Three Reasons Christians Make Dating Weird

We had been dating for a few months when he brought up the question of whether we were "boyfriend and girlfriend."

Does this mean we get to hold hands now? [Photo by Brett Sayer]

This was soon followed by, "So should we call my parents? Book a flight back home so you can meet them?"

I was confused—it felt like something we might do if we were engaged, not just officially exclusive.

We had gone on two dates (different guy, because I really get around) when he tried to shove his tongue down my throat when we hugged goodbye.

I was confused—we had seen each other in person exactly three times. Was there some memo about making out on the third meeting that I hadn't received because of a glitch in the Christian worldwide dating protocol server?

Christians. They make dating weird.

It feels like I'm stating the obvious, but dating while Christian can feel like swimming in a pool full of jello, snapping turtles and dynamite—except that getting out with all your extremities is the least of your problems.

From side hugs to guys who won't date you but will let you wash their socks as they pour out their hopes and dreams, Christian dating is just weird.

Why? Here are three reasons:

1. Traditional gender roles

I have heard so many Christian women say some version of either, "No one asks me out" or "I want to be pursued" (including me). Unfortunately, this can extend to every phase of dating—if no one asks you out, then you don't date.

Ever.

Even expressing interest in a guy is suspect—because isn't he supposed to pursue you, as God meant for male/female relationships to play out, from the Garden of Eden on? Adam didn't have to pursue Eve, and look what happened to them.

In this construct, Christian women have to come up with extremely roundabout and sneaky ways to communicate interest in a guy—signals that the guy is somehow supposed to pick up on.

"Would you like to, um, go to Bible study together on Thursday?"
or
"I would love to get your exegetical take on 1 Corinthians 13."

This is all very confusing and great for angsty, 2AM conversations with friends. Not so great for actual dating.

2. Sex

I don't know if I can really explore here all the ways that sex makes Christian dating weird.

There's this idea floating around that if you hold out for marriage, you will have (amazing) sex. No wonder Christians are marriage-obsessed.

Awesome married sex is predicated on how much I save my body for my future husband or wife. If I hold hands with you and we don't get married, does that mean I'm cheating on my future spouse? What if we kiss? Every act of physical intimacy is potentially cheating.

On the flip side, I've encountered guys who grab me and try to kiss me when I've given no indication of interest. At best, it's awkward. At worst, I feel like my boundaries are invisible or irrelevant. The guy has no interest in my comfort level or what I want.

3. Marriage

The threat of marriage hangs over every, "Will you go to coffee with me?", every tentative flirtation, every first, second, 20th date.

Marriage plus gender stereotypes mean that every girl is gunning for a dress, a cake, and a husband in that order and every guy is too scared to actually ask anyone out.

Because marriage is everything, we ask the wrong questions at the wrong time.

At the beginning of a relationship, instead of asking, "Do I like him?", "Do I enjoy her sense of humor?", "Do we have fun together?"—

We ask, "Could I marry her?", "Do we want the same number of kids?", "I wonder what he thinks about living on a farm in New Zealand and raising llamas?", "Do I like her laugh or will it drive me insane after 45+ years?", "OH MY GOD WHAT IF I HAVE TO SPEND THE REST OF MY LIFE CRINGING EVERY TIME WE WATCH THE OFFICE GET ME OUT OF HERE I CAN'T BREATHE."

Ahem.

It's enough to make any sane, commitment-phobic girl bolt.

How do we make Christian dating less weird? I feel like that is fodder for a different post.

More about dating:

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - Anger

10 Reasons You Should Think Twice About Dating Someone Who Goes to Your Church

F*** A Nerd: A Solution to the "Sexodus" Crisis

Ladies, there is a crisis in the land: Cowed and oppressed by the forces of radical feminism, heterosexual men everywhere are checking out of the dating scene and checking into video games and online porn. You might have heard about this crisis, this "Sexodus." It is a terrible, terrible scourge of biblical proportions (the 11th plague) afflicting women everywhere.

But luckily I have come up with a solution:

F*** a nerd.

Find the most pathetic specimen of masculinity possible. The more he loathes himself, the better. The longer he hasn't showered, the more he needs the redemption that only your body can provide. He lives in his mom's basement and watches online porn for 12 hours a day? Perfect.

Throw away those unrealistic and cruel expectations for men manufactured by feminism and romantic comedies. You say you want a man who will treat you with respect, and yet you read "50 Shades of Grey." Twice. Clearly, you don't know what you want.

