Soul Mates

[chevalier]

There are people who haven’t heard of Buddhism or Hinduism or the term soul mate, who wonder if there is one ‘prince’ for them, very young girls for instance.

Yup. But the prince charming is a pattern from fairy tales. It’s different from what children would develop spontaneously. Besides, it may be a projection of the eventual spouse. “My future wife whom I don’t know yet,” doesn’t mean, “the woman destined to be my wife.”

And where did the Buddhists and the Hindus borrow the idea from? They knew it innately just as anyone would. The idea is as old as love itself.

They also got karma from somewhere. Or reincarnation.

Otherwise if we are only talking terminology, it is irrelevant, the poll question says it as plainly as possible.

Semantics matter nothing. We’re talking about the concept of a man and a woman being set apart for each other.

You just seemed to appreciate the goodness of the scenario the movie depicted, so I used that to infer what you think about a soul mate.

Wrongly, then, alas, as there was no notion of predestination. The way some people use the word “soulmate”, it may be a relationship developed without the existence of any preestablished destiny, even one “deniable”, respecting free will. But in that sense, the, “one and only possible pre-chosen soulmate,” is something different altogether.

Marriage came before the priesthood, priesthood came after the fall. And arguably, stopped being necessary after the crucifixion.

Ekhm? So Fathers are generally superfluous in our Church?

God intends everyone to come to the knowledge of His son’s death and be born again too, and he does guide people, and they reject. And if few people meet their real mates, then that just shows how few people care to believe how good God really is, and how good God wants to be to His followers.

That basically means looking out for the one true love kind of thing is doing God’s will and God’s will is served by discernment of whomever God might have pre-chosen as our spouse. While somewhat viable, I don’t think the concept is substantiated well enough to pass as necessary.

I was hoping I could enlighten your very moderate and satisfactory view of marriage. It does in fact imply that there can be one specific person, you just don’t want to believe.

Sorry, but you’re drifting onto some strange waters.

Yes, we are monogamous, just as Jesus was monogamous in spirit, having only one bride as his church.

We’re talking about a human marriage, a relationship resulting in conception of offspring through sexual intercourse. The way you put it, you could claim a married priest is in two marriages at the same time. What also with nuns who refer to Jesus Christ as their husband? Does He have thousands of wives? We’re talking about a human marriage here.

Ah but what other planet is there? Is that only because we are one civilization you ask? We don’t need to worry about that…

Let’s stay on topic, please.

That is how deeply embedded the idea one intended person is in this mystery that is life. That is just how pure, simple and obvious it is.

It’s neither simple nor obvious, even if it is possible.

God wouldn’t want it any other way.

Such as, for example, it being our responsibility to find a spouse, even with divine aid?

…or it could prove our desire for one person has merit.

Once again: our desire to marry one person comes from our being monogamous. We have the view that one man and one woman make marriage for as long as both of them live. Most people have some desire of this kind of relationship. But this doesn’t prove the relationships were matched before we were born.

But we are to become one flesh with our wives and love her as Christ loves the church. A spouse is a friend and more.

There’s no relation whatsoever between that and the question whether the choice is pre-made by God before our birth or if there’s no pre-chosen mate for us. It’s not merely insufficient evidence. There’s simply no tie.

 

[chevalier]

So where did that young girl get the idea from?

From where the poster before you had said. From fairy tales read in childhood.

What about Tristan and Isolde, and Romeo and Juliet? The term soul mate wasn’t used, but the concept of one true love existed in medieval Europe.

If you mean soulmate as a type of bond only, then they probably were so. But that doesn’t mean they were meant to be with each other by God before they were even conceived. That kind of concept is simply not there. But if you want to find it somewhere, you will find examples in the Bible. However, you will not find enough evidence to claim such preselection of spouses is universal and applies to the whole populace.

But logically speaking, the idea of soul mate it linked with monogamy itself.

It is. But the idea of a soulmate doesn’t actually necessarily mean that the soulmate is chosen by God for us before we’re born. In other words: you can have soulmates without predestination. Monogamy means you’re married to one person at a time. It has nothing to do with whether the person was pre-chosen or not.

