Realizing that I’m opening up myself to stuff from well-meaning family and friends, I’m opting to link to this great essay by Michael Spencer about the over-emphasis of marriage in Christendom. The entire essay is fantastic, but I plan to explore a little beyond just his essay. First, Spencer quotes Southern Seminary’s President Mohler, who spoke at a conference:

Singleness is not a sin, but deliberate singleness on the part of those who know they have not been given the gift of celibacy is, at best, a neglect of a Christian responsibility. The problem may be simple sloth, personal immaturity, a fear of commitment, or an unbalanced priority given to work and profession. On the part of men, it may also take the shape of a refusal to grow up and take the lead in courtship. There are countless Christian women who are prayerfully waiting for Christian men to grow up and take the lead. What are these guys waiting for?

I love how he starts that paragraph by saying that he doesn’t think that singleness is a sin and then contradicts himself pretty well by saying essentially that it is a sin. Nice.

Of course, being single myself, I take great issue with Mohler’s assertion. Deliberate singleness? I can’t think of many Christian singles that I know who are deliberately single, but rather are circumstancially single and living the life that God has put before them the best they know how. It is misguided for him to making a sweeping assertion, to a group of young Christian singles, that I don’t believe is Biblical or responsible or sensitive.

I can agree somewhat with his sentiment about Christian women waiting for Christian men to step up. Unfortunately, there aren’t enough Christian men to begin with - we single, Christian women far outnumber our male counterparts. Statistically, the sad fact is that there just aren’t enough men anyway. But I digress ...

Camerin Courtney at Christianity Today wonders Is Singleness a Sin?

Perhaps many of us are slower to marry not because we don’t take marriage seriously, but because we do take it seriously. Because we’ve seen and experienced the consequences of hasty unions, because we’ve seen the statistical evidence that older first-time marriages have a better chance for survival, because we take very seriously the words “till death do us part.” If anything, I think rushing to marry and preaching a gospel of marriage for marriage’s sake devalues it more than our generation’s hesitancy and seeming passivity.

When Mohler calls marriage the “ultimate priority God has called us to,” I cringe. Not because I’m anti-marriage, but because I don’t find backing for this in the Bible. I don’t see the place where marriage is called a requirement. It’s called a blessing many times, but then so is singleness. The only list of Christ-follower requirements I find in my Bible is in Micah 6:8—"He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” These things, not marriage, should be our ultimate priorities.

Amen, sistah! Reading that entire article, I got to this tidbit that almost sent me through the roof:

Rainey added a personal anecdote about how excited he was when his sons popped the question to their respective wives, “because I knew life was about to begin in earnest.”

Emphasis mine. It is statements like that, from married people especially, that drive me insane. I grieve for the single people who heard Rainey say that, especially single women who still live under the Cinderella, fairytale fallacy that life doesn’t truly begin until Prince Charming comes sweeping in and marries his princess. If I had opted to live my adulthood with that attitude, then I would have missed some incredible ministry opportunities, fantastic travel opportunities, and some great friendships.

Courtney continues my own thoughts brilliantly:

I appreciate Dr. Mohler—as well as Rainey and Lepine—pointing out some current troubling trends affecting singles and the state of marriage in our culture. It’s good to have Christian leaders at their level addressing the sometimes-overlooked demographic of single people and the cultural and demographic forces affecting us. However, I take issue with the gross overgeneralizations they make about single people. Their comments make me wonder how many actual Christian singles they interact with on a regular basis, or whether they’re basing their understanding of singles from viewing a few episodes of Friends. Most of the singles I know and hear from aren’t delaying marriage due to selfish motives. Rather most of them earnestly desire to be married, are surprised and/or frustrated that they aren’t yet, and are prayerfully trying to figure out how to get from here to there.

Mohler seems to assume that all still-single women are such because we chose to climb the corporate ladder first, and that all still-single men are such because they first chose to sow their wild oats. But this simply isn’t the reality of singleness I’ve witnessed and experienced. Now, I know I haven’t met all the single Christian women out there, but I’ve certainly talked with quite a few at singles events and heard from literally thousands more through e-mails in response to this column. I’m sure there must be some Christian women somewhere who pursued a job/career to the exclusion of marriage, but I have yet to happen on even one. For the vast majority of us, a vocation is a way of finding an outlet for our God-given gifts, being a responsible member of society, and, most importantly, paying the rent.

Admittedly, I’ve interacted with less single Christian men than women over my 30-some-odd years, but I’ve yet to meet any who are choosing singleness in order to live a wild life while the getting’s good. No, most of the single Christian males I know are rarely dating, let alone sowing any oats, wild or otherwise.

Exactly! And then she gets to my last point:

And as for the assertion that getting married is synonymous with becoming an adult, I agree that making that caliber of life-long commitment grows you up in many ways. But, I would add, so does having to fend for yourself for decades of adult life. Does this marriage-as-adulthood argument imply that I and my 40something, 50something, and beyond unmarried counterparts are somehow still children? Wouldn’t character issues such as righteousness, goodness, faithfulness, and the other fruits of the Spirit be a better gauge of maturity?

