Guest-post: A man’s words on sexual attraction and failed courtship

One of my (male) readers recently left this comment on one of my posts on sexual attraction. I wrote about the fact that men are taught to fear sexual attraction – how the different notions of beauty and sexual attraction are taught in a way that causes men to flee from what is sexually attractive to them, and instead go for what (their environment tells them) is ‘beautiful’.

After asking for his permission, I wish to share this as a single post with the rest of you. I think his words are very important and very precious – they need to be heard. It is unfortunate that we have so few men among us when it’s a known fact that they suffer just as much from growing up in these destructive teachings, so I did not want to miss the chance to share that men are just as much devastated by the purity and courtship culture as women are.

“This was difficult for me to read, only because it hits me so close to home. I don’t even know where to begin. How about the “self blaming and guilt”?

But first, I appreciated reading a woman describing how we men learn to avoid attractive women like the plague… We’re taught to feel so guilty about sexual attraction that we really do avoid being around you… I was touched somehow by even reading that bit.

The Courtship movement, fundamentalism, submission to pastoral authority, allowing other people with the “right answer” tell me what God’s will is, as if they knew… well… I allowed myself to go with other people’s ideas of God’s will for my life in the choice of a wife.

Long story short, I married a woman 13 years ago to whom I’m not sexually attracted, and I’ve never lusted after.
I knew it before I married her. I knew it the day I married her. I’ve known it for 13 long years in a passionless marriage.

She’s a really nice girl, and I’m devesatingly ashamed that I’ve ruined the woman she could have turned out to be… I see her as the true victim in it all… lack of passion has done that to both of us.

Warped by church teachings, I literally convinced myself that God was going to bless me with sexual attraction for her, by being obedient to marry her… like some magic wand of his would tap me on the head and “poof” …. Happily Ever After.

And, no, I’m not gay… I can sense you all wondering.

I had cold feet right up until the wedding, but had convinced myself that it was “just lack of faith.” … so I suppressed it.

The night before the wedding, I got no sleep. I had no peace of mind. I don’t remember too much about that day…. and we left the reception early during the festivities… I was too tired to continue. But the full force of what I’d done hit me during the week… like a cold chill of death running down my spine… I was married… marriage is forever, and I’m unhappy…. forever … the exact opposite of what i’m supposed to be… I can’t get a divorce… divorced people go to hell in the express lane or the handbasket, or something. There may even be a reserved section in hell for divorced people, I thought… like maybe even a VIP entrance.

I felt so ashamed of myself. In a foreign country… surrounded by my new fundamentalist in-laws (still my neighbors today after all these years)… I vowed to just stuff it… all of it… just repress it and forget and go through the motions, and to never say a word to anyone. Too ashamed to admit what I’d done. Just put on a happy face… smile…. go to Church… and pray like hell.

Within two weeks I was being confronted by the father in law… something was wrong, since i was obviously not happy, not sleeping with his daughter…. emails were being sent back home to the pastors in the states… who also flew over eventually to meet me and my wife… I was ashamed, alone, and scared … I still believed that I needed to believe in the “right answer” … so I lied to them, and told them that my marriage was God’s will (besides, who wants to go to hell for divorce.) so I tried really hard to “do the right thing…” … and just stuff the negativity and the lack I was feeling….

My married life became one of fear, obligation and guilt.

Well, I don’t have to tell you, that women aren’t stupid. It’s been hard on both of us… and I didn’t become honest until several years and several children later.

I wish I’d never stepped foot in a Church.
I wish I’d never been so easily guided by other people. As a man, there’s nothing more debilitating than that.
I wish i’d never made my wife a victim. She doesn’t deserve this kind of a non-marriage.
I wish I’d stood up for myself, and just spoke the truth to the people pressuring me … Fear, Obligation, and guilt are no way to live.
I wish I’d known that I’m not “evil” or “damned.”
I wish I’d learned to be myself, rather than another cookie-cutter religious dude, prideful of beliefs that aren’t even my own.
I wish I’d learned to have a personal Relationship with MYSELF early in life, before it was too late… to really know myself such that other people’s opinions mattered less to me.
It wasn’t a personal Relationship with Jesus i needed. I needed to know myself… intimately.
I wish I’d learned to trust my intuition rather than to doubt it or repress it… as if it were sinful somehow.

My blood boils sometime with the desire blame others for their influence over me… but I know that I can only blame myself.
Wanting to “please God” led me to not trust my own heart… I allowed myself to believe the Bible literally when it says :”The heart is desperately wicked. Who can trust it.”…

I think that must make me the ultimate people pleaser, or passive aggressive, or something horrible like that.

So I threw my heart away a long time ago. Tragic that it should be the necessary ingredient to the rest of my life… to make me a “Real Boy.”

Your post just reinforces the feeling that everything you said with regards to sex… all these points you brought up about sexual attraction… is entirely beautiful. And entirely right.

I think deep down, I just wish that I had someone in my life that I was attracted to… someone I can’t stop thinking about, someone I would like to do things with, who I get along with, someone I can mutually fantasize with, … someone who is a safe haven for my ever-expanding imagination… not to mention sexual attraction at any age.

I only hope there’s another man actually lurking on the site who reads this, and can learn something from it for his own life.”

Relationships after the purity cult

There are so many thoughts on the damage of the purity culture out there that I decided to evaluate some of my behaviour.

I think one of the major problems with purity culture is not necessarily that it suppressed sexual feelings in general but rather how these sexual feelings are ignored, and how that leads to devastating results.

Feeling sexual attraction toward someone is actually pretty bad in the purity culture. Of course they’d never admit that – they don’t tire of stressing how important physical attraction is, but what they actually mean by that is not necessarily sexual desire but beauty. Men are encouraged to look for someone they find beautiful. Women are encouraged to make sure their match is handsome, physically and characterwise. And that is exactly the problem. Beautiful and sexually attractive are not synonyms.

I don’t know about you, but there’s plenty of people I find beautiful, but not all of them are sexually attractive to me. And it works the other way around too; people whom I find sexually attractive aren’t necessarily beautiful to me.

