To find this wedding / relationship worrying

[Tenlittlemonkeys]

My brother in law is getting married next month to a woman who is 19 years his junior.

I find brother in law quite an odd character. He grew up in a non-religious family and had “troubled” teenage years. He eventually got expelled from his pretty illustrious private school and left home at 16 without even getting any GCSEs.

He somehow got introduced to a Pentecostal church and has now, 20 years later, become an ordained pastor in this church. It is very conservative in its views I.e. abortion is bad, homosexuality is bad, sex before marriage is a sin. When we went to my BIL’s ordination, I found it quite creepy as all those being ordained seemed to have been “broken” and then been healed by the church. Most of them had stories of alcohol abuse, substance abuse, terrible childhoods, messy divorces, histories of depression etc.

BIL’s fiancée is from overseas and came over here for a semester studying. She is still at university. I think she comes from quite a religious family and she ended up going to BIL’s church while she was in the UK.

Since her return to her home country, she and my BIL see each other every few weeks. Obviously, due to religions beliefs, they have to stay in different rooms / places. They got engaged after a year and will have been together for 2 years by the time they are married.

She is a sweet girl, but very naive. She has such limited life experience. She is 21 (BIL is 39), but even for a 21 year old has had a very sheltered life. The only time she had lived away from her parents is during the semester she spent in the UK. After she gets married she will have to return back home for a year to finish her studies.

I just find their relationship odd and wonder whether she finds the attention of a much older man (in a position of authority) flattering. I find my BIL misogynistic and he has said that after she has finished her studies she will come to the UK so they can start their family (he is expecting 3/4 children).

I worry that my BIL and his fiancée don’t really know each other that well and that, in 10 years time, she will start to feel that she has missed out on so many experiences of being a young adult. Of course, it’s not really my business, but if I were her parents I would have serious concerns.

I understand your concerns but there is nothing you can do if her own parents aren't speaking to her about it, or maybe they are and she has her mind made up.
All you can do is offer a hand of friendship when she moves over so if she struggles she has someone to turn to.

It's nice that she has someone in the family who will look out for her. Her story isn't an uncommon one, in that a young woman from a sheltered, religious background marries an older misogynistic religious man. It must be a contiontioning thing.

An ex-colleague of mine was a member of one of these churches, her DH was a pastor. They were delighted that their young daughter was proposed to by an older member of the church who was a widow with four children. They married and soon had another child but it became clear that the new wife was wanted as a minder for all the children. The husband continued seeing other women and treated her like the nanny. She, and her parents, felt shamed into carrying on as if everything was rosy.

Well either way it's not good. Either she'll become aware that there's something wrong with a 37 and 19 year old (as they were at the beginning) and she's missed out on a lot, or she'll never know because she's been groomed/conditioned into believing her place is supporting the man that God brought into her life.

I think the only thing you can do is stay close to her but never criticise the BIL, unless there's something he does in front of you that's outrageous, and then be gentle with how you criticise.

I'd have a problem with any 37 year old who started dating a 19 year old, regardless of whether they were sleeping in separate bedrooms or not. That in itself is a signal there's a problem. If he really loved her, he'd want her to have a life and experiences first. What he wants in this specific situation is to be her first.

These churches were formed specifically to to corral and control breeding rights to women imo.

It's a shit situation for her to be in, your BIl sounds awful, but I don't really know what you can do about it.

This is good advice and realistically the only thing you can do.

As PP say, there's not a to you can do. It's a shame, as faith can bring a lot to your life, and this sounds more like indoctrination/control.
My MIL is a priest (ordained later in life after a 30 year career elsewhere). She's been divorced, remarried, wears sparkly shoes, drives a sports car, drinks wine in moderation, and is very much a normal person. Gay people attend her church and are made welcome, as are single parents, couples who live together who aren't married etc. She never judges or tells people what to do and is probably one of the kindest people I know.