How the Black Church Destroyed My Marriage and My Life
Ms Cooper, I read your article about the Black church and I couldn’t agree with you more. The following is a true account of my experience with the church and a valuable lesson that I learned.
I met a woman whom when we met I informed her that I was not a church going man. I’d tried it before..it wasn’t for me… my path was different.
She had just come from a relationship of living with a man for 20 years when she wasn’t going to church that would not marry her, even though she had 3 children by him. She left him, because he wouldn’t go to church with her, because she wanted to “stop living in sin”, and because she wanted to get married once she joined a church.
She got heavily into church before she met me. Somehow we dated, were engaged, and got married. I never promised her that I would spend the rest of my life going to church with her, I honestly tried to go with her the best I could.
I tried but once again, I had way too many questions about religion no one would or could answer. I couldn’t fake..what I thought my path should be toward my path toward The Creator Of All Things, I had already told her that my path was different.
A mutual “best friend” posed this question to me over lunch: “Do you think that she really would’ve married you if you weren’t going to church with her?” I told this “alleged” mutual friend the following reply: “That’s a real messed up thing to ask me about my wife, but I’ll tell you what, there isn’t but one way to find out.”
I was already having issues of hypocrisy out of my newlywed wife, as in what she said was one thing, but her actions very often reflected the opposite. That’s why I stopped going to church with her. So I decided the inevitable would be better done sooner than later to stop trying to be someone I know that I am not. (Not a bad person..always did my best to be a righteous man..just not a religious one.)
I believe in “The Creator of All Things”, yes; but organized religion? No.
She had an absolute fit about me not going to church with her. Three months later she wrote me a letter and said she was leaving me. Now watch what that one decision revealed to me about “what” I was actually married to.
1) She was feeding the homeless, but absolutely hated cooking dinner at home for her family.
2) Was going to clean the Pastor’s house all the time, but had stopped helping to clean our home. (Pastor has a wife and enough money to hire a maid. I told him I had a problem with my wife going to clean his house and not our own and I’d appreciate it if he would ask her to leave when she would show up out there again. That Pastor never did that to my knowledge, knowing how I felt about it.)
3) She would go anywhere and do anything for the church, yet would hardly do anything at all that I would suggest.
4) She would be in church giving testimony telling the entire church how thankful she was that God had sent her a wonderful man of God that is now her husband (me), a man that does not fight with her, but resolves issues with a peace and love and understanding that humbles her even when she wants to argue with me. After church? She would get home get out of the car and not even speak to me.
5) She had claimed that she wanted a man to be her “head’, her “covering”, and she knew that “The Lord Jesus” would never allow her to mistreat me, because he would convict her of her actions. Yet, after we got married she never, ever (99.8% of the time) ever listened to anything, or any advice she would ask me for that I would suggest.
Those were just some of the issues I had concerns about, and why I stopped going. Now from this point? This very same “Christian Woman” did the following in response to me not going to church with her any longer:
1) Stopped paying her portions of the bills for three months until she moved out, never said a word to me at all for I trusted her to take care of that part of our household expenses. I had the bigger portions. So when she left 3 months after I stopped going to church with her all of my utilities were behind and about to get cut off, and she never said a word and hid all of the mail.
2) She took the stove, the microwave, a big freezer full of food, and threw all of the food away from a house we lived in with me and my 3 sons. She left me with no means to feed my family.
3) She literally took everything out of the house that she could, left my house looking like an empty warehouse.
4) Took our king sized bed left me sleeping on the floor, knowing that I am disabled and have a very bad back. She also took every gift she ever gave me she took as well.
5) Looked me in the face and lied to me as she stole money from me that I trusted to go to her account. She could have asked me for it, and I literally would have given it to her, there was no need to lie to my face and then steal it.
Two months after this we were still trying to work out our “differences” for I honestly thought that love, God would prevail so I chose to forgive her. She went off on me one day and said this to me:
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Category: Guest Posts, Society and Culture, The Black Church
The Black church was not founded by black people. It directives are not and have never been in the interest
of blackpeople-although were have been fooled into believing so. It has been continuelly throws in our faces
generation after generation and the same problems have prevailed in every generation. It is a failed policy
that no one wants to admit to. “The slave master never gives his slaves anything of value-only that which
the slave in subjugated physically or mentally,forever.”
This blackwomen is the result of false religious upbring and a lack of culture-both of which the slave master
promotes and supports.
See, this is why you don’t try to pretend to be someone you are not to try and get someone to love you. I’m not a religious person and never will be. If I were I would lean more on the Pagan side than anything else. But in the end I believe in myself. Religious people are just crazy and the most hate filled people you can encounter. I’m not saying it’s the guy’s fault for pretending, but because he wasn’t true to himself from the start he brought some nutty bible thumping freak into his life. I hope everything is going well for him now.
