Minister in a Mouse Click

By Carl Kozlowski

Last Friday night seemed like the perfect time for my first wedding. The sun was coming down in a beautifully clear sky over the crashing waves of a Malibu coastline, and I looked out past the smiling bride to see the faces of 60 guests waiting eagerly for the vows.

Only this was one of the strangest weddings I'd ever been involved with. For one thing, it wasn't my wedding exactly. Rather, I was the minister in charge, and I was barely even a minister. I had applied online for the legal title from the Universal Life Church only a week before, then placed an ad on the Web site Craigslist offering to "Perform a Wedding - Fast and Free!"

For months, I had been inundated with spam from sites offering to ordain anyone, anytime, for free or dirt-cheap prices. And after hearing that even Courtney Love had been accepted as a ULC minister and had married 27 couples in a Nevada radio-station promotion, I knew I had found the perfect church with which to become a minister in a mouse click.

A guy named Seth had responded to my Craigslist ad, saying his Russian fiancée Oxsana had to get married within a week or else her three-month "fiancée visa" would expire and she would be sent back to her homeland. It sounded a little strange, but I needed to wed someone within a week or I'd miss my deadline too -- so there I was, standing in a ridiculous gold robe in front of 60 strangers who could easily star in a real-life version of The Royal Tenenbaums.
Questions were flying through my mind: Was this really legal? (Yes.) If it was, why? What did real ministers and priests think about the ability of anyone to sign up online and wed people at will? And if an untrained buffoon like me could be in charge, what did this have to say about the state of marriage today?


FOLLOW THE LIGHT
I've had people pressuring me to be a priest all my life. I grew up in a Polish-Catholic household, and from the time I was six I was an altar boy. But I never felt compelled to become a man of the cloth -- at least not as a full-time career.
As I Googled the ULC and read through their Web sites, it seemed like there were no catches to becoming a holy man. I had to put in a few pieces of personal information -- no Social Security number, only name, e-mail address, and home address -- and click an "Ordain Me" icon. Within moments I received a fairly impressive black-and-white copy of my ministerial certificate, calling me "The Reverend Carl Casimir Kozlowski."

Now I was one of the ULC's 20 million worldwide ministers, a total that makes the church the McDonalds of ministry. They've been a source of snickering and intrigue for generations now, as friends dare each other to sign up, or couples that can't afford a fancy wedding or don't want the myriad planning hassles ask friends or family to serve on the happiest day of their lives.

"We've been a church since 1959, but there's really only been widespread Internet signups since late 1995," explains Andre Hensley, a ULC board member whose father was one of the original founders of the Modesto, CA-based church. "At first, word of the ordinations was spread by word of mouth and then by articles and television news reports, but every decade it seems there's been a different movement that's carried the growth along."

According to Hensley, ULC ordinations were a major haven for men seeking draft deferments during Vietnam in the 60s; in the 70s they became a fad as people turned against organized religion during the disillusionment of that decade. During the Me Decade of the 80s, millions signed up in hopes of dodging taxes (a ploy that often didn't work), and in the 90s the frenzy settled into the more romantic mode that holds today: peoples' desire to have friends and family officiate at weddings.

The ULC is founded on just one rule, the Golden Rule: "Do that which is right" (meaning do whatever you want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else and it's legal). So, the church doesn't care if its services are conducted in the style of Catholic, Buddhist, Baptist or Jewish formats -- everyone can join the party.

Of course, this level of open-mindedness leaves them open to criticism, not to mention pranks. Even one of the three websites listing the ordination guidelines and church rules notes such odd specifics as: "Please only ordain others with their permission. (This includes public figures as well as cartoon and other fictional characters)" and "Ministers can perform any ritual they wish to perform, except circumcision."

"We get people all the time who try to request ordinations for sitting presidents, but that's what happens when you have such an open process," says Hensley. "Then of course there's those who make jokes, like signing up as Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck. That's why we screen all the requests because this is to be taken seriously. I'm not sure about the reasons for discussing circumcision, but [a member named] Brother Daniel stated there was someone who tried to perform a circumcision in Florida and so he decided to forewarn people by putting it out there on the Web."

For a church that wants to be taken seriously, their openness to any allegedly "normal" person being able to sign up also poses a problem.

"If I were to deny Courtney Love, that would be going against the teachings of the church, and that would be going against God's teaching to turn people away," explains Hensley. "We have to take it by faith that she'll do the right thing. What it comes down to is that my father thought it shouldn't be hard for someone who's been in church all their lives to preach by having to go to a seminary for years."

