Singleness

Most Christian singles, and that is including myself, look forward to being married. This does not mean that we are searching or desperate, but just that we feel that to complete our life, to complete the task we have on this earth, getting married and having children is one of the things the Lord has planned for us in our life.

Involuntary singleness has never been easy. But the difference in our modern society is that in both the Christian community and society outside the number of unwilling singles is on the increase. More and more of our generation are staying single for longer, despite wanting to get married, which suggests that the process of finding a mate is becoming rather more difficult.

Church leaders often stay silent on the issue because they don't want to upset people, others do speak out, but they are out of date, living in a world which was utterly different from today. And there are those who think it is not a church issue, but rather something to be left to the secular marketplace. The help that is offered often consists of helping the single person to "cope" with being single, it is great if you want to treat the symptoms but what about trying to solve the problem which caused it?

Some churches are wonderful they provide a vibrant social and spiritual life within the congregation out of which many marriages are formed, but other churches see the single-scene as a group of people that are not fitting in with the church calendar, and they are only handy as a backup for the washing up after another valentines dinner for the married couples in church. And in so many other cases, the church just stays static.

Singles who remain in churches - and many don't - are confronted with a minimal, or non-existent, choice of partners. Marriages which do take place are not that rarely poor matches where the most significant area of compatibility was a sense of mutual desperation. Any surprise then that divorce has increased in our churches?

Within many churches, singleness is one of those "hush hush" subjects, we have special "family" services, parenting courses. Services in which we pray for families, marriages, but when do we give any attention to the singles? We try to get children to come to our Sunday schools, we encourage teens to stay in the church by providing special programmes for them, but what happens when they turn 21 and they have not found their partner in life? Get me right I am not saying we should start a dating agency, but I do suggest that the church take a good look at themselves.

But this is not just a warning for the church it is also a plea to those around us who are married. It is still a given fact that many single people find it awkward to invite their married friends, it creates a strange atmosphere, where no one really knows how to act any more. the couple often find it awkward to be with the single person, and the single person does not know how to respond to the couple without leaving one of the two out.

In many cases single people are not invited as often as a couple would be, at dinner parties they might be lucky if there is an odd number and the single person happens to be of the opposite sex, but otherwise they will have to wait for the exceptional occasion where the couples dare to invite their single friend into their circle of friends.

© 1998 Emy Böning, last updated 1st November

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