(Not) Forsaking All Others: Faithfulness beyond Exclusivity

Christian discussions of marriage frequently treat sexual exclusivity as synonymous with covenantal faithfulness, yet the meaning of faithfulness itself is rarely examined. Drawing on qualitative interviews with sixteen church-attending polyamorous Christians, this article argues that polyamorous Christians, precisely because they cannot define fidelity by sexual exclusivity alone, have been forced to articulate what covenantal faithfulness actually entails. Participants consistently described fidelity in terms of honesty, mutual consent, accountability, and care, rather than in terms of the exclusion of additional partners. Engaging the work of Elizabeth Stuart, Marcella Althaus-Reid, Susannah Cornwall, and Carter Heyward, this article contends that contemporary Christian theology has often asked sexual exclusivity to bear more moral weight than it can sustain. Polyamory thus serves not primarily as a challenge to monogamy, but as an invitation to recover a richer theological account of covenantal faithfulness.