A thread for my sisters in singleness:

I married by 21. Divorced 30ish yrs later. I love Jesus.

Do any of you have the impression that church world conveys the following messages implicitly or explicity to boys, girls, men & women?

Women don't actually become "real" until a man legitamizes her thru marriage. No matter how accomplished or competent she is, her life doesn't really start until she is married. Then having children is the pinnacle of success for a "godly woman."

Women are in a holding pattern & folks assume the best thing that could happen to her would be to marry & raise children.

Yet, when Christian women marry, too often their sense of self is subsumed by trying to meet the expectations of their role as a godly wife.

I know several Christian women who'd admit, if they dared, that they feel diminshed as a woman since marriage though they are given the church world stamp of approval & meet expectations.

They have lost their sense of self while fulfilling a role. Diminished instead of enhanced.

(I can hear the strident protests already: appeals to divine design, reminders that "self" is to be put to death, marriage is to make us holy, not happy, fully surrendered, etc.)

We've been conditioned to equate an "external locus of control" mindset w/ spiritual maturity.

I was married to a "successful" Christian man-an elder in the church, civic leader. I ticked off the expected boxes for an educated, family-focused Evangelical woman.

When I left after 3 decades, I was a shell of the young woman who welcomed marriage w/ joy & great seriousness.

Now I *really* don't fit the mold. I say I love Jesus but I'm divorced. I say I'm pro-marriage & pro-family but I can no longer build my identity there.

I was married to an abuser. That doesn't mean he was horrible every moment. It does mean I was emotionally unsafe always.

But my concerns are deeper than my own experiences.

I see women hobbled by Evangelical marriages leaving them diminished & discouraged.

Complementarianism is a sweeter gig for husbands than wives. Many wives become tenders of men who are long on headship & short on adulting.

People sometimes ask if I'd like to remarry. (I enjoy singleness to a degree that shocks me still.)

I struggle to picture how marriage would not send me straight back to expectations. I'm thriving after breaking the mold & lots of work to heal & rediscover who I am at heart.

I've been married. I know we churchers too often present marriage as a cure-all & the peak of human experience. When we are paired, we have arrived!

Um...that can be unrealistic. We idolize celebrities & marriage in Evangelical sub-culture. And marriage promises sexual delight!

Sex. I have a bone to pick w/ those who set sexpectations in "biblical" marriages.

No doctrine or verses will magically over-ride an inability to communicate, a lack of self-awareness, absence of a technical understanding of healthy sexual functioning or incapacity for intimacy.

I appreciate those working to help couples have healthy sexual intimacy as a part of a marriage between Christians.

BUT...single women are to smile & nod while waiting for the godly man who will rock their chaste worlds.

Single, single again, widowed women are often invisible in a coupled-up, family focused church community.

But there are actually scads of supposedly "sex oblivious" women in churches where there is greater devotion to marital status & glory of family than Jesus.

I'd like to see us wrestle w/ the inadequacy of simplistic paradigms promoted in church world.

Maybe I missed it but it seems churches ignore Jesus loving women who desire to live whole heartedly as mature, sexual, relational adults w/o believing a man is needed to be real.

Lots of teaching about the importance of being a sizzling fireball for your husband. (But be pure/sexless until you awaken on your wedding day where you mysteriously become a she-cat in the sheets by midnight)

Resources galore about marriage & parenting.

All the single ladies just gonna have to wing it. We don't offer models of meaningful, satisfying singlehood.

Other than nuns, I don't know of any paradigms offered in church world for a full life as a single woman. This needs to change.

I didn't realize how unusual my conservative evangelical mom was when she'd occassionally tell us 5 daughters, "Never forget that singleness is a very viable option."

Not one friend remembers their moms making such a statement. Mom didn't believe marriage makes a woman real.

My single friends, try not to feel too bad. Jesus is often overlooked in churches too.

We're too often family centric & "hip-centric" rather than Jesus centered.

I could add many "but-I'm-not-saying" isms & qualifiers. Complexity of thought can sprain but not break a brain

Unless you have been a single woman or childless by choice or heartbreak in church world, this is theoretical only. I urge you to listen to single women about their experiences.

If you are bully church men who must set me straight (after you tell the elders your "paid for by marriage" sex rights aren't being met), remember I decapitated my head & I don't have to listen to you.

I'll read & say, "Yep! Right there is why I like my twin bed!"

I'd wink and say the last was said in good fun but it seems lots of "heads" broke their funny bones settling on the throne of their castle.