Posted on 06/19/2003 8:29:45 AM PDT by Korth
On April 20, 2002 I married Stephen W. Carson after a 4-month courtship and 4-month engagement. Our marriage date marked for me almost five and one half years since I stopped dating, a decision I made at aged 23. Now I date almost every night – my husband!
Dating became a rather disheartening and shallow way of finding a mate, and so I made a rather unprecedented decision to stop. I say unprecedented because, while I am not the first one to do this, I am one of the only people I know, except for my husband who had independently also stopped dating almost one year before I did. During my abstinence from dating I received offers from men to go out and much to the dismay of my mother, turned them down. "How will you find a husband this way, Heather?" she asked, pining for grandchildren. With all vocabulary about courtship having been disposed of, I had no way of explaining that my heart’s desire was for exactly that – courtship, and so I usually said nothing or explained that I would be praying for God to provide. Now before you deem me a holy roller, allow me to elaborate on what brought me to this place.
During my undergraduate studies I wo rked as a Resident Advisor in a freshman dorm to help pay for school. My campus was rather unusual in that all of the dorms were still same-sex since the school was private and relatively conservative. At the beginning of the year I would sit down with the girls and go over dorm rules and answer any questions they might have. Many of these girls were away from home for the first time and welcomed the help. Each year, I would learn that many, if not most, of the freshman girls were virgins. One by one these girls came to me, after only a few months at college, wrestling with the desire of their new college boyfriends to be physical with them. One by one I counseled them to wait to have sex. Unfortunately, by the end of first semester, nearly all of them had become sexually active and were now nursing broken hearts, unplanned pregnancies or STDs, and were left with the question of how to cope with dating experiences gone awry. By the end of second semester these boyfriends had already broken up with the girls whose virginity they had taken and were pursuing other girls. Even as I look back, I am amazed at what I advised them since I was, at that time, actively dating and certainly had not been taught any rules about proper courtship.
My own dating experiences started out innocent enough. I began in high school around aged 14. I remember feeling uncomfortable left to make my own decisions about whom I would and would not date. I was asked out by a senior during my freshman year, and timidly turned him down feeling like I was making a major social blunder. I recall one date when the guy didn’t want to take me home right after the movie, which ended in a minor physical struggle before he finally agreed. My dating experiences in college were less traumatic, at first. But after a while, the lack of parental protection, and seeing so many of my peers going hog wild with their new sexual freedom, I grew rather cynical and began treating men worse than they treated me. My self-esteem plummeted. Finally, at aged 23 I decided to call it quits.
I see two main problems with dating as it is now. One is its purposelessness. I’ll illustrate this to explain. As a professional counselor, I’ve been asked to speak on the topic of dating numerous times at church youth groups. Youth pastors, church leaders, and parents are desperately trying to impress some kind of moral constraint on their youth by bringing in a "professional" to reconstruct the definition of dating. At these speaking engagements I look out into the faces of bright, eager youth and begin by having them think and rethink about their definition of dating, to somehow mold a definition that does not imply getting emotionally and physically involved without the proper protection that marital commitment brings. The lingo from the teens goes something like: "Dating means….being in a relationship". Or…"having a boyfriend/girlfriend." Or…"playing the field." Or (my personal favorite) …"getting to know each other."
What does all of this talk about relationships and boyfriends and girlfriends really mean? When I venture to ask those bright, eager faces they simply have no idea. This is dating: the act of being in a relationship or playing the field or getting to know each other for the purpose of ….the act of being in a relationship or playing the field…You get the idea.
What is particularly heartbreaking about all of this nonsense is the aftermath. As a counselor I have seen numerous teens and young adults wrestling with the consequences of this kind of dating. They are bewildered by their emotional reactions. Dating is, after all, supposed to be casual. One girl, I recall, felt so bad at the end of a dating relationship that her parents sent her to me for counseling. She was depressed and confused about her response and not sure how to handle it. Young girls are taught that something is wrong with them if they experience longings for commitment. After months of being led on by her boyfriend with talk of marriage she began to realize he had no intention of following through. Her biggest need at this time was permission from an adult to break up with this young man since she wasn’t getting it from peers or parents. Once armed with this permission, she ended the relationship, her depression ended, and she became a much happier young lady. Another teen girl I counseled was not so fortunate. She was very pretty, and had no idea how to handle the attention from her fellow male classmates. Her parents gave her no real guidelines for how to conduct herself, and yet she had somehow managed to preserve her virginity. Nonetheless, her low level of emotional maturity often led to putting herself into compromising situations, not to mention the morally chaotic excuses she used to justify her own behavior. She stopped attending our sessions without any real change in her behavior, and I often wonder how she’s doing now. One thing nearly all of these cases had in common is that their fathers are not providing the protection needed.
