From a talk with my eldest. With her permission. Because teenagers need to know that they’re not alone. Another bonus of NFP…it makes it easier to promote chastity and abstinence to your children. I noticed the other day that you were listening with rapt attention to the girls at the pool as they talked about [...]
I don’t really like abstinence. Wait. What? I certainly think restraint is valuable–I resist the kind of trips where you go to Target for two things and come out with ten. I try not to eat meat on Fridays. I teach NFP. In some cases, however, particularly the case of sexuality, abstinence seems to miss [...]
A couple summers ago, I yelled “gonads!” across a classroom of laughing grad students. We wiped tears and covered red faces while during the first session of our human sexuality class, we shouted all the sex words we knew. Our professor – sex therapist Dae Sheridan – made a list of them on the board. [...]
After listening to a great talk issued by Lighthouse Catholic Media’s new young adult line, Truth be Told, I found myself greatly in need of an emotional chastity makeover. The talk, entitled “Why Do Women Do That?” and given by Lisa Cotter, examined the way a woman’s mind works, how men should best respond, and [...]
More often than not in life we remember criticisms more than we remember compliments. When someone asks me to recall the last time I received a compliment it takes me at least twice as long to recall than if someone asked me to regurgitate the last insult or criticism thrown my way. Chances are that [...]
In 388 AD, Saint Augustine wrote: “We all certainly desire to live happily; and there is no human being but assents to this statement almost before it is made.” True. But what does it mean to be happy? Season one, episode one of a little show called Sex and the City considers this question as it applies [...]
Aside from the good stuff like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, a lot of questionable things came out of the 80s. Perms, spandex, Rick Astley…if there’s a kernel of truth from that decade, though, it’s this: love is a battlefield. Thanks, Pat Benatar. Seriously, during my engagement, I became more aware of spiritual warfare than I ever had before, [...]
A male reader of my post “This Modern Love” wrote an aside of how “man conquers woman” in the courtship process. He gave a personal example and said that though he did all the right things (e.g. gave her flowers, wrote her letters), he did not win her heart. He also wrote that, at one [...]
I used to have a big yellow bumper sticker stuck to my car’s rear windshield. In red letters, it said CHASTITY IS FOR LOVERS. I’m fairly certain our culture begs to differ, as evidenced by various statistics (88 percent of unmarried people between the ages 18 and 29 are sexually active*) and by a reader who [...]
Modesty gives no quarter to our fallen nature, and it brings the full splendor of the other person into sharp relief.
The blogosphere has been abuzz about all the sex The Bachelor isn’t having. It’ll be abuzz again now that his engagement is public. This started when America discovered that Sean Lowe, this season’s star of ABC’s The Bachelor, is a “born again virgin” – somebody who is saving sex from now on for marriage. And [...]
To pursue, or to be pursued? That is the question. ‘Tis nobler in the mind to date until your breath is taken, or heart is broken… Dating – in the man-meets-woman, man-asks-woman-out way**- may sound outdated to those more liberated in their feelings. Instead, people get to know each other by hanging out and never [...]
Imagine my surprise when a friend who works with the parish youth group asked me to give a chastity talk to the middle and high school aged girls. “Who, me?” I said, raising an eyebrow suspiciously. I thought, Why not someone who has actually lived chastely her whole life? Me? I did it all wrong. [...]
I sat in my seat in a circle of students in my counseling theories class. Pen in hand and a self-inventory worksheet on top of a book on my lap, I thought about the question at the top of the paper: What did you learn about love from how your parents treated you? This is [...]
Grateful for the invitation to talk about chastity on Tell Me More, NPR’s nationally syndicated radio show hosted by Michel Martin. I was part of a panel of women – Monique Matthews, an author from Los Angeles and Lisa Marziali, from the first episode of TLC’s The Virgin Diaries - who also have committed to saving sex [...]
“Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life” – Proverbs 4:23 (NIV) “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life” – NLT “With closest custody, guard your heart, for in it are the sources of life” – NAB “Keep your heart with all vigilance, [...]
It’s not my tradition to be glued to the tube for the Heisman Trophy Award Show, but this year was different. I’m a K-State Wildcat alumna and one of our own, Collin Klein, was one of the three finalists for the award. And as Johnny Manzel from Texas A & M was handed the trophy [...]
The Feature of Florida, the Rockin’ Wave of the West Coast of the Atlantic, the Goodness of the Gulf, Arleen Spenceley asked for a guest post on pre-marital counseling. Here is part of my response with linkage to “the rest of the story.” Arleen also contributes over here too. Why am I proponent of pre-marital [...]
From the Roman collar to the brown scapular, the Church has developed a plethora of physical signs one can sport to testify to his faith or vocation. A more recent one which- though not invented by the Church- is gaining popularity not only in various Christians circles but also in Catholic communities, is the purity [...]
“New research shows that The Pill reduces lubrication, arousal, and a woman’s ability to orgasm, thus lending credence to my theory that a lot of hormonal birth control “controls” whether or not you give “birth” by making you never want to have sex. We just can’t win with our ladyparts, can we?” –Jezebel We women [...]
Why do we love movie romances so much, and why do we desire for the love stories in movies to happen to us? Really, why do all of us want to be in love like the movies? “But in the movies they’re not in love at all…” We can never be in love like [...]
Flying home, the college lady next to me mentioned she was in a “complicated” relationship with someone back home. I smiled and said I’d been there. “Make sure you draw clear lines,” I said. “Relationships don’t have to be complicated.” Perhaps this sounds too simplistic – as I fear the lady took it – because [...]
For the average practicing Catholic, dating can be really fun. After all, you’re young, ready to discern marriage, and maybe even ready to start a family of your own. But when it comes to the questions…
I had no idea when I wrote my last post that it would generate so much controversy. I certainly had no idea it would offend so many people. I assure you I meant no offense against anyone. The whole post started out as a private joke in a conversation with my cousin, and since the concept struck [...]
Q. How do you pronounce “ignitum”? A. Well, you have some options. The Romans would have said ig-NEE-toom. In church, we’d say “in-YEE-toom.”
Why?
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