On Sitting in Church... Alone.

A few weeks ago, a podcast interviewer was asking me about some of the practical complexities and pastoral challenges that single Christians often face in churches today. When asked that question, I often mention that, for some single Christians, something as simple as where to sit in church can be deeply profound and deeply perplexing.  Walking into church alone, looking around and wondering where to sit, who to sit with, and how to feel like you belong can, for some, cause weekly anxiety. And then I typically volunteer that it is something I’ve personally struggled with.

But then, on that particular day, on that particular podcast I added something more. I said that it was something I had personally struggled with and that it is something I feel like I’m struggling with more and more, rather than less and less.

I didn’t know those words were going to come out of my mouth, but they did. And as soon as I said them, I realised that they were indeed true. I find the experience of walking into church alone every Sunday and looking around to see where I might sit increasingly difficult and sometimes even painful. I am becoming more nervous about it rather than less.

The podcast interviewer gently asked me, “Why? Why do you think that is the case?”. Their question was not intended to be a challenge but rather an attempt to understand my experience better and I was thankful they asked it. I can’t remember the exact answer I gave at that moment. But I’ve since found myself returning to their question over and over again.

As I grow in both age and spiritual maturity, why am I finding something as seemingly simple as where I sit in church on a Sunday to be increasingly profound, complex and even anxiety-producing?

In one sense, there is a straightforward answer to that question. You see, I’ve recently changed churches. This was occasioned by a house move I made to another part of Sydney about two years ago. At that time, I didn’t want to say goodbye to my church family, so I stayed. However, the distance was making it difficult for me to be involved and invested, not just in the structural ministries of my church but in the lives of my family there. And so, after much prayer, I made the difficult decision to change to a church that was not only closer to my home but many of whose members live in my immediate area.  I’ve been warmly welcomed at my new church and am very much enjoying getting to know people there. But I’m a newcomer. Walking solo into a place where you know very few people can heighten the whole “Where should I sit? Who should I sit with?” question.

But even as that is an undoubted factor in why I’m currently finding the experience more rather than less difficult, I knew it wasn’t the whole answer. You see, I had been feeling the same sense of anxiety at my old church. I knew and loved so many people in that church community. And yet, there was still an underlying sense of disquiet on most Sunday mornings. Each week, I’d walk in and think, “Ok. Should I sit in a pew by myself and hope that someone comes to join me?” all while knowing that if they didn’t (as was often the case), I’d be sitting alone for the next hour, feeling simultaneously conspicuous and invisible. Or I’d think, “Ok. Should I approach some people already sitting down and ask if I can join them?” all while bearing the weight of almost always feeling like the ‘needy one’ in this equation.  

So, I knew what was going on for me was pretty deep-seated. But I couldn’t put my finger on why it was becoming more, rather than less so. And I was puzzled about where this consistent disquiet had come from. It hadn’t characterised my experience of church for earlier portions of my adult life. So why now? When had it started, and why was it becoming a bigger and bigger thing for me?

That podcast interviewer’s gentle probing question wouldn’t leave my mind. I kept turning it over and over.

And then, it hit me.

Pull Up A Pew

I suddenly found my mind transported back to a Sunday morning at church a few years ago. I could see myself sitting in a pew, alone, with nobody next to me, nobody behind me, and nobody in front of me.

And I was weeping.

It was mid-2020. The first of the “Covid Years”.

In Sydney, we had an initial lockdown in early 2020, but then sometime around the middle of the year (maybe a bit earlier—it’s a blur!), that lockdown was lifted, and churches were able to meet again on Sundays. But there were still restrictions in place.

One of those restrictions was that the number of people that could meet in a room was dependent on the size of that room. The smaller the room, the fewer number of people could gather in it.  This meant that my church congregation could no longer meet all together because we had been meeting in what was a pretty small space, and we wouldn’t have all been allowed to attend under the restrictions. To cut a long story short, logistics required my congregation to divide up and attend one of two different church gatherings with others from a different congregation who met at a different (and larger) church building within our parish. Seemingly overnight, I lost the church family I had been a part of for years. It was nobody’s fault. It simply was what it was. But gee, it was hard.

But there was another restriction in place. Not only could only a certain number of people gather together at one time, but we needed to keep at least 1.5m between us and anybody else who wasn’t in our household. So, I was now attending a newly integrated congregation that was a mix of some people I knew and loved from my old church family, as well as some people I didn’t know. But I wasn’t able to sit with any of these people.

During those months, I would walk into church and sit in a pew by myself. The pew in front of me was roped off. The pew behind me was roped off. In theory, if I sat at one end of the pew, then another lone person could come and sit right down at the other end of the pew. But in reality, almost nobody did that.  For months, I sat alone in a pew, totally isolated, with nobody being allowed anywhere near me, watching family households walk into church and sit together week after week.

I spent most of those Sunday mornings either fighting back the tears or weeping silently. I have never felt as wretchedly alone as I did in church during those months.

