The Church Drift
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[4 Comments]
One day last summer I lost my church. Or rather, it lost me.
I'd been out of the country a couple weeks, and, therefore, hadn't been to church in a while. My first Sunday back, I showed up at the usual time and place ready to reconnect with friends through a communal experience of faith.
My first clue of something amiss was pulling in my usual three minutes late and being the only car in the parking lot. Inside, the community center that had been our church plant's meeting place for the past eight months was empty. I even drove to the new building we were in the process of converting into a church to see if we were holding a special service there. Nope.
I drove around feeling like an idiot. Who loses their church?
Apparently I do.
When I got home and consulted our church website, I realized services had switched to summer hours while I'd been gone. Apparently with preparing for and taking my trip, I hadn't been to church in longer than I'd thought.
The following week I came down with pneumonia, making me miss another three Sunday mornings of worship. So, all told, I didn't darken the door of my church for two months (though, for the official record, that one week in there I really did try).
As I came out of my pneumonia–inspired stupor and began re–entering the world, I had a startling thought: It would be easy to simply not go back to church.
While I enjoy my ethnically diverse little church plant family, I and four other people are the only singles in our 150–member congregation. The rest of our body of believers is mostly young couples with several toddlers in tow.
Being the odd one out every Sunday isn't easy. I often have to sit alone. Several of the parents are connected to each other through their kids, and I don't share that connection. And many of the sermon illustrations, centered on marriage and parenting, apply to the majority of this congregation, but leave me out.
While most days I truly enjoy my single life, I struggle to sit amidst so many people at a life stage I thought I'd have reached by now—and to do so week in and week out, month in and month out, year in and year out.
I think I was most concerned that no one called during those two months I went missing to find out where I was.
For all these reasons, sometimes I simply feel invisible at church. So I'm tempted to really truly disappear, and therefore not attach such negative connotations to one of my key spiritual experiences.
I've discussed the lack of single men in the church, part of a larger issue of males in general drifting away from "too feminized" worship experiences on Sunday mornings. About a year ago, I told a friend I was worried that if churches didn't change their hyper family focus, they'd start losing single women as well.
While I have no studies to prove that theory, I've watched several single female friends leave church in the past couple years. These women are strong Christians, long–time believers, and even onetime leaders in their congregations. One or two of these women specifically cited the strong family focus of their congregations as a major reason for departure. These singles just got tired of hearing about family camps, back–to–school ice cream socials, daytime women's Bible studies, and moms gatherings. While these ministries certainly belong in the church, they led these single women to feel left out, as if maybe they don't belong in the church. And many female readers of this column indicate they've left the church for these reasons as well.
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Average User Rating:
Elizabeth
This article was very honest. Thank you for sharing your feelings! As the author mentions, many, most, or maybe all of us have felt this way at one time. I have to say that during the time I was an established member in a church, I really reached out to people who travelled or who were single (understanding both of those situations) but my attempts to be concerned and friendly were mostly rebuffed, especially at first. As a single person, it is important not to be cold when someone reaches out to you. I am a single person now, after a divorce, and I try to remember that. Every person who is reaching out to me probably has to step out of their comfort zone to do that, so I am thankful when they do. Also, calling a church a social club is a pretty harsh thing to do. If people have truly treated you badly and without remorse, you should remember to confront them as in Matthew 18. It is not a good idea to just leave without talking to the Christians who have hurt you and trying to repair-
angela
Helpful article that addresses what so many single people feel. What stood out to me was the feelings of guilt we have when we don't fit, as if we've done something to cause it, and the second half of the Heb. scripture about encouraging one another. I'm not sure the people meeting together were really a church to the author. Maybe she's not called to keep meeting with these people who really haven't been the body of Christ to her. But I know from personal experience that for a single person a community that values and respects you as you are is a hard one to find. Sure 'churches' can talk until they are blue about acceptance and love, but it's a shallow acceptance many times (for anyone who may be 'different' from them) and based on feeling like they are having to help this poor single (or otherwise unique) person rather than true fellowship and care. Does God call us to keep putting ourselves in these churches? Are they really even the church if they don't even check on someone who has been gone for so long? Sounds like more of a social club to me.
JT
This morning's sermon was on 'singleness' which was kinda rambling and missing key points. It mostly focused on 'so you're divorced now' and 'one day you'll be married too.' I have been travelling lately and only 1 person noticed that I was not around. For the first year I reached out to a lot of other people by talking to each one after every service or before. When I was organizing events for another group I invited people from my church. No one ever attended. None of the 'friendships' formed. These people are acquaintances--not friends or family. Most of them are couples and the few singles that show up from time to time don't last.
yoda
I can definitely relate to this article. The first occurrence that something was amidst was when I returned to my tiny church after 8 weeks being away in different countries. Returning from a vibrant church service of several thousands in Singapore, I returned to my 20 something church population of mostly 70+year olds, with the rest of the population of marrieds in their 40's and 50's. I'm single, mid-thirties and feel really lost about what church fellowship really means any more. I once had an understanding of He 10:25. I have brought this issue up with my church leadership several times, in several ways...but they feel lost on how to address this issue this either. I'm not sure if they feel my pain and at the same time, question my church non-attendance of several weeks as unfaithfulness. It's a mixture of both.
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