So my fiancee 22M (we’ll call him Harry) and I 23F grew up most of our lives in very conservative Christian circles with very traditional views and rules. My fiancee’s best man 22M (we’ll call him Grant) also grew up like this. As Harry and I have gotten older, we have drifted away from following the traditions we were raised in. Grant still very strongly believes in traditional values and will straight up tell you you are wrong if you don’t agree with said values.
We are one month away from our wedding, and I have been moved in with my fiancee for one month total already. I moved in due to my previous living situation being a toxic environment that I needed to get away from, and it didn’t make sense to move anywhere else when the wedding was so close and Harry was already living/paying rent in our soon to be shared apartment. The only reason we weren’t living together our entire engagement is because we wanted to keep peace with our very conservative parents who would view us living together as a straight up sin against God and are also the people paying for the wedding and would pull the funding if they found out. Yes, if I could go back I wouldn’t have let them pay for it and have that power over us, but too late for that now.
The other important detail here is that our apartment is literally across the parking lot to Grant and his wife’s apartment in the same apartment complex. Yes, we did this on purpose because up until this point Grant and his wife have been super chill about our difference in values and best friends of ours. However, not long after I moved in, Grant obviously saw my car in the apartment parking lot and realized we were living together. He had a talk with Harry and straight up told him that “it’s wrong for us to live together” and that Harry “needs to move out into separate housing until the wedding”. We clearly don’t agree with him and have no desire to move our things/life/routine again for the whopping month that is left before our wedding just to appease his wishes.
When Harry told Grant that we don’t agree with his moral convictions and have no plans of moving into separate housing, Grant said that he might not be able to be Harry’s best man if he doesn’t change his mind and move. To Grant, standing up at someone’s wedding is a statement that he supports everything we are and we do as a couple. He said he couldn’t in good conscience stand up at our wedding knowing he doesn’t agree with the choices we’ve made and the fact that we had to lie to my parents to live together and get me out of my previous situation. Despite this disagreement, Harry still really wants Grant to be his best man and to be a part of our special day.
What should we do? Should Harry move out just so that Grant will for sure be in the wedding? Should Harry and I say Harry’s not moving and possibly risk Grant stepping down? Would we be the assholes if we just found a way to lie to Grant so he gets off our case?
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So my fiancee 22M (we’ll call him Harry) and I 23F grew up most of our lives in very conservative Christian circles with very traditional views and rules. My fiancee’s best man 22M (we’ll call him Grant) also grew up like this. As Harry and I have gotten older, we have drifted away from following the traditions we were raised in. Grant still very strongly believes in traditional values and will straight up tell you you are wrong if you don’t agree with said values.
We are one month away from our wedding, and I have been moved in with my fiancee for one month total already. I moved in due to my previous living situation being a toxic environment that I needed to get away from, and it didn’t make sense to move anywhere else when the wedding was so close and Harry was already living/paying rent in our soon to be shared apartment. The only reason we weren’t living together our entire engagement is because we wanted to keep peace with our very conservative parents who would view us living together as a straight up sin against God and are also the people paying for the wedding and would pull the funding if they found out. Yes, if I could go back I wouldn’t have let them pay for it and have that power over us, but too late for that now.
The other important detail here is that our apartment is literally across the parking lot to Grant and his wife’s apartment in the same apartment complex. Yes, we did this on purpose because up until this point Grant and his wife have been super chill about our difference in values and best friends of ours. However, not long after I moved in, Grant obviously saw my car in the apartment parking lot and realized we were living together. He had a talk with Harry and straight up told him that “it’s wrong for us to live together” and that Harry “needs to move out into separate housing until the wedding”. We clearly don’t agree with him and have no desire to move our things/life/routine again for the whopping month that is left before our wedding just to appease his wishes.
When Harry told Grant that we don’t agree with his moral convictions and have no plans of moving into separate housing, Grant said that he might not be able to be Harry’s best man if he doesn’t change his mind and move. To Grant, standing up at someone’s wedding is a statement that he supports everything we are and we do as a couple. He said he couldn’t in good conscience stand up at our wedding knowing he doesn’t agree with the choices we’ve made and the fact that we had to lie to my parents to live together and get me out of my previous situation. Despite this disagreement, Harry still really wants Grant to be his best man and to be a part of our special day.