Yes!

One last thing to remember ...

So singleness as sin? No way! If the reasons for delaying marriage truly are selfishness, childishness, and a purposeful denying of God’s will, as Mohler, Rainey, and Lepine assert, then those things are the sins—not the resulting singleness. And throwing around the s-word like that, especially toward a group of individuals who already sometimes feel devalued by the church, our families, and sometimes even ourselves, seems not only unscriptural but also irresponsible.

Courtesy: Such Small Hands, (who linked to the IM essay)

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1. I read this earlier, decided not to comment, then stewed over it some more I have to get this off my chest....

   A SIN?!?!?!? This guy shouldn’t be let anywhere near a congregation of any sort. [insert all the bad words I’m currently thinking] What a self righteous, judgmental prig. People like him are what drive people away from God, and he’s going to have to answer for that in the hereafter.

   I can’t wait to tell my mum about this. She’s always quoted Paul to me as an example that living a single celibate life is a good thing.

   I feel better now :)

   Posted by Ith  on  03/10/05  at  01:34 PM

2. Ith, I knew this would get you going as well. It’s not bad enough that Christian singles feel less than all too often in their churches, but to be told we’re sinning because of our life circumstance is dead wrong. It’s amazing to me how clueless married folks are about the single life, especially those who married young and have spent pretty much all of their adulthood as a part of a married couple. These examples of ill-advised lecturing frustrate me no end.

   Posted by  on  03/10/05  at  02:04 PM

3. Calling singleness a sin is just wrong. Singleness is singleness. If a single Christian is unmarried, but also living with the “significant other,” then call that what it is--adultery. And if two people love each other and feel God’s command to each to marry the other and still refuse to follow that guidance, then that may be sinful self-willfulness, but that circumstance is practically impossible to imagine. And that circumstance is about the only definition I can think of for the term “deliberate singleness.” To accuse singles of, “simple sloth, personal immaturity, a fear of commitment, or an unbalanced priority given to work and profession,” is the sin. That attack is a denigration of how God chooses to lead people.  Was Paul’s “unblalance priority given to work and profession” a sin? I think not.

   Bad, bad philosopy.

   Posted by  on  03/10/05  at  02:38 PM

4. Dad, exactly!

   Seems to me that if Dr. Mohler is so concerned with the sinful status of the Christian single, he might actually spend some time talking with them about their singleness rather than lecturing them in glittering generalities that are unloving.

   It’s clear that he no clue of the anguish that many singles experience because of their singleness. It’s not that easy to just decide you’re going to get married. I decided long, long ago that I was going to be a wife and mother. Unfortunately for my plan, God’s plan didn’t match. I opted to go with God’s plan and I’m told I’m performing the egregious sin of “deliberate singleness.” Go figure.

   Posted by  on  03/10/05  at  02:51 PM

5. I have feeling that Spencer must have quoted this Mohler character out of context.  No sane person living in the 21st century would make such silly comments.  It sounds like something coming from the Victorian era.

   Posted by Dibla  on  03/10/05  at  04:54 PM

6. Dibla, while I’d like to believe that’s true, I’ve been around enough clueless church folks to know that he meant what he said.

   Thanks for visiting and commenting, btw!

   Posted by  on  03/10/05  at  04:57 PM

7. Very good post.  I like you don’t know very many Christians that are single deliberately.

   Posted by Michael Morgan  on  03/10/05  at  05:12 PM

8. Thanks, Michael.

   Posted by  on  03/10/05  at  07:44 PM

9. I can’t say that I’ve ever met somebody who thought being single was a sin ... and, you already know what I think :)

   Posted by Tony Rosen  on  03/10/05  at  10:13 PM

10. I am a 56 year old single woman...never married. I am a bit disturbed over this subject, too. Now, in my earlier years I lived with my boyfreind and that definately was sin. I am not the greatest at relationships...why?  I don’t really know.  Maybe I am a slow learner and this is God’s way of teaching me how to have a relationship with Him before I can have a real relationship with the opposite sex or anyone for that matter.

    President Mohler has a website(http://www.albertmohler.com/) and you can contact him via e-mail.  Maybe we should confront him about this. Call him on scripture to back up his opinion.

    My personal belief is that there are those that are called to be single, and yes, I believe that celibacy must be a part of that calling.

    Posted by  on  03/11/05  at  09:11 AM

11. Tony, yeah, I know what you think.

    Sandi, I’m happy enough with my post as riposte. I think Mohler has taken some heat as a result of the CT article. If you read the links to his message, he argues his case pretty well. I happen to disagree with him.

    Posted by  on  03/11/05  at  09:28 AM

12. Good post, I’m glad someone has the assertiveness to address this lurking overtone.  Don’t rush things until you are sure, I’ve seen too many relationships fall apart within the first year to want to rush into something like that.

    Posted by  on  03/12/05  at  07:48 PM

13. Fred, thanks for commenting and your kind words.

    Posted by  on  03/13/05  at  01:59 PM

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