If you believe we can marry one woman and love her our whole life, then the idea that only one person is meant for you to begin with, is not far off.

Yeah, but it’s also easy to conceive the idea in such circumstances without regard to its actual veracity or lack of it.

Any person who is in love, loves to feel that they are the only one (that relationship will be tested with time), and any couple who is together knowing full well that they could be with anyone else, isn’t in it for the love, and whatever romance they delude themselves into thinking they are participating in, is no more than a primitive biological urge.

Objection. “Anyone else” is not the same as “someone else”. If they think they could be with anyone, they’re deluding themselves. If they think they could be and make it with a person from a wider selection, it’s not the same, and they have much of a point, actually. Additionally, your claim it’s merely a primitive biological urge is downright false if you claim it’s always merely a primitive biological urge unless you have the knowledge your partner is the preselected person.

You can’t entertain any notion of existence without having a pre-occupation with your own self (this doesn’t interfere with unselfish acts of love to your neighbour), so if we are called to become one flesh with another person, their idea of existence circulates within themselves and only themselves. No one else can exist to them. Thats how any woman loves to feel (and therefore any man), and thats how a man loves to make his wife feel.

Sorry, but that’s no logical proof of preselection of spouses by any means.

All that one needs to know about the afterlife is that we will know eachother in heaven, which takes no effort to believe.

Jesus said they wouldn’t marry in the Kingdom of Heaven when asked whose spouse would a wife of seven brothers (successively) be in heaven.

Dating is obsolete to someone who has faith in their God. Dating is a secular idea, it is what someone with no heavenly resources resorts to. God also gives clear guidance, and doesn’t send ‘test drives’.

Dating is a skewed concept at the very best and yes, secular in origin and spirit. I have many a problem with it. I could rant on and on. In fact, I find danger in its core principles. Especially the kind of non-exclusive dating with multiple co-existing romantic partnerships of one person.

God gives guidance, but our perception is not always clear. Guidance may be clear but without clear perception it will not be received clear.

I find it hard to believe that God would use consecutive boyfriend and girlfriend relationships to teach people things, as in for training, too.

But here’s the problem: you need to meet your future spouse somewhere. You can’t lock yourself in a cell and pray that God sends him or her your way. You can’t limit yourself to asking God if the man or woman is right for you without even getting to know the person. Obviously, getting to know doesn’t necessarily include finding out what kind of kisser the other person is.

Dating more and more people will only make it harder to believe one ideal person exists, how can the multitude compare with the one?

The multitude you talk about is composed of individuals, who are compared as such. Otherwise it would be a choice between polyamory and monogamy.

 

[chevalier]

As for the ideal person, He came and we crucified Him. The ideal person is not even a logical concept, it’s a projection. A teenage girl or boy conceives a complete list of features and sets out to find that in a living person. Not likely going to happen. And certainly belief does not create existence. The fact we thought up a set of qualities like that doesn’t bring a corresponding physical person into existence.

All this said, I’m still somewhat partial to the idea of God having someone in for us all, but I don’t see enough evidence to talk about it the same way we talk about articles of faith or principles of morality.

 

[nablaise]

I think you’ve answered your question.

Eeek. Come on. Sorry, but you’ve been listening to feminists too much. A man is no worse than a woman and if you mean man as both genders, then still, evil is not our default state.

The next thing you’re going to say is that the only way to do something good or right is for God to take direct control over your body. We have free will. We’re vulnerable to temptation and prone to sin. But we’re God’s children at the same time and made in His image. Are you going to say that unless something is directly “orchestrated” by God, then it’s automatically wrong, sinful and what else? That’s just not correct.

Do you not believe in free will? And it’s beyond me where you read anything in my posts to suggest that God lumps a man in Africa and a woman in South America and go on, folks, find each other. God has the power to do anything, but this doesn’t mean that He goes on to trample our free wills. He wouldn’t have created us first of all, if He had wanted just that.

I am afraid I believe like Michal.