Hence, while it may work out for some, marrying someone whom you deem beautiful does not tell you whether you will find him/her sexually attractive in the long run. As a matter of fact, I feel that sexual attractiveness is something that is systematically labelled a ‘bad thing’ in courtships.

As both men and women are encouraged to flee from sexual immorality, they actually flee from those people whom they find sexually attractive. A woman will do her best to kill all her desires for a man they sexually desire and end up rejecting them on a regular basis. This goes as far as interpreting advances by those men as attempts of the devil to succumb to sexual immorality. Likewise, a man will try to keep his ‘lust’ out of the picture, systemically avoiding women who cause him to lust – which is nothing more than a clear sign of sexual attractiveness. Instead they will seek for a woman whom they might find beautiful, but who also draws them closer to Jesus – a popular euphemism to avoid those women who are actually sexually attractive to them.

Of course, a sexual desire may be present in all of these people initially, considering that those are their first chances to gain sexual experience, the feeling of new and unknown, of absolute intimacy and, not to forget, the promise that everything will work out heavenly because they waited and fled from all sorts of sexual immorality. But initial attraction needn’t always last for years to come. When, after a few months of marriage, this promise of perfect sex is not fulfilled and the spouse loses the initial sexual attractiveness of the opposite gender in general, they may end up hitting rock bottom with the realisation that while their partner is beautiful, he or she could not keep the promise of ultimate sexual attraction.

Back to myself – I do not think that I would have ended up with a man like my boyfriend if I still followed the purity culture. He causes me to do things which are generally only permissible if you are a man. Fantasies, undressing him in my thoughts, looking at him and not seeing the (obvious) beauty of his face, his eyes, his expression, but instead lusting for whatever lingers a few inches lower, which is a body which many people might not consider objectively “beautiful” but rather as an average man. A body which I would not have permitted myself to find beautiful because it is tightly packed with tattoos. No, he might not have that objective perfect beauty of a six-pack and a flawless body, but neither have I and that’s something I can totally live with. Because I know that this person is extremely sexually attractive to me, and so am I for him despite my obvious flaws of a small chest and a body so skinny you might just mistake it for a boy’s. And fyi, I don’t even feel bad about it because I know that when he looks at me, he doesn’t see those flaws, neither does he think “well she has a beautiful face” like a good courtship boy should. No, I know that he lusts, and to be quite honest with you, I like it. I like seeing in his eyes that he can look at me and lust despite what I consider imperfect. I learned to appreciate the difference between being told “You’re beautiful” and “You’re hot”.

That doesn’t mean that you always feel this way, and it is by no means a guarantee that it will always stay this way. Of course I can still see all the other great things about him, and likewise he can see whatever makes me special to him. But I feel a good deal safer knowing that I am not with someone who has to kill all sexual desires for me in order to even deal with my presence.

I guess that the moral of this story is that if you put a ‘sin’ label on sexual attractiveness, don’t be surprised if you end up with a spouse you do not desire. I feel a lot of anger towards those in the purity movement who withhold this information from young couples, setting them up for a lifetime of self blaming and guilt.

why would someone want to keep their courtship secret?

As I went over my blog stats, I saw this question pop up in the search engine list. I thought it was kind of self-explanatory, but obviously not everybody understands why a courtship might be kept secret (in certain groups/families).

First off, not every girl (or family) feels the need to keep a courtship a secret. As you can imagine, some girls are so happy about being courted that they just can’t keep it to themselves. Openly talking about courtship is something you’ll see in the more “liberal” groups of the P/QF movement. It’s especially important to differentiate between P and QF here – strictly patriarchical families are more likely to keep it secret than families with a strong emphasis on the QF theologies.

And yes, there are families who aren’t patriarchical but live quiverfull. Others again are full-blown patriarchical families, but don’t believe in the quiverfull theologies (aka NFP and sometimes condoms are allowed, but it’s the man who decides when the wife will get pregnant).

The thing is simply that the patriarchs feel very much like they have to use the (successful) courtships of their daughters to show off how well they filtered potential suitors before hand. A failed courtship can imply that the father did not pick well and this might reflect back and his authority and leadership skills – at least in the public eye of the movements. Of course this isn’t true for every case, but the motto is usually “better safe than sorry”.

And it’s not just the fathers. In very strict groups, a girl turns into “damaged goods” faster than you might think. Even a failed courtship might label her as damaged goods and have a negative influence on the range of future suitors. It’s all about the “value of the bride”.

Imagine you’re in a store for soft pillows. The shelves are full of soft, handmade, expensive pillows. Lots of people come in to buy pillows. Now, some pillows might have attracted more customers in the past – they look a tiny bit “touched”, there might even be a little stain. They’ve never been slept on (no pun intended), but one or the other customer already picked it up to inspect it more closely. Now, if you do want a flawless pillow, you won’t even buy the “inspected” ones – you’ll go for the ones in the back, the ones nobody ever inspected, fresh from the storage room – if possible still wrapped in plastic.

It works very much like that in strict courtship movements. If a girl has one, or, even worse, more than one, failed courtships, there’s something “wrong” about her. A girl breaking off a courtship is something rather “wild”. The idea is that the girl will certainly like the man her dad picked out because, well, her dad knows her best. If you hear of broken courtships, the general idea that comes to mind is that the guy broke it off for some reason (or the dad, which then would be kept secret again because dad doesn’t pick “the wrong guy”). The girl’s value decreased with every courtship she goes through. She’ll be labelled damaged, easy to get, high maintenance and so forth. And simply because of that, it’s so much easier to keep courtships secret until the day of engagement.

Courtship – engagement – weddings (1)

It’s time for another courtship – engagement – wedding post.

There is something weird about courtship I realized. I never read anything about this particular issue and it doesn’t exist in every family, but in some (or many) it does.

Why do so many families keep it a secret when a daughter is starting to court? And it’s not like that for men – at least, not that I know of! When a man starts courting, he will say that he “has a feeling” or that “he thinks God is showing him something”. He might not directly admit “Yes, I’m courting”, but he won’t say no either. With girls, it’s different. A lot of fathers tell their daughters not to talk about it until the biggest deal breakers are out-of-the-way. Why is that?

