waking moment of every day.'

Yeah, but we're not talking about staying for the week, nor about casual acquaintances using your house in a nice postcode as a hotel. This from context is the sort of visit where you arrive for Saturday lunch and leave after Sunday lunch. So assuming young kids, that's biting out about a third of the time of the visit.

"Come for dinner, but I'll be going to my friend's house while you eat desert, because I also go on Saturday night. Hey, you get two thirds of my time, I get a break and the friend's more interesting than you anyway".

Mathanxiety - I have just as much right to second guess a mythical creature as you do :)

'The weekend' might equally mean turning up Friday night and leaving late Sunday afternoon, so not necessarily such a short time together. And we don't know yet who invited whom.

I think the OP is trying to put her square peg brother into a round hole here, and I don't understand why.

"I think the OP is trying to put her square peg brother into a round hole here, and I don't understand why."

I suspect it's this.

B: Come and stay for the weekend.

S: Fine!

B: But we'll be out Sunday morning, you know, church.

S: (( Thinks: bloody hell, can't he miss it just one week, but last time I asked him about religion he told me I would be going to hell and then the kids started crying )) Oh, fine. We'll cook lunch (( Thinks: mutter mutter )).

B: See you Saturday!

Well said SpeedyGonzalez, you have encapsulated in a pithy post what I have ponderously been trying to say. The issue about religion in this thread is purely that there are many who seem believe that religion gives you permission to be inhospitable in a way that other pursuits do not.

Wow at some of the intolerance on this thread, and some particulaly inflammatory posters.

YABU. Just accept your brother for who he and his family is, in the same way I would expect your brother to accept you for who you are and they way you are.

He has a faith (which I think is unfair to call a fanatic) and its important to him that he attends church on Sunday - fair enough. You don't want to go - also fair enough.

Does doing seperate things for a couple of hours out of a whole weekend really matter.... No....

TheBeast and Tokyo: ironically hospitalty was ingrained into the very lifeblood of the early church. HOSPItals, HOSPIces and HOStels all started in people's homes, as a way of showing love and care and HOSPitality to visitors. Also 'church' was about people, not sticking to rigidly applied rules of attending services in a church building. People met together in their homes and showed each other love and hospitality. So what Tokyo and I are arguing (funnily enough, from different ends of the belief spectrum) is a return to the values of the early church.

I didnt come back to the thread for a bit as it ended up on the subject of fruit and gambling for some bizarre reason.

Anyway, I dont know that it's relevant who invited who. As it's my brother I think it would be a huge shame if appointments to visit had to be made. If my brother and family want to visit us they just say, they dont wait to be invited and visa versa.

We plan on arriving saturday around 2 ish and leaving sunday at the same time. If they are at church sunday 9 - 12 then there seems little point in hanging round.

I think the majority of YABU posts are because religion is involved. If I said I wanted them to forsake their golf on a sunday morning I dont think I;d get half as many YABU.

Well I thought you were BU, but then in our family; if you visit SIL they are working on Sunday (both Vicars); and if you visit us, we are out some point DD in the Cathedral choir.

So I think arrive at 2 on Saturday and leave 2 on Sunday wouldn't seem the best way to see us. Either arrive earlier and leave when you've got yourselves up on Sunday, or leave later on Sunday when we've had a chance to be sociable.

Of course big family Christmases are out, as we have commitments at different ends of the country. But there is always New Year.

But if my son was a county player of Golf and had to practise every Sunday, well we'd be having to fit that in as well. Or another friend coaches Rugby, he's out Sunday mornings too.

Can't be bothered to read through everything.

I'm not at all religious but you either visit him and accept he and his won't be there for a morning OR don't visit.

My dh and his family are catholics. I don't at all beleive and when I'm there at mils(reluctantly) there's a whole load of diary dates for them - ie saints and church stuff. I don't go as I've seen the whole thing and it's not for me. It's their religion - I let them get on with obviously just as they don't try (usually) to force me to go.

Faith is faith whether you agree with it or not. It's about their being so please don't try to stop them. Surely it doesn't hurt you.

However, if they tried to rope in your kids, nnow that would be a different matter.

