Was I supposed to acknowledge her?

[Fourthtwin]

Help me understand something and please tell me if I'm wrong here. My wife and I are in our early 50s. I'm 54, she's 53. We have been together some 20+ years. We are very active in our church, well at least I am. I'm a deacon and on several different auxiliaries and things so I pretty much stay very busy while service is going on. My wife doesn't really do much but she is on one auxiliary. They usually only meet ever few months or so when something needs to be planned. I'm on the same auxiliary as well.

Again, we've been together some 20 years. We went to bed together Sat night. Woke up together Sun morning. Got dressed together and rode to church together. Even sat together for 2 hours, shoulder to shoulder. Talked from the time we woke up till the time service was over and I had some duties I had to do. I was recently elevated to vice chair of the deacon's board so I now have more on my plate. One thing I do is assist the finance woman with making sure the offering is collected and to make sure she gets to the finance room safely. Me and a few other guys are equipped with radios with earpieces to stay in contact with each other for security reasons and things like that. After service me and the woman were on our way to the finance room and just so happen my wife was coming up the other end of the hallway. Me and this woman were discussing her mother who had just passed a few weeks earlier. My wife and I took a road trip to the funeral for support. Anyway when I / we passed my wife we were still talking so we just kept on going while my wife walked in the opposite direction. Once all my duties were done and the church was secure the wife and I left. We rode home together. But by the time we got home my wife made mention that when she passed me in the hallway I didn't say anything to her. Please correct me if I'm wrong but was I suppose to acknowledge her after sitting next to her for the past 2 hours, rode to church with her, etc? She said she felt some kind of way by me not saying anything to her. Was I supposed to?

I would have thought smiling and acknowledging her as you walked past each other would be been possible. If I had a DH, I would always do this.

Well,this is very odd. Do you really not know if you pass your spouse when out it’d courtesy to smile, nod ir say hi and it is different to being at home? Is there a back story here in terms of your ability to understand social norms?

Also how much is the offering that you’re all walkie talkied up and need escorting the lady. Can’t be more than a few hundred quid. Are you all really jumped up on uour own importance?

It doesn't matter what we think OP. It matters what your wife thinks. I'd hazard a guess you dismiss her feelings quite a lot

you sound far too involved in this volunteer crap you're doing and can't even see it might cost your relationship eventually.

A big important man ignores his lowly wife of 20 years in the hallway and can't understand why she's upset.
I mean she's had 20 years to get used to her big important busy husband not even bothering to give her a quick smile as he passes by. His many duties are far more of a priority than that small gesture.

You sir are an arse.

This is the weirdest scenario l've read for a long time! Must be American surely? What a load of unnecessary waffle about what is really just a rude, self important man ignoring his wife and then stamping his foot because she called him on it.
OP, if this is real then get over yourself and say sorry to your wife for blanking her, it's as simple as that.

Nailed it @Seaoftroubles - Pompous and self important were the words going through my head… there were others.

Official duty😂😂😂😂. You are a volunteer at a local church. You weren’t part of the royal guard at the queens funeral.

I honestly think you need to calm down and realise you aren’t nearly as important as you think you are.

I was dragged to church as a child and it was full of older men who hadn’t quite succeeded professionally but were on two committees in the church so thought they were God! We once had a committee to retarmac the car park and heavens the fuss! If these men worked for me now I don’t think I could cope!

Others have covered the hilarity of the self important posting style and the ignorance of not acknowledging your wife as you passed her.

But can I suggest that your church would save a fortune in earpieces if you took some time to provide the congregation with a QR code to donate via just giving. And you'd maximise your gift aid too. But that might make the men feel a little emasculated so I don't suppose you'll be passing this tip on to the pastor.

A smile or a nod or catching her eye would be normal, yes. You didn’t have to break your conversation to do that.

It’s different for your pastor and his Mrs because they are together in his workplace all the time I imagine, so they are just colleagues in that scenario. You aren’t.

Anyway it doesn’t need to be a big deal, hurst say oh sorry I was deep in conversation and acknowledge her next time.

Yes you are being dramatic and silly. Just acknowledge your wife next time. You aren’t at work.

Literally the smallest shift in facial expression would have been enough here. You don't need to fall on your knees and worship her or whatever it is you think she's asking for.

Generally speaking, yes, your relationship with your spouse is more important than your responsibilities to the minor details of the church's financial arrangements. Church is about loving people, not money.

I guess a smile would have been reasonable. You don’t seem very interested in other peoples perspectives though, so I’m not sure why you bothered posting.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of this.. if you are a caring husband who is in love with his wife, I would see her reaction as an opportunity to be a better husband and let her know she is valued and appreciated. Small regular and unforced gestures of love, attraction and appreciation are the glue that holds you together. Without them you both risk being unhappy. Give this the priority it deserves, even if it means dialling back on your volunteering commitments.

"One thing I do is assist the finance woman with making sure the offering is collected and to make sure she gets to the finance room safely. Me and a few other guys are equipped with radios with earpieces to stay in contact with each other for security reasons and things like that."

😂😂😂

This is absolutely hilarious!!! Is the finance woman Beyonce?!?! Ear pieces to escort the local church's finance administrator to her office?!?! 😂

I have a feeling that what your post is trying to tell us is that you fancy the finance woman who you so diligently and safely escorted to her office. This is probably why your wife is pissed off. But you want to act all high and mighty because you're a member of the church so don't want to admit it outright.

@Fourthtwin yes and I am married to a man in a vastly more important position than you. He would still afford me a smile / nod / gesture because he is my husband and a kind, polite, generous man.

You clearly feel your wife and her duties are beneath yours. The efforts you go to showing how important you are should be higher up your priority list than this post.

I am grateful my husband does not behave in this manner. He is a gentleman in all things regardless of the situation or his importance.

The fact that you don’t understand that yes, your spouse is more important than any other person in the world (baring children) is incredibly sad.

You sound a bit overly formal and dare I say a little proud of your church duties and elevated position as you say. Could that be an issue?

The more I read of this, the sadder I am for the poor wife here.

This church sounds like rather a sinister establishment / security / earpieces etc <did we mention the earpieces>

Why is it that men like this will come on here and expect their actions to be vindicated / excused and then never listen as the majority tell them otherwise.

Arrogance and ego. Every single time. Dressed in fine clothes and hiding behind religion.

Are you in USA??

Lol 😂

I wondered that. Maybe it's one of those happy clappy spiritual churches where people pay zillions to find Jesus or get cured from various ailments?

I'm guessing an evangelical Baptist church with very large congregations, music and sound systems the like of which we have a lot of in London - eg Hillsong style place. A lot of organisation and oodles of money involved which seems to have given you the mistaken notion that you are superior to others, including your wife.

Ultimately Christian values boil down to humility and kindness don't they?

The pomposity of all this has given me a good genuine chuckle this morning reading this thread, so thank you Mumsnet for that!

To say nothing of the pastor's wife being "our first lady".

In our church, the person collecting the offertory seems to manage to lock it up without the need of big strong men with walkie-talkies to guard her.

Ask yourself, wwjd.