I think it’s got a lot do with 1. the image of female purity and 2. submission of the female part in a relationship.

About the first: While evangelical circles deny that there is such a thing as a difference between purity in women and in men, we all know these differences exist. It’s got a lot to do with the image of how each gender “loves”. While women tend to get emotionally involved very quickly – and therefore give pieces of their hearts away – men love more on a physical level, physical attraction and sex are the major things a man will crave when he is in love, and not the emotional aspect of a relationship. Hence, once a courtship starts, the woman is much more likely to lose her purity and pieces of her heart while the man is only looking for sex and by that, won’t give away pieces of his heart. The emotional attachment comes much later (if it ever comes!).

And I see this as a major reason why so many families are eager to hide a new courtship of a daughter. This might go on for just a week or two, it might take months for the parents to allow the daughter to admit to it, depending on a large number of circumstances. But it is done on a regular basis.

I think for many families there’s a huge fear of  their girls being “damaged goods” as soon as she enters a courtship relationship. To avoid this, the rules on courting seem to get stricter and stricter, and likewise, the girls seem to pick up a “holier than thou” attitude that wasn’t there before.

While holding hands or even kissing wasn’t “as bad” a few years ago – many fundamentalist couples admit to kissing before getting married – the younger generations, particularly the girls who are just getting into the age of being eligable for marriage. Kissing seems totally off-limits these days and the view of holding hands before marriage is changing as well. There are plenty of people who do not hold hands these days but instead hold a stick on each end to “imitate” holding hands. If you look around in the blogosphere of this group of girls, you will find an awful lot who are against any form of physical contact before marriage – we’re talking actual marriage here, not engagement. It goes as far as even the man not putting the engagement ring on the woman’s hand – he will give the ring to her father, who then will put it on her finger – to avoid physical contact.

I find this behaviour to lead down dangerous streets. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with purity, but the fact that you would avoid every form of physical contact in a way like this goes beyond my understanding. While only acts of sexual sin made you physically impure a few years ago, we’re already at physical impurity when it comes to sliding on that engagement ring.

But back to the discussion of keeping a courtship a secret. The second reason why I think it’s kept secret was submission. This might sound strange to you at first, but -

If a women went out to tell any of her friends, anybody really, about her courtship with a man, and even if that’s all she would tell them, she would put a sort of pressure on him. We all know about expectations from your environment and as soon as you’re in a courtship, certainly thing are expected from you. While many say that a courtship might as well fail, this is hardly ever the case. A courtship is typically only allowed once the father of the girl has already thoroughly inspected the suitor. The biggest deal breakers after starting a courtship would be coming from the girl or the boy, such as not getting along or wanting totally different things, feeling different callings. But that almost never happens. Most courtships are broken for reasons such as sexual sin and rebellion.

Now, once a woman goes out to talk about her courtship, the environment expects them to get along, to make it work. A courting couple in the mind of the people is almost engaged, and engaged is almost married. The simple act of telling others about it might be understood as a way of pressuring the man into taking further steps. But, as we know, that isn’t allowed. Even in courtship, a woman is expected to submissive – let him take each and every step in the relationship, the only thing you’re really allowed to do is follow quietly. Every form of trying to push a man are understood as a sign of a lack of submissiveness. And this, in fact, can be a deal breaker for young men.

Due to the fact that my next issue differs greatly from this one, I’ll split it into another post.

How to find a spouse?!

There are two beliefs within the movement about looking for a spouse (that I know of, there might be more). Basically, beliefs divide into two groups here: The ones who believe in “the one” and the ones who believe in “choice”.

Basically, the choice believers believe that God didn’t make two people who are absolutely perfect for one another. There are multiple people in the world who would end up being a good match for each person and you still got to pick one of them. There’s choice involved in this.

The other (bigger) group believes that God made one single perfect match for everyone. You have to wait for God to bring that person into your life and nobody else can make a marriage as perfect as this single person could. These are usually the people who strongly believe in the purity movements.

My family belonged to the latter group. While the first group leaves choice and preferences, allowing a man to actually “look” for a wife, the other group doesn’t allow “looking”. It’s all about waiting and seeing what happens – obviously the man still has to make the first step, but only if he feels God is telling him that this is “the one”.

I have major issues with the entire mindset of waiting on God, believing in “the one” and, maybe, even being called to stay single for life. I do not think that the bible means to express this mindset. I think it’s false prophesy and causes a lot of hurt in a lot of people.

Why? Well, I base my belief on the following verse:

Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do. But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion.(1 Cor 7, 8-9)

Uh uh. So… where did that “one” go? Where did that “God will bring them into your life if you’re supposed to marry” go? I don’t think that’s what’s meant here. What I read is: Paul thinks people should decide whether they should marry or not depending on the fact if they can stay pure without being married (or not). I think this single verse blows up the entire construct of waiting and just taking it if God doesn’t send you “the one”.

I have always had major issues with people discussing this verse away, trying to spin the actual, literal meaning. I think that this is a general issue with Paul’s writings. Too often they are abused and twisted to suit the needs of the individual. Paul has written some of the most beautiful passages in the bible, and some of the most misunderstood, and yes, some of Paul’s writings are the complete opposite of something else in the bible.

I’m not trying to say that there isn’t “the one” for you, neither am I saying that there’s only “one”. I don’t really know what I’m saying, to be quite honest with you. I don’t know what to believe in this area. It’s just hard for me to imagine that there could be only one single person you can spend your life with, you know? I mean, I like to think I’m pretty easy-going, social life wise. I might not be the woman everyone looks up to, respects, is impressed by, but neither am I the person people don’t like or even hate. It’s easy for me to get along with different personalities because I try to accept everyone for what they are – the posh, heavy make up girly girl who talks about lipstick all day long, I understand her because it’s something that she enjoys, just like I can talk to the tomboy type of woman who likes football more than anything and cries when her favourite team lost. And likewise, I love the different personalities of several men I know, some are more quiet, deep thinking and emotional, others loud, funny and sporty. They’re all fine the way they are.