What should we do? Should Harry move out just so that Grant will for sure be in the wedding? Should Harry and I say Harry’s not moving and possibly risk Grant stepping down? Would we be the assholes if we just found a way to lie to Grant so he gets off our case?
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> The action that we are not sure would make us the assholes or not is us potentially lying to our friend’s face just so they aren’t upset anymore and will agree to be in our wedding still.
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Contest mode is 1.5 hours long on this post.
NTA. Do nothing. If you lie, it will be found out and make everything worse. Let Grant decide now. He’s not the ultimate moral authority of what’s right and wrong. Tell Grant to decide asap so he can be replaced if he’s so repulsed by you two living together. Accept the fact that Grant and his wife aren’t good friends, the are judgmental AHs. Not all friendships are forever.
NTA. It’s weird that Grant is all strict about your living situation even your parents.
Tell Grant that a true friend wouldn’t be offended by you moving in and tell him it’s not his business.
Why would he abandoned the friendship over your guys living situation? It’s weird.
He being manipulative and a major a-hole. It’s not his place.
“Shall not judge be neighbor” i believe is one of the 10 commandments. He committing a sin according to that.
Grant needs to wind his neck in, who died and made him the authority on morality? Please ignore him because, if you give into his nonsense now, he will forever put conditions on the support and friendship he offers.
NTA and instead of letting Grant decide whether he can allow this behavior I’d remove him from the wedding party and let him know that his threats are unkind, unnecessary and unwelcome.
It feels to me like the friendship between Harry and Grant is pretty conditional…sorta sad that your fiancé is willing to accommodate such a judgemental person…
Does Grant wear clothing that combines more than 2 types of fabric? Does he eat bacon or shellfish? Does his wife sleep outside when she is on her period? Are there some biblical rules that Grant is not following?
I hope your fiance doesn’t fold…Grant needs to live his own life as he desires and stay out of the lives of others…if that means withdrawing from the wedding…I would be hard pressed to miss such a person at a celebration…sounds like the type that will walk around seeing what else other people are doing “wrong”.
Fiancee is female, fiance is male, I kept thinking that you are a same-sex couple.
Either way, you are both adults and you live the way you want to, but there may be consequences, especially taking the money from your parents.
Lmao catering your plans around the best man???
Why don’t you two go down to the courthouse and quietly elope? Then you’re married on your terms and can enjoy the party your parents paid for later? Also, NTA. Grant needs to leave well enough alone.
NAH – you guys just have different values. Sorry you feel that way, and keep it moving.
NTA. You can say that you’re sorry he feels that way and that if he feels so strongly about it, he should step down, so you can have someone who accepts you for who you are standing beside you.
NTA. Tell Grant to get off his high horse.
So is Grant offering to take your husband in for a month until the wedding?
Live your life.
This will always come with consequences occasionally.
You might lose Grant as a friend. Grant sounds tiresome, sanctimonious, judgmental.
This guy doesn’t sound like someone who should be your best man anyway atp. The only question left seems to be whether you accept any fall out before the wedding or after 🤔
You could elope. Problem solved.
I have an issue with anyone making moral judgements about someone else’s life. God doesn’t need Grant’s help in keeping people on the straight and narrow path. Let’s face it, God forgives, so why can’t Grant? It’s a month out of your life, it’s not like you have been living in sin for years and are finally getting married. I have been in a religion that the people in it expect everyone to live by their moral code and that’s just not right. I would tell Grant that neither of you are moving. If he wants to assume you are having lots of sex, thereby living in sin, that’s his problem and he can sure “pray for you” but he doesn’t get to dictate how you act or assume he knows more about your living arrangements than he actually knows. It doesn’t matter a whit what other people assume. I would tell Grant you will miss him as best man but if he cannot accept your living situation. It’s pretty simple really. He needs to get off his moral high horse and just be a friend.
