Dating ages?

[TheRealJuliane]

Your example is amusingly exaggerated, but I am one of those people. I frown heavily on people getting married in their early 20s, and I have told my kids (only halfway joking) that they shouldn’t get married before the age of 30.

I don’t know why, how or when young people became less mature and more self-centered than their peers from many decades ago, but it’s happened. Most people in their early 20s just aren’t ready for marriage, and almost every divorced person I know was married before the age of 25 or 26.

The problem with that is, fertility. The best time to start bearing children is in the 20’s. If someone waits until age 30…It’s hit or miss as to whether they are going to have natural children. Or how long it might take.

 

[Irish_Eyes_826]

I know I won’t be married for a long time. I really don’t have any interest in being in a committed relationship until I’m done pursuing all the things I want to do. That includes traveling, a master’s degree, etc. What can I say, I’ve got fire under my feet. I’m eighteen and I know that if I got married in my early twenties I would be so restless and it wouldn’t be good for me or my spouse. The idea of settling down and having babies any time soon is not a good one for me!

However, I do go on dates now and then, just for fun. It’s nice to spend time with boys and learn about the world of dating. You don’t have constantly be sizing them up as a future husband.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Wow! I truly did not expect to have such an overwhelming amount of replies to this!

Thank you all for your opinions. I suppose, after reading everything you’ve all said and really thinking about it as best I can, I really should hold off, at least for a few more years.

As a matter of fact, I have given much thought to my vocation and have been praying for guidance since an excellent retreat I went on in early 2011. Being the eldest of an unusually (nowadays) large family, I certainly feel most comfortable with the idea of marriage and family life because it’s what I know. However, I recently met a young woman who recently made her final vows as a religious sister, and I look forward to discussions with her on her own experiences with the religious life.

While I respectfully disagree with Owlpride, I hope everything you all have said will really stay with me as I age and mature. Thank you and I do plan to try to talk to my mom about what the actual rules might be (since as of now, I have only received joking answers ranging from the ages of 27-35 ).

God bless!
Rose

That’s great. Another book, I’d recommend is Religious Vocation: An Unnecessary Mystery by Father Richard Butler. It’s excellent.

Pax

 

[Dan_Daly]

LOL… what? Don’t kiss or even touch each other? Good luck with that!

Most of the kissing that goes on in dating relationships has been condemned by the Catholic Church.

According to a decree of Pope Alexander VII in 1666, a kiss is not "merely a venial sin when performed for the sake of the carnal and sensible delight which arises from the kiss, even if the danger of further consent and pollution is excluded.”{1}

• Alexander VII, “Condemned Decrees” proclaimed on the 18th day of March in 1666 (Denzinger 2060, 1140 40).

As Pope Alexander VII makes clear, the problem with a kiss is not simply that it may lead to other activities (a position many people today take), but that the arousal of sexual passions outside of marriage is gravely wrong in and of itself. When does so knowingly and willingly, they commit a mortal sin.

Sadly, a great many Catholics are set up to fail by poor catechesis which basically says “as long as you keep your clothes on, you’re good”- and that’s the “good” instruction that doesn’t accept outright fornication.

Can a young man kiss a young lady, especially one whom he is romantically interested in without arousing sensible delight?

In theory, it is possible. In practice, I believe it to be very unlikely.

If one is dating a person whom they see no possibility of marrying, or when either partner is unready for marriage, they are seperating the romantic affections directed toward and fulfilled in the sacrament of marriage, from the sacrament and it’s ends, primarily children.

In essence, “recreational dating” is spiritual contraception.

Pax Christi

 

[Irishmom2]

This. Don’t know what the “right” age is because it is not the same for everyone. But what the OP describes as wanting–is a friendship and there is nothing wrong with having friends even in high school if it remains friends. But it is up to her to keep it at that level when she is friends with a guy. And I agree with whoever said it earlier, that what the OP wants is what most girls get from their female friends. If she can find a guy that is interested in what she desires, that would be fine if she were my daughter. To go off to college and expect her to suddenly be able to discern the good from the jerk guys might be difficult without having experienced even a friendship earlier.

 

[Dan_Daly]

This. Don’t know what the “right” age is because it is not the same for everyone. But what the OP describes as wanting–is a friendship and there is nothing wrong with having friends even in high school if it remains friends. But it is up to her to keep it at that level when she is friends with a guy. And I agree with whoever said it earlier, that what the OP wants is what most girls get from their female friends. If she can find a guy that is interested in what she desires, that would be fine if she were my daughter. To go off to college and expect her to suddenly be able to discern the good from the jerk guys might be difficult without having experienced even a friendship earlier.

I must respectfully but strongly disagree with the idea that dating is needed to build social skills independent of the participants readiness and seriousness about marriage.

Courtship is for discerning if you will marry someone. Period. There are plenty of other ways to build social skills and gain confidence.

When people date an emotional bond forms. When people do “mushy stuff”- hold hands, kiss, hug, this bond can form very quickly and strongly. The bonding process is one God designed- to keep a married couple united through the difficulties of life.

An “early and often” approach to dating which sees it as a means of rounding out one’s personality rather than finding a spouse means that this bond will most likely be broken many times and do great harm to the individuals involved.

As an analogy, put a piece of tape on your forearm. That is the bond. Now pull it off. That’s breaking up. It hurts. It’s supposed to, because God made the bond to last.

Now, keep putting it on your arm and pulling it off. That is our our culture’s approach to dating- numerous relationships that each bond and break. Breaking up (pulling the tape off) gets less painful with each subsequent brake, but the strength of the bond is also degrading. Eventually all you have is a dirty, hairy piece of tape that won’t stick to anything.

I am not proposing that one must marry the first person they court. I am proposing that one should not court anyone they are not seriously discerning marriage with, and must end the courtship once either party determines marriage is not for the couple. Limiting physical contact shows not only an obedience to God’s laws (6th and 9th commandments) but also also for reason to better operate in discernment process.

Pax Christi

 

[Sillara]

I had two “dating” relationships prior to dating my now-husband. One was a young man whose family would have rejected me outright (I am not of his ethnicity), and when I went to college, our 3 months of dating ended.

The other was a man, nearly 10 years my senior, who was, I thought and he said, courting me. After about a year, he dumped me for the divorcee he cheated on me with. I had just turned 20.

But a year later, I had found my now-husband. And I told him that I didn’t date casually. I didn’t play games, and I didn’t say what I didn’t mean. I scared him off. He came back within a few weeks, though, once he realized there were other guys who wanted to go out with me – and he didn’t want them to.

We got engaged the summer between our junior and senior years of college and married the week of graduation. We had no jobs, no nothing.

Now we have half a dozen children, and we both have Master’s degrees. He teaches university. I homeschool our children. We write novels, and I am a freelance editor.

I was 22 when we married, the oldest of my siblings to do so. It’s nearly 15 years that we have been married. My sisters have been married 14 and 12 years, respectively. They were 20 and 19 when they married. It is not age. It is a question of maturity.

You don’t need money as much as determination.

 

[Irishmom2]

I must respectfully but strongly disagree with the idea that dating is needed to build social skills independent of the participants readiness and seriousness about marriage.

Courtship is for discerning if you will marry someone. Period. There are plenty of other ways to build social skills and gain confidence.

I think you misunderstood what I was saying, we are actually in agreement. I said she could be friends with a guy if it remains friends. And being friends with someone is not dating them. It is, as you said, a way to build social skills and gain confidence.

 

[NSFrame]

Let me share my experience.

Boys started knocking on my door, so to speak, when I was around 10th grade (this was the mid-90s). My parents met all of them. And let me tell you, this was extremely important. My mom could spot a smooth talker a mile away…and she would let me know, “no, you are not going to be seeing that boy”. At such a young age, I thought a boy being “nice” to me meant just that - that he really liked me as a person. HA! Mom gave me that “radar” to spot the phonies and cads. She also would rave about boys that genuinely were respectful to adults and to me, which made me have very high standards for how boys should treat me. I am a naturally trusting person, and without her guidance at home, in high school, I would have been drowning in a sea of sharks as a young woman.

 

[Dan_Daly]

I think you misunderstood what I was saying, we are actually in agreement. I said she could be friends with a guy if it remains friends. And being friends with someone is not dating them. It is, as you said, a way to build social skills and gain confidence.

Ok, I did misread you, or perhaps you misread the OP. She stated she was looking for a male friend to among other things “do mushy stuff with”. I don’t know what exactly that means, but it doesn’t sound like “just friends” to me.

If a boy and girl are just friends then there is also no need for them to be spending time alone together.

Sorry for the miscommunication and God bless.

Pax!

 

[joshvanrad]

If a boy and girl are just friends then there is also no need for them to be spending time alone together.

I disagree. I have a friend who is a girl and we have been friends for the better part of a decade. We have never had romantic feelings for each other, but we often hang out alone. We realize that we are friends because we have similar tastes in media, so we watch movies together once in a while or go to shows together. We don’t do anything “mushy” like hold hands or cuddle because we are strictly platonic friends, but we have been known to spend a fair amount of time together- just the two of us.

Ite in pace,
Joshua C.