Seven years ago, while in my third year of seminary and approaching my late twenties, the reality of singleness and the female pastorate dawned on me. The anecdotal evidence around me indicates that Presbyterian women, who are single at the time of ordination, often remain unmarried. If they do get married, it is well after their first few years of ministry.
     Putting aside unpacking the questions of why single female pastors can typically remain single, I simply had one question in my last year of seminary: Why, in all the previous years of preparation for ministry, had there been no invitation to consider that my vocational path might mean I would remain an unmarried adult?
     To the best of my knowledge, there is a lack of denominational resources that explore the demographic of living faithfully into one’s pastoral call as a single female. Or materials that support single candidates for ministry to process the impact of career choices on their dating life. In an ad hoc way, I simply hobbled through creating such resources for myself.
     That third year of seminary, though wishing I had been warned about singleness, I internally accepted the likelihood of being unmarried with pursuing ordination. God had clearly called me to the Ministry of Word and Sacrament, as affirmed through the preparation for ministry process. This call is one I longed to keep following with all my heart, even at the cost of a dream for typical family life.
Gushing about the groom
Now, three years after my ordination, I am unexpectedly getting married to a man far more wonderful than I could have asked for or imagined. I have become an outlier among my anecdotal statistics.
     We met as a part of my involvement with presbymergent, when I was on a several-week visit to a seed gathering for a potential New Church Development in Cascades Presbytery, Oregon. At the group’s weekly gathering for a meal, Bible discussion and prayer, Dave’s emotional and intellectual intelligence really made him stand out to me. But what made me swoon, Presbyterian polity geek that I am, was when I stopped by for a brief visit at the NCD’s weekly committee meeting and saw him there.
     He found his way to the NCD group during his one-year stay in the area as an Americorps volunteer, through getting connected with the nearby First Church. But it had been at Bidwell Church in Chico, Calif., while a part of their outreach to college students at California State University Chico, that he came to vibrant Christian faith. The community at Bidwell had a profound shaping impact on his understanding of love and grace, resulting in a man very excited to be a pastor’s husband.
     This historical downtown church has been an extreme outlier of Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) church attendance/membership numbers, growing from a flat line of worship attendance of 200 or less fifteen years ago, to now more than 800 in worship and 2,000 enrolled in Christian Education. Though effective know-how is often scant for turning around historic tall steeple churches where the building remains large but the worshipping community is small, Bidwell has accomplished it! The Church of the Last Stop tells Bidwell’s story; see (PPCbooks.com).
     Sometimes female PC(USA) pastors, with their twenties behind them, do meet and marry incredible men. Sometimes PC(USA) churches, with decades long membership declines, do revitalize towards spiritual formation, authentic relationships, and missional engagement. They are outliers encouraging us all towards what can be possible, as we follow God’s lead.
