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I’m not entirely sure who represents the nagging wife or the uninterested marriage partner. The church and her critics could equally fill those roles in your analogy.
Yep – and it’s important to recognize that.
We tend to identify with the spouse that most closely matches our view of the relationship at any given time – and it’s easy to forget that “the Church” can be any type of spouse for any particular person at any given time, especially since “the Church” can be so many different things to people.
The church has an awkward way of defining roles in marriage. Equal partners but the man is the head of the household. That in itself is confusing. The church is the patriarch in the relationship and the members are not. I also consider the church to be more like a domineering and controlling husband than an equal partner. A husband who has all the economic and power to influence thought in my relatives in the gospel such as other members. And at the same time withholds privileges if i don’t pay to contribute my own income…regardless of my circumstances. I have found it indifferent to legitimate needs I have and punitive I’d I display unorthodox behavior or beliefs borne if experience with the marriage. Really, the relationship is not best characterized as a marriage but as an organization-volunteer relationship. With strong cultural rewards and punishments for not following established norms of belief and behavior. Sent from my XT1080 using Tapatalk
There’s one unfortunate parallel. Sometimes the church is like a third party in a marriage. It takes sides or is used as a weapon against the other person in the marriage.
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