"Isn’t our daughter cute…isn’t she popular…she’s dating now!" parents proudly proclaim. What the above girls really needed were protective fathers to help ward off unwanted physical advances honeyed with deceptive talk of love and marriage.
But it’s not just young women who are heartbroken. I have heard from young men too who have no idea about how to go about courting a young woman toward marriage. If a teenage boy shows interest in treating girls properly, with respect and gentility he is made fun of mercilessly. One particular young man comes to mind who, when his last relationship ended, was crushed. He had wanted to marry her, but he really had no idea how to do anything but date and so avoided the topic of marriage. The relationship ended with the young man feeling empty, depressed and confused. Our young men do not know how to initiate commitment, or pursue a woman toward marriage. The cultural message is that this is not a quality valued in a man anymore.
Some may object and say that dating does have a purpose, citing the definition I gave earlier (getting to know each other, etc.). But what does this getting to know each other ever lead to? How long does it actually take to "get to know each other," and if you finally do reach the level of "knowing each other," what then? Usually this aimlessness leads to the dating couple becoming lovers, and many times bringing an unwanted child into the world. Or acting as if they didn’t know sex was procreative and killing the poor baby, calling this the merciful thing to do as we have now deemed the greater tragedy a living child who is unwanted. I hear complaints about the shame and annoyance of unwanted pregnancy without any attempt to address the true cause: irresponsible, unchaste behavior and no boundaries to how men and women ought to be relating to each other. Dating provides no structure for male and female relationships, and our endorsement of this kind of coupling is only enabling the very social ills we complain about.
The above examples lead me to my second problem with dating. Where are the parents? With regard to the college campuses, the answer is easy: nowhere to be found. Year after year parents send their youths off to get an education with no authority figures in sight to bring some kind of restraint to their sons and daughters. In an effort made by our parents to destroy convention another convention has arisen to fill the void – dating, instead of courtship. Dating views each possible eligible (and many times ineligible) person as a mate – not for life, but for right now. I’ve heard it said, "I’m looking for Mr. Right," but this is passé. I have actually heard women say, "I’m looking for Mr. Right now." I’m not fooled. I saw these same girls crying and depressed about being dumped after a one-night-stand.
But permissiveness about dating starts long before college, in junior high and high school. I was amazed at the number of freshman girls who were still virgins in college since at my own high school the talk in the girls’ bathroom indicated that the sexual revolution was alive and well. Any girls who claimed chastity were promptly deemed prude as if they were lepers. So…where are the parents? Well, they are allowing their sons and daughters to date at ages 12 and 14. If the parents are really "uncool" they make the teen wait until age 16. But wait for what? What does age have to do with it if the parents will provide no guidance, no purpose, or responsibility? It’s simply not enough to hear it at their church youth groups from a professional counselor. So off these kids go without parental protection to embark on "getting to know each other," "being in a relationship."
But the real problem with all of this purposelessness and lack of parental control is the false perception of human nature that is the driving forces behind it. Human beings need constraints to guide our behavior. As it is now, we call our weaknesses strengths. We praise our lack of self-control and restraint and call ourselves "liberated." We talk about the innate goodness of mankind and then fail to make good on our promises. "I promise I’ll love you if you’ll just sleep with me." We elevate predatory sexual behavior calling it "playing the field" and say we are following our animal instincts. I have yet to see an animal mate out of anything but an instinctual drive to procreate. As it is, we have sunk lower than the animals since we don’t even want to discuss that sex is procreative anymore. This is dating. "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools…."(Romans 1: 21-22)
If I have made any kind of case against our current dating practices, I know that was the easy part. The solution is not necessarily obvious, and our current cultural atmosphere simply does not provide any support for a return to old courtship practices. In the past, these practices were the backbone of any community since it was mostly through courtship that new families were begun to become productive members of a community. This simply is not the norm anymore. But, there have been a few of us, disheartened by current practices that have stopped dating altogether in exchange for abstinence, and courtship, and those that are interested in doing so. Just this past weekend, for the second Sunday in a row, I had a teen girl approach me and express a desire to meet with me and talk about alternatives to dating. Some of my friends have begun to forsake the dating scene for a more respectful and less predatory way of interacting with the opposite sex, and are the happier for it. While the effects of the sexual revolution have been devastating, I am seeing a flicker inside the hearts of many youths that indicate they are beginning to desire something more, something deeper, which is a real cause for hope and rejoicing.
