He's celibate until marriage, and dates won't tolerate it

Chicago Sun-Times ^ | June 15, 2003 | Mary Mitchell

[Enterprise]

I'm honestly not trying to frame this as "right or wrong." If it seems that way I apologize, it is the way I write, and not the way I believe. It is absolutely to the benefit of both of them that if he didn't feel the passion for marriage that he be honest about it. Honesty can cause heartbreak, but it is better than a heartbreaking marriage.

I have worked with a lot of people. I never cared who was celibate or not, and didn't particulary feel the need to ask them. I just feel that if it was something important to know, it would only matter to that other person and the one they were in relationship with.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

Perhaps he belongs to a different era.

[Mark17]

like expecting Lizzie Borden to write her doctoral thesis on the Fourth Commandment.

Lizzie Borden took an axe, gave her mother......oh well, you know the story.

[FourPeas]

Perhaps. A better era, one where women understand the importance of their bodies and that they don't want to be an unpaid prostitute. I only hope that it's an era to come in our society not one gone forever.

[mountaineer]

even "good girls" do it

No, they don't.

[stands2reason]

I dated a very intelligent woman

Mistake.

Some men believe intelligent women are freaks, and "real" women are dumb, like cattle----Men who can't stand women who are smarter than they are. Of course, for you, that rules out the population of women with an IQ above 80.

Your screenname is quite ironic.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

I wonder how many people who were not virgins when they married, now wish that they had been virgins?

[hellinahandcart]

No, the way I read it was that, after dating for six months, she wanted to go to the "next level". Since, with Mr. Washington, the next level isn't SEX, she wanted a commitment. An "If I stay with you and only you, and abstain until marriage, as you are doing, I need to know we're headed for marriage" sort of thing.

Six months may seem like a brief period of time to someone who's (cough!) in college, but once you're in your thirties and forties, women and men both tend to come right to the point a lot quicker. Time's a wasting, particularly for women who want to have children. And at that age, experience and wisdom should tell someone long before six months have passed whether or not they're wasting each other's time.

Or toying with someone else's feelings. A mature and virtuous man would not do that.

[TheSpottedOwl]

Parents should try their best to remain with their spouses. And, protecting these children is a life-long exercise.

I agree. Some parents switch partners constantly, they introduce the new catch of the day as your new mommy or daddy. That is confusing and sets a bad example. Your children will lose respect for you.

Parents are people too, you just have to be careful.

[scripter]

Excellent posts. If only parents today would raise their kids with the values you've presented here.

[Cannoneer No. 4]

There is celebacy and then there is celebacy

[hellinahandcart]

Why would he date her for six months if he knew it would go nowhere?

If he's not in love by then, he ain't never gonna be.

Don't get me wrong, you could know somebody for years and years BEFORE you fall in love with them, but dating is different because it's courtship. It does raise expectations. At the very least, it raises questions. And she had every right to the answers even earlier.

Even FreeRepublic has many women not worthy of him.

Personally I think I'm too good for the little pompous ass (as well as too old, thank God). I'd never treat a man the way he treated her.

[Age of Reason]

Some men believe intelligent women are freaks, and "real" women are dumb, like cattle----Men who can't stand women who are smarter than they are. Of course, for you, that rules out the population of women with an IQ above 80.

The optimal IQ is the average IQ, 100.

[my_pointy_head_is_sharp]

But if you are still celibate at 33, there is something wrong.

Yes. What's wrong is that he is commitment phobic. As he practically said himself:

"I dated a very intelligent woman, an attorney, who was OK with celibacy," Washington said. "But after six months, she wanted me to make a commitment. She felt if she knew we were going to marry then she could abstain. I couldn't make that promise."

[stands2reason]

MEDIOCRITY RULES!!!!

[jwh_Denver]

The apostle Paul stayed celibate all his life.

Paul never mentions having a wife or kid in the Scriptures but he had been a member of the ruling Jewish Sanhedrin and this group required being married with at least 1 child.

[Mister Magoo]

Oh, come on. If a man doesn't want to have sex with you before marriage, he isn't going to want to have sex with you after marriage. I've known two guys who advocated celibacy for religious reasons through college and afterward, and both ultimately acknowledged they were homosexuals. If this guy was a heterosexual, believe me, he would have found a woman to marry.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

Your post only strengthens the argument that women should not have sex, outside of marriage, with homosexual men! LOL

[PianoMan]

I'm firmly commited to being celibate - one day a week.

[hellinahandcart]

No, your line about manipulating women with virtue instead of sex was perfect; you said it in one sentence instead of a paragraph or ten. :D