Interesting that this guy has no issues himself. Yet, he can diagnose, all by himself, that his ex-wife had mental illness. Of course, he is perfect. Riiiight.
MaryAliceMiller so what he went through is basically BS? something obviously was wrong with her so why make it seem like he did something to bring it on himself? god people like you piss me off. always want to blame the victim and act as if they’re crazy when you got it twisted.
@topaz627: WTF are you talking about? He needs to check HIMSELF. He CHOSE her. Step with that BS. OK?
MaryAliceMiller so basically he should have known she was going to act like that? how would you know? FYI you can’t. nobody acts like that when you get into a relationship, it pops out later. i doubt she was acting like that before he married her. and no I’m not gonna step make an REAL agruement. stop blaming him like you know the situation you’re on the outside looking in.
um no actually try to have a real argument besides the tired old”they chose them so they must’ve known they’d act like that so obviously they deserve it” crap used on abuse victims all the time. sure like everyone acts so obviously off when you date them. Even though at the least he should’ve checked to see if that is too much a deal-breaker for her, nobody expects someone to act that crazy and vengeful because they don’t go to church with you. If that doesn’t show psychological issues, what does?
topaz627 Yeah. And you know for a fact that hubby dear is a perfect angel with absolutely no faults of his own. Even though this post is from his side only. Riiiight. Get real.
MaryAliceMiller topaz627 From my anecdotal observations crazy usually gravitates towards crazy and they both feed off the other… That dude must have been getting something out of being with that woman, otherwise why would he continue to stay and be abused by her over and over? What was in it for him? Something about her, was fulfilling a ‘need’ in him because he put up with her for so long even though she was driving him crazy with her (according to his side of the story) mental issues.
MaryAliceMiller topaz627 the issue is you are so caught up on wh whether or not the guy was”innocent” which doesn’t matter. What matters is the fact you keep dismissing as if you’re opinion of the situation is be all end all. No sympathy, only deserving it right? So you’re saying if this was a girl, you’d say the exact same shit? This woman probably is crazy so what would hearing her side of the story prove excatly?
Razzy MaryAliceMiller topaz627 That I do agree. I’ve seen that play out in real life or he said some serious self-esteem issues.
topaz627 I wish I could block you. I don’t know why every two week you comment your foolishness. It is obvious that this man is only focused on the wife HE CHOSE without looking at the part he played in the situation. You are saying she is “probably” crazy based on what he said? Are you her psychiatrist? No. You don’t even know the woman, or the man complaining about her. Cut the crap. No one is perfect… including this self-righteous husband. Get a life, then you won’t have to focus on him or her.
@MaryAliceMiller funny thing is you say I’m obsessed yet keep commenting yourself. This is how it works on threads like this, it’s not stalking. I have a life, why don’t you learn how to handle someone disagreeing with you. last I checked you don’t know either of them too, so to claim how bad of a person he is based off of this story is ridiculous. The part he did play was ignoring the signs of a troubled individual and maybe self-esteem issues. She hid her behavior by being a saved christian girl so her craziness was dismissed. That’s common in the black community. Well if she isn’t crazy then what is the girl, normal? is that normal behavior to exhibit over not sharing the same devotion to going to church? Or to act that way towards your kids? Do you have an answer for that or are you gonna deflect some more?
topaz627 You really should get a life… or some therapy. You certainly need it.
MaryAliceMiller hah aha grow up. the one who needs professional help is the one who claims what you do. Since nobody’s perfect, by your rationalizations everyone deserves to be treated like shit and abused in a relationship. try harder please besides “you need a life or therapy.”
I’ve long come to the conclusion that the more a woman or man bible thumps, the more pious, devout he or she is, the more crazier they truly are. They are using religion as a crutch when they really should be seeking professional psychological therapy/counseling for their mental disturbance.
The black community has a long history of not recognizing mental illness and using religion as a bandage to treat it. Clergy men are not qualified therapist and you can’t pray/bible thump away your mental illness. Just as one would see a doctor for ailments that afflict the body, one should seek the proper trained medical people for ailments that afflict the mind and religion/preachers ‘ain’t the ones. If anything that just exacerbate an already mentally disturbed person’s issues.
Most people who are devoutly religion often times are hiding troubled lives, or have lived some messed up lives or they have issues best served by seeking the proper professional medical personnel.
Razzy Have a group on facebook called Touch My Heart Instead-Church Hurt, I welcome you to join…