Plus, you think you're so hot. Well, let me tell you, your expectations are way, way too high. Are you Jennifer Lawrence, Taylor Swift, or Beyonce? No? Then you are fugly at best. However, your female privilege has convinced you that you are all that, two Coach purses, and 54 pairs of shoes. You think you can get a "hot guy" with a job to commit to you. Good luck with that. 

Remember: You can always be replaced with porn and video games. Porn doesn't file false harassment charges. Porn doesn't nag at you to empty the dishwasher or get a job. Porn doesn't say "No" when it means "Yes." Porn doesn't only have sex with assholes. Porn doesn't smile at you one day and put you in the "friend zone" the next. Porn doesn't fight back. Chew on that.

Ladies, if you have sex with a nerd, he might just start to overcome the years of rejection and oppression he has experienced at the hands of our female-dominated society. Sure, he knows he really deserves a supermodel and the six figure job you got just because you are female, but the consolation prize of your subpar body will have to do for now.

Really, it's for the good of humanity, the continuation of the species, and a peaceful resolution to the war on men that's being raged in America.

If we are to end this crisis, drastic measures must be taken. So here's my advice:

Stop trying to get ahead at work. Turn down that promotion. You don't need that promotion. A man needs that promotion.

Stop being good at school [a female-created institution designed to make men feel incompetent and insecure].

Stop volunteering to lead at church. You don't need that leadership position. A man needs that leadership position. If a man stops coming to church, it's your fault for taking the leadership role that was rightfully his.

Stop having expectations for the men you sleep with. It's enough that he condescended to sleep with you in the first place, when he could have been playing Minecraft.

Stop complaining about sexual assault, sexual harassment, and sexism. Men are tired of hearing about it. You are only perpetuating the feminist myth that all men are rapists and pigs. Men will assume that asking you on a date will get them charged with assault.

Stop sending mixed messages. Either you want a real man who forcibly takes what he wants or you want a passive nice guy who treats you as an equal but never makes a move. You can't have both.

Women: the choice is simple. If you don't "lean back" and spread your legs, unemployed men drowning in self-pity who have given up on any semblance of personal hygiene are going to refuse to have sex with you.

Do you want to die single and alone? I didn't think so. Get out there, and start f***** as many undesirable and unattractive men as you possibly can. If you're lucky, one of them might even agree to marry you.

But don't count on it.


Inspirations:
Lysistrata by Eurpides
Matt Walsh
Article about the "Sexodus"

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - Introduction

I love the miscellaneous sale section at Ralphs. Tucked between the dairy section and the packaged meats you can find nine dollar bottles of wine, congealed donuts, leftover Halloween decorations, six-day-old apple pies, Duck Dynasty costume castoffs, cartons of pedialyte, bruised apples, liver-spotted bananas, and Barbie bandaids.

Way, way in the back, hidden behind a few dubious boxes of laxative tea and 100 count bottles of aspirin, it sits.

Our friend, the dented can.

Back when I worked full-time at a book warehouse, I used to read a lot of books (more like skim, but who's judging). One of those books was a chick lit novel called The Big Love written by Sarah Dunn.

The twist in this particular novel is that the heroine was a lapsed evangelical Christian. And there was this one passage that stuck out to me, which I've excerpted at length below, that made me go Yes Yes I SAID YES:

Photo by labullets.blogspot.com

I should have known about Gil, of course. I should have known the way you know about a dented can. But this is the thing: everyone has been warned about dented cans, but surely not every dented can is bad, or they wouldn’t be allowed to sell them, right? Someone’s buying those dented cans. Someone’s taking them home and opening them up and examining the contents and then making a bet about whether or not the stuff inside is safe to eat. And let me tell you, when you’re twenty-five, and a virgin, and you refuse to date anybody but a Christian—and not just any Christian but a certain kind of Christian—your options are all dented cans. When Gil and I finally broke up, I took another look around the church basement, and I had the closest thing I’ve ever had to an actual vision. There sat Brian Berryman. Single. Thirty-two. An attorney. Crown prince of the church basement. So morally upright he didn’t believe in dating; he believed in praying. He’d been praying for a wife since he was sixteen. He’d drawn up a list of all the qualities he wanted her to possess, a list which he was continually revising, and then praying about, and then revising some more, and then informally circulating among the single women at the church. A woman of pure heart, the list would go. A gentle and quiet spirit. A submissive nature. Is this what you want in a husband? I heard a voice saying. Well, not an actual voice, but it was as clear as day. I realized that if I kept searching for husbands in church basements I was going to end up with a seriously dented can. [from The Big Love by Sarah Dunn, emphasis mine]

"So, what, Ms. Blogger, are you saying that all single Christian men are dented cans?"

