Four Reasons You Should Be Casually Dating
With the advent of Buzzfeed, lists have become rather popular on the internet. I'm taking advantage to share my reasons for "casual dating". First, I should tell you that I'm not using the word "date" the same way that we use it today. The word "date" was used in a completely different way when our parents were of dating age. Dating someone meant simply spending intentional time with another person with the aim of getting to know them. This was often in the form of dinner and/or a movie or driving on a Friday or Saturday night. Often, men would take several women out in a month. Vice versa, women would have several dates throughout a month. "Dating" now is the equivalent of "going steady" for them. I am not saying we should have an excess of boyfriends or girlfriends in our back pocket. I'm also not saying we should serial date just to get the attention of the opposite sex. I am saying that I think it's healthy, appropriate and beautiful because:
1. Emotional Chastity. I talk about emotional chastity on a fairly consistent basis, so many of my friends are rolling their eyes at me right now. Emotional chastity is the ability to be modest with our emotions: revealing emotions at the right time within the proper context (CCC #2523). Emotional chastity allows for safe vulnerability, and allows a person to have healthy emotional relationships within their entire life. It seems that going on dates with several different people wouldn't allow for a person to be emotionally chaste. Au, contraire! This allows a person to practice guarding their hearts. Imagine this: if you had a dinner, lunch or coffee date with different guys at least twice a month, would every date become a big deal? Absolutely not! It would still be exciting, but the purpose behind each individual date wouldn't be hidden. Women and men (don't even try to tell me that men don't struggle with emotional chastity) would have the opportunity to get to know different people. (more on this in a follow-up blog on modesty...stay tuned...) Which leads me to:
2. Proper Discernment. Discerning marriage is good, beautiful and difficult. The discernment of marriage is a Vocation in direct relationship to another person. We cannot discern definitively marriage without being able to discern with another person. Does this mean that those who have prayed and experience a call to marriage are wrong? No, but it does mean that they cannot fulfill that call without the other person. Seems pretty obvious, right? So, how does dating help? Getting know several people allows you to understand several different temperaments. In this way, dating several different people helps you to discern what you truly want and (more importantly) need in a spouse. How many youth rallies, conferences, or even lifenights have we been told to make a list of things you want in your future spouse? How do you even know what you want or need if you've never spent intentional time with the opposite sex?
More than this, we sometimes need to adjust what we want. We should never, ever, ever, ever, in a million years, lower our standards for a potential spouse. Virtue, chastity, relationship with Christ, ability to lead, kindness, etc, are very important to marriage. However, we should be cautious to know that our spouse is likely not going to look like a Calvin Klein model. We also need to remember that no person is perfect. Men, stop looking for the perfect woman; she doesn't exist. This is a fallacy that's been placed in your mind from the time you were young. Ladies, stop looking for Mr. Right; he's not real. Emotions are an important part of attractions, and we do need to pay attention to that, but we cannot simply say that we always know and understand the Mind of God and know exactly who we are looking for.
3. Boldness. A few years ago, I met a wonderful priest named Fr. John Parks. I was a FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students) Team Director, and he was a high school chaplain in Scottsdale. One afternoon, Fr. Parks and I were discussing over the phone something that's near and dear to my heart: evangelization. Fr. Parks posed the question to me, "Why is our society so afraid to share the Gospel?" My response was, "Our parishioners do not see the necessity in practicing boldness." Virtue is something that is acquired through the perseverance and consistent practice of a habit. In order to be an evangelist, we must not be afraid to be bold with Christ, as He makes bold strides with us daily. We are too afraid to hurt feelings or rock the boat that we miss opportunities to share Christ with others. So, how does dating help this? I hear on a pretty consistent basis that guys are afraid to ask women out on dates because they fear rejection, and this makes me wonder what kind of Christians they are in the public sphere. Often times women do not show their feelings for men outright because they are either guarding their hearts, working towards a more virtuous way of flirting, or trying not to lead a guy on. Whatever the case, I would recommend that guys get over it and ask her out. The worst thing that could happen is the lady says, "No." How is that even bad? Your relationship is now further defined, and the Lord closed the door for you.
Conversely, I have a rule (and I'm fairly certain my roommates share this rule): If a man asks me for intentional time or a date, I am free at the time proposed, and I don't feel physically unsafe with this person, I will always say, "Yes." to the first one. I don't always say, "Yes" to a subsequent date, because sometimes it's pretty obvious that we aren't called to marry one another. We don't know where our spouse is coming from. We don't know who the Lord has in mind for us. Ladies, allowing a guy the opportunity to be chivalrous will allow you a chance to practice receiving. Also, what an opportunity for boldness on our parts: there may be something that comes up on the date that we can address as a matter of loving virtue. Get out there and date!
4. Opening the Lines of Charitable Communication. Dating allows people to practice being open with their communication. Dating teaches us how to have healthy and holy conversations with persons of the opposite sex. I studied Human Communication, psychology and sociology in my undergraduate. One of the biggest things that was stressed by my psych and soc professors was that communication, and how that communication is presented, is key to the health of every relationship. Most experts rank that as the first focus for healthy and satisfactory relationships. While, as Catholic Christians, we know the most important focus of every relationships should be creating an environment where Christ is at the center (and making sure both parties are pursuing Christ and being pursued by Christ), it goes to say something. Communication is something we are missing. Just look at this: I'm a nobody writing to a group of people I might never meet, and they got this through means that didn't require actually talking to someone (most likely). It's not like I'm a news reporter who writes for a newspaper, and you have to walk down the street to the newsy on the corner to read this. Nope. You opened your macbook or iPad. Your marriage will not be a series of text messages. Your marriage will not be emails. Yes, these forms of communication have allowed us to make the world smaller, but you have to look at someone's face to make vows. Dating allows you to learn how to make conversation and opens those lines without the potential awkwardness. This allows for a less awkward "DTR". When a guys asks a lady to be his girlfriend, or to "go steady with him", there's clarity in what that means. Yes, boundaries need to be defined, but that conversation is already set up for that. Yes, other conversations will follow, but at least you know that at that point, the discernment has reached the next level: let's be exclusive and discern marriage.
In these ways, I would say that a date is any time that is spent one-on-one, intentionally, and not "dutch" (one party pays). The challenge lies in this: what is it about the word "date" that makes you live in fear?
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