NTA and you’re likely to have a better marriage because of this. I know statistics say that those who live together are 50% more likely to divorce. But my husband and I lived together first and it was comforting to both of us that we knew EXACTLY what we were getting.
I am my husband’s second wife because he caved to pressures from his parents to not live together with his college sweetheart. And it turned out they weren’t well-matched and because they got married simply to live together, the marriage didn’t last. She cheated on him and they wound up divorced. A WHOLE lotta heartache that could have been avoided. They both, at least, figured out early that they didn’t want to have kids together.
When I came along, we were pretty much an insta-couple. My hubby moved in with me and then proposed. We took a year to plan a ginormous wedding. During that time, we asked all siblings and the one SIL to be in our wedding party. My BIL and his wife are those holier than thou types, too. After being asked, he said he needed time to think about it. Ultimately, four months later, he called my husband to “talk about the predicament we had put him in”. He and his wife wanted to support my husband. But I was clearly the “devil incarnate” and they worried that a marriage to me would mean that I would corrupt my husband, allowing the devil to win over my husband’s soul and relinquishing him to a certain afterlife in hell.
My BIL still to this day does not know that conversation took place on speaker and that my husband wanted me involved. I stayed quiet. But. To say it has forever tainted the relationship would be an understatement.
My hubby called his mom who then told my BIL in no uncertain terms to knock it off. My faith is and always has been important to me. But that said. I most definitely think you have made a wise choice in extracting yourself from toxicity and placing yourself where you have. You are now going into your marriage with eyes wide open. And how cool is that, with eyes wide open, that you still want to marry him.
Maybe the bff needs to bow out and exit stage left. Maybe he’ll realize how judgmental and stupid he’s being someday. And maybe not. But you and your fiancé are the only ones that need to make this decision. And maybe it’s best to decide him right out of the wedding party.
He said he couldn’t in good conscience stand up at our wedding knowing he doesn’t agree with the choices we’ve made…
Do you and Harry really want someone who doesn’t support you standing up at your wedding?
NTA. Start your life together on your terms, not someone else’s.
Your the AO. He can do whatever he wants. If he disproves and can’t stand up and publicly bless your union, then he shouldn’t have to.
NTA. Grant should stop pushing his outdated Puritan views on others. You don’t need this guy at your wedding. Get someone who lives in the 21st century not 1600s Salem.
He needs to mind his own business. Lose him as a best man and kick him out of your life. The way he’s acting shows he’s not a friend and to that end, not a “best friend.”
I’ve never understood why living together is such a big deal when literally everyone is having sex before they’re married. So the only thing about it is if you live together the neighbors and the Joneses know. I find it fascinating that Christians want everybody to lie about sex before marriage… As if the only way anybody knows that’s going on is if you live together. Can’t God see everything and doesn’t he know all? And isn’t he really the one that you should be worried about instead of what the Joneses think?!
NTA. If Grant’s beliefs are that strong how can he stand up knowing about this? Moving out does not out the horse back in the barn to borrow a traditional phrase. Or is ok to sin just not give the appearance of sinning?
OP, no judgement because I think it’s much more important for you to consider what your future looks like.
Scenario A: Harry is no longer this conservative but only situationally, because it suits him (sex on demand, a live-in housekeeper, not losing money on a motel for eight weeks). If so, he’s going to revert to being like Grant and your parents once you are
trappedmarried, or, best case, as soon as there are kids. When he’s away from home, hisenforcerhall monitorbuddy Grant will be nearby to keep a close eye on your “infractions” and keep you on the straight and narrow.Scenario B: Harry has truly changed his core values and beliefs but is extraordinarily naive (to believe he can continue being BFFs with someone whose beliefs include policing others’ everyday lives and choices because that’s what “friendship” means) and would also rather be dishonest than accept / live up to the consequences (good and bad) of his own choices (like having to change his best man, change a friendship, scale back a wedding to within your means, etc). This is as good as the is will get, I promise – adding life stressors like job changes, illness, pets, property ownership, or children will not make this issue any better.
I want to give you the benefit of the doubt here that you mean what you say when you say you have changed your own values, but it does strain credulity a bit because you are continuing to take your families’ money knowing you are violating core principles of theirs by living together and by lying.
