I'm hoping you all can give me some honest thoughts about a situation I'm in right now. My boyfriend recently got invited to the wedding of a friend of his, and asked me to be his date. I happily accepted, but as I find out more and more about the wedding, I'm getting a little uncomfortable about it. The families of the couple are very religious, and are holding the ceremony in a very traditional Church. This has created a few situations that I'm worried may cause a problem.
1.) I am not religious at all. While I have absolutely no problem participating in most aspects of the ceremony (standing/sitting/kneeling as appropriate, bowing head, singing, etc.), I definitely do not intend to participate in sich acts as taking Communion. My boyfriend has told me that he thinks this will cause problems, as the family has a definite thing against people that do not share their faith, and will almost definitely want to have a tak with me at some point that night to "save me" (I guess this already happened once before at another child's wedding, with very uncomfortable results.) He thinks I should just pretend in order to avoid confrontation. I am EXTREMELY uncomfortable doing this, because of my own beliefs and because I feel its disrespectful, and against the practices of the faith.
2.) There is a VERY strict dress code for the entire day (ceremony and reception). Women must cover their heads, wear tops that completely cover the arms down to the wrist and are not low cut or sheer, and skirts and dresses must be below the knee. I didn't have a problem with this, as I intended to wear a nice pair of dress pants anyways. After a conversation with the couple though, my boyfriend informed me this was not acceptable. Pants are "not appropriate for women", and this would be seen as very offensive. I had no problem with the long sleeved, high cut top, or the head covering, but the pants bothers me more than a little. I have some pretty severe scars on my legs that are very obvious and I don't like to show them around people I don't know. It has often led to questions/comments that I feel uncomfortable answering or talking about, and to be honest, I just hate the staring and whispering and pointing that often goes on around strangers. I asked my bf to explain this to his friend, and was told that "regardless of what my legs looked like or how I felt", I was not allowed to wear pants.
I don't know what to do about these things. I want to respect the couple, their families, and their faith, but I also dont want to do through the day being miserable and uncomfortable, nor do I want to be preached at. Whats the right way to handle these things? Normally I wouldn't worry, thinking that the families will be too caught up in the day to worry about a guest they don't know, but I have been told that is definitely not the case here.