We have to realize that God is the only being with Free Will. We are only free when we are in Him. Else we are slaves of sin. And yes, Why can’t He get two people on two different planet to met if it please him. I think it is a matter of staying in grace with God. As long as we are in Him, we can’t miss anything his love would like us to have.

 

[catechumen08]

Does God intend for us to marry one specific person designed just for us? I see in the Catechism there is strict emphasis on human will, on the husband’s and wives’ part, but what about God’s will?

This is a tough question. I would like to think so, but finding that person is, well, tough. A girl thought I was her soulmate, but I didn’t really think that she was mine, at least not at the time.

I’d really like to find my soulmate one day. The only thing I fear is that maybe I’ve already met her, but I let her slip through my fingers. But I place my trust in God that He will bring her into my life, if He hasn’t already.

Alright, back to studying. Now I’m a little sad - I’m studying on a Saturday night. Haha, oh well, can’t have it all, I guess.

 

[chevalier]

I am afraid I believe like Michal.

We have to realize that God is the only being with Free Will.

Sorry, the Church believes otherwise.

We are only free when we are in Him.

That’s a different kind of freedom.

Why can’t He get two people on two different planet to met if it please him.

He can, but it’s absurd to claim He creates a man in France and a woman in China and woah, they have the duty to find each other.

I think it is a matter of staying in grace with God.

Those who believe it’s their responsibility to find a good spouse and who ask God for guidance in the matter (cf. the Book of Tobit), why wouldn’t they be in grace with God?

As long as we are in Him, we can’t miss anything his love would like us to have.

Yes, but that doesn’t prove He selects our spouses for us.

My concern is that the preselection of spouses is turning into some unofficial dogma and I’m pretty sure it’s taught to people along with the tenets of faith and morality, while it’s not so clearly substantiated.

 

[nablaise]

Hi Chevalier,

I believe there is only one Freedom. That is God’s. Sin makes our relationship with God weaker and weaker. A sinner convert because of the grace of God. But before conversion it does not mean that he was in grace (fully). I think it is the same thing with freedom. We have only a certain amount of freedom according to how strong our relationship with God is. As we all know, the more sinful we are, the more it is hard to act freely. As Jesus said, we are slaves of sin when we sin.

Just to say that there is no different kinds of freedom. So about soulmate, I believe if we are in God, and our will are united with his, then our freedom is His, and whoever we end up with is surely who he want us to be with from his eternity.

But if we are in sin, we are more likely to make wrong decisions based on our ‘corrupted’ free will. We are not as free as we think we are. I know we can think of all divorces and separation or all aprouved marriages by the Church etc, but I think it is all part of the infinite Justice of God.

I voted yes, because I think God is eternal and unchanging. In his perfect love, If I say ‘your will be done’ I am sure He will give me the perfect one for me. May be it will require me to offer lots of sacrifice, lots of reparations so that the Father’s will be done.

I think the most appropriate action that please God is to give with love our hearts to him. That means our free will back to were it come from in the first place. Adam and Eve received this gift in the breath of life. The Law of love is of complete self giving to the beloved. That’s what Adam and Eve should have done, but they used the precious gift against God who is their life, and the result was their death.

So I don’t think the Church believes otherwise. Because the main teaching of the Church is that we be One with God. Only then we can be truly alive, truly free, and truly capable of loving more perfectly.

 

[nablaise]

I am not saying that the soulmate God have for us is perfect. I am saying that God has him/her for us in his loving will from all eternity. If we do His will we will surely end up with them.

*"A saintly soul is a soul freely submissive, with the help of grace, to the divine will. All that follows on this free consent is the work of God, and not of man. The soul should blindly abandon itself and be indifferent about everything. This is all that God requires of it, and as to the rest He determines and chooses according to His own plans, as an architect selects and arranges the stones for the building he is about to construct.

It is therefore of the first importance to love God and His will, and to love this will in whatever way it is made manifest to us, without desiring anything else. The soul has no concern in the choice of different objects, that is God’s affair, and whatever He gives is best for the soul.