What are your values, now that you have moved on from those of your childhood? Honesty? Kindness? Loving one’s fellow beings? Self-respect? Independence? Responsibility? Compassion? Do your choices reflect someone (or a couple) living into those? Or do they reflect convenience, social image, conformity?
If you’ve changed and grown, please make sure your life mate has changed and grown in the same way – or consider pausing big steps like marriage. Inconvenient as it is, this wedding is a good test of this – what are you and he willing to give up to be true to who you are? And if you aren’t willing to give up anything, or are only willing to give up four weeks’ motel fees, are you really being honest with yourselves about who you are when you say you have outgrown the values of your childhood? Are you really grown up enough to enter into marriage if you don’t know your true values?
Ultimately, you are only hurting yourself if you don’t seek answers to these questions truthfully. If you don’t actually want to change anything about your life other than to just avoid the hassle of your community’s judgement while you are “living in sin” and will happily slide back into your place once you are safely married and allowed to live with your partner, fine. But if your adult self truly doesn’t align with the values you grew up with, you should think very carefully about what this situation is revealing about your own tolerance for the discomfort that comes with charting your own path in life. If Harry is your person, you’ll do this together and be on the same page, but it’s important to do so even if he isn’t – because you are about to enter a new phase and make things so much harder to untangle if you discover that the two of you aren’t aligned later.
Some things to ponder: What if you have an LGBTQ child? Will living where you are living and being close to those you are close to be something you ask your child to lie in order to safeguard? What if you discover your politics don’t align with Grant’s, and he says he can’t associate with you if you don’t vote as he votes? Will you change your vote or lie about it to keep the peace? What if your best friend gets divorced or opens her own marriage? Will you publicly disavow her and give up your friendship because Grant / your families don’t approve? What if Grant ends up working with your husband or you? Will you need to be in lockstep with his every dictate in order not to lose your job, and if so, will you conform in order to avoid that?
Good luck!
Don’t lie. Just tell Grant that you are sorry to hear that, but you would never ask him to compromise his beliefs. You are sad he won’t be at your wedding, but that is his choice.
That is the nice version, but honestly, Grant is an AH. He does not get a say in your life. Let him go, and you will be better for it. No one needs some controlling guy trying to have a say in what is absolutely none of his business.
NTA. Your fiance should Tell Grant he understands him feeling conflicted, so he will be replaced as best man. The end. You don’t need to sit around and let this guy control the wedding party. No one needs that stress so close to their wedding. He and his wife are welcome to come to the ceremony and continue the friendship, because at that point you and your fiance will be morally upright in his eyes.
NTA – who’s running your marriage – you two or Grant?
Does Grant think that one of you moving out for a month is going to erase the month you already lived together and turn you both back into virgins? That’s why it’s bad to live together before marriage, because premarital sex is bad and if you’re living together you must be having sex.
At this time, it’s really a moot point since the damage Grant is so concerned about has already been done. Giving in to his nonsense would just encourage him to keep manipulating you and your fiance into getting back into your oppressive religion. Because I promise you that’s a big reason why he is still friends with your fiance. He sees bringing him back into the fold as a mission of faith. But where you live is none of Grant’s business. Nor are your religious beliefs and practices.
I would tell Grant that you’re sorry he feels that way and that you’ll miss him and his wife at the wedding. Because you just can’t have someone who doesn’t support your relationship at your wedding. Let alone as best man.
NTA. Grant thinks standing up for someone at a wedding means supporting “everything they are as a couple and everything they do”? Wow, that’s a big responsibility.
Does he expect to go through both of your finances in detail? Does he need you to fill out a spreadsheet tracking any volunteer hours you’ve done in the last decade? Check to make sure you’ve cleaned that tricky spot behind the bathroom sink carefully enough?
Honestly, I don’t see how you could marry your fiancé if you both are letting this AH dictate the terms of your marriage. If it were me, Grant wouldn’t have a choice of being in the wedding anymore. He would be OUT. And honestly, I would go no contact. If he’s going to behave this outrageously before you’re even married, how else is he going to gatekeep your marriage, your parenting, your lives down the road after he successfully managed this travesty.