When I was out with some friends on the weekend, I had a quiet conversation with a friend of a friend, a man. I’ll admit he was a bit drunk, but we talked about his family and his struggles, something that he hardly ever talks about. Suddenly he asked me if I could imagine to date him. I laughed because I didn’t take that question very serious, after all, he was drunk! But he put on a serious face and I gave it a quick thought and this is what I said: “Well, you’re really handsome, you’re smart, much smarter than me, you’re a good listener and a hard worker, you’re interesting and lots of fun to be around, all in all you’re the type of guy all women would like to date – but no, I can’t imagine dating you – at all.” All of what I said was 100% true. I keep wondering why my answer was no. Well, obviously I can’t imagine because I already have a wonderful man I date, but that’s not all of it. There must be something more to it. By no means I believe I found “the one” with Daniel. I can’t say that after such a short time! I don’t know, I just keep wondering! The man who asked me this question looks A LOT like Daniel – the stereotypical tall dark and handsome guy.

At the end of the day what I end up with is: I think most people are compatible with a larger amount of people. In this group of matches, there might be one, two, maybe even three exceptionally perfect ones. But you can make it work either way. Does that make sense?

Training up this child – Part 20 – Hurt

(As some of you might have recognized I name many of my posts after songs or movies. I usually pick out a song that suits the mood of each post, usually googling “songs about XY” and then listening to my options. This time, I was torn between two song: Chris Isaak – Wicked game and Johnny Cash – Hurt. I ended up with Hurt because, well I think it sums up a lot of how I felt. I know that some of my readers are just as unworldly as me, so here’s a link to the song on youtube in case you don’t know the song.)

Harry’s mother seemed a lot more excited than usual. She made compliments about how I looked, how nicely we decorated the house, how amazing the prepared food smelled. Everybody had a huge smile on their faces, a smile I immediately thought was… retarded.

It felt as if the universe had shifted. I was no longer in the real world but in some weird dimension, full of retarded people who don’t even know that some sort of magical boss is shoving lies down their throats. I felt as if they looked at me like I was about to join their sect, go through a weird ritual where they’d take out parts of my brain to make me smile just as stupid as they did.

I can’t recall much of this. I was in trance. I talked but it wasn’t me who talked. I heard myself speak and my voice was different, strange, not mine at all. My words didn’t come out of my brain – I didn’t know what I was saying and at the same time wondering how I came up with the things I said.

Cold sweat was covering my entire body, my skin felt cold and tacky, but I still felt like that person wasn’t me. There must have been some sort of small talk, some sort of prayer, some words of encouragement but I memorized nothing at all. The only thing I can remember was looking at my shaky hands, covered in freezing sweat and desperately trying not to throw up all over the place. My insides were rotating and I was truly afraid my heart would stop beating any second out of sheer fear.

I remember at some point Harry asked me to go outside with him, sit in the garden for a bit. I agreed, my face frozen in I don’t know what position and a very strong, sudden urge the really throw up. I think I held my hand in front of my mouth for a second, because my Dad gave me an encourage stroke on my head and opened the door to the garden for us.

As soon as I was outside my mind started screaming: “RUN! Now’s the chance! Run away and don’t turn back!”. But I didn’t. Instead, I followed Harry to the bench in the garden and sat down. I was completely quiet and the sweat started to run down my neck and back. My hands were so wet, they sparkled in the evening sun as if they were powered with diamonds.

Harry spoke up: “Do you like the flowers?”

“Yes” I said, “Lilies are lovely. My favourite flower.” That was true.

“I think so too. You know, you’re like a lily to me. As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters.“

“That’s true” I said, not knowing how to react.

“Lisa, you know, I have been watching you for such a long time. Years now. I can’t imagine that there is anybody more beautiful and lovely than you.” He said and took my hand, squeezing it, which embarrassed me because my hands were freezing cold and soaking wet.

“I didn’t have to think much about if you were the one. I knew it all along. I would’ve done this so much earlier but I felt I needed to wait and be patient on you. I was doubting your feelings for such a long time but now I feel like it’s different. I feel like we’re made for each other.”

Harry looked at me, but I just started into the grass next to my shoes. I hadn’t looked at him during this entire conversation and I couldn’t find the courage to look into his eyes now. He was silent for a few seconds, but then let go of my hand. He stood up, slowly. My stomach twisted, making me feel sicker every second, my heart skipped at least 10 beats. Harry stood in front of me. And then, he did it. He got on one knee, found a little box in his pocket, opened it with shaky hands and presented a lovely ring to me. I stared at the ring and the universe shifted yet some more, completely separating my body and my mind at this point. And as I stared at the ring with my body, and my mind stared at myself sitting there, not knowing what to do, Harry finally said it:

“Lisa Franziska Bennet, will you marry me?”

I didn’t say a thing. I stared at the ring in Harry’s wet shaky hands and almost heard my mind laughing. This is crazy, this is unreal.

“Lisa?” he said after some time which could have been hours for all I know.

And for the first time I looked into his eyes and what I saw there I will never forget. I don’t think one can describe the horror and fear I saw on his face that moment. I looked back at the ring, then back into Harry’s eyes. Terror. An entire world crashing down, hands shaking violently, tears starting to fill his eyes. My, a lot worse than I could’ve possibly imagined. I still hadn’t said a word but I felt the need to react somehow. I took the ring in my hand, not putting it on and looked at the pretty little diamond. I could almost feel Harry dying inside and wanted to hold on to him, to make sure he wouldn’t just stop breathing. I put my hand on his hand, then on his cheek, stroking through his hair and while I did that I just slightly shook my head. I was still a mute.

“Does that mean no?” he asked and I nodded just as slightly. Harry now sat in front of me, on his knees, staring into nothingness.