The whole of spirituality is an abridgment of this maxim, “Abandon yourself entirely to the over-ruling of God, and by self-oblivion be eternally occupied in loving and serving Him without any of those fears, reflexions, examens, and anxieties which the affair of our salvation, and perfection sometimes occasion.” Since God wishes to do all for us, let us place everything in His hands once and for all, leaving them to His infinite wisdom; and trouble no more about anything but what concerns Him. " Fr Jean-Pierre de Caussade, SJ*

If we are asked to love our neighbor as ourselves and if we are going to be judged on that, isn’t it obvious that that ‘perfect’ match for us is one of our neighbors and that we may very well miss him/her if we don’t love enough? and that this is a judgment?

The Church forgives our sins, but also asks us to do penance and reparation to make satisfaction of God’s will. For mortal sins, Jesus is the only satisfaction we can offer, but we also have to complete what is lacking in Christ passion!

“Beneath these appearances, terrible though they be, the divine action will so work on this material part as to make it partake of a heavenly power which will render it brilliant as the sun; for the faculties of the sensitive soul, and those of the body are prepared here below like gold or iron, or like canvas for a picture, or stones for a building. Like the matter of which these different materials are composed they will not attain their brilliance and purity of form until they have passed through many alterations, have endured many deprivations, and survived many destructions. Whatever they suffer here below under the hand of God serves to that end.” Fr Jean-Pierre de Caussade, SJ

 

[chevalier]

Nablaise, free will is dogma. As for being united with God’s will, this may as well only imply that we make the choice God would want us to. So okay, in our specific situation someone may be the best option for us in God’s eyes. But that doesn’t mean that before we were even conceived, God planned who we would end up with and tailored the people to each other. Nothing close to preselected spouses appears in the official teaching, by the way.

 

[Michal]

Chevalier:

Yup. But the prince charming is a pattern from fairy tales. It’s different from what children would develop spontaneously

The pattern from fairy tales is also a product of the objective emotional desire of the human person. Children adopt it, like they adopt any other truth, the point is it is adopted to a point where desire permeates to the core of their being. We may have adopted kissing and hugging aswell from when we were very young, that doesn’t change the meaning of it.

Semantics matter nothing. We’re talking about the concept of a man and a woman being set apart for each other.

Good, I hope we can give Hinduism and Buddhism a rest now.

That basically means looking out for the one true love kind of thing is doing God’s will and God’s will is served by discernment of whomever God might have pre-chosen as our spouse. While somewhat viable, I don’t think the concept is substantiated well enough to pass as necessary.

I don’t understand what you said here, can you reiterate?

Does He have thousands of wives? We’re talking about a human marriage here.

Human marriage is modelled after the relationship between Christ and His church. The church, composed of many millions, is one spouse.

Let’s stay on topic, please.

I anticipated the possibility of you using that logic just as you said Eve wasn’t the only mate, she was the first mate.

It’s neither simple nor obvious, even if it is possible.

So just as Christ has one church, and Eve comes out of Adam’s one flesh, so do we have one mate, which we meet out of living the simple life of listening to God’s commands for our life. God desires the best for His children, His destiny is laid out before us, so to us, it might as well be the only way. Some times we will fail, but meeting your mate is one of those things which is realistically inexcusable.

Such as, for example, it being our responsibility to find a spouse, even with divine aid?

No, it is our responsibility to cling to God.

Yeah, but it’s also easy to conceive the idea in such circumstances without regard to its actual veracity or lack of it.

I also don’t understand what you mean here.

Sorry, but that’s no logical proof of preselection of spouses by any means.

Can you…elaborate? I was trying to dive beneath the surface of what ‘one flesh’ implies.

Jesus said they wouldn’t marry in the Kingdom of Heaven when asked whose spouse would a wife of seven brothers (successively) be in heaven.

When I said all we need to believe is knowing eachother in Heaven when I was responding to Milliardo, I meant that if can believe we will know eachother in heaven, we can certainly believe we will continue to know our wife.

Is that Old Testament law common practice in the Catholic church? I know Catholics strongly defend monogamy, and I think I remember reading a Vatican document on their website which supported St. John Chrysostom in the belief that a husband should be able to proclaim to his wife that his love for her will extend into Heaven. They will not be married, that technical aspect is of the Earth, but they can still know eachother in Heaven. You cannot deny this to a husband who has received the love of his life.

