Online Dating as a Catholic
Today we have a guest post from my friend Matthew, the man behind SystematicChristianity.org and author of the book Rational Faith.
Before he left San Diego, Matt and I had talked about the world of online dating. I had never signed up from sites like CatholicMatch.com, so asked Matthew about his experience.
As we talked, he mentioned that he should write an article about the Catholic on-line dating scene. Several months later, as I heard of more and more of my friends using these websites, I sent him a message on Facebook asking him if he would, in fact, write something for Restless Pilgrim. He graciously agreed. Everybody, please welcome Matthew Grivich…
First off, I really appreciate David for starting the conversation on dating in the Catholic world. This is a topic that is badly (or evilly) covered in the secular media and barely touched in the Catholic media. When Catholics do discuss it, they usually spend more time saying what you are not supposed to do, instead of what you are supposed to do. Alternatively, they skip straight over meeting and dating to people who are already married.
Be it that I am engaged, and I met my fiancée (Jennifer) on-line, I am at least somewhat qualified to discuss this topic. However, your mileage may vary and take with a grain of salt. Clichés are no extra charge.
Advantages of On-line Dating
As I see it, here are the advantages to on-line dating:
1. A wider search pool
It makes sense to start your dating attempts meeting people off-line. However, unless you are successful, you eventually run out of new people to meet at your church and it’s really hard to meet good Catholics at places other than church. It is hard to run out of people on-line, as you can always widen your search (geographically or otherwise).
2. Explicitly Catholic dating sites exist
The only dating site that I put serious effort into was catholicmatch.com. The nice part of Catholic Match is that most of the people on the site are Catholics and they have specific profile questions to ask how Catholic people are. Members range from cafeteria to orthodox to traditional, from serious to non-serious. You can’t assume that any particular person has any particular (or correct) approach to their faith, but there are indications of what their approach is and whether it is compatible with yours. Catholic Match also had the most important thing for me: enough members of sufficient quality to keep me busy until I found my lovely fiancée, who strives (with me) to be a good Catholic.
3. Efficient
Meeting people in real-life requires that you go out, probably on a regular basis. Many of the people you meet are unavailable or obviously not appropriate. Going out to meet people purely for dating reasons often feels like a waste of time. Going out for other good reasons (spiritual growth, charity, fun with friends, etc.) often has few dating options. In Catholic on-line dating, every person you meet is (we assume and hope) looking for marriage. You can start speaking of marriage related topics quickly without worrying that you are crossing boundaries. People that are obviously not appropriate for you are much easier to screen by looking at their profiles. Unlike off-line dating, you are able to find out the answers to many important compatibility questions: whether they want children, whether they agree with the Church on important questions, age, availability, etc. before you even contact them. Off-line asking of these questions can often be rude or awkward (though keep in mind that I never figured out off-line dating).
4. Without on-line dating, I would almost certainly still be single
Maybe on-line dating is the special sauce that you need.
Disadvantages of On-line Dating
Although there are many advantages to on-line dating, it is not without its drawbacks:
1. A wider search pool
If you are prone to indecisiveness, more options are not necessarily a good thing. You can always feel like there is some better choice right around the corner. Not only is this true for you, but it can also be true for the people that you are trying to contact. At some point, you have to have faith that a given person is right for you and vice versa, and more options makes this harder.
2. It feels like looking for work
Many of the same issues that occur when looking for work also occur in on-line dating. If you are a man, many of your messages will have no response or have a form-letter type rejection. If you are a woman, you will get many “applications” from unqualified “applicants”. People can just disappear if they decide they don’t like you. The early e-mails, phone calls, and dates have a job-interview feel as you both try to ascertain whether or not to proceed with the relationship before there has been enough time for emotional attachment to develop. Romance and chemistry can and do happen, but only after the relationship has moved off-line and the initial jitters and worries have passed.
3. A long distance relationship may be your best option
If there are limited options in your area, or none of them have worked out, it makes sense to look at people who are farther away. However, you then run into the problems with long distance relationships. They cost significantly more time and money. If the relationship goes well, longing for your love is common. If the relationship goes very well, one of you will need to move away from family, friends, and/or career. On the other hand, in an ordinary relationship, proving your devotion is challenging. In a long distance relationship, just having a date demonstrates a significant amount of devotion and moving cements your devotion. In addition, because you can’t be together unless you are talking, it is almost impossible to have a relationship without good communication. Small talk isn’t enough to sustain the conversation.
4. Catholic Match is annoying
I’m thankful for Catholic Match for providing the means to meet my fiancée. However, Catholic Match has many problems. As I’ve mentioned, the culture of Catholic Match is that most women don’t reply to messages. I find this very rude and disheartening. However, free accounts are not marked, and free accounts can’t send or read messages. At least some women are not be able to politely reply that they are unavailable without spending money (though they could mark it on their profile).
The men on Catholic Match tend to be fairly good about sending messages, but they are often bad about escalating to phone calls and dates, and once on dates are often bad about escalating the relationship further. This can be frustrating for women.
When you browse someone’s profile, it sends that person a message. This means two things (from the man’s perspective). One is that if you like a profile, you should send a message quickly. The other is that if you don’t send a message, you are basically rejecting that person. I felt bad about it, but there was nothing I could do.
The articles from Catholic Match are often on interesting topics, but they are very low quality. Either they don’t have particular insight into the problem at hand, or they are essentially advertisements for the site. The “how we met” stories especially are advertisements and don’t give you real insight into in how to meet and fall in love. Similarly, it feels like the forums could be helpful, but most of the posts are by a small group of people, who are almost all long-term disgruntled singles.
Next time…
Tomorrow, in Part 2 of this series, I’ll give my suggested advice for Catholics using these dating sites.