Why Begin a Courtship?
Why Begin a Courtship?
Twice, “I have a girlfriend”; two ways of looking toward the future.
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I have sons and daughters beginning their first courtships. Others are approaching that age when a glance can brighten an entire day, and one discovers, with some surprise, the desire to see someone again. At home, those butterflies in the stomach are beginning to appear—the ones we parents recognize before anyone tells us a thing.
Watching them grow makes me happy. It also makes me think of everything they will discover: the happiness of feeling loved, the excitement of getting to know another person, and the questions that arise when affection begins to occupy an important place in life.
For their sake, I have wanted to write this series. I hope it will also help other young people, those who have been courting for some time, and families who wish to accompany them with affection and sound judgment. I do not pretend to settle their love lives on a page. I would like to offer them words with which to talk about love, beginning with a simple question: why begin a courtship?
The boy waited until everyone was seated. His mother had just put the tortillas on the table; his sister was looking for the salsa, and his father was pouring water into the glasses. He had been smiling for several minutes without explaining why.
“I have a girlfriend.”
He said it all in one breath, as though afraid he might lose his nerve before finishing the sentence.
His sister was the first to react. She asked who the girl was, though she probably already knew. His father looked up with a smile he tried to conceal. His mother saw a new happiness in her son's face and was happy with him.
He was sixteen. He had liked the girl for months. They had begun talking after class, and now any message from her could turn an