This post is about an untimely death, an upcoming funeral and the planned exclusion of the ex-member father.

I’m framing it with the current trend of lessons for Relief Society and Priesthood are focused on:

It was in this context, and in the context of my awareness and involvement in grief issues relating to the death of a child that I ran across a recent area authority’s decisions involving the funeral for a child who died in a tragic accident. The details would make anyone weep.

The decision was that the father, who had left the church, was not to be allowed to participate in any fashion if the funeral were held at the local LDS Chapel in Mooresville, North Carolina.

His involvement with podcasting (Unequally Yoked) has been well received in communities on both sides of the divide.

But that said, I was curious about what goes into deciding to ban a parent from participating in their child’s funeral, how common that is and the way the process is engaged in making the decision and using the relief society president to deliver the message.

Does anyone know?

How does this decision improve how the church is perceived by the family and the local community?

Is this a churchwide position or only part of the Church in North Carolina?

Is there anything to the story that I don’t know and that leaves this incomplete?