Immaculate

by Anna McGahan

‘There are some people in the church community who see marriage as the outward manifestation of your faith, you know? So if you’re getting married, you’re kind of climbing the ladder to heaven. If you’re married with kids, you’re even closer. If you’re single, God must be working on your character. If you’re infertile, you’re having trust issues. If you have marriage problems … well, someone’s living in sin, because the covenant is your salvation. Even if staying feels like self-betrayal or abuse, it’s the most important thing. Leave your spouse and you might as well have left God. And once you’ve exited the institution of marriage – which is the bedrock of the church’s survival, because if you can’t control people with sex you can’t control them at all – once you’ve left the system, you just don’t fit into its trajectories anymore. You’ve done the forbidden thing, the unforgivable sin. You’ve eaten the apple. You know too much.’