And to be clear, his opinions about you and your relationship with God and how it pertains to your marriage are borderline heretical. Grant is not God, despite how he seems to be able to twist Christian theology to think otherwise.
His is a toxic relationship to God,- he’s bastardized the word of Christ and you should stay away from it.
NTA. Uninvite him from the wedding because he will cause issues.
And when he does, be sure to have people with scripture on the ready to prove the various sins he commits all the time.
A Christian follows the teachings of Christ. A “real” Christian follows what they think Christ would want, which is 99% of the time what they want. They are not the same. And every day I think the last Christian was Mr Rogers and he died years ago.
Tell Grant to pound sand. This is ridiculous. Do NOT lie. Either you two are grown ups who can make your own decisions and stand by them or you are children who lie to circumvent disapproval.
If parents find out and pull the funding… who cares. Get married at the court house. I would at that point remind your parents THEY are making a choice about how close you will be going forward and you will be deciding how much they will stay in your lives since they disapprove so very very much.
Don’t lie. Explain to Grant the logistical situation and that it would not be pragmatic for you guys to find separate housing for one month. If he still wants to drop out of the wedding, respect his choice. We all have the right to live as we wish as long as we are not hurting anyone else. NTA.
I grew up in a super conservative Christian enclave. Lots of people have already made great points including scripture. I’d say, “Grant, we’re asking you to support us GETTING married. No one, including God, is asking you to sign off and approve every decision we’ve made prior to that moment. And no one, except God, gets to know the private details of how and why we’re living under the same roof now. And no one, except God, has the right to judge those decisions. [Cue the scripture verses.]”
But knowing the type of Christian he is, he’ll air your private business in his speech, to “ease his conscience” (make himself look good and cause drama). So I’d actually think all of the above and actually say, “Grant, we’re really disappointed at your unchristian behaviour in trying to raise yourself above us and judge a situation that you don’t know the details of, when the Bible is so clear on that. [Cue verses.] In the light of that, thank you for stepping down and we will find an excuse for your absence that doesn’t paint you in such a judgemental light.”
NTA and Grant is NOT a friend. I feel sorry for his wife and any future children that have to be raised by that judgmental ah.
If your fiancé lets Grant have ANY sway over your living situation I would reconsider this relationship entirely.
The only correct response is to replace Grant as best man because he is NOT the best man!
Ditch him, nta
Judge not, lest ye be judged. So best man should mind his own business – according to Jesus. He is neither pastor nor God so he is sinning just by passing judgement. He had his wedding, this isn’t it. Your fiance, i hope, is man enough to tell his best man that he can/will be replaced.
If you give in on this, what’s next?
Are you willing to let Grant dictate how you live? How you raise your children?
Grant needs to love his neighbor or get a clue his convictions aren’t that Christian.
But imaginary skydaddy masturbators are nutbars anyway.
Grant is not even family.
Grant can stay home and read his bible.
Get married without out him and his ridiculous judgement.
Letting him have that much power over you tells him he’s allow to keep pushing his values onto you and walk all over. All about forcing his perspective on something down your throats.
It’s utter hogwash.
I’m sorry Harry may lose a friend, but who does he want to build an entire marriage with Grant or you?
And if that’s actually hard choice for him, you know where you really stand.
NTA
Sounds like Grant is your mother in law now. Are you serious? Tell your fiancé to grow a pair and leave that psycho out of your lives.
NTA. This weirdo doesn’t need to have anything to do with your wedding at all. He is mad that you are already having sex. He waited for marriage and is mad you aren’t. He is a creepy grown man who saw your car from across the parking lot and now is so mad at you guys for doing it that he’s trying to sabotage your wedding. That is so so so weird. Drop him from your lives.
This isn’t really an aita thread. You’re basically just asking for advice. Nobody in this story is even an asshole, by definition, even though it’s obviously written to be anti Harry.
Harry can step down if he wants, you’re doing nothing wrong by living together. Don’t let Harry bully you, tell him you need that decision made ASAP, because if he wants to step down you need time to find a new best man.
updateme
Excuse me for sullying Grant’s religious sensibilities but fuck him with a blazing hot pointed stick. Why would you let his misbegotten fairy tales override your wedding day? Uninvited.