As radical as that idea may sound, it really isn't that far off the mark from the concepts that drove Luther to create the Protestant Reformation, according to Rev. Paul Sawyer of Throop Unitarian Universalist Church.

"Luther believed in the priesthood of all believers, a radical idea generally still practiced by Quakers, who don't believe in professional ministers for the most part and believe that everybody is equal," explains Sawyer. "Even our Unitarian Universalist tradition believed they could choose ministers and make them leaders. and a lot of early leaders in any Protestant church didn't even go to college. Just because you've got a degree or title doesn't make you good."

Not all clergy agree. Father John Collins is an Irish expatriate and associate pastor of St. Phillip's Catholic Church in Pasadena. Collins said he had never heard of online ordination prior to this interview, but thought that the concept was "somewhat silly" and "a huge danger because of the position of power."

"We look at everything that has gone on in the Catholic Church in the past couple years and those are people who have gone through a 7- or 8-year formation program designed to weed them out," says Collins, ".so the idea that anyone can do weddings and funerals and be with people when they're at their most vulnerable and take advantage of that is appalling."

David Manock, of First Hollywood Presbyterian Church, followed the traditional route of studying: 4 years in a seminary for his Masters of Divinity and another 7 years for his PhD, so he felt that online ordination "undermines and demeans the value and meaning of ordination. Ronald Kelly, the director of church relations for the Worldwide Church of God, believes that the potential for financial abuses is vast, as ordained ministers can claim income tax deductions on church donations annually, are allowed a tax-free parsonage allowance, and have part of their salaries rendered tax-free.

"If you have a certificate hanging on your wall or card in your wallet, then someone might think you're a qualified counselor and you're not," says Kelly. "Someone who valued an education by being a graduate of a certified institution wouldn't stoop to this kind of credential."

But for the sake of sheer curiosity, I would.


WHAT THE LORD HAS JOINED TOGETHER
Because of that, I rode in my robe on two Metra trains and a Rapid Red bus all the way to Sherman Oaks to meet Seth's sister Vicki on a sweltering Friday afternoon -- and I barely drew a stare from the other freaks on public transit. At her house, I was the center of attention while being a complete stranger: everyone wanted to know what kind of preacher I was, as the groom had apparently forgotten to tell them he found me online for free.

I soon found I fit in, for as odd as I felt, they were odder. There was Seth's octogenarian father, a self-proclaimed "heathen" who had driven from Minnesota with his fourth wife, a Mormon, and their shaggy-haired twin sons who were to play a duet of the wedding march on their violins. The twins were 17, which made them just 4 years younger than their new sister-in-law Oxsana, who was about to marry Seth, 49, but still acting like he was 18.

In other words, they were one big happy American family -- 21st Century style. Elsewhere in the extremely crowded house were Oxsana's utterly bewildered parents, who were in from Russia for the big event, and Seth's mom, who was his dad's wife Number 1. (Numbers 2 and 3 "have scattered to the winds!" Seth's dad exclaimed.)

After an extremely long and winding drive out past Malibu, I met the rest of the friends -- an assortment of people from Seth's current career as a real-estate wizard and his past career as a rock singer on the L.A. club scene. The only people I had yet to meet, oddly enough, were Seth and his bride.

Seth was late to his own wedding. So was his bride. And the band. Oh, and the U-Haul truck that held all the tables and chairs for people to sit in and have a meal. Thank God the booze was there, and everyone seemed to be availing themselves of that -- even me -- until Vicki's husband noticed I was starting to sway and decided it might be best to cut me off unless they wanted to have the wedding challenged over the minister's sobriety.

Finally, the couple arrived. I had envisioned Seth as a look-alike for Larry of the Three Stooges, but he looked like the lead singer of Def Leppard, minus the mullet. Oxsana, meanwhile, was a dead ringer for Valerie Golina in Rainman.

Their arrival set off a whirlwind of preparatory activity -- preparations that should have been done long before. The guests set up their own tables, folded their own place settings, and Seth scrambled to go over which songs he wanted to sing with the band. I remembered that we hadn't even discussed one rather significant detail yet: the vows.

When I asked Seth to take a look at the vow selections, however, he said, "Oh yeah, those things" - and proceeded to dash through the choices picking "Number one, number three, and number seven" from the lists with the same care and enthusiasm he might reserve for ordering off a Chinese takeout menu.

"Just what the hell was going on here?!" I wondered, but before I could really question going through with the ceremony, it was announced that the caterers were ready to dish out the barbecue. Heaven and its attendant moral quandaries could wait. Besides, we were about to be treated to a couple of classic rock covers by Seth and the band.

