The Bishop's Wife Read Online Free Page A

bishop’s wife wasn’t a full-time job and it certainly didn’t pay. But then again, no calling in the Mormon church does. Bishops, stake presidents, and all the other leadership positions were unpaid. That meant if you were called to go on a mission, you had to pay for it yourself. The prophet and the apostles had their travel expenses paid for and were sometimes given a stipend, but usually not.
    Kurt was as an accountant, and would continue to work as one through his years as bishop and whatever came afterward. His life was particularly difficult during tax season, when he had to balance double business hours as well as his church work. We didn’t see him for much of March and April. Kurt had been bishop through one tax season already, and that meant it would likely be four more until he was released as bishop and another man from the ward would take over.
    I CAME BACK to the church with Kurt that evening for Perdita and Jonathan’s ceremony. Kurt had put on a clean white shirt and tie and I was wearing one of my best dresses, a shell pink sheath that everyone said looked good on me. It made me slightly uncomfortable because pink had never been a color I liked much, but this was a wedding, and it was not about me being comfortable.
    Inside the cultural hall, under the gazebo, Kurt waited for people to arrive (Mormon-standard time meant ten minutes after the wedding was supposed to begin). I sat quietly in the front row, listening to heels tapping and squeaking on hardwood. Tom deRyke and Karl Ashby, the first and second counselors in the bishopric, arrived next with their wives, Verity and Emma. I greeted them with a nod. More people arrived by the ten minute after mark, which was pretty typical of Mormon standard time.
    Then Kurt brought the couple up to the front and gave themadvice. This was the longest part of any Mormon wedding ceremony, in a church or in the temple.
    â€œJonathan, you need to think of Perdita as the most important person in your life now. You give her one hundred percent because no marriage works unless both people are giving all they can. And if it feels like Perdita isn’t giving as much as you are, get on your knees right at that moment. Ask God to show you what you aren’t seeing. Because we are all blind. We see what we sacrifice, but we take for granted what other people give up. And that is true nowhere more than in a marriage,” said Kurt.
    He turned to Perdita. “Perdita, Jonathan is your top priority now. I don’t mean making him happy or pretending to agree with him.” Kurt’s eyes slid toward mine and I couldn’t repress a slight smile. “I mean, his real well-being. If he is wrong, I don’t want you to think that being a good wife means ignoring that. Being a good wife means telling him the truth as best you can. It means dealing with the hard stuff together. It means having courage to face the world, and having even more courage to face God together.”
    I knew very well what Kurt was doing here. He hadn’t said a word about the temple marriage ceremony or the secret endowment ceremony that these two would have gone to if they’d ended up marrying there. But his advice was filled with allusions to temple doctrine. The Adam and Eve story might be about women making the wrong choice in other religions, but in Mormonism, it is all about Eve making the right choice, even if it meant facing difficult consequences. She was the one who reminded Adam that they couldn’t obey the commandment to multiply and replenish the earth unless they ate of the fruit, and Joseph Smith argued that she spent a thousand years thinking over the decision before she finally had the courage to face the consequences of being sent out of the Garden.
    When Kurt was finished with his advice, the simple wedding ceremony was merely a question, at which Perdita and Jonathan agreed to marry each other with a single-word answer: