How to deal with your daughter having sex before marriage?

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My daughter started a serious relationship when she started university. My husband asked her on the phone 1) whether she was having sex and 2) whether she loved him. She refused to answer and one year later she is still very angry. She feels he invaded her privacy by asking. Further, he said some bad things in the heat of the moment, like ‘are you f***ing him on my dime?’ She feels he shamed her and she seems emotionally distraught to this day.

One year later, he is still not really talking to her as he is so disgusted about her having sex. He has admitted to me that he loves her a little less.

I want them to reconcile. Whilst I wish she hadn’t done it, ultimately, I am accepting. And I strongly feel that I would never abandon my children. My love is unconditional.

My husband says I’m a bad catholic for not holding her to account like he is. I personally feel that he needs to forgive her. I remind him that Jesus was not too fond of the righteous. We have a duty to guide and to try and get people on the right path - not to abuse and shame them. So - first question - who is following the faith in the way we’re dealing with this? Do I need to be harder? Does he need to be more forgiving?

Secondly - is it ok for a father to ask his daughter whether she is having sex? He says all catholic fathers would ask. I personally feel a bit weird about it. I think it was her right to decline to answer, being 18, if it made her uncomfortable. He could have reaffirmed that sex before marriage is a sin etc etc without making her answer and then left it as a matter between her and God. What do you guys think?

Ps she is still in the relationship, the boy is very nice and they seem happy. I think there is a chance they’ll marry.
 
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Your husband sounds like a complete psycho, frankly. Asking her in that tone and using those words is insane. I don’t blame your daughter for being hurt.

As for “loving her less”, ask him if everyone else should “love him less” for his sins. I think you need to encourage him to discuss this with a priest because it sounds like he needs help.
 
It’s good to get an outside opinion. Every time I try to defend her, I’m accused of having weak morals or being a bad catholic. So I really want to see what other catholic fathers think.
 
I am sorry you are in the middle of this.

I think your husband was totally out of line to ask his daughter the question, and his response was over the top. This is not something a father usually asks his daughter. While it is something she should not have done, (if she did anything) his reaction was not helpful.

Since he seems very concerned about who was wrong and who was right, I think you should suggest he meet with a priest and discuss not your daughter’s behavior, but his own toward her. His response was not loving, nor was it very Catholic.

Please remind him that we are all sinners, and that your daughter may have sinned differently than him, but he is as much a sinner as she is. He needs to forgive her and guide her without being so reactionary or he will damage their relationship permanently. He is wrong to be holding on to this for so long, and for loving her less. That is not anything a parent should ever do.

I hope that you, as her mom and as the calmer half can suggest that your daughter go to confession if need be, she hasn’t already done so, and also talk with her about her choices.
 
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Poor girl. She didn’t say yes or no? Maybe because her father treated her shamefully.

She’s an adult, and he’s run the risk of ending the relationship with her.

Love her a little less? Terrible.
 
The way your husband is treating your daughter is just vile. Not only is it none of his business if she’s having sex, but it was completely inappropriate for him to ask.

No wonder she is emotionally distraught. He did shame her, and he’s continuing to shame her. He needs to be asking her to forgive him, as an absolute minimum. The way he’s treating her is abusive. Shaming, the silent treatment, withdrawing love? Abusive. No wonder she is angry and distraught. And to add all that, he’s now shaming you. He is wrong, not you and your daughter.
 
KJL said:
Secondly - is it ok for a father to ask his daughter whether she is having sex?
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While it’s not out of bounds, it’s pretty awkward especially if they didn’t have an open and honest relationship on sex topics all through the teen years.
KJL said:
He says all catholic fathers would ask.
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I know ZERO Catholic fathers who would ask their college age daughters about their sex lives.
KJL said:
What do you guys think?
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Your husband needs some counseling. Sexual sins aren’t necessarily worse than any other sins, and we all fall daily. He’s got a weird hang up about this, it sounds like to me.
KJL said:
who is following the faith in the way we’re dealing with this? Do I need to be harder? Does he need to be more forgiving?
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Sounds like you have a good grasp on things, and he sounds cray-cray.

Maybe he would talk to your pastor about his feelings and actions towards your daughter?
 
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I agree with all those who said dad needs some professional help.

These are not appropriate questions for a father to ask an adult daughter who is dating, and suggest an unhealthy level of interest in/ hangups about the daughter’s sexual behavior. And no, it is not something that Catholic dads all ask about. My dad was a very good Catholic and never asked me these types of questions. I can totally understand your daughter being upset and frankly, if my father had asked me those types of questions, I would not have wanted to talk to him at all about anything going forward and would have probably focused on how I could quickly get away from him for good.

Furthermore, even if it was a different situation where a father might really need to inquire into this (such as if the daughter was younger than college age, had a history of bad misbehavior, was bringing her partners to the family home for hanky panky, or even a situation where the dad and daughter always had frank and open communications about sexual behavior) there are better and calmer ways to be asking the questions than the way he is going about it in this case.
 
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KJL said:
My husband says I’m a bad catholic for not holding her to account like he is. I personally feel that he needs to forgive her.
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I’m confused—didn’t she refuse to answer? What would he be forgiving? He asked an inappropriate question, she correctly refused to answer —and now he’s shaming her. The one who needs to ask for forgiveness is not your daughter, it’s your husband.
 
Even if daughter had answered that yes, she was having sex, it’s not the dad’s place to be “forgiving” her for it. If she’s in college, she’s an adult, and any sex presumably didn’t happen under his roof. We don’t live in a society where the dad is disgraced or put into some bad social position (for example, not honoring a marriage contract) because his daughter has premarital sex.