Yes. Hell, I've dated a few of them.

No, but it sure feels like it sometimes, as if I'm walking by the sale section, scoping out the goods and thinking, "Oh please, Lord. Not that one."

When it comes to dating within Christian evangelical culture, it often feels as if you're screwed if you do, and screwed if you don't (or not screwed either way, now that I think about it).

That's the honesty part of this post--the hopelessness part. But this series (Yes! A series!) is not about hopelessness--it's about those qualities in single Christian guys that make them undateable.

I'm well aware that we are all dented cans. But perhaps a distinction can be made between the can of diced tomatoes sporting a few delightful and adorable indentations from being dropped on its head a few times and the can of sliced yellow peaches in a light syrup that gives you a fatal case of botulism.

Join us next time for a lighthearted take on:

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Misogynist
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Coward
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Racist
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Myth of Persistence 
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - Entitlement

Is it Awkward to Date Someone From Your Church? & Why You Should Hit on Women at Church ... Stay Tuned

There's a lot of angst over dating within the church (as if anyone needed a few dozen Google searches to figure that out). This post is dedicated to the trials, tribulations and titillations of church dating. All questions brought to you by a search engine near you! 

"I really like a boy that goes to my church"

If there's one thing I've learned, it's that churches are veritable hotbeds of unrequited longing. Welcome to the club, my friend.

Okay, so you like this boy. Is he single? What are you waiting for? Sit beside him at church at the next available opportunity. Careful though! You only want to sit by him. Avoid eye contact or any form of "talk." In fact, pretend he doesn't exist while taking copious notes on the sermon. 

This is a widely recognized form of Christian courtship. Anything else and you'll come across as too pushy. And if there's anything a church boy likes less than a chili cook-off before ultimate frisbee, it's a pushy woman.

"The woman in church is attracted to you where will she sit[?]"

Attracted to you = As close as Christianly possible

Not attracted to you = With her friends, several rows down.

You are Ryan Gosling = In your lap

Realize that she is making a conscious choice and that it absolutely relates to you and her level of attraction to you. These things must be read carefully and with attention to nuance, like the Book of Revelation or the entrails of a ground squirrel.

"There are no girls in my church"

That's awful. I would suggest finding a new church, posthaste. Given your church's stance on gender segregation, I would carefully review their mission, vision and core values. Compare these to the teachings of Jesus and make your decision accordingly.

If that's not possible, there's always eHarmony. I hear they have a favorable male/female ratio. [But be wary of their doctrine of the trinity]

"Is it awkward to date someone from your church[?]"

So awkward. However, judging from some of these other queries, the only thing more awkward than dating in church is not dating in church--I imagine single guys and girls completely shutting down in the presence of the desired sex.

The problem--as I see it: some single and seeking church members completely missed "Flirting & Attraction 101." They are unable to accurately gauge the interest or lack of interest displayed by another person. They are likewise unable to constructively and lightheartedly display interest in another person. 

Maybe it's because the stakes (marriage) feel too high. And if them's the stakes, why even play? 

"Why you should hit on women at church" 

Some of you guys/girls need to lay off the hitting on for a bit. Stop playing the field and be the field, so to speak. I mean, good grief, you start chatting up everything with a Bible and a smile. You're making people uncomfortable. You read "desperate." Just stop. Take a break.

Others of you...maybe you've given up altogether and you're just going to church for the "fellowship." Good for you. But if you feel like maybe someday in the future possibly if the timing's right you might I dunno potentially want to date someone who goes to your church--

Ask them out.

Advice From the Google Trenches: How to Catch a Christian Girl, Hitting on a Girl Through Text, and "My Job Doesn't Challenge Me"

Hi everyone! This is the third installment of "advice based on Google search queries from someone who has little to no idea what she is talking about." Thanks for joining me. You can read the first two installments here and here.

"My job doesn't challenge me"

I'm sorry to hear that. You are certainly not alone. I worked a long, long 10-month slog in a job that didn't challenge me. 10 months doesn't seem like a long time now, but at the time it seemed like an eternity.

