Thomas G. Morrow - Christian Courtship in an Oversexed World: A Guide for Catholics

Courtship:the pursuing of an intimate friendship to see if marriage wouldbe desirable.

The typical scenario in the United States is for a couple to meet,to start dating seriously two or th r ee timesa week or mo r e, to sleep together after the thi r d date, and to get marriedafter about a yearand ahalf. What follows is a 50 pe r cent chance of divo r ce (unless they live together befo r e marriage, in which case the chancesof divo r ce a r e 74 pe r cent).This is not to mentionthe high rate ofvene r eal disease (acco r ding to the Centers for Disease Cont r ol and P r evention, 65 million peoplein the U.S. have an incurable sexually transmitted disease)as well as the bad t r eatmentof women both befo r e and during marriage.

If you r e satisfied with all of that, I dont think youlllike this book. But, if you think things have gone awry in the last forty years, that the dating scene is abit bizar r e, and that we needto start over to build a new systemfor courtship, this book may be just what you a r e lookingfo r .

If you think we mightfind some r emedies for the sadnesswe have w r ought,by looking to Jesus Christ and his Chu r ch, r ead on.Howeve r , I must warn you, whats written he r e is a bit radical, pe r haps as radical as the Gospel itself. This book is for those who wantto do things the way Jesus would do them, which is a truly radical thing (and always has been).It is written by a Catholic priest for Catholics, but many of other r eligions have found it useful. I amcertain that if you carry out whats writtenhe r e you will be happy in thislife, and happierin the next.

A Priest... on Courtship?

W e had been going togetherfor almost a year virtually since wehad met. She had blue-blackhair with dark Irish eyes and was bright, and religious with a sparklingpersonalit y . Lets call her Judy McIntyre. W e had often ta l ked about the possibility of marriage, so whatI said to her that day must have come as a surprise.

Jud y , I said, Theres no point in our continuing this relatio n ship.

Why not? Her disappointment was evident.Because Im going to become a priest.

Thus ended my first great romance at age six. I was sure God wanted me to become a priest. Judy andI were both first-graders at St. Gabriels School in Riverdale, New Y ork, and, as I look back,rather precocious.

I continued in that mind set for the next nine years,opting to study Latinin my freshman and sophomore years of high schoolto prepare for my vocation to the priesthood. Then, I discovered girls. I toyed with the idea of marryingand then becomingan Eastern Rite priest, but, in time I gave up on priesthood altogethe r .

So, although I had casuallydated on and o f f through juniorhigh and early high school, in sophomore year I began to go out more, with the prospect of marriage in the back of my mind. I had my firstgreat love in college (or second, with due respectto Judy). She wasa California blonde with a delightful personality and was Catholic, but only ma r ginall y . After we had dated for several months,she fell for anotherstudent, whom she eventually married.

Then there was Sallye in Los Angeles, where I had gone to workas an engineer after college.Another blonde, she had the addedappeal of being a devout Catholic. Things began swimmingl y , but aftera few months she optedfor a pen pal who came back from his armyassignment and swept her o f f her feet.

Finally there was Mar y , from Belmont,Massachusetts, whom I met while employedoutside of Boston. She was from a delightful,devout Catholic familyand was devout herself. When she answered my proposal with Probabl y , I had great hope since my own motherhad responded thus to my father when he proposed.Howeve r , Marys probably was not as firm as my mothe r s. Mary eventually married her previous sweetheart, much to my sorro w .

Through the years of dat i ng from the age of 18 or so until I was 33, I tried to live chastelyand while I dated some Catholics, I mostlydated non-Catholics, foolishly hoping that we could work outour religi o us di f ferencesbefore marrying. Duringthis time I wassaddened by the fact that there seemed to be so few groups in theChurch where one could go to meet a good, lively Catholicwoman. I reme m ber thinking that if I ever got the chance I would try to dosomething to provide help for single Catholicsto live chastely and find others who wanted to do the same. (How I would do that as amarried man is quite a myster y .)