Am I Going to Hell?

Do you have what it takes to get thrown out of a church?? Are you bad ass enough to be told that you're a negative influence on a congregation?? Have you ever been kicked out of a House of God by the Pastor himself??

I have! That's right, 5 years ago this Screaming Meanie was thrown out of a church and asked not to come back!

I know what you're thinking. "JC! What did you do?!??".

Was I dealing drugs?? Heckling the Pastor?? Questioning the Good Book?? Mocking Jesus?? Or did I turn the Pastor's wife into a Screaming Moanie??

Mwuahahahahahahah!

No, I'm afraid it was nothing quite so sinister. In fact, it was such an everyday event that it's almost unfathomable that it was an issue for the church. Are you ready for this? Folks, I was tossed from a church for - *GASP* - dating!!

Huh?!?? Yeah, I didn't get it either. It's not like I was dating a man.

*sigh*

I will explain.

5 years ago, the future Mrs. Meanie and I began our whirlwind romance. However, at the time that our courtship began, we were both still married to other people!!! Mon dieu! Well, according to the "church" we were still married, according to big brother, we were happily seperated from our respective spouses - and had been for over a year!

My ex-wife and I had called it quits the year before, and she wasted no time moving on. The day after I moved out she posted an ad on a dating site! The future Mrs. Meanie's ex-husband left her for, ahem, an ugly woman! That's no joke, I couldn't make that up folks.

The trouble with the church started when one of the busybody neighbours (who was a member of the same church we were) noticed that I had slept over at the future Mrs. Meanie's house (how bad are we?!??). Being the good Christian that she is, the neighbour ran to the Pastor to tell him what we had done!

And so the intervention began.

The Pastor had arranged to have a few of the men in the church meet with me to try to make me see the error of my ways. We met individually for coffee, and as a group - after a series of meetings over a few days, I almost felt dirty for falling in love with a woman. Almost.

Of course the women did the same thing with the future Mrs. Meanie.

They tried their best to make us feel guilty for "cheating" on our spouses. It didn't matter that we were both legally seperated, because in the eyes of the church we were committing adultery because God doesn't reckognize seperations. He doesn't??

Now, you have to understand that this whole church thang was still very new to both of us. Neither of us grew up going to church. In fact, I was 18 before I realized that "Jesus Christ" was a real dude and not just something your parents say when the cable bill comes in!

So then how was I supposed to know that it was "God's plan" for us to reconcile with our spouses?? Far be it for me to question (or worse - anger) the big guy upstairs, but surely he knew my ex-wife. So how could that be his plan for me?? Didn't he like me??? Didn't he want me to be happy?? Or was this one his tests that I heard so much about?? You know what I'm talking about right?? Your house is ripped apart by a tornado on the same day you lose your job and find out your Mother has passed away - but it's not a bad thing - it's just God's way of "testing" you to see if you will continue to follow him.

But I digress....

It was unimportant to the church that both of our ex's had moved on or that the future Mrs. Meanie and I had ZERO interest in patching up our marriages, the good Christians tried and tried and tried to get us to stay with The Lord and put our relationship on hold.

But there were two things working against that, a) we were madly in love and b) we had both been single for over a year and had rediscovered the joy of physical contact (I'll let you make your own conclusions).

So, the church called in the big gun - The Pastor himself!

He came to the house to Biblethump us. He didn't want to lose two of his sheep. Two of his rising stars. Two of his future leaders in the church. Two people who were regularly tithing. Oh, did I say that out loud??

Armed with scripture, he blasted us with reasons why our relationship couldn't continue. Then he started on me with his "if you were a man" nonesense. If I was a man I would be strong enough to dump the future Mrs. Meanie. If I was a man I would be able to reckognize that she wasn't strong enough to do it herself. If I was a man I would be able to see that by prolonging the relationship I was risking her eternal damnation.

If I was a man.

If I was a man??

Cue the slow burn.

I was raised to respect people in a position of authority, but I was beginnig to lose my good senses. I politely explained to the greedy well meaning Pastor that we had no intention of ending our relationship.

He then told us that we were a bad influence within the congregation and that they couldn't condone what we were doing. He said that if we insisted defying God's will, that he was going to have to ask us to stay away from the church.

Gak! The future Mrs. Meanie and I had just been thrown out of a church!! So what were we to do?? Well, I decided to "be a man" and I threw the Pastor out of the house!!

My question is, what would happen if we were to ever go back to church?? Would we spontaneously combust and be cast into the depths of hell the minute we set foot in there?? Well, the future Mrs. Meanie and I have decided not to risk it and have therefore just avoided the hallowed grounds altogether.

So far it seems to be working for us.