“Do you really mean no? Why not? What’s wrong? What did I do wrong? I can make it right, just tell me what I have to do, I’ll do it. I’ll do anything.” I shrugged, silent, just staring at Harry sitting there in the grass, at my feet, not knowing what he or I should do next. Finally I found some words somewhere in the back of my head: “I’m so sorry”. There were some tears on Harry’s face, but he wasn’t really crying. “Well, tell me why you’re saying no. I thought everything went well.” My cheeks were burning as I tried to explain. That I felt like I wasn’t ready for marriage, that I was doubting practices and beliefs in the movement, that I didn’t feel quite right about marrying him. He took a seat next to me again, thought about what I said for a bit and then asked me “Ok, so what do you want? I’ll give you anything you ask for if you marry me.” I told him how I wanted an education and maybe a job, how I was afraid of having so many kids, especially right now, and that I wanted a different life, not as set apart from the real world and other people. I wanted to have friends. I wanted to be normal. Harry was quick to answer. “You can have that. You can find yourself some friends once we settled down. You can go to school if we can afford it and you can work until we have kids.” I told him that by our beliefs, we’d have a kid within the next year. He told me that I couldn’t say that. God would time them. And if we did, God’s way would still be perfect. That he thought if I kept following God’s plan, I couldn’t possibly be happier. As he told me all that, the truth started sinking in, the truth Beth predicted: I couldn’t change his mind, I couldn’t make some sort of deal with him that our marriage would be different. He was too convinced of his beliefs.

“This isn’t going to work” I finally said. “We’re too different in too many ways. You’re sure that your beliefs are right while I’m doubting everything. You can trust God while I can’t. You dream of a biblical family, I dread it. How can we possibly be happy together? It might just be a phase for me, but I don’t know that yet. If it is, and we are meant for each other, we will be together eventually. But if it isn’t, you’ll be stuck with a wife and family you’re too good for. Is that really what you want?”

Harry was quiet, crying and so was I. “If that’s what you want, if that’s what you can deal with, I’ll marry you.” I hadn’t said that because I wanted it. I said that because at this point, I realized what I got myself into. Two families were waiting for a happy, engaged couple. They weren’t going to get one. I was very, very afraid of what waited for me back inside. I was clueless how to explain all of this. I think at some point I wished he’d agree and still want to marry me so that I could avoid what was sure to come: Anger, hate, disappointment, being kicked out of the house into a world I didn’t know, cut off from my family. I realized the extent of what I just had done and it was just as scary as my other option. I was trapped with no way out.

“No, I think you might be right. You’re obviously not in the right state of mind to make a good wife. You need time.” Harry’s answer was partially a relief and partially the scariest situation I could imagine. I took his hand again and for whatever reason I said Thank you. I was emotionally broken down to bits and pieces and started crying violently. “What do I do now?” I asked him. “What will we say?”. Harry just shook his head. “I don’t know.” I cried even more at that and Harry must’ve felt sorry for me, because next thing I know was that he put his arm around my shoulders. I couldn’t resist and hugged him, crying harder, begging him “Please don’t let me do this alone, please help me, please do something, I can’t do it.” We sat there for a few more minutes, until I found a tissue in my pocket, cleaned up my face as well as I could. “We should go back in. I bet they’re wondering what’s going on.” Harry stood up, but I just couldn’t find the strength to do it. He took my hand again and pulled me off the bench. “Come on, we’re in this together.” He didn’t let go of my hand, which I’m deeply thankful in retrospective. We slowly walked over to the back door of our house. My mind was empty, fear struck me but somewhere deep inside I felt that I had done the right thing. Harry held the door open for me, and inside I went to wash away those stupid smiles off my parent’s faces.

I’m a cow, free at last.

As a girl you see the world as a giant candy store filled with sweet candy and such. But one day you look around and you see a prison and you’re on death row. You wanna run or scream or cry but something’s locking you up. Are the other folks cows chewing cud until the hour comes when their heads roll? Or are they just keeping quiet like you, planning their escape?

(Quoted from the movie “The good girl”)

When I watched this movie a few days ago I was struck by this opening passage. So much that I in fact paused the movie, restarted it and listened to it again. And for some reason, this very stereotypical quote from a hardly known movie made me think. And it lifted a weight from my shoulders that I didn’t even know about.

I know so very well just how you believe everything is a wonderful dream as a child. And I too know the moment of looking around and realizing – it’s a prison. I’m a cow, I’m on death row. Everybody is. I too wondered if I was the only one realizing what we were. Our deaths would come much too soon and someone would have to act, but for some reason, nobody did. The humans stared at us whenever we left our barn. They stared, made fun of our furs and claws, were shocked by our ways and always wondering why there were cows at all.

I accepted my inevitable fate. My death sentence was spoken the day I was born and no amount of pleading would reverse the decision. I took my case to the highest court, begged God himself on my knees to somehow let me out of the cage and remove my chains. God’s answer was simple: The butcher was sent to make it short and quick.

I was decorated and prepared to walk down the aisles of the slaughterhouse soon enough. I, the fearful cow, looked around at the other cows, just as chained as caged as I was. But they didn’t know. They didn’t see it. They didn’T see the blood splattered tiles on the wall, blood of hundreds and hundreds of other cows who weren’t able to escape the freezing cold deathtrap.

I saw my own death approaching with steady steps, a large knife in hand, smiling softly. “This is what you were made for” he told me. And just as he was about to swing his knife, he trembled. Let me go, I said. And to my surprise, he hesitated for a moment and his eyes told me to run for my life as long as I had the chance. And I did.

Running down the aisles, making my way to the backdoor, the other cows mooh’d and boo’d at me, threw stones, spit blood out of their half slaughtered mouths, and finally, as I could see the first flicks of sunlight at the end of the hallway, they joined together to form an unheard choir. “You are lost, you are lost, you are lost.” The steps approaching, the sound of metal banging against tiled walls, the slurping sound of dying meat dragging across the floor grew louder and louder as I finally pushed open the door and stumbled on warm, hard concrete. With a loud banging noise the door closed behind me. I looked back just to realize there was no knob on the outside, no way to get back in. From inside I could still hear the choirs, the dragging, the screaming but muted now.

