My Jewish Catholic Shinto Greek Wedding

The Day Before
I am so stressed helping my dear friends finalize the plans for their incredibly complicated wedding that I have begun to mumble to myself. Even more frightening, I am answering! What were they thinking? What was I thinking in agreeing? Am I going to be party to a wedding disaster of epic proportions? This is, after all, Greece, where everything is epic.

Dear! The Shinto priest and his sister are stuck at the Athens air­port, and they speak only Japanese!

What?!

The Catholic priest has been waiting for his flight in Atlanta for 48 hours—there’s a hurri­cane! He may not come! I am freaking out.

But don’t worry, the rabbi is on the boat. He’s arriving on the island in a few hours, sans baggage, sans robe, sans tzitzis. His luggage is lost.

Darling, do you think the Athens rabbi can lend him his? But he’s coming for sure. I talked to him—there will be a wedding.

We are on the Greek island of Spetses. It’s 30 hours before the wedding of Minos Matsas, a Greek-born, L.A.-based composer, and the Mexican-Japanese filmmaker Amira Lopez, who also lives in L.A. When Minos and Amira made their big decision, there was the eternal problem: In what religion should the ceremony be performed?

The groom: a Sephardic Jew. The bride: a Shinto on her mother’s side and a Catholic on her father’s. Minos wanted to please his traditional Jewish parents, and Amira felt that her parents and their traditions should be respected, too. What to do?

The couple decided to have a three-religion ceremony, because, said Minos, “Religion should unite people, not separate them.” And after all, aren’t all religions one?

There will be only three best men: Kostas, Konstantinos and me, Konstantin—how could I refuse? My wedding gift was to design the invites and decorate the chuppah. As a homosexual man, religion and state still refuse me the right to marry, so my pleasure at the weddings of my friends is double.

Organizing a wedding on a Greek island is already complicated. But trying to find a rabbi, a Catholic priest and a Shinto priest who are willing to travel overseas to perform a spiritual ceremony together is next to impossible. After phone calls, emails, letters, invitations and pleas, we found a liberal rabbi on the East Coast and an open-minded Catholic priest in California. And yes, they would travel! Finding the Shinto priest was more difficult, as their religion worships nature, and traveling is generally not part of the practice. But then...a miracle! The Shinto priest who founded the only temple in Europe was willing and would bring all the sacred elements needed for the union—a mobile temple, if you will.

The Big Day: 11 a.m., 100 Degrees
Amen. The priests arrive, jet-lagged, and we start the rehearsal.

But, darling, this is just impossible. I can’t breathe. It’s too hot!

The Catholic priest has a heart condition—he’s hyperventilating!

Oh, no, I’m fainting...

The Shinto priest has a history of sunstroke!

I’m suffocating...

Sweetie, I know it’s crazy hot, but what can I do? I mean, this is Greece in the summer.