Interfaith couples tell how they navigate church and relationships

WHEN entering relationships, it’s always advised that there is commonality in beliefs, values and practices. Usually among the most important of these are religion and spiritual beliefs — ensuring that you and your partner are for the most part “equally yoked”. For Christians, this discussion often extends to whether or not marrying someone from a different denomination means you’re “unequally yoked” since there is likely to be slight doctrinal differences.

All Woman spoke to some inter-denominational couples to see just how their relationships fare when it comes to denominational differences.

Norman Whyte and Susan Gordon-Whyte, married:

Despite the different denominations — he is Church of Christ and I am Nazarene — he has a spiritual connection to God that allows him not to be a puppet of his denomination and its church rules. The common understanding we have is that we believe in the Trinity and that Jesus died for our sins. The only difference we have is in tithing. He was taught ‘to give as the Lord prospers you’, one-tenth or not, while I was taught to give one-tenth of earnings.

Ornecia Williams and Sharome Blackstock, engaged:

In the initial stages it didn’t matter due to similarity in doctrines. However, as we drew nearer to marriage, the issue became more prominent as we needed to decide where to go to church. We have always been against the idea of going to separate churches on a Sunday. After many discussions and reflections, weighing everything, we decided that we would attend the same church/denomination. This has not shifted our love and respect for each other or our decision to get married. One of the things that played a major role in our decision was our family and how they felt about us changing denominations. For my family it was an extremely big deal because my father has been a pastor in the New Testament Church of God for over 30 years. That’s where I was born and bred. I have been serving that denomination all my life. The idea of switching was hard for me and my family to deal with. However, his family was not as hung up on the idea as my family was because they were used to him going to different denominations, especially when he was attending school. He is a member of the Church of God in Jamaica. They understood and were more accepting of his moving about, so when both of our families had that discussion they were more accepting of him moving. We had that discussion for ourselves and after weighing our options and putting things in perspective, we decided to stay at the New Testament Church of God. Of course he would occasionally visit his other church but our mainstay would be New Testament Church of God.

Oneil and Mellissa Hall, married:

We’re from Church of God in Jamaica and New Testament Church of God. Our faiths or doctrine for the most part is similar except on the issue of end times. It’s not something we discuss, however; the second coming of Christ will be and we both just want to know that we are with Jesus when he returns. Our challenge is mainly about which church we attend. We are both deeply involved in our respective churches and there is the expectation that once married the wife should follow her husband. We’ve been married almost two years now and I have not met that expectation and he doesn’t mind. Reason, when we attend each other’s church we feel lost and stagnant. We’re not used to just sitting and participating like regular congregants. There is always something we feel we need to do, so we feel lost. His church needs more manpower as there are very few men, so it’s harder for him to compromise and attend my church. But on special occasions, certain church functions, or just when convenient, we do once in a while attend the other’s church. The only other thing that may be of concern is where we will attend church when we have children. We haven’t decided yet, we just keep saying that when that bridge comes we’ll cross it.

Khalid and Shadelle Lawrence, married:

Khalid and I met and were drawn to each other because of the commonality of love for music. That was the first similarity we identified and we were certainly thrilled. Already, we had confirmed one of the two major things we looked for in life-long partners — the love for music and the love for God. Within the first week we met, we both shared our love for and commitment to God — jackpot! Within the first few weeks we continued talking about our values and beliefs. Khalid is a member of the New Testament Church of God (grew up in the Anglican church) and my membership is at the Church of the Nazarene. We visited each other’s place of worship and realised there weren’t many differences. Just before we got engaged, however, we hadn’t decided which church we would settle at — I knew he loved my church though. Today, we remain members of our original churches, but we also visit each other’s church from time to time and even our friends’. We see ourselves as not just members of whichever church, but as servants of Christ. We believe in the Bible and that matters most. We see the need to be growing with a specific congregation, but more importantly to go wherever we are needed and where God wants us to be.