Have you tried finding another job that does challenge you? If that's not an option, you could:

Spend your work downtime learning a new skill. This could be something related to your current job (e.g. make you more promotable) or something related to the job you wish you had (programming, graphic design, another language).

Teach someone something. You could write the book (metaphorically or literally) on how to do your job and do it well. Start a company wiki. Develop new processes that help you and others work better, faster.

Find a problem to solve. Solving problems can be challenging. Find a problem related to your job and try to solve it. Maybe the printer gets jammed at the same time every Tuesday. Maybe your office runs out of staples at least twice a month. Just think of the possibilities!

"Hitting on a girl through text"

Speaking only for myself here, I'm not a huge fan of getting hit on via text message, but then again, I'm not in high school. Scratch that. Even if I were in high school, I wouldn't want to get hit on via text message. Sure, it's easy, noncommittal, and you can do it with multiple girls at once, but--

1. She will know you are putting out the least amount of effort possible.
2. If she doesn't like you, hitting on her via text won't win her over.
3. Text messages don't contain useful information like body language, voice inflection, and facial expression.
4. If you're hitting on her anyway, why not just ask her out? Say, "Hey ___, would you like to go do ____ at such-and-such a time?"

"When you are single and no one asks you out"

Hmm, I wasn't aware people were still getting asked out. As far as I can tell, guys are texting girls "Hey" and writing "LOL" on their facebook walls.

You are not alone. Oh wait. You are. Ha. Hehehehehehe. Heh.

Have you tried asking him/her out instead? If that's too intimidating, you could just ask them to "hang out." Or forget that, try flirting with someone cute. No expectations.

"How to catch a Christian girl"

First, you need to isolate the Christian Girl within her natural habitat--LifeWay Christian Bookstore. Second, you need to know that Christian girls LOVE PB & Nutella sandwiches. Love them. The only thing they want more? Marriage. That's right. Lure them in with a PB & Nutella sandwich, then drop them with the marriage harpoon. Sample phrases:

"I'm really looking forward to having a wife to iron my shirts."
"All I want is a family. And a farm. Maybe a few chickens."
"Where do you want to go on our honeymoon?"

She won't know what hit her.

10 Reasons You Should Think Twice About Dating Someone Who Goes to Your Church

DISCLAIMER: Every guy I have ever dated that has gone to the same church has been a perfect gentleman. No complaints or negative experiences here. Also, there [were] only 8 reasons.

Reason #1 - The Awkward

Let's talk about the awkward, shall we? Awkward: He asks you out. You say no. He proceeds to pretend that you have fallen from the face of the earth. Awkward: Your friend dated his friend's roommate's set dresser's bartender's ex-girlfriend's cousin. Awkward: You volunteer together every other Sunday and still have to see each other at church, even if it ends...awkwardly.

Reason #2 - "That Guy"

Let's talk about that guy (there also exists "that girl," I'm sure, but all my experiences have been with that guy. Sorry.) Have you ever heard "No one wants to be that guy"? Well, revise that to "No one wants to date that guy." Harsh, but true. Why? Because he hits on every single single girl at church, which means he's: A) Desperate, B) Has very little dating experience, or C) Desperate and has very little dating experience. It might be poor personal hygiene. It might be the tendency to constantly bring up a struggle with lust during coed group discussions. It might be an inability to take "no" for an answer (At which point that guy becomes "that stalker" and you might have to get a restraining order.) Regardless, that guy will always ask you out, as a rule. Which is, as you already may have guessed, awkward.

Reason #3 - She's Just Not That Into You

This is not, strictly speaking, entirely true. It's just that, if you like them, they probably don't like you, and vice versa. When girls complain that, "No one asks me out," what they really mean is "No one cute (or that I like) has asked me out." I theorize that, realistically, there are one or two girls or guys everyone wants to date. They, in turn, have inexplicably taken a vow of celibacy and/or are holding out for Ryan Gosling. Yes, the guys too.

Reason #4 - Nice Girls Finish Last

You are too nice. If you were raised to be a good Christian guy or girl, you probably aren't completely comfortable saying "no"--just "no"--no qualifications, no "You're a really nice guy, but..." or "I'm really focusing on my acting right now, so..." These things take practice. If you're nice to a guy, he might think you're flirting with him (in fact, he will definitely think you're flirting with him if you don't want him to think you're flirting with him). Now, you're stuck somewhere between a rock and a literalist interpretation of scripture: If you're not nice, you're a bad Christian. If you're too nice, you're a good Christian, but now this guy is stuck to you like a barnacle to a whale's arse no matter how politely you tell him that you're focusing on your walk with the Lord.