I began this article by saying I recently married after a 4-month courtship. This was both a bewildering and exciting experience for Stephen and me as we grappled with the resurrection of a ritual that has long been dead. Leon and Amy Kass define courtship as "to woo with a view toward marriage." I believe our courtship was a success. We avoided the purposelessness of dating by setting boundaries on our time together and made it known that marriage was the overall goal, whether it would be to each other or someone else. We made sure our actions protected each other from the embarrassment and awkwardness of getting too emotionally involved too fast by each having the accountability of our parents and elders in our life. No talk of marriage was made until an actual proposal was given, and there was no kissing until the ring was on my finger, (how exciting that night was!!). We remained physically chaste until our wedding night. I am so thankful that our courtship was a wonderful and memorable process that I will want to share with our children some day, and without all of the embarrassing mishaps and broken promises that a lack of structure and purpose brings.
While I cannot, at this time, give a concrete and historical dissertation on courtship, I can recommend several books that I have read and two that I am currently reading on the subject. Starting with the ones I have read:
Passion and Purity, Quest for Love – both by author Elisabeth Elliot. The first book deals with her own courtship experience with her late husband Jim Elliot, and the latter focuses more on general courtship practices and answers specific questions for how to proceed in our current atmosphere.
I Kissed Dating Goodbye written by Joshua Harris. This is a great book for young adults interested in learning how to pull back from dating.
I am currently reading: Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar written by Amy Kass and Leon Kass. This book is a historical anthology of writings on courtship. I am so excited to have been directed to it by my husband. I am nearly finished reading A Return to Modesty by Wendy Shalit, which addresses the effects on our culture of losing the virtue of modesty, a key aspect of historical courtship.
So, go ahead…stop dating!!! Liberate yourself from the baggage that dating relationships always leave you with. Read up on courtship and enjoy the mystery and excitement that modesty and self-restraint bring.
The biggest joke of all, is that when I read "I Kissed Dating Goodbye", I realized that, for the most part, that's what I'd been doing all along. I could have written that book myself, except that by the time it was published I'd learned the hard way that it didn't work.
BTW, that book wasn't really anything new, it just codified and collected a lot of ideas that had been fed piecemeal into the minds of a lot of Christians for a long time. I had even come to a lot of the same conclusions independently.
Admittedly, the idea of actually *not dating at all* had never occurred to me, since I had not (AND STILL HAVE NOT) figured out an alternative method of finding and getting to know potential prospects -- but, my approach to relationships was very much like what was described in that book. And guess what: it was a miserable failure. There I was, single, still a virgin, and 35, laughed at as a "geek" by all the girls, and occasionally told that I was "too serious" or "came on too strong"... while other guys got all the girls. Oh, yes, I should mention: Christian girls are frequently the cruelest of all.
Anyway... Something had to change. And it did. My parents had been telling me all my life, to get out and casually date lots of people. Oh no, I protested - I wanted to get to know the girls well first, through Bible studies, etc -- I didn't just want to ask out random women. Stupid, stupid, stupid me -- turns out Mom & Dad were RIGHT ALL ALONG, and the Church folks were wrong. When I finally, angrily snapped, decided to kiss WAITING goodbye, and did it my parents' way, my fortunes started to change rapidly -- I met several good prospects in short order, and was married within 3 years.
The happy ending: My wife and I met on the internet, dated 6 months, were engaged 6 months, and had sex for the first time on the wedding night. That was a little over a year ago, and we are expecting our first baby in October. All of these happy events would NEVER HAVE OCCURRED if I had fallen into the "courtship trap".
Sometimes I feel like I'm talking to a brick wall when dealing with courtship advocates. I hope that's not the case with you. If you are able, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, I beg you, for the sake of the singles who will be so terribly hurt by extreme courtship teaching -- HEAR me on this: The "no-dating" doctrine, however well intentioned it may be, is KEEPING PEOPLE SINGLE who shouldn't be. The fortunate few who grow up in close knit Christian communities, especially homeschooler networks, may have an easy time identifying a suitable partner and setting up the formal courtship mechanism once they do, but I BEG you to open your eyes and realize that this represents a TRIFLING percentage of the population. Courtship is simply NOT AN OPTION for most singles, and by stigmatizing dating you run the risk of keeping people single for life. Biblically, you don't want to do that:
I Timothy 4:1-3 Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.
The Computer Industry teaches us there are two kinds of Stupid. There is hardware stupid and there is software stupid.
Children of financially successful people are seldom hardware stupid. Their parents would not be able to afford to send them to college if their genes contained hardware stupidity. So it has to be software stupidity that's their problem.
In many situations, the kids weren't software stupid when they first came to college. But then they met the other kids there, they got into campus culture, and they had teachers who taught moral relativism. And thus they were programmed into their stupidity.
And even the best computer hardware doesn't help you if your software programming has a bug that makes 2 and 2 equal 5.
There is no formula that works for everyone, and extreme positions on either side are dangerous, as in all situations. I don't recommend 'extreme courtship positions,' but I also know for a fact that you do NOT have to date a lot of people to find the person God wants you to marry. You just have to be obedient to HIS leading, wherever that takes you.
