How Shannon Harris Kissed Biblical Womanhood Goodbye

(RNS) — When Shannon Harris stumbled into a conservative evangelical church and a marriage to Josh Harris (of “I Kissed Dating Goodbye” fame) in her early 20s, she didn’t realize what she’d signed up for.

As the wife of a bestselling Christian author, purity culture celebrity and heir to the hugely successful Covenant Life Church, Harris had unknowingly agreed to a role that came with a set of expectations for women that, she said, included a lifetime of performance and perfectionism. Her dream of becoming a full-time musician? Impractical. Her maternity dress? Too revealing. Her posture in worship? Too subdued. Her prenatal yoga video? Too Buddhist.

A lot has changed since Harris was married in 1998. In 2018, Josh Harris disavowed and apologized for the harm caused by “I Kissed Dating Goodbye,” and a year later he announced his departure from Christianity and the end of their marriage. For decades, Shannon Harris tried to stuff her beliefs, personality, passions and body into the prescribed “good Christian wife” blueprint—but could never quite reach the idealized standard.

“I did not understand that in my husband’s mind marrying a woman was something like checking a box on a to-do list…I do not think he fully understood he was marrying a woman with needs of her own,” Harris wrote about her marriage in her forthcoming memoir. “But this is what he was taught in his family and his church.”

Now, beyond the confines of her marriage and her church, Harris is embracing her whole self. Religion News Service spoke to Harris about “The Woman They Wanted: Shattering the Illusion of the Good Christian Wife,” which will be published by Broadleaf Books on Tuesday (Aug. 29). This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

How did you come to write this book? And why now?

I was raised in a secular home, and when I graduated college I joined a conservative evangelical church in the Washington, D.C., area. That is where I stayed for the next almost two decades of my life. The book is an attempt to tell my story of that time. Every single part of my life was consumed and directed by the church. I liken myself to Alice in Wonderland; I think I’m just going to peek my head in and see what the church is all about, and then suddenly I tumble headlong into this other world, a place where things seem really amazing, but they also don’t always make sense. I’m told who to be, and who to become. I get married and I have a family, and then it all starts to crumble. The remainder of the book is me trying to make sense of things until I’m finally back home in myself. The answer to “why now” is: This is the length of time it took me to have those experiences, deal with the fallout and to heal.

When you first began attending church as a young adult, what about it appealed to you?

It was wonderful at first, and I didn’t feel judged at first. There was a lot of what I call love bombing, but it was genuine. The church attracted wonderful, caring, vibrant people. I got involved with the music really early. I had not been there more than a year when I was getting my first opportunity to get to a recording studio. That actually was what I wanted to do with my life. So I thought, “Oh my gosh, this is amazing. I’m learning how to record!” That felt really good for a few minutes.

What kind of harmful theology did you encounter at the church?

My church and their brand of churches interpreted the creation story very literally. God created Adam, and then Eve. Women are second. God created Eve from Adam’s rib, so she’s not her own person. She’s been made from a piece of Adam. God gives Eve the job of Adam’s helper. She didn’t have her own purpose. And then, Eve is curious. She listens to the serpent and she trusts herself, and she becomes wise, and that’s seen as bad. She gets punished for her wisdom.

This theology puts a man in a higher place in the hierarchy. And it’s a male operating system. It’s run so men can succeed. So when I walked into my church, I learned my wisdom was faulty. My emotions and feelings are not to be trusted, and they’re not really true. On top of that, you have women being shamed for their bodies or their sexualities, constantly having to cover up to avoid tempting a man. All of these things together can damage a woman’s attunement to her body. What makes it so dangerous is that her alarm systems can be silenced and/or dismissed.

How did your courtship with Josh stop being about the two of you?

The moment my courtship started with Josh, it really did stop being about our relationship. It became about appearances. It became about getting purity right, because Josh had written this book on purity. It became about what C.J. and Carolyn (Mahaney), our pastor and his wife, needed it to be for the church. It became about making sure Josh did not, quote unquote, “fall” in any way physically. It was not about getting to know each other or exploring the relationship.