Reason #5 - The Prohibition Against Drinking in Church [Communion Wine Excepted]

Just kidding. Sort of. Problem is, Christians take dating way too seriously, and at church, everyone is on their best, church-behavior. Plus, when you're screening every member of the opposite sex for desirable life partner traits, it kind of takes the fun out of dating, or most forms of social interaction for that matter.

Reason #6 - The Sisterhood of the Traveling Gossip Pants

People, they talk. And by people, I mean girls. They talk about guys at church and whether or not it would be a good idea to date them. This leaves, oh let's see, one and a half guys who are acceptable to date. All the single girls at church then hold a gladiatorial contest to determine who gets to sit next to him during Bible study. (Of course, then he goes and says something that could be construed as insensitive and we all take a vow of celibacy and/or continue to hold out for Ryan Gosling.) It's brutal.

Reason #7 - The Insta-Couple

The minute you sit with that guy or girl at church, everyone assumes you are a couple. I'm not sure why this is. Probably because when you look around at church, it's all couples or suicidal single people sitting by themselves. Or with friends. This makes so much sense. Guys I barely know have sought me out at church in order to sit next to me. I guess that's their way of staking their claim. Perhaps there's something about singing "Blessed Be Your Name" next to someone that really clinches whether you should spend the rest of your life with them. Sitting together = practically married, after all.

Reason #8 - The Insta-Wife [Add one heaping tablespoon Jesus and stir]

Church engagements are known for being criminally short. Or maybe it's just my church. Soon after becoming someone's insta-girlfriend or boyfriend you are this close to becoming someone's insta-husband or wife. It's insane. Not to mention scary. What makes it worse is that everyone will be secretly or not-so-secretly judging you for your three-minute-engagement. You dog, you.

Reason #9 - The Temple of the Holy Spirit Market

Think about it for a minute--scoping out your church for dates feels...a little bit icky. "Wow, that was a really great sermon--I really felt like God was speaking to me about---whoa, that guy in the plaid is hott!" Or worse: "She's really cute, I wonder if...OMG! WEDDING RING ALERT!" Treating church like a singles mixer pretty much always leads to feeling like the least spiritual, most shallow person on the face of the earth.

Reason #10 - The Clincher

You might meet someone and fall in love. This reason alone should be enough for you to never think of, or even CONSIDER dating someone who goes to your church. Don't say I didn't warn you.




More on church dating:

Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys are All Dented Cans - Introduction
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Misogynist
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Coward
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Racist
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - The Myth of Persistence 
Undateable: Why Single Christian Guys Are All Dented Cans - Entitlement

The Burden of Fear

As I walked past the seedy--yet somehow comfortingly familiar--entranceway to the local crack den on my way to church, I couldn't help but think about respect, and its importance in my life.

Yes, I was thinking about the suspect(ly) named Love and Respect Ministries and how as far as I can tell, it's mostly about women learning to respect men, not men learning to love women. As it turns out, I have a theory as to why this is:

Books, conferences, and ministries focused on making marriage better are primarily marketed toward women. And the primary marketing tool at work is fear. Fear of infidelity (his). Fear of a less-than-great marriage. Fear of not being good enough (as a wife, mother).

But the core fear, that coveted, prized, and beloved of advertisers the world over fear--is the fear of abandonment. How do I know this? 'Cause Google tells me so. One of the most persistent, recurring ads I get online warns me: "Why Men Pull Away: 10 Ugly Mistakes Women Make That Ruins [sic] Any Chances Of A Relationship."

[Then there's this Christian book, "What Your Husband Isn't Telling You" by the same author of "Why Men Hate Going to Church." This guy has got this angle on lock. I love the contradictory messages: men are simple and have basic needs (food, sex); men are a mystery, buy this book.]

Christian or secular, it doesn't matter. The fear is the same. The message is the same: If he leaves, it's because of you. You did something wrong.

This plays out on a larger scale as well. Why are men leaving the church (or why don't they attend in the first place)? Women. The feminization of Christianity. The predominance of xx chromosomes. Who's supposed to do something about this "crisis"? Women, particularly if they hope to ever get married to a Christian man.

Seems a bit backwards to me--men aren't stepping up and being men in the church! Who's to blame? Women! The most manly thing we can do is blame someone else (Eve) for our problems.

But, sadly, it seems that this kind of fear, no matter how poorly articulated, sells.

