Christian dating and why it's not working

In response to 10 Lies Christians Believe About Interacting With the Opposite Sex

www.huffingtonpost.com

After reading this a few friends of mine had a short debate on facebook on how true or valid the points that were made are. Many points were good but I found the article as a whole to be incredibly one sided and presumptuous. The female author's board generalizations of reasons behind man's motives I found slated. She made no real comment on how the church, society or women effected these problems but the tone on Christian men's short comings was almost accusatory. “Stop being scared or indecisive or lazy or whatever it is ”. How encouraging does that sound? In her cry for men to take action, author Courtney Gabrielson both missed and re-enforced the biggest problem young men are getting today: pressure.

Expectations have always been a burden for both men a women to bear. However, what those expectations are for women, is vastly different for men. I won't say these expectations don't apply to both genders but the focus is clearly not the same. This is especially true within the church. The focus for women is to “be”, as in “be beautiful inside and out”, “be a supportive wife” or “be a loving mother”. The male focus is to “do” as in “lead your wife”, “provide for your family” and “defend the gospel”. Gender roles are deeply ingrained into our culture and our faith. As the world at large is changing and with it the roles we play in it, not being able to adapt our expectations is a major cause of this back lass.

A word that has been throw around in churches but has never been well defined or illustrated first hand for me is “courtship”. The concept arose from old practices of arranged marriages. The idea would be that after a women reached marring age, her parents would arrange meetings with eligible suitors. These meetings would be supervised or monitored so it often took place in the courtyard. After these meetings had concluded, the bride would select he preferred suitor and then the formal engagement would begin. This is the model that Christian dating is based on.

In the old model, men and women both understood the procedure. As men being given the call to take action, there's also a voice in the back of the mind saying “you better not screw it up!”. Men only had so many chances to impress the lady before she was off the market, so each shot was for all the marbles. The pressure of first meeting her parents preset standards, then the cost of gifts, travel and any other factors that would call for a successful wooing all possibly came down to one meeting. This model is completely different from modern dating yet we keep many of the same traditions and procedures and attempt to apply it to a modern mindset. This is what I see most times when I ask a girl out. I see a woman whom I barely know, do everything I can to try and impress her and a whole potential future is riding on it.

Of course this isn't how we should do things in the 21^st century, right? Well then, how should we do it? A major problem has been our treatment of dating and sex within the church. Church is great about covering marriage.. The problem with the treatment of sex is 90% of what you hear about it is “NOT TILL YOUR MARRIED!!!!!” and even after marriage, “only with your spouse!!!” and that's it. The church has a bad tendency to treat dating young dating couples as if they were already married except of course, no sex. That leads to a ton of pressure to behave in a marriage like fashion long before it's appropriate or even healthy. In my 15 years of attending sermons, Sunday school and bible study, I've heard a total of one teaching on what a healthy dating relationship looks like. We have no structure to go off of, no procedures to fallow but we still have that pressure of win her now or lose her forever.

But wait, why does it have to be this all or nothing approach? Can't we get to know each other, maybe become friends before moving on to love and romance. If only it could be that simple. Getting to know somebody would actually be ideal if there wasn't that confusing, awkward and terrifyingly soul baring attempt to transition from friend to “more then friends”. The friends first method lead to the most painful rejection of my entire life. I confessed my love and she simply didn't feel the same. She was very kind and caring in letting me down easy and genuinely hoped to still be friends after that but that just didn't work (it rarely does). In the end, we had neither the romantic relationship I hoped for, nor the close friendship we had before hand.

Being upfront about romantic intentions always feels forceful, overbearing and desperate. The other end of the spectrum is the dreaded “friend zone”. Having spent time with a girl, spent money on meals and activities and thinking that your growing close for her to one day say she met somebody, will knock a guy off his feet. This usually makes us angry and bitter. Thinking that we were doing everything right then being passed over brings up feelings of betrayal, inadequacy and self doubt often to the point of questioning our self worth.

An interesting point author Gabrielson made was about men ignoring or being stand-offish toward women. She purposed the motive was “trying to guard our (woman’s) hearts” but also “because of the passivity and indecision of Christian men”. The guarding of the heart isn't one directional. Ever time I avoided a girl that I liked was because I wasn't prepare to take my shot. Being afraid of rejection is a very pervasive feeling and approaching a girl with intent usual requires a bunch of mental preparation. When trying to impress a girl, every word feels likes it's being graded so if we're not bringing our A game, we try to get out of there, quick.

An observation that I made on this article was that it was written by a woman and originally posted on the woman’s support site goodwomenproject.com but all the calls to action were directed at men. In my response, I want to be as constructive as possible as a man writing main to women. Here are a few of my idea's as to how you can help us solve this dilemma:

1. Ask the guy out. I'm serious. If any girl I was even remotely interested in asked me out for lunch or a cup of coffee I would immediately take her up on the offer. Men have pretty much the same insecurities, doubts and fears that woman do so being approached could be the difference between trying and giving up hope altogether. This doesn't mean you have to all the perusing either, just enough to get the ball rolling.
2. Make it clear that you are interested. Subtlety sounds great, but how far has it gotten us? The romantic notion of mystery is just that, a romantic notion. Not being direct usually just leads to more confusion and that's half the problem. I in no way mean this perversely but the reason male animals fight over the females is because they can smell that they're in heat.
3. If you want a mature dating experience, behave like an adult. If you want a playful dating experience, be playful. This isn't a course of the relationship rule, it's a tone setter. The first date or two sets want your standard behavior will be. Any avoiding or stopping tonal confusion just makes life easier.
4. Break traditions but don't break faith. Quite simply, if the same old thing isn't working it needs to be changed. I'm open to new idea's and as long as they don't conflict with the two great commandments, to love God and to love each other, it may be worth a try. We need a new way to relate to one another and the all or nothing mentality I've had drilled into my skull has lead me to a lot of heart ache. Wouldn't it be great if I and every man like me could believe it second chances and wasn't terrified of romantic failure. I know I have to fix my issues but fixing this broken dating system would help us all.

And for a final thought, for both men and women, try not to force it. I was talking to a art classmate last week and she mentioned that her husband doesn't get art at all. “How'd he end up with you then?” I asked and very matter of factly she responded “Well, we fell in love”. The pressure of expectation, the fear of rejection and the sad prospect living the rest of our lives alone. All these things are making us desperate. If we loosed up, trusted in God and just did our best maybe we all could simply fall in love.