Dating

I don't miss dating. Not one bit.

It's not that I ever took a vow not to date anymore. Since I broke up with my last boyfriend, the one I thought I wanted to marry (and whom I thought wanted to marry me, but I was wrong and he lied), I've only gone out on a couple of dates. They were fine. Nothing weird. One guy was nice enough,a Ph.D who was new in town and just looking to connect with a new social group. I saw right away he was a control freak. He was massively intelligent but defective in both his Catholic genes (was a fan of Voice of the Fuddled and was brainwashed to think they were "orthodox"), and really seemed to have a need to control everyone around him as much as possible.

It wasn't so bad on one date and at a couple social gatherings where we both happened to be present, but of course, that kind of guy, over time, gets worse. Not better. But he did me a favor and moved somewhere else so the dating possibility went elsewhere with him.  Good guy for a friend, but thank GOD for preventing me (and hopefully any woman) from being his wife! 

Other than that, I haven't met anyone I've even WANTED to date. To be clear, I LOVE men, I am very attracted to men, but I also find the pickings very slim. So many single men aren't interested in holiness; even in their 30's, they seem to be into the party scene, refusing to grow up and move on, or, of those who ARE incredible, I seem to have missed the boat. I have to wonder if I'm a rarity in my age group? A woman who truly loves Our Lord...but lives in an age group that has bought so into the secular culture of relativism that they find God, if they believe in Him, to be a hindrance to their hookups?

It's not that I've ever been any beauty at all, and in a thousand years, I wouldn't stand out in a crowd. (I like that, actually.) When it comes to marriage, looks may be a hook to get attention, but it doesn't last. The happiest couples I know aren't the beautiful people worshiped via Hollywood's lens; they're average everyday people who don't stand out to anyone but to each other.  

That's beauty, and that's love.  That's very often holiness.

And that's one of the factors I've considered in my own Vocational discernment.

It isn't about "I'm ugly so I should be a nun."

No.

It's not, "I can't find a decent guy, so I should be a nun."

No. 

Jesus isn't a consolation prize.  To consider Him such is to trivialize Who He Is and what He did to save us...and the fact that He calls and jealously guards His loved ones.  

Discernment doesn't come from deprivation, but only with a focus on love. Where is love to be found? Where is God to be found? What is God's will? Where is Christ most expressed to us, through us to others?

Deprivation, or some perceived and alleged flaw, isn't a part of understanding and seeking what we are called to be.

While we need to understand what we are "giving up", we also need to understand what we are gaining, in any state in life. I have friends who desired to be Nuns or Sisters...and ended up happily married. They saw an ideal, and God revealed His plan, when it was time. They were ready to give up the world, and God revealed to them the way to gain it and eternity entirely.

So often, the men and women who choose and are chosen by the priesthood (for men!) and religious life are subject to diatribes from the world about what they have supposedly "given up". The world forgets that some have tried what the world had to offer and found it...insulting, at best. Dismal. Unfulfilling. Typically the issue, from the worldly point of view, is sex.

People, get over it. You can live without it and be far happier without all the angst it causes.

It IS a deprivation to give up children and family, and for religious, to even be separated from family and friends while still walking the planet. But it's a sacrifice with meaning.

Dating...had no meaning for me. I'm not sure when that happened, but at some point, I just stopped looking or caring.  And that's where God entered in and asked me to look at Him. 

I don't really miss dating. Sure, it was nice to go to dinner and a movie sometimes, and the last guy I dated was a perfect gentleman (THAT was rare!) who didn't expect to be "paid" for dinner. The food, the conversation, the social aspect...that's something that was very enjoyable but I can find that same enjoyment with my friends. 

At some point, I realized there is supposed to be something more.   THAT was the deprivation. 

Some people are called to marriage, and my heart goes out to them as they seek the one God has chosen for them. Long marriages are amazing, and in this culture, it seems so hard for any woman to find a good man, and vice versa.

Sometimes, I realize that I'll never be married, and I'm a bit saddened, but at the same time, I have this sense that it was never meant to be, anyway. From the time I was a little girl, even as I spoke about marriage, I don't think I ever really believed it was something I'd experience.  

Maybe there was a part of me that thought, for awhile, that such a gift as marriage was "too good" for a girl like me.  

It doesn't sadden me, so don't offer "condolences" or "there now's".

There is no consolation prize that you can offer, and I'm not in need of consolation of any sort...none offered by this world. 

If I WAS in need of consolation, however, and if any future-brides out there need help in gaining perspective, I would recommend going HERE. And you may find that your attitude has been properly adjusted.

Or, uh, consoled.

And that's all I have to say about that.
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(This wasn't going where you thought, was it? And if you haven't, click on the link NOW!) 


Oh, yes, Adoro has a funny bone. 

The Wise and the Foolish

Terry has a wonderful post about virginity and chastity, in the spiritual life, as he quotes his good friend Fr. Mark at Vultus Christi.

Celibacy and chastity and holiness.

Don Marco has an excellent post on the subject, taken from a homily of St. John Chrysostom on the parable of the wise and foolish virgins. Both St. John and Fr. Mark have a marvelous understanding of the primacy of mercy and love in the spiritual life. They point out that both the wise and the foolish virgins obtained a remarkable and exalted grace - that of virginity, chastity, continence, what have you. Both awaited the bridegroom… and when they heard the announcement of his return, only the wise virgins were prepared, while the foolish were not. We all know the story, yet this is what St. John says:

“Virginity then, being a thing in itself so great and so much esteemed among many, lest any man having attained unto it, and kept it undefiled, should think that he hath done all, and so leave the rest undone, the Lord putteth forth this parable, in order to show that if virginity, though it have all else, lack mercy, its owner will have his portion without among the fornicators, among whom Christ doth justly place the heartless and pitiless celibate.

“By the “lamps” spoken of in this parable, the Lord signifieth the actual gift of virginity and holy continency, and by the “oil” gentleness, almsgiving, and helpfulness toward the needy.” - St. John Chrysostom

Go visit Terry and Fr. Mark and read the rest!