[Avodah] Children at a Wedding

[Micha Berger]

On Mon, Nov 02, 2009 at 08:11:33AM +0200, Akiva Blum wrote:
: From: .... On Behalf Of Joseph C. Kaplan
:> and my reaction, after reading all the posts was, in typical Jewish fashion, a
:> question: why should there be any minhag at all?  There are so many differing
:> factors that are relevant in trying to do the best thing for both the children
:> and the marrying couple; 

: On the contrary. Would you be able to tell your child "Sorry, you can't come to
: my wedding. My new husband/wife doesn't like you/may not like you/feels
: uncomfortable with you around/may feel uncomfortable with you around, etc."

: Much better to have a fixed minhag. Sorry kid, you can't come, that's the
: minhag!

Hilkhos Aveilus are wonderful that way. They remove from the aveil the
decision of what is "enough" or "appropriate" to do for their parent's
memory by giving him  standard to follow.

Here too, as RAB writes, it no longer becomes a pressure on the
step-parent to pretend to feel comfortable with not having "their moment"
because of the "ghost" in the room...

(Not that the step parent would necessarily feel that way, but if they
do, the pressure is off.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The mind is a wonderful organ
micha at aishdas.org        for justifying decisions
http://www.aishdas.org   the heart already reached.
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