"Look at Oxsana's father. He does not look amused," said one guest, an elderly Frenchwoman who claimed that she too had been ordained by the ULC. "So how many weddings have you done?" she sweetly asked me.

"This is my first," I replied.

"Fuck!" she exclaimed.

With the sun in danger of slipping away for the night, someone finally convinced Seth to stop singing and get ready. And at last, we were ready to begin, as the band cluelessly played what must have been the only vaguely religious song they knew: "Knockin' on Heaven's Door." I heard at least one guest mutter, "Dude, isn't that song about death?!"

Indeed it was, but with America's divorce rate standing at 50 percent, perhaps they were just offering a candid and timely reminder that this was a grave decision the couple were making. Soon enough, the Mormon twins kicked in with their off-key yet heartfelt rendition of "Pachelbel's Canon" and Seth walked up to me in a white tux. I told him he looked good, and he shot me a weird stare like he wondered if I were gay. I decided not to offer any more comments.

Then, as one of Seth's sisters ripped open a plastic bag filled with rose petals and started madly tossing them all over the beach, Oxsana made her entrance in a stunning red wedding dress and white veil. She stood before me with Seth, and the two suddenly looked like any couple should: happy, and thankfully like they actually knew each other. I breathed a sigh of relief that this didn't appear to be a big sham after all and launched into the prayers sans microphone, yelling to be heard above the crashing waves and noticing that Seth's dad was hunched forward and squinting like crazy in an attempt to hear a word I was saying.

It was an odd feeling, taking people through that moment, realizing that this might be the most important moment of their lives while at the same time thinking "nah, something's off here." I was suddenly no better than Courtney Love. (Well, OK, I wasn't committing felonies, but this was certainly in the ballpark of unstable behavior.) Sporting the robe now conferred to me a sense of solemn power.

They put on their rings, Oxsana sort of stammered through her vows after Seth sailed through his, and then they kissed as I pronounced them man and wife. Everyone around them clapped and seemed to be into the moment, and what I felt -- more than any earthly or spiritual power -- was that I just helped make a bunch of people really happy.

And I realized that the ULC's idea of making that ability free was a valuable one, because just like a Mastercard moment, making people this happy was priceless. As the couple made their rounds to friends and family, the rest of the crowd started patting me on the back and saying things like, "That was your first one? Great job!" More than anything, I wanted to just sit down and have a drink under the stars.

Funny how Oxsana read my mind - sort of. I was perfectly willing to sit alone and let her perhaps enjoy introducing herself to the guests as the new Mrs., but instead she came hurtling through the darkness and across the sand directly towards me.

"More tequila!" she exclaimed. I hadn't had any that night, but that didn't stop her from grabbing my hand and offering to get me started.

"More tequila!" she laughed again as we ran across the beach towards the bartenders. I was looking around frantically now, wondering where Seth was, and if he was going to kill me if he saw me holding hands with his wife. But he was back singing with the band, and Oxsana suddenly slowed down.

"I'm married now, Carl," she said, making a face that looked like she had just bit into a grapefruit when she was expecting an orange. "Married!"

My heart sank. Had I just ruined her life in some way?

"Are you happy about it?" I asked.

She shrugged her shoulders as if she'd been asked whether she'd rather buy Nikes or Reeboks. "Sure," she replied, then off we went again to the bartenders, where she supervised the pouring of an extremely large glass and my downing of it in one extremely painful swig. As I gasped for air and sanity, she laughed again and ordered, "More tequila!" The bartender asked "Are you sure?" and this time I waved my hands furiously, "NO!"

Then she leaned over and kissed my forehead.

"You really should get back to Seth, ya know," I said, pointing him out across the crowd as he sang "Mustang Sally" with the band. Oxsana looked over and seemed to get a little serious for a moment before bending over, hiking up a leg of her dress and slipping off her garter.

Then she looked at me again.

"Are you married, Reverend?"

"No," I gulped.

"I don't believe you," she replied.

I flashed her my hands -- devoid of rings, marriage or otherwise. Then she handed me her garter.

"You're a good man, Carl. I hope you find a good woman. That's what this is for." She leaned in towards me again, and. gave me a hug. I never thought I'd say I'd rather not have a hug from an exotic foreign beauty, but this moment was one of them.
She then let me go, turned, and faded into the darkness across the beach. I looked up at the skies and saw the stars brighter than they'd seemed in ages, and I made a wish that she was right.