In November of 2014 I married an incredible man.
One of the greatest blessings of our marriage is that we both had a good understanding of the Catholic Church’s teachings on human sexuality and marriage.
Independently of each other, prior to dating, we had both taken seriously our duties to be educated in both areas.
Our courtship was lovely. We lived in different areas so there were mid-way dates and letter writing.
Yes letter writing, that thing where you make a conscious effort to put pen to paper to let someone know that you are thinking of them. Many of our friends found this quaint, so sweet in the technological age.
I am grateful for the box of letters I have sitting in our bedroom and hope it can inspire our children one day.
As ‘old fashioned’ as letter writing is, and the amount of people who have ‘awwww-ed’ and gone gooey over the letters it does not compare to the response that we have had when people find out that had committed our dating relationship to chastity and abstinence.
Reactions to Chastity
In today’s society people don’t seem to know how to react to the witness of chastity. Two days before my wedding I was sitting having my nails done and the technician asked where we lived.
“I live in Johnsonville and he lives in Wilton.” The bottle dropped out of her hands. She apologised and then looking thoroughly confused she inquired “You don’t live together?”
This brought on a half an hour conversation about that fact that we weren’t co-habitating, she was so taken aback that her hand waving, squealing and gushing prevented her from doing the job I was paying for in a timely manner, but hey, that’s the price of witness. Continue reading
- Jane Bourke in Restless Press
Jane Bourke is a Catholic Secondary School teacher who specialises in Science and Religion.