I stood up just to realize that I actually had two legs and the warm breeze gently played with my flowery skirt. My bovine grimace was gone, replaced by a pointy little nose, almond-shaped eyes and small mouth with soft lips. My fur, which had subjected me to much joking from the human crowd had receded and formed a ponytail on my head. I looked at my claws, bloodied still, but now made of fragile fingers. As I started walking away from the slaughterhouse I wiped my hands clean on my dress. Not quite sure where to go, I left the slaughterhouse grounds through a little whole in the wire netting fence. Out on the sidewalk I was greeted with wild inner city traffic roaming on the streets. Cars, busses, trucks. The other pedestrians looked at my shook-up being with some suspicion, but I quickly adjusted as I walked down the street. As I reached the end of the street I saw a bus-stop. I took a seat on one of the worn down benches and waited with the other figures. Did they know what was happening right here, in the middle of the city? Had they not wondered about the cows? Had they not heard the screams?

The bus arrived, smelling of gas and city dirt, making steaming sounds as it stopped. Together with the other passengers I got in line and stepped onto the bus. The friendly old driver shot me an understanding look and asked “Where to, young Lady?”. I was speechless. Where should I go? I tried to come up with something but my mind was empty. As the first tear started flowing from my eyes, the driver said “No worries. Just sit down. I’ll take you to the train station. From there, you can decide where you want to go.” I nodded thankfully and sat down and as I did I could hardly believe the thought which flooded my mind. Free, free at last.

So, as I watched this movie and the scene unfolded in my head I couldn’t help but take a deep breath. I hadn’t realized before just how lucky I was to get out when I did. I know that, once I had been married, it would mean my death. It would have been the point of no return. I jumped off the crashing train just moments before it hit the wall. And this realization was so… amazing.

Fundamentalist weddings 2 – Planning a wedding in 6 weeks?

Now, as I was thinking about the actual weddings in the movement, I couldn’t find much of a difference to normal weddings. Obviously, there are differences, but there aren’t any strict rules the couple has to stick to.

If you were at a fundamentalist reception, you might not even realize it’s not a normal wedding, except you won’t see anybody dancing, and there might not be constant music. But there too is a lot of talking, eating, walking around and such. There are usually fun activities to do, too, like photo booths and different games to play. Let me try point out some of the most common differences.

Generally I found that big fancy weddings are considered somewhat selfish. Spending a great deal of money on that one day is considered foolish, as most would have to expect a baby really soon after the wedding and the money should be invested into the marriage, not just the wedding. It’s all about being frugal and smart on money, which doesn’t mean that everything is dull and boring. There are plenty of people, women usually, with amazing skills for decorations, flowers, cooking and sewing. I don’t think you can tell that the foods and decorations haven’t been done by a “professional”.

I also want to remind everybody that this scenario doesn’t only describe a very short engagement. Longer engagement periods don’t change the fact that the wedding should be frugal and a lot of work will be done by family and friends, not by hired caterers or decorators.

Before the day of engagement: Typically, the suitor of the girl will have to have some money saved up in order to get the blessing to propose to the girl. This can go as far as the bride’s dad wanting to see actual bank account numbers and all savings. Additionally, it is normal that the suitor already has some sort of living arrangement prepared, be it a house or a rental apartment. This sometimes may happen in the first week of engagement, but many times I have also seen that the groom already had it prepared prior to proposing. Obviously, it wouldn’t be fully furnitured, as most of that would be the bride’s job and many things will be given as a wedding gift.

As most girls don’t receive any sort of pricey education like college, the family of the bride will have some amount of money saved up for her wedding day. All of this money will go into the preparations. So, even before proposing, the financial factors of a wedding will be more or less cleared.

Another important factor in fundamentalist weddings is that the community helps the couple with all preparations. Sometimes, money will be gifted prior to the wedding by wealthier families. Most of the time, the community will offer all sorts of services: Sewing, catering, decorations and so on.

A room for the reception will be no problem either: Most of the time, the wedding will be outside in somebody’s garden. Other times, they will find a church which is bookable on short notice. They don’t care that much about the denomination of the church as they don’t consider themselves a member of either denomination. For the reception, they will have a range of places to choose from: A big room at their own house, their garden, family friend’s houses, or even a “community center” in areas with many QF/P families. Those community centers can be anything from old houses to barns to bigger garages which have been built into community houses and private churches.

After the proposal: The bride and her bridesmaids and her maid of honor will go hunting for dresses. Sometimes, a seamstress from the movement may sew the dresses all together. Others will look for used dresses in the community. Though some do buy on ebay, that’s not typical. They are a bit afraid that a used dress from outside the movement may mean bad luck. Used dresses from inside the movement are no problem. Some others have old wedding dresses from their own family. These will be altered and reuse if need be. I have seen a girl get married in a dress that her own grandmother wore – the dress had been altered four times at this point! She again kept it for her own daughters. Few ones will buy a new dress. Especially if the kids come from a big QF family, this is an exception. A new dress is a lot of work, too: You can’t usually use the dress as it is, as most new dresses are too “immodest”. They usually need to be altered, anyway. If the groom is generous, or the dad saved up a lot, the girl might nevertheless have a new dress. The same applies for the groom’s outfit, as well as the one for the best man.

Also, they will start looking for a place for their honeymoon. Sometimes, that is just one night at a fancier hotel in the area. Richer ones who can afford to actually travel will find and book a place. Again, it’s totally dependent on the money they have, but big fancy journeys to a far away place are a huge exception. An expensive honeymoon is not seen as desirable, especially since most people believe the money should rather be saved for the future babies.

The families will be trying to find a place for the wedding and the reception. Different places will be visited and evaluated. Typically, cheapest wins. Anything that doesn’t look great will be decorated, so it doesn’t matter that much anyway. Decorations like flowers may be ordered, but it’s more likely that the family/friends/community will make them themselves. They use their own flowers or maybe even ordered ones. That way, it’s not only cheaper, but also faster, as more people are working on them.