I've been writing about the burdens that women are expected to bear in our culture, and I feel like this is a key burden.

It fits so neatly with a pressing temptation women face: To take on blame for the failure of a relationship. Or I dunno, maybe it's just me.

There's something oddly comforting about taking on the burden of blame, perhaps because it's easier than anger, or perhaps because it turns into something you can control. If I change my behavior, repent, respect, submit, then he won't leave me.

There's the fear too, that men always cheat. That they can't keep it in their pants. It's in their very nature to stray. And this fear too, sells.

And as far as the feminization of church goes...color me confused. I get the part about wanting "adventure to live" and "battle to fight" and such, but I doubt that this translates into "What I really want as a Christian man is to literally go into battle and die for my family/faith/country" or "I could really use a few more disfiguring knife wounds so that everyone will know I'm a real man" or "I want nothing more than to do the back-breaking, manly labor of a lumberjack for the rest of my life" or "I wish that disemboweling scene at the end of Braveheart could happen today."

All this "Men were made for battle" stuff seems to translate into, "Get back, woman! Let the men lead." Am I wrong?

I am not a man. And far be it from me to offer here a definition of masculinity. However, I am a daughter and a sister and a friend, and I'd like to challenge this conception of what it means to be a man.

To return to this article, my favorite article, from the website Love and Respect Now, I think we need men who can honestly and non-defensively talk to their own daughters. I'm not sure what, in the name of Mel Gibson, this has to do with battle, or MMA, or adventure, or knife throwing, or rescuing wenches from dragons, but it seems important to me. And probably way, way more difficult. Is that not true strength?

The Christian Girl's Guide to Guys

Greetings fellow traveller. I'm sure you, like me, are pining away teaching Sunday school and wondering when that cute Christian guy will finally notice that you bothered to wear your cute, kiss-me-but-only-after-we're-married heels to church.

Fear not. I have put together a handy guide that covers all possible church foyer scenarios, from that first divinely inspired meeting of your windows-of-the-soul to the moment when God finally decides to write the "Going Steady" chapter of your love story.

Bu first, let's cover proper foyer posture and bearing for the young Christian woman. Remember, be receptive and open. [Receptive. reception. Wedding reception. You follow?] It's best to stand off by yourself. Friends will only scare him away. You should be doing nothing in particular, or how will he know you're available? You are the lady-in-waiting. Smile. No one likes a scowling woman. Act as if the words of the young man who has not yet approached you are already falling upon you like raindrops after a decade of drought. Laugh heartily at the jokes he hasn't yet told you. This will let him know that you are truly open and receptive.

Now that we've covered proper posture, let's move into the specifics:

He says: "Hi."
Translation: "The magnetism of your intense love for God, fair trade coffee, and orphans drew me over here to speak with you."
Suggestion: In the ensuing conversation, let him do most of the talking. If the question of what you do comes up, make sure to say, "But what I really want to do is be a stay-at-home-mom." He will be like putty to your hands.

He says: "Wanna grab lunch?"
Translation: "God told me we're meant to be together, but first I want to take you out to Chick-fil-A."
Suggestion: Make sure to talk about Purity and how much it means to you. Let him pay so that he knows you respect him as a provider.

He says: "Let's sit together in church."
Translation: "I consider us practically engaged. I hope you've picked out a pattern for the wedding dress you will sew by hand."
Suggestion: Under no circumstances allow your arm or leg to brush against his. This is an opportune time to test his true intentions. Is he marriage-minded or just trying to get an extra-marital cuddle on the side?

He says: "Where's the bathroom?"
Translation: "I see you, woman of God. I see you. Also, I really need to use the bathroom."
Suggestion: Smile and point him in the right direction. Do not lead him there yourself. This lets him know that you will make a great help-meet someday.

He says: "How was your week?"
Translation: "Tell me your heart. Pour it forth into my listening ears. I will treasure it forever, my beloved."
Suggestion: This is your moment. Prepare yourself for a DTR.

He says: "Seen any good movies lately?"
Translation: "I want to ask you out, but I'm not sure how."
Suggestion: Talk about guarding your heart. Look at him meaningfully when you say this. Your favorite movie is "A Walk to Remember."

He says: "I like your shoes."
Translation: "I am enthralled with your beauty. I want desperately to hold your hand in mine. I beg of you, be the Ruth to my Boaz."
Suggestion: Bake him cookies and write a note praising him as a man of godly character. Leave these on his doorstep.

