Of Girlfriends, Church, and Breakups

A curious thing has remained somewhat consistent in my history of girlfriends, church and breakups. The combination of these 3 things can lead to some confusion and frustration, and in my case usually does.

Girlfriends

When dating, as a christian I prefer to date only for the intent of eventual marriage. While this often times puts too much unnecessary pressure on a relationship (something I do try hard to avoid) I believe it’s important to have a purpose to the relationship other than just having fun. When a relationship ends, the ‘idea’ is supposed to be that it was not a failure, but rather successful in discovering that this union was not meant for marriage.

Anyways, the reason I point out my purpose-driven dating is that it causes things to change somewhat in a relationship.  Knowing that marriage may be in the future causes you to (fortunately and unfortunately, depending on the case) approach things from a somewhat different level. One particular case that comes up, where to go to church.

Church

In the relationship that begins at a church that you both attend regularly things are totally fine, for now. If you both attend different churches though, things become a little more sticky. There will come a point in the relationship when you will want to be sharing church with each other. It’s a deep part of who you are and what you believe and care about, and you want to invite this person into that world with you and share that world together. If you both go to seperate churches that have services at the same time, this becomes a little more difficult as one of you will have to give up their service for this union to work.

In my past it seems that the girls I choose to date seem to have really great choice in churches. Like seriously good churches. But once you’ve plugged into this great church to share that with your girlfriend, there seems to be that unfortunate happening waiting around the corner.

Breakups

So, crap.

Here is where you’re placed between that great challenge of deciding between continuing to attend that awesome church and having to deal with the awkwardness of seeing your old girlfriend there (which gets especially awkward if you or her begin dating someone else), or abandoning the church and starting anew to find a new home church to plug into.

Previously I had chosen to stay with the church which I had grown to love and just deal with the awkwardness that came with seeing my “no-longer-my-girlfriend” every sunday. Which actually wasn’t that bad, until a month or so later when she began dating again.

Now I’m pressed up against that decision once again and I’m just not sure where I stand on it. This is all too oversimplified than what is really going on and what I’m working out in my head, but still stands valid. Due to other circumstances, I actually won’t have to make this choice for several weeks now, but I don’t know if I’ll be any better prepared to deal with it then than I am now.