Lists will start going around, calculating how much food will be needed and who will prepare it. A professional caterer is something I have never seen. The families and members of the communities will provide all foods and drinks. I have seen weddings where a “traditional american BBQ” was the theme of the foods served. There were steaks, burgers, ribs, salads, everything. And a lot of cakes, cupcakes and candies, too. All of it was prepared by the families and some family friends (men) where responsible for the meat.

Decorations are sometimes borrowed from other families, or they will be self-made. Same goes for the flower arrangements. Many fundamentalist families don’t see a point in spending 100s or even 1000s of dollars for flowers. As most of the movement families I knew lived out on the country and had big pieces of land, there was always someone with a huge flower garden which were used for the decorations.

Jobs will be given out: Who is responsible for the food station? Who’s working as a waitress? Who helps decoration, who helps cleaning?

Also, “entertainment lists” are written. Who will give a speech? Who’s the band (usually community members)? Does anybody want to read stories, poems, bible verses? Do kids want to prepare a little play? Things like that. The individual entertainers will start working on their things.

There will be meetings for bible study together, evenings where stories about the courtship of the bride and groom are told, how God brought them together, how certain people felt when they saw God work in the couple and so on. Also, there might be meetings of the couple with older married couples to exchange experiences.

The last few days before the wedding is when “the talk” happens. Typically, it will be within the last 2 days of engagement. Though they most likely have somewhat of a biological knowledge about their own bodies, they will hear for the first time in detail how the other sex’s body works. Women’s groups and men’s groups get together with each the bride and/or the groom to tell them some last advises. This has been done during courtship already, but this time it’s really about marriage and normal life that the couple soon will face.

The wedding:

In the morning, the women are usually busy getting all the food cooked and ready. Last touches and decorations will be added to the cake. The bride and the bridesmaids will be helping with this until noon, or they will be doing the last decorations in the church and the reception hall.

The men do the “hard” stuff. Putting up chairs, transporting people around, transporting the food to where it’s supposed to be (if need be) and so on.

By late morning/early noon, the bride and her bridesmaids will be busy doing everyone’s hair and make up if they are allowed to wear it. Dresses are put on and everybody is getting ready.

Wedding pictures may be taken at this point already. Most fundamentalists don’t believe that seeing each other in wedding dresses before the wedding means bad luck.

All weddings I have been to started rather late during the day. 3 PM was the earliest as far as I remember. There’s a simple reason for that: The bride and groom are supposed to “sleep in” and have a relaxed day. Also, the celebrations are kept rather short as to not wear out the couple. The actual wedding would be late noon or even early evening and the celebrations would last until 10 PM on average, 12 if the couple is “wild”. Simple reason: This is the day the couple will have sex for the first time and neither of the two should be tired or worn out. It ends that early to have time for… well, sex. It doesn’t really matter if the couple wants it that way, they’d usually be pushed into this pattern.

The wedding vows usually include: “I will submit to you, obey you and serve you like the Church does for Christ” for the bride, and “I will provide for you, protect you and love you like Christ does for his church” for the groom.

Generally I found that fundamentalist weddings can be rather long. Sometimes, the couple doesn’t want to be the center of the party and wedding will have more of a church service feel to it than that of a wedding. Others keep it short and sweet, without long sermons and vows and music. That would be done later during reception then.

The reception is rather unspectacular and normal. Dancing is an exception as it’s too immodest and sensual for most groups. There will be a lot of speeches and such. There might be some group dancing done by the kids.

The reception won’t be so much about the newlyweds as it will be more about religion, God’s plan, prayer and bible readings.  Depending on the taste of the family, the reception could be that everyone sits on their chairs and listens quietly to hours of studies, or it might be like an actual, fun reception where people sit together and talk, discuss and have fun. It’s not like all fundamentalist weddings are boring.

As said before, the night will end early in order to give the newlyweds time to actually fulfill their marriage that night. The families might stay longer than the couple to celebrate into the night, but since most families have small children, they don’t last much longer than the couple.

Further reading on betrothal

I have received many comments on my last post in which I made a short mention of betrothal. It seems many have not heard about this form of relationship yet and I don’t feel like I can answer all the questions since it wasn’t practiced in my group, but I gathered some links and articles for the ones who are interested in it.

As for the many questions, betrothal is still very rare in fundamentalist christianity, but it’s not an exception among the messianic jewish (or old testament christians, whatever you want to call them). These groups are very close-knit to the fundamentalist christians and I know of many fundamentalist christians who have decided to follow the OT law. We had several families in our circle of friends who didn’t eat pork and wore tzitzit. It’s not that uncommon among fundamentalists anymore.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/09/us/new-christian-take-on-the-old-dating-ritual.html (Short mention of a betrothal right at the beginning of the article)

http://ylcf.org/courtship-stories/bowers-testimony-of-betrothal/ (A short story of a betrothed couple. Note the fact that they entered their relationship with vows which are considered unbreakable)

http://www.goodmorals.org/lyman.htm (Another article, betrothal is talked about especially at the end of the article.)

http://www.lifeandlibertyministries.com/archives/000195.php (Older article dealing with the differences)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09OXeGZcJQY (Video of an actual betrothal ceremony – I don’t know whether the rituals shows are typical or not)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnDlwPoou9g (Trailer for a documentary about Betrothal – I haven’t seen the movie yet as I can’t get my hands on it, but I would be interested if any of you guys have it where you got it!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rky0k7zP0ew&feature=related (An interesting interview with fundamentalist christians talking about betrothal)

Fundamentalist weddings 1 – Courtship, Betrothal

I received a comment in which I was asked what fundamentalist weddings look like. I thought that was a great idea for a post! Also, since the commenter didn’t seem sure about the different concepts of courtship, I decided to first post a small collection of different courtship forms and then move on to the type of wedding I know from my group. So here’s about courtship! Even though the term “courtship” is constantly used in Christian circles, there are a TON of different concepts how it works. I don’t know all of them, but I’ll describe the ones I know, aka the most popular ones.