Dad could express concern for her behavior, try to encourage her to stop the behavior/ repent/ confess, or withhold financial support such as refusing to pay for her college. But she’s still not committing a wrong against her dad, no matter how disappointing her behavior might be.
 
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Your husband is completely out of line both with your daughter and with you. It is frankly pretty weird for a parent to ask their child about whether they are having sex. I mean, obviously if the child is a minor and you think they may be being abused or if they are somehow lacking mental capacity and may be being exploited, then of course that becomes a safeguarding issue and you have to ask. But that’s not the case here. If she’s a university student then she is obviously capable of giving consent.

I can tell you, my parents have never asked me anything like this. They believe in being pretty open about things, but there are lines that one does not cross.

You cannot have a good relationship with somebody where you reduce the amount of love you have for them based on their behavior. I did once read about a guy who said he couldn’t love his son after he kidnapped two girls, spent a night raping and torturing them, murdered one, and shot the other in the head believing her to be dead too. That’s a pretty extreme case. Your daughter has not committed some heinous crime.

I guess what is comes down to is that your husband is very hung up on sex. I am wondering whether he comes from a culture where a woman’s value is based on her being a virgin on her wedding night, e.g. some cultures in the Middle East and South Asia. The fact is that having sex outside of marriage is not some unique sin that is worse than every other sin. Some people just have this completely irrational attitude about sex and virginity, and usually it’s either about homosexuality or a female losing her virginity.
 
do_justly_love_mercy said:
I guess what is comes down to is that your husband is very hung up on sex. I am wondering whether he comes from a culture where a woman’s value is based on her being a virgin on her wedding night, e.g. some cultures in the Middle East and South Asia.
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I was wondering it too.

In those cultures, a woman sexual purity and behavior is a reflection on her male relatives honor. The male relatives are supposed to be the stewards of a woman’s sexuality.

This is why honor killings exists in those cultures.
 
It used to be that way in many other cultures as well, including the ethnic European-American cultures in USA, though usually the reaction against errant daughters didn’t reach the level of “honor killing”. It might have reached the level of throwing daughter out of the house and telling her not to come back. What happens when American parents find out a daughter, or sometimes even a son, is having premarital sex has been a very common theme in a lot of 20th century literature.

Back in the days when people lived in small villages or communities and everybody knew each other and sexual behaviors were observed by and often informally policed by the community, having a daughter who engaged in sex outside marriage would usually bring the community’s frowns not only upon the daughter, but upon the parents, who were often blamed for bad parenting or not controlling their daughter, and maybe even upon other members of the family; a sister for example might have trouble making a good match because she was perceived to come from a bad family background or because people assumed she must also have loose morals.

However, times have changed and the fact that a girl might commit sexual sins doesn’t usually have repercussions on her parents, other than making them sad and disappointed and perhaps creating financial or emotional burdens for them if the daughter gets pregnant or has some other kind of trouble related to her behavior.
 
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I don’t have too much to add to what the previous posters have said. I’ll just reiterate that your husband is very wrong and is acting in a way extremely contradictory to Catholic Christianity.
 
I hope your husband gets help. My daughter and I went through a rough patch when she was a teenager. I’m fact I was about to hand in my parental badges😇 . One thing I did right was continue to love her. She got pregnant at 17. For several years we endured custody issues which finally resolved with the father forfeiting his rights. We then did our best to help our daughter become a mother. The positive is we became very close with our new granddaughter. My daughter and I worked on our own relationship. Today she is a wonderful 47 year old women who has a great husband and blessed us with two other grandchildren. And that granddaughter we helped raise while our daughter got her life straightened out? She just blessed us with our third great granddaughter. I say all this to just say to those dads out there stick with them. Love them through it and in the process learn a whole lot about Someone who loved me when I was deep in sin. In fact He died for me.
 
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For a righteous, Christian man, your husband has some vocabulary. And, talking that way to his own daughter!

It sounds as if he has an unhealthy interest in matters that are not his business. As your daughter is an adult, living outside his home, her behavior is between her and God. I agree…his behavior could drive her away from the church!

You have done nothing wrong. He really needs to speak to a priest.

Do you have any sons? It would be interesting to hear his views on their sex lives!!!
 
I’m a daughter, not a father.

But I’d say… technically, it strikes me as reasonable that a good father (and good mother) could make inquiries about their children’s love lives (including, in nongraphic language, the question of whether they’re conducting the relationship in a healthy way, or falling into sin). Alternately, the approach you suggested (reminding her of Catholic teaching, then not ‘making’ her answer you about what she’s actually doing (since ultimately it’s God she answers to, not you)) seems eminently reasonable to me.

That said, it sounds like your husband (unfortunately) did a horrendous job of this. He used profanity when speaking to his daughter? He told you he loves her less??

I’m sorry to hear about this sad situation. I hope you have support from your priest or other trusted friends, who can affirm for you that you are living out your love for your daughter in a loving way. And I especially hope that somehow, your husband can seek and receive help for his harsh, judgmental approach to his daughter. Has he always been like this, or did some switch ‘flip’ in him as he aged, and maybe medical consultation may be helpful…? Or at least therapy. From this distance and admittedly sole anecdote, it sounds to me like your husband has serious underlying issues, e.g. with anger and judgment.
 
Oh my goodness, you’re right. He does see sex as a worse sin than everything else. And I have been led to believe it (I’ve been shamed for my own past for many years). Thank you for opening my eyes to this.
 
Wow. Way out of line question and attitude for a parent.

Your daughter is an adult. Her sins are between she and her confessor.
 
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