I'm sorry that you had a negative experience because you didn't date, but you need to be careful not to assume that everyone's experience will be the same as yours either.
What I have been referring to all along here (in case you didn't read all my posts), is that it is far better for teenagers not to date.......not adults. It is a dangerously sexual world for young people, and it's best for high school kids not to get into one on one situations with a date that could lead to disastrous consequences.
And in no case did I say that one should never go on a date. I think you may have misread my position. However, our own four children (23, 21, 19 and 16) have all opted not to date on a regular basis, and my husband and I have strongly encouraged that decision.
You're assuming that it is predestined. My understanding of it, both scriptural and experiential, leaves substantial room for free will. I've seen people walk away from what seemed to be *obvious* divine setups, and suffer for it. Yet the "dumped" party eventually married someone else -- was that predestined before the earth was created? I don't think so.
My point is that you don't need to date a lot of women/men to find the one that God wants you to have as a life partner.
Sometimes you do. Sometimes it takes a diligent, targeted effort to locate potential partners -- especially in major metropolitian areas where the Christians are few and far between. Some guys just won't find a mate unless they visit other churches, join Christian dating services, troll the Christian internet sites, and take lots of different Christian women to dinner -- and keep it up until something clicks with somebody. Courtship advocates sternly discourage that sort of effort, of course. Yet, none of them could tell me an alternative.
...in no case did I say that one should never go on a date. I think you may have misread my position.
Since you advocated "I Kissed Dating Goodbye", I made that assumption. If the author had limited the book's scope to teenagers, it wouldn't be all that bad, but he didn't -- and a lot of adult singles ditched dating at his word, without having an alternative path to the altar...
However, our own four children (23, 21, 19 and 16) have all opted not to date on a regular basis
How, exactly, do you define that basis? If you mean, your kids don't have a compulsive need to go out with someone, anyone, every weekend, I wholeheartedly agree. If one doesn't know anyone potentially worth pursing, going out with anyone just for the sake of going out is ridiculous, sexually dangerous, and expensive.
Sadly, a lot of Christian women seem to have the idea that they have a "right" to be taken out regularly, and if no Christian man asks them out, they'll date nonbelievers (and if challenged, will indignantly defend that decision thus: "They're the only ones asking!" -- which, often isn't even the truth!). Meanwhile, the Christian guys, for the most part, have the faith to *sit at home* Friday and Saturday nights rather than be in a spiritually unequal dating situation. Ugh. Bad memories...
But "not dating on a regular basis", is a big, big difference from "not dating at all", which is the "offical" courtship party line.
As to the predestination, this is not the thread to get into a discussion of Calvinism vs. Armenianism. I know that my husband is the absolutely perfect person for me to have to spend my life with, and I cannot attribute our meeting to either chance, or to my own free will. I don't deserve him.
And now I will leave this discussion with my impression of you......you have found the right wife for you, and you are griping because you didn't marry someone else sooner because you didn't date.
It looks to me like you need to be thankful for what you have, give up the pity party you seem to be in, and at the same time, let others make their own choices, even if they are different from your own.
Glad to hear it.
my impression of you......you have found the right wife for you, and you are griping because you didn't marry someone else sooner because you didn't date.
Careful. First, I never claimed to "not date", only that my approach to dating was a lot closer to "courtship" in many respects... and that this was a mistake.
I did, however, find a perfect wife.
you need to ..give up the pity party you seem to be in, and at the same time, let others make their own choices
My wife and I minister to a lot of singles, both formally and informally - mainly because we didn't dump our single friends when we got married, and were asked to continue helping run the singles ministry even after we were no longer single. (There were staff layoffs at church about the same time, too).
"Pity party" isn't really the right word, but in dealing with the struggles of singles, we often find ourselves hauntingly reminded of our own, not so very long ago. If there really was a divine agenda in keeping me... us... single for so long, it was probably because these painful experiences have been so useful in helping us to counsel other singles.
But one of the things I counsel them, is, DON'T give up dating.
Regarding "pity parties" and the struggles of singleness, perhaps this article would help you have a more compassionate outlook towards those for whom singleness is an intense struggle (as it was for me, and as it still is for many of the folks we minister to):
Talkdown -- Preparing for Singleness When You'd Much Rather be Preparing for Marriage, by Ross Clark
In numbers large enough to be significant, males have stopped being men and fathers. Successive generations of this phenomenon have now bred significant numbers of males who have no idea what it means to be a man, be father, be commited. They follow their selfish desires above all because no one has stepped in to show them the honor and social necessity of sacrifice and service. Public Enemy Numba One in the USA: the unfathered generations of men and women who flounder through life undirected.
Satan:"Married twice, eh? You want a job?"
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