My friend, a single lady, would like to know where all the single unmarried Godly men are, because she’s been doing church for years but never matched with any.
Turns out, all the singles are out clubbing on Saturday night and too hang-overed on Sunday morning to make it to the House of Yahweh.
Also, why are walevis so generous towards each other: Strangers meet, buy each other beers, forge friendships, make sure each gets home safe…but churchgoers wind up their tinted windows as they drive past fellow congregants leaving them suffocating in a crowd of dust, never talk to each other, never offer each other lifts, ever so wary and so damn selfish?
The rate at which their numbers are dwindling is alarming, don’t you think? Walk into any church and you’ll notice the crowds are made of two main groups; the parents, and the children. Rarely will you ever see an elderly person or, a young adult. Why?
It is the insanity that’s bred every single Sunday, pastors’ guilting and coercing congregants into giving. A ‘posh’ church along Mombasa Road parades hefty givers to the front and celebrates their generosity while the ‘mean’ are condemned for their un-celebratory packages that aren’t pleasing at the God’s alter. Ohh, and did you hear that they banned that Catholic song; “Tolea Mungu wako ee sadaka, usiidharau hata kama ni kidogo…”
In 2020, when Covid hit hard, and everything shut, my job did too, and so did my partner’s. It got so bad that we barely had any food in the house and asking for help from family and/or friends was out of question for many were in a worse state. I remembered how we’d always taken food donations to our local church and it’d be distributed during community outreach programs. Can you believe after an hour or so of desperate begging, they only gave me one unga, and said that there were no church records indicating that I was a member of that church?
I was the IT girl. Is that an acceptable Christian-like term? I called, or rather used to think that of myself because that’s how my church made me feel. Young, beautiful, successful, single, in the choir, and a mentor for the youth. That was until I got a bun cooking in my ‘saintly’ oven and everyone could tell that I was no Virgin Mary. I Got Banished! I could no longer interact with the youth, sing in the choir or sit at the front. The elders made it clear I had to always sit at the back, retake all the classes like a new church member would, and wouldn’t get my baby dedicated or baptized unless I got me a husband.
Some other lady broke the shackles off her marriage and the church was furious. Marriage is for a lifetime, they said. God Hates Divorce. Once you divorce you can never remarry for that would be considered infidelity. Have you tried counseling? Imagine how wonderful it would be to reconcile and have the church witness your Vow Renewal? God Demands we Forgive 77X7 times. How many times have you forgiven him? Divorced women can’t be in the Mother’s Union. The mission school too can’t admit pupils from broken families.
At 25, I felt like I no longer belonged. All through my younger years, there were all these specialty church programs for kids my age but once you become an adult, they send you all into this crowd of adults where you either roll in with the Women’s Guild or Men’s Ministry crowd. At the time I desperately needed to be with my kind of people and not abandoned into a cage where I’m suddenly supposed to feel at home at and chill with my parents and grandparents. By then, most of the guys I grew up with had left the church and I didn’t want the same for myself so I raised the issue. The elders said we could create a Bible Study to cater for whatever was missing.
Shortly after retirement, my dad fell ill. Of course he got better later on, but not better enough to walk up and down the many stairs to the main church hall. Church seats further deemed too uncomfortable for his not so healthy body. He could neither get the elders to give him a more convenient parking spot nor tone down on the amplified sound systems that had become both a health concern and nuisance to his ears. His predicament got me thinking about all those people who are handicapped, temporarily or permanently. Guys using crutches, wheelchairs, the blind, the deaf…the church has no place for them.
“I don’t want that thing on my face.” I always want to scream out loud. Why is every church so keen on content creation and documenting everything? Why can’t you let worshippers worship and be intimate with their God without being zoomed in onto the screens? I don’t know about you but I’m more comfortable in a setting that lets me be one of the sheep, away from the public eye. Focusing on congregants is both distracting and gives pressure for people to be camera ready lest they embarrass the church.
As for the churches that have dress codes, c’mon… You mean a lady can’t wear pants to church, or a short dress, a sleeveless blouse, has to cover her hair, no jewelry, lipstick too? How outrageous! We also have to wear matching uniforms to church? Food too? The church chooses what foods we can and can’t eat! Are you sure that’s a church? Sounds more like a cult.
…so, I think I’m gonna ditch church for now, nothing permanent, it’s just a hiatus, but I’m gonna be back, I promise, once I get married and start filling the earth. Of course I’ll need them to grow up in an environment that’s instils good Christian values, so I’ll definitely be back. Until then, adios.
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