I’m generally fine with being in my own company.  I live alone. I’m comfortable being alone. I’m very happy to go to movies or cafes or even restaurants alone. And so it wasn’t sitting alone, being alone, feeling alone itself, which was so difficult for me on those Sunday mornings. Rather, it was sitting alone, being alone, feeling alone in my church family.

It felt so wrong. And that’s because it was wrong.

Not wrong in a “it was wrong to obey government restrictions” sense. Not wrong in a “nobody should have asked that of you sense”. We were in the middle of a pandemic. People’s lives were at stake. Frankly, none of us really knew what we were doing or what we should be doing. The whole thing felt wrong!

No, I mean it was wrong in the sense that “if there is any place where a Christian should never feel so wretchedly alone, then surely that place is the gathering of the family of God. It was wrong in the sense of “this feels so awful because it is not what is meant to be”.

As I turned that podcaster’s question over and over in my mind, I realised that my increasing struggle with sitting alone at church all comes back to that experience of feeling—indeed, of being—so wretchedly alone in my church family for all those months. And the terrible reality of that aloneness was tangibly expressed in the reality of my sitting alone.

This is why the question of where to sit weighs so heavily on me now. This is why the prospect of sitting by myself, with nobody on either side of me in church, causes me anxiety, even in a time and place where (thank God) none of those restrictions still apply.

I have intimate experience with the wrongness of sitting alone, of feeling physically isolated, within the household of God.

I hated it then. And so I hate it now.
I grieved it then. And so I grieve it now.
It caused me distress then. And so it causes me distress now.

I’m not suggesting that my experience is descriptive of any other single Christian’s experience. I’m not saying others feel the way I do or ought to feel the way I do for the same reason I do. I’m not saying that every person should undergo a deep existential crisis at the thought of sitting alone at church (though, keep reading for more thoughts on that).

I’m just saying that no member of God’s family (single or otherwise) should feel that the place where they most belong is also the place where, sometimes, they feel most alone. None of us should be OK with that.

The ultimate issue is not where singles (or indeed married Christians) sit in church but whether their experience of relational belonging within that church congregation reflects the truth that this place, these people, are truly their family.  

Where to Place Your Butt & Other Things That Matter

So, what do we do all this?

Well, first, I want to say a word to my fellow singles. And also to those married Christians who attend church without their spouse.

If you time your weekly arrival at church perfectly so as to make it easier to walk into the building alone, if you go through the whole rigmarole of where to sit each week, if you dread the moment right at the end of the service when suddenly the pressure is on to find someone to talk to (made harder in a context where all the parents immediately rush out the door to pick their kids up from their program), then I get it. I truly do.  

I am intimately familiar with feeling both incredibly conspicuous and absolutely invisible all at the same time. Brothers and sisters, if it feels wrong (and it should feel wrong) that is because it is wrong.

And so, the challenge for us is to allow that truth to embolden us.

• We need to pray for the spiritual courage needed to put ourselves out there relationally, to not simply sit—or hide—in our (metaphorical and literal) corner.

• We need to ask the Spirit for bravery in initiating “the ask” and for boldness in letting our church family members know how they can love us.

• We need to ask God to grow in us a nagging sense of discontent and dissatisfaction with feeling alone while we sit in the midst of family.

• And we certainly need to ask him to rebuke any sense in which we might clutch onto those feelings of aloneness in order to harbour or legitimate feelings of resentment and bitterness towards those who have left us alone.

We need to ask, “Hey, can I sit here with you?”.
We need to ask, “Hey, why don’t you sit here with me?”.  

I’m going to be praying God gives me the courage to do both of these things more and more in the weeks and months to come.

For my married readers, can I invite you to look around and see those sitting alone in your church gathering? Can I invite you to notice those who arrive at church alone each Sunday? Can I invite you to observe those who, immediately following church, look anxious, lost, or ready to rush straight out the door?

And then, can I invite you to think about what small things you could do to help those brothers and sisters feel like they belong to your church and, indeed, to you?

• Perhaps it might mean asking a single friend if you can pick them up on your way to church some Sundays.

• Perhaps it might mean making a real effort to get to church ten minutes early so that you are in a position to invite someone arriving alone to come and sit with you and your family.

• Perhaps it might mean approaching someone sitting alone to say that you and your family would love to worship next to them.

• Perhaps it might mean not always sitting together in a family unit at church, in order to demonstrate the truth that in that place, amongst those people, you all equally belong to one new household… together.

• Perhaps it might mean making a bee-line to the person who is sitting by themselves right after church so they don’t feel the immediate need to run for the door.

• Perhaps it might mean inviting that person to walk and talk with you as you go to rescue the long-suffering kids’ program leaders from your little ones.

• Perhaps it might mean alternating weeks with your spouse regarding who is on “kid duty” after church so that one of you is always free to seek out conversations with people who seem a little lonely or lost.

• Perhaps it might mean all of these things or other things entirely.

At a family gathering, no family member should even be left alone. At a family gathering, no family member should ever seek to be left alone.

Those of us who belong to Christ belong to each other. We are his family. How might we express that wonderful, confronting, glorious truth, even through something as simple as where we choose to place our butts on a Sunday?