Do not let him dictate your life. It’s your marriage and your morals. If he doesn’t want to be your best man, good riddance
Grant sounds insufferable and more than likely has quite a few “ungodly” traits and/or habits.
Tell him you don’t negotiate with terrorists and then cut him off.
I don’t share Grant’s beliefs. However, there are moral reasons why I would back out of being part of a wedding party. So, I’m not condemning Grant for wanting to live by his belief system.
You would be AHs to lie to Grant just to have him be the best man. However, if Grant is threatening to expose you or cause issues that would affect your wedding and relationships with your family, then that’s a bit different and I wouldn’t judge you as AHs if that were the case.
What happens the next time you and Harry make a choice as a couple that goes against Grant’s principles/beliefs? Grant’s friendship sounds conditional unlike Christ’s love.
This doesn’t sound like a very close friendship if he only knew you were living together because he saw your car in the parking lot.
Why would your fiancé want this person as his best man? Or a friend at all? He’s giving ultimatums based on something that’s 100% not his business. It’s really troubling that you’re considering giving into him, or even lying about it.
Live your lives the way you want. If he doesn’t like it, too bad. Don’t cater to him. That’s ridiculous.
NTA, but out of curiosity is Grant willing to house Harry for the next month? Honestly, for shit and giggles I’d have Harry pack his bags and show up at Grants door just to see the reaction.
Is Grant offering to let Harry move in with him? Paying a place for a month is a waste of money.
Let’s be honest, the s.i.n, is s.e.x. So Grant is making presumptions on what goes on in your relationship, living together or not. You could play that let’s pretend game, and someone sleeps on the couch
This is where I find organized religion to be a hypocrisy. Grant can’t support Harry marrying you, so you should just live together? The marriage should be encouraged.
Whatever you decide tell Grant to make a decision fast so Harry knows if he needs to pick another best man or not.
Nta
[removed]
Fucking Christians insisting that others obey their rules.
Why are you even thinking about adjusting your morals for someone else who does not approve the way you live your life? Ignore him.
Nta
Don’t let others dictate how you live or your relationship with your partner, ever.
I’m sure Grant wasn’t “pure” when he got married, but your bf probably supported, him…. so many hypocrites.
OP – live your life how you want but don’t be a hypocrite. You damn well know you just wanted your family’s $ for this wedding and you can give it back. You can 100% make a plan to pay it back – it’s not goo late!
ESH
NTA You should remove him as the best man anyway.
NAH
As someone who isn’t dedicated to any organized religion, I respect others who practice their own religion and their beliefs as long as it’s not harming others. Grant doesn’t believe in living with a partner before marriage and has the right to decide he doesn’t want to stand up along side something that doesn’t align with his beliefs. I don’t think he’s an asshole for that.
You and your partner have the right to live your lives however you see fit without compromising for others. How you two move forward is up to you, and neither of you are assholes either for doing so
“Grant you’re no longer the best man I hope we can stay friends. Please keep your judgments to yourself the way Jesus advised”
NTA. That is extremely sanctimonious behavior. What you do is tell him “I’m sorry you feel that way. But I live my life base on my values, not yours. You’ll be missed at the wedding.”
As for your family, I’m guessing they wouldn’t cancel now anyway. The embarrassment, inconvenience, and loss of money for them would be far worse for them than you. Don’t let them control you. Take their bluff. If they try to cancel over this or anything else, then your response is also “I’m sorry you feel that way but we respect your decision. We plan to get married on X day with or without a wedding.”
Once people realize they have no power over you, you’d be surprised how quickly they buckle. And if they don’t? Not worth keeping around.
NTA I would ask myself if this guy really will be in your life longterm with this behaviour and with this, why try to please his judgemental views?
Like would you want him in your life if you have children? If you don’t raise them christian, will he give you an ultimatium again?
You let a third person dictate your relationship.
The best man should be the support of the groom. He should be there for the groom. But here the best man makes everything about himself.