Now that we've covered many common scenarios, you should be well-equipped to catch a Christian man of your own. Good luck and God bless. And remember, b-e-e-e-e-e receptive!

The Heresy of a Woman with Ambition

[Excerpted and expanded from an email to a friend]

Let me preface this by saying that I will probably have kids someday. But I worry. I worry that having a family will conflict with following my dreams.

A friend once told me that part of his dream for his life was to get married and have a family. So, in other words, to him, having a family and living his dreams wasn't a conflict. I think this is how it should be, ideally speaking.

Of course, for men, having a career and having a family isn't usually seen as a potential conflict. This rests on the assumption that the wife will do most of the child rearing. I don't think that's terribly fair. But then there are plenty of women who want most of all to be wives and mothers, which I find completely valid. I'm just not one of them.

But why, when I bring up my desire to have a career and a family, does a guy my own age feel comfortable telling me, "Well, you probably won't feel that way after you have kids," as if motherhood miraculously transforms all women into selfless beings with no ambitions of their own.

I can remember bringing up in a women's Bible study once that I didn't want to JUST have a family. I was quickly reassured that I didn't have to have a family, I could always not get married or have kids--you know, focus on my career.

But I didn't mean it as an either/or proposition.

So to return to my original point, two things: One, I think that having kids should be part of life, but not life itself. While I agree that parents should love their children self-sacrificially, I also believe that there's more to life than raising kids.

Two, in my ideal world, the husband would be just as involved in raising and nurturing children as the wife. This might not mean that he ends up doing the actual physical work of raising kids--it's more about having the mindset that it is just as much his responsibility as his wife's.

I originally asked: If men have the responsibility to support their families financially by themselves, does this mean that they should pursue careers that will enable them to do so? Or to put it another way, should this goal trump following their dreams/passions/interests etc.?

I think that this either/or mindset--either I follow my dreams or I work to support a family--can cause guys to put off getting married and starting a family--mainly because they do not wish to sacrifice their dreams. (I don't know, but it seems like in Hollywood at least, following your dreams usually means being pretty broke.)

I can relate to that sentiment, but why can't following your dreams coincide with getting married and having kids? The burden on men to be the sole providers seems to contribute to both this unnecessary dichotomy and the unnecessary extension of adolescence (Again, extended adolescence seems more prevalent in LA where the cost of living often necessitates living a college-student-esque existence long after graduating.)

Honestly, what I've seen the most here in LA (and my sample size is pretty limited) is wives making financial sacrifices for their husband's dreams. So, the wife works as a nurse/teacher/accountant/other-paying-profession and the husband writes or works part-time, generally making less money. I wish I could think of examples where the genders were reversed.

I wish this didn't bother me so much. I think the core of it is that whether the wife is working to support her husband financially or taking care of the kids, she always seems to be in service to his dream, his purpose, his aspirations. I get the same feeling when I read that a woman with amazing talent and a successful career "would throw it all out the window tomorrow" if the right guy came along.

Of course, this is reductive, and in many cases simply not true. There are many people who aspire to be teachers, nurses, and accountants, and it has nothing to do with supporting the dreams of another person.

I think our culture tends to both over-romanticize (for lack of a better word) motherhood and the self-sacrificial role that mothers play, while simultaneously denigrating all things seen as "women's work." We undervalue the work of mothers even as we heap on the sentimentality.

But to say that as a woman you value having a career just as much as you value getting married and having a family. Heresy. Flat out.

Don't believe me? Watch how almost every single romantic comedy ever made punishes women for caring about their careers. And the number one punishment? Being single, alone, and unhappy.

Lose Yourself: Submission, Emotional Abuse and the Dorothea Effect

[I'm having a hard time writing this. I'm not sure if it's because my ideas haven't coalesced or because I keep seeing connections everywhere--in a way, I think in writing I figure out what I want to say--I start in in one place with one end in mind and then end up somewhere completely different.]

Holy Not Happy - An Unnecessary and Misleading Dichotomy

"What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?" asks the subtitle of Gary Thomas's book Sacred Marriage. 

It's a sobering thought. I suspect it's written as an anecdote to those Christians who divorce because "God wants me to be happy." 

However, both these conceptions of happiness seem suspiciously shallow. Surely there is more to happiness than the mere absence of physical, emotional or psychological pain. 

If God doesn't just want me to be happy, does that mean he wants me to suffer? So I can be more holy? If that's the case, the more marriage makes you suffer, the better. 

