The church broke my heart... again

I don’t even know where to start with this post or what group to post it in...

I was raised Baptist in my family. I grew up going to church, Sunday school, VBS, mission work in our small town. I only went to one church, except when i got older but I’ll explain that further on...

Growing up my family was very busy. We often didnt make it to Sunday school. The Sunday school teachers would always embarrass me and have me attempt to read all the books of the Bible in order from memory, and if i managed that then they’d tell me to do it in alphabetical order. Sometimes they’d even take little starts from our star chart off of my name bc i missed a Sunday. Just really trying to embarrass me. Mind you i wasn’t older than 10.

My parents knew of this and once it really started to affect me they stopped forcing me to go and i would attend “big church” with them. I went a few years without going and i finally started going again in highschool. That was my “emo phase” as most girls go thru 🙄😬😩. I wore rock shirts to youth fellowship and i wore dark makeup and the youth group leader basically asked my mom to not let me come anymore because i was not living the Christian way by my makeup and shirts... so that was another slap in the face. And i went to another church youth group for over a year and loved it then left town and went to college.

Well I’m back to my hometown now, engaged to the love of my life who happens to be catholic and not Baptist. I’m 5 months pregnant (22) and we decided we wanted to get married before the baby comes but i wanted to be married in the church i grew up in even if i didn’t have the best memories there. There is a new pastor now that is a “sitting pastor” basically someone to preach and fill in until they find the official pastor.

I went to go see if a date was available To use the church. Mind you i didn’t even want to use the pastor of the church, bc i didn’t know him. And I’d use someone else. Any member of the church can use the church for a ceremony and it doesn’t have to be held by the pastor. Nevertheless the pastor wanted to visit with us knowing we weren’t even going to use him anyways and planned on telling him that at the meeting, again.

We had our appointment today and it ended with him saying he has “reservations” about marrying us because we do not uphold the highest standards of godliness bc we live together and I’m pregnant and not married, And also because my fiancé is catholic (not practicing tho). I even explained to him that our child would be raised to know the love of Christ but that wasn’t enough.

He said i could have the date to use the church but he would not officiate the wedding. I didn’t want to use him anyways, but to hear that i don’t hold a standard to his liking about my relationship with god and my fiancé’s just really broke my heart, especially when i has just met him. It just feels like once again I’m getting my hand slapped from the church for being less than perfect... when the church should be open arms to all.

Once i got out of the office i cried all the way to the courthouse to get our marriage license. My fiancé said we can get married anywhere and we’re doing this bc we love each other, but my heart is broken that once again i get judged by my home church.