One thing that I think is worth saying on the religion front is that if I was visiting friends who had a different religious belief from mine I'd gladly go along to whatever their meeting was in order to learn more about it. But I think that has to come from the guest, not from the host persuading them to go along.

Hi Trifle

I?ve been lurking, and the conversations here did get a bit bizarre and I agree it?s not relevant who invited who. What is significant is that you will be there only 24 hours, and of that time 3 hours is going to be spent apart.

And it?s true that the YABU posts are because religion is involved. But religion is important to people, and people who practise religion do not consider it a hobby, irrespective of what has been said on here. If it were about golf, then you?d not get half as many YABU, true, but religion is involved, and that?s how you have to take it.

What denomination are you brother and SIL? What time does their service start and end, and does the 3 hours involve travel there and back and socialisation after service? Or is it a 3 hour service? Also, have you visited before and they have not gone to church? Or do they go every time you visit?

The reason I ask, is to establish if they think they are being unreasonable. Because that?s the crux of it. It doesn?t really matter what people on here think. If you think brother and SIL are being unreasonable to go, and they don?t, it?s a simple choice of go and put up with it, or don?t go. Which is the lesser of two evils, as it were? A full 10 or so hours (to take into account sleep time) time together, or none at all?

And, I asked before, if you want to spend time with them, why not go with them? If it?s all about spending time together, if that?s the issue, I mean. Otherwise, what is the issue? (And bruxeur I object to being called a numpty for asking that, firstly because personal insults are really not necessary, and secondly because while I know it?s not a neutral option, I don?t think I missed the point on this occasion, I was merely stating that the OP wants to spend time with her family and is unhappy with the neutral option, which is to do something else and/or wait for them to come home) and if she wants brother and SIL to consider not going to church, she should consider how she would feel to go to church.

So in other words, you invited yourselves and you don't want to say because you then don't have a leg to stand on. 'AIBU to foist myself on my brother's family and expect them to change their routine' doesn't get you the answers you want, does it?

It is entirely relevant who invited who.

Trifle this thread really did take a surreal turn!

Why don't you go up Friday night? Then everyone wins - you get more quality time with them, but they can still do what's important to them.

I completely agree with the OP. It seems remarkably twisted and not at all Christian in spirit for the OP's brother and SIL to put Church (a regular occurrence) ahead of Family (that they see rarely) in their priorities.

You think it's more rude for them to go to their church service on a Sunday morning than it is for you to announce you will visit them regardless of their religious inclinations? Just because it's your brother doesn't mean you can just arrive and expect them to drop everything to cater to you and yours.

You are taking your nearest and dearest for granted here. And asking them to choose between 'important you' vs. 'unimportant Sunday thing'.

It really does matter who invited who. There's no excuse for basically inviting yourself anywhere, especially when your plans include an overnight stay.

I frankly don't blame your brother and SIL for being inclined to leave you for 3 hours all by yourself. Take their hint.

I'm confused. Maybe I've missed something in this long thread but since when has it been unseemly to invite oneself over to see a loved one? How bizarre. I find the 'who invited who' arguments too playgroundy for my liking.

Oh and Mrs is right: religious observance is nothing like a hobby. Nothing like it at all. Whoever said that has a serious lack of knowledge.

With my family (and, indeed, many of my friends), the division between inviting yourself and being invited is obviously a lot less formal or rigid than in mathanxiety's family.

I consider it normal to extend an open invitation to my family and friends, so that when they contact me and say they are thinking of coming for a weekend, a week or whatever, I don't regard this as them inviting themselves. They do the same for me. Obviously, if it is inconvenient we let each other know and try to make other arrangements.

The very idea that we would set different rules for their visit depending on who initiated the visit, totally horrifies me. In fact, the idea that there might be formal rules horrifies me. Good manners and good will, friendship and love, transcends the need for rules.

Both sides try to fit in with whatever arrangements the other has and, while I would personally not mind if my hosts did absent themselves for part of my visit, I would find it very distressing if my siblings on a rare visit did not at the very least try to give themselves and their children every opportunity to get to know my children better and vice versa (which seems to be the OP's main wish) rather than dragging themselves away to do something they do every week and can do at another time on the same day, even if in a slightly altered format.

But the worst of all this to me is the fact that so many people think it unreasonable to even have a discussion with their siblings about what will happen during the visit.