I'm taking it a little far, but I think the subtitle in question sets up an unnecessary opposition of holy versus happy, or being a person of character versus being happy (in a deeper sense) with your life.  

I also think that this opposition can be twisted into a justification for either perpetrating or enduring emotional abuse.  


The Problem with "Twilight" or  The Lure of False Submission

I was in an emotionally abusive relationship once, in a professional, not a romantic, context. And there's one thing that the other person would say to me that sticks out in memory: "I believe in you."

He meant to imply that as much as I failed to live up to my potential, if only I would give in to him and do what he said, I could be better. I could be more holy: "Let me control you and everything will work out."

As much as it stings my pride to admit it, there was something undeniably attractive about this offer. I knew I was flawed. That I screwed up. And here was someone honest enough to call me on my crap.

If only I could be better. If only I could stop failing. Maybe if I submitted my will to his, I would stop hurting people and actually become a better person.

It's the "this is for your own good" line of abuse--and there is something subtly alluring about letting go of responsibility for and control of your own life, your own dreams, your own being. I don't know how else to explain the success of "Twilight," which trumpets the kind of all-consuming love that demands the loss of self in the Other. I know only that self-immolation and self-abnegation are a temptation--particularly to those who feel less than whole to begin with.

The Dorothea Effect - It's About to Get Literary Y'all

Dorothea Brooke is a character in the novel "Middlemarch" by George Eliot. At base, she is a crusader without a crusade, a missionary without a mission field, a saint deprived of martyrdom. Being so, she makes her own martyrdom, choosing to marry a dourly pedantic and humorless man (Edward Casaubon) over twice her age, so that she might help him in his great, world-changing work, "The Key to All Mythologies" (as bad as it sounds--worse, actually).

Of course, if she were a man in nineteenth century England, her ambitions and ideals would find an easier outlet. As it is, she makes a disastrous marriage to the wrong man--dare I say because she desires holiness (to serve God by serving Casaubon) over happiness (in the sun is shining, birds are singing, isn't it a lovely day to be married to a hot young artist sense. *Spoiler alert* this happens later in the book).

Jane Eyre faces a similar temptation in the form of the handsome and deeply religious St. John Rivers. He asks Jane to marry him and follow him to the mission field as his help-meet. He does not love her, nor does he find her attractive. He simply sees that she is constitutionally and temperamentally suited for the rigors and challenges of missionary life. How romantic.

Adrienne Rich calls this the temptation of self-immolation--literally burning oneself alive.

Jane is tempted to a living death--sacrificing her life to St. John's missionary calling; denying her need to love and be loved by marrying a man for holiness and not happiness.

Dorothea falls into this temptation. Jane does not.

I would define "the Dorothea effect" as denying your own dreams/art/work/calling to serve the dreams/art/work/calling of another person.

In other words, find your own damn "Key to All Mythologies."

More to come on this later.





Inspirations:

1. This article about the end of a Christian marriage.
2. A talk at church (for women) about submitting to God's will.
3. Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas (which I haven't read in full). 
4. Middlemarch by George Eliot
5. "The Temptations of a Motherless Woman" by Adrienne Rich.

Objectification and Men

Some friends and I were talking about the ways in which men objectify women--not in the sexual sense, necessarily, but in the sense of desire and projection.

A man will project onto a beautiful woman his conception of "the perfect woman." So, it's not about a mutual recognition and attraction, but about, "You are beautiful to me. Can't you see that I find you lovely?"

Perhaps this is the correlative of the "So you're saying there's a chance!" phenomenon. Hope springs eternal. But when is he pursuing a fantasy instead of a real girl? Why won't he take "no" for an answer?

When a man takes rejection personally, it's as if he's saying, "Your un-acceptance is unacceptable because it's a reflection on my worth."

But then, women objectify men too, where the "object" in question is the wedding. The groom is interchangeable. Wedding magazines are "porn." There is a TV show called "Say Yes to the Dress."

Today, I watched a court case where a young woman called the cops on her boyfriend because he wouldn't propose to her, even after she had thrown an elaborate engagement party. She was, as everyone agreed "crazy." The judge questioned her motivations: Is that love? Threatening your boyfriend so that he finally proposes?

The man is perhaps the only part of the ceremony that is not an object. The dress, the cake, the flowers. All objects.

[Note: The court case was entirely fictional. There was no claim that this was something that actually happened, but was rather written for entertainment value only.]