There are a few general rules about courtship: The parents are strongly involved, the father is approached by the men, not the girl, and the goal of a courtship should always be marriage.

First, there is a very worldly form of courtship. This is usually done by conservative, not fundamentalist christians. The girl and the boy meet and already have some sort of interest in each other before they even enter a courtship. The boy might even tell the girl he will talk to her dad before he talks to her dad. The father will evaluate the boy, but the daughter will be strongly involved in the questions he’s asking and has a big say in the decision he’s making. If the girl isn’t interested in the guy, she might even tell her dad to deny him right away in order to not hurt him personally. If the boy gets permission to court, he might be allowed to ask her himself (not dad telling her). Once the courtship starts, the girl and the boy sit together to make rules for their courtship. How far can they go? In most cases, holding hands is ok for the couple. They may also decide if they need chaperoning, and when they need it. They may go on dates alone if they wish to do so. Kissing is usually a no-no during courtship, but might be ok for the engagement. Same goes for saying “I love you”. The boy will need permission to propose, but if they have been courting for a year plus it’s very likely he’ll get it. Engagement times are longer, comparable to secular engagement times. The whole engagement and wedding process is comparable to worldly weddings.

In a more fundamentalist version, the girl will most likely not know that a boy is interested in her. The boy has to go to the dad first and be evaluated. If the boy gets permission to court, the girl will be told that there’s someone interested in her. In some cases, the girl might not even know her suitor, e.g. because the boy had seen and watched the girl at a conference, but the girl didn’t take notice of the boy. There will be a lot of contact between the boy and the girl’s dad and the dad can give his veto to the relationship at any point during courtship. They will always be chaperoned. Going into very date-like situations like movies or a restaurant usually doesn’t happen. It’s typical that boy and girl visit each other’s families in order to see their partner in “natural” environment. Kissing is off-limits until the wedding, holding hands may be allowed once engaged. “I love you” may be allowed, but not in every family.

Even more strict is a form used in some fundamentalist groups: The girl will not be allowed to have any emotions towards a guy. If she does feel something, breaking off contact entirely is encouraged. The guy pretty much has to walk around in the dark and take chances when he asks for a courtship. The father will evaluate (family might be involved). The dad often has long talks with the guy over a long period of time, several weeks even, before he gets permission and the dad tells the girl he has a suitor. Then she will receive counsel and opinions from her family, which she will use to either agree or disagree with a courtship. Usually the girl agrees as she fully trusts her dad’s evaluation. Evaluations are typically much harder to pass in this version. Once the courtship starts, the boy and girl are not allowed to be alone together. Chaperoning might not be enough to fulfill this in the first months, so they’ll always have to stay around many family members. Sometimes, girl and boy visit each other’s families. Emotions aren’t supposed to be evolving at that point – that’s for engagement or better yet marriage. Courtships may be very long, up to several years, depending on the boy’s financial situation, missioning work etc. Sometimes, the girl may be a minor (16 is eligible for courtship in some groups – in all other forms, that’s at least 17 or 18.) so naturally the courtship will be longer. Physical contact of any form is off-limits until the wedding, as well as verbal expressions of affection. If you see a couple where each the boy and the girl hold a stick or a band of some sort which the other holds as well, a “connection” of some sort, that’s the replacement for holding hands in this version. The family can veto the relationship at any point during courtship and engagement. The boy asks for permission to propose to the girl and will be evaluated again. He will have to work through the courtship with the girl’s dad and talk about different issues to get permission. This permission can be delayed or fully denied if for example the boy is struggling with some sort of problem the dad doesn’t like, or isn’t “financially ready” for a wife and baby within the next 9 months. This happens quite a lot and the permission to propose might be a long process. Engagement happens with somebody close (a chaperone). In some cases, the boy might not even be allowed to put the ring on the girl’s finger himself. The dad may be taking care of that and will put the ring on the finger. Touching is still off-limits and the first time they touch would usually be when the guy put the wedding ring on the girls finger during the ceremony. The engagement periods are rather short as the wedding is supposed to be frugal and cheap as well as all the “getting to know each other” was done during courtship. It’s really just the small time frame they need to plan the wedding. Breaking up in the state of engagement usually happens only in cases of adultery.

So much about courtship, but I feel the need to talk about another form of getting together. I have seen a slight rise of this in the last 2 years so I’m a bit worried. It’s betrothal and if you don’t know what that means, keep reading.

Betrothal is supposed to be even more biblical than courtship, and prevent heartbreak even better. Neither the girl nor the boy have any say in choice of partner. The parents of both parties will talk to each other, usually without the knowledge of the couple, to see if they fit together. The girl may already know the boy as a friend of the family, but it could also be a complete stranger. Either way, they will not know that their parents have picked them a spouse until they feel the deal should be sealed. Both girl and boy will be told that a match has been found. There is a chance of veto from both at this point, but they’d need really good reasoning and I personally can’t think of anything they could say to get out of it without making the parents look ungodly (“I’m not ready for marriage!” – “Yes you are, I talked to God, he says so.”). Then the girl and the boy will be betrothed in a small ceremony. I have heard of cases where they weren’t even in the same room together, meaning that they still don’t know each other at this point. The betrothal vows are like marriage vows – they are unbreakable. A betrothal is a serious commitment and can only be broken in cases of adultery, just like marriage. During betrothal, the couple gets to know each other. They may fall in love at this point but don’t have to. Not that it matters anyway, they are in a seriously committed relationship. Physical contact of ANY sort is completely off-limits and may be considered adultery in some groups, which would lead to an immediate breaking off of the relationships. Either way, physical contact would mean a harsh punishment for both parties. The girl will start planning the wedding, the boy will work to get a house and some money saved up. They wait on God to tell them the date when they will be married. Betrothal durations can vary from several weeks to several years.

Personally, I think betrothal is nothing but arranged marriage and should be under close watch. I’m sensing that in times where the fundamentalists grow crazier and crazier, this form of relationship will become more popular.

So much on the different types of courtship, the next post will be concerned with the question what fundamentalist weddings look like in groups with very short engagement times!