Dating is a skewed concept at the very best and yes, secular in origin and spirit. I have many a problem with it. I could rant on and on.

Please rant, I want to find something in common.
You can’t lock yourself in a cell and pray that God sends him or her your way.

You need to moving, just not in her direction. God will keep you occupied with other things just as Adam had to tend the garden, and teach you whatever lessons necessary in preparation for her, I believe.

As for the ideal person, He came and we crucified Him. The ideal person is not even a logical concept, it’s a projection.

I mean that no one is perfect, but two can be perfect for eachother.

but I don’t see enough evidence to talk about it the same way we talk about articles of faith or principles of morality.

The great things in life take faith, just like the existence of God. I know Catholics know there are mysteries of the faith, why can’t this be something like that?

 

[Michal]

nablaise:

We have to realize that God is the only being with Free Will. We are only free when we are in Him. Else we are slaves of sin. And yes, Why can’t He get two people on two different planet to met if it please him. I think it is a matter of staying in grace with God. As long as we are in Him, we can’t miss anything his love would like us to have.

Simple child-like faith.

Sometimes intellectualism can get in the way of love for God, and create a cold, distant atmosphere.
catechuman08:

The only thing I fear is that maybe I’ve already met her, but I let her slip through my fingers.

God is wise enough to give you gifts at a time you know it is from Him only
Just don’t interfere with whatever He wants to do in your life, is what you need to worry about.

chevalier:

Those who believe it’s their responsibility to find a good spouse and who ask God for guidance in the matter (cf. the Book of Tobit), why wouldn’t they be in grace with God?

When I first read the Book of Tobit, I thought it sealed the deal. Then I learned that according to my conditioning, I shouldn’t accept that Book. But here’s an interesting quote which speaks of pre-destination:
Tobit 6:18:

As soon as the demon smells the odor they give off, he will flee and never again show himself near her. Then when you are about to have intercourse with her, both of you first rise up to pray. Beg the Lord of heaven to show you mercy and and grant you deliverance. But do not be afraid, for she was set apart for you before the world existed. You will save her and she will go with you. And I suppose you will have children by her, who will take the place of brothers for you. So do not worry."

So romantic, void of cold legalisms. God killed 7 previous so called ‘husbands’, so that they could meet. How does a Catholic see this?

But that doesn’t mean that before we were even conceived,

Do you believe that some people come to this Earth and surprise God by their existence? (ie an adulterous affair)

 

[catechumen08]

God is wise enough to give you gifts at a time you know it is from Him only
Just don’t interfere with whatever He wants to do in your life, is what you need to worry about.

Aye, those are wise words! I need to learn to better submit to His will.

 

[sacredcello]

I love the Book of Tobit! It contains some of my favorite passages of Scripture.

Now we can have a discussion of soul mates within the context of sacramental marriage and its implications for this life and the hereafter.

Tobiah rightly understood the risk in taking Sarah as his wife, because a demon had killed seven of her previous husbands. Would he be next? No, because he followed the wisdom he heard from the angel Raphael to pray for deliverance. Tobiah was a good man who loved God and honored his parents. Sarah’s previous husbands may have been intended for her by God, but only Tobiah was ready. And, he was set apart for her and she for him before the world existed.

Of course, this is Old Testament, and, therefore, a Jewish conception of marriage; nevertheless it is the Word of God.

How does this relate to us in the 21st century? The phrase “many are called, but few are chosen” comes to mind. In other words, there all sorts of people who believe they have found their “soul mate,” and have even married them, but are not living according to the will of God, or the teachings of the Church.

Just one example: a woman who is a practicing Catholic “falls in love with” a man who is only nominally Catholic and he does not want children (already had them in a previous marriage, and doesn’t want any more). She believes he would be a good spouse, and they marry and proceed to use artificial birth control. Their emotional life is richly rewarding and they are the happiest couple, according to all their friends. Consequence in the afterlife??? Only God knows.

