No 'Hooking Up' In Church...Woman Threatened With Arrest

[bloodrayne]

Woman Kicked Out Of Congregation As Part Of Church Discipline

Every religion has rules its members are supposed to live by, but how far would religious officials go to enforce those rules?

Knoxville, Tennessee - A woman found out when she got a letter from her church telling her not to come back on church property or risk arrest for criminal trespass.

Catrina Adams and her family joined Fellowship Evangelical Free Church on Middlebrook Pike in Knoxville in the mid-1990s. They enjoyed the active congregation.

"I was in, I think, every intercessory prayer group at invitation to be a part of those groups," says Adams of her involvement in the in the congregation.

She says she reached out to a single, divorced father at the church. Adams describes the relationship as a friendship, nothing more.

"We didn't even hold hands. We've never kissed; we never discussed; there was no flirting," says Adams of the relationship.

But the friendship started causing problems at church.

"My understanding was the relationship brought concern to people and they began talking. To be gut honest with you I think it was gossip," says Adams.

One of the pastors called Adams in for a meeting. She was told to stop seeing her friend.

"It's not right for somebody to try to dictate what I read, who's my friend or whether or not I'm permitted to do this or that," says Adams of the warning she received.

She kept spending time with her friend and church officials kept up the pressure. Several months later, in July of 2000, she got a letter from church officials telling her not to come back.

"I was terrified. I was seeing a friend behind the backs of everyone, and you'd think I was having an affair, but I wasn't," says Adams.

According to a letter sent to church members, Fellowship Church follows a discipline process laid out in the Bible. It involves a series of meetings between church leadership and the member in question about the alleged sin involved. If the member will not repent, he or she is asked to leave the church.

"I step foot on that property of that church, I risk incarceration," says Adams.

So she has stayed away. She says she has tried to work things out with the church in order to support her kids, who still go to Fellowship Church with her ex-husband, but so far she has not been successful.

Now, five years later, Adams wants others to learn from her experience. She says people need to think for themselves, avoid judging by appearances and learn to take responsibility for their actions.

"I don't think they had any idea how much control they had of our lives," says Adams.

Since then, Adams says she has changed, and now she is ready to move on.

We contacted Fellowship Evangelical Free Church for a comment on the way they handle church discipline, but they declined to be interviewed.

[mothermold]

.....baptists.:rolleyes:

[Despare]

I would've went and got a bible, walked in to the pastor's office and tossed it on the table. When the pastor looked down at it then back up at me I simply would have said: "Read it asshole." Then I would have left and if I wanted to go to church it certainly wouldn't have been that one.

On another note, wouldn't church be the best place to meet somebody *IF* you're looking for another Christian to be in a relationship with?