We could name many other examples of “soul mates” such as gays and lesbians. How about the oh-so-glamorous Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. My non-Catholic friends love to throw that example at me. (Tracy was a married Catholic who carried on with Hepburn for years, but never divorced his wife “because he was Catholic”).

 

[valient_Lucy]

I said no because I think that this idea comes from a very dangerous obsession that the modern world has with finding “the one.” I believe that the one is whoever you end up marrying. But I don’t think that there’s one person who’s going to make us happy forever or any such ridiculous nonsense. I think that God gives people a vocation of marriage, and I do think that it’s possible that we are called to enter into the sacrament of marriage with a particular person. But I don’t think that that necessarily means that we will be passionately in love with that person. I think that it is possible to discern that God is calling you to marry a particular person, even if you’re not “in love” with them.

I heard an Indian woman once remark that the rise of “love matches” has changed the way people view marriage. Nowadays people think that you fall in love, and then you get married. She said that, when she was young, people married and then fell in love, that it was something that they had to work on. I think the latter view is a much healthier view. (Sometimes I envy people who live in a culture where arranged marriages are an acceptable practice.)

 

[catechumen08]

I think that it is possible to discern that God is calling you to marry a particular person, even if you’re not “in love” with them.

I’d have to disagree with that. Why would God want you to marry someone with whom you’re not “in love”?

 

[MooCowSteph]

I can’t vote because the title differs from the question. Yes, God might intend for you to marry a specific person. But no, there’s no such thing as a “soul mate,” one magic person who completes your life and without whom you’ll never be happy. Even if you choose to marry somebody whom God hadn’t intended for you, God still can bless the marriage. Once you marry, your mate becomes the “right person” for you whether they were God’s original choice for you or not.

I like this response and it sums up very well how I think on the matter. Sometimes people seem SO perfectly matched that you can’t deny God’s hand in the matter, but I think if we all run around looking for our “soulmates” we’re setting ourselves up for divorce. No marriage is perfect, and society seems to say today that if things aren’t perfect, then the couple must not be soulmates, so they’d better divorce and just move on.

 

[valient_Lucy]

I’d have to disagree with that. Why would God want you to marry someone with whom you’re not “in love”?

To make us grow in holiness and our love for Him. God doesn’t give people the vocation of marriage to make them happy; He gives them the vocation of marriage to make them holy. Now, one does not necessarily preclude the other, but if people enter marriage with a belief that the purpose of marriage is to make us happy and to be “in love with someone forever” then the marriage is doomed to fail, as soon as one person decides that the marriage doesn’t make him happy, or that he is not “in love” with his spouse and is “in love” with someone else.

There’s a story that St. Therese’ mother heard God say, when she met her husband, that He was the man who had been prepared for her. However, were they passionately in love? I think the fact that they remained celibate for almost a year after their marriage, and they only consummated it after both of their spiritual directors urged them to consider being open to children, indicates otherwise. But I don’t think that that fact necessarily means that they should never have married, simply because their “feelings” weren’t strong enough. After all, feelings change every minute.

 

[kage_ar]

I’d have to disagree with that. Why would God want you to marry someone with whom you’re not “in love”?

Give a study to history and sociology - modern western thinking is that two people meet, fall in love and get married. Throughout most of history, and in many parts of the world/cultures today, marriage is arranged. Love for the spouse was something that came after marriage.

Joseph and Mary had an arranged marriage.

 

[valient_Lucy]

Give a study to history and sociology - modern western thinking is that two people meet, fall in love and get married. Throughout most of history, and in many parts of the world/cultures today, marriage is arranged. Love for the spouse was something that came after marriage.

Joseph and Mary had an arranged marriage.

Excellent point, and I think there is a lot of wisdom in the practice of an arranged marriage. Would I do it? Maybe.

 

[Chyna]

i believe that God sends people to us, but it is our choice. Saying this, yeah, where is mine? i know that i would make a good wife. As far back as i can remember i wanted to be a wife. i also believe those that have crossed my path, has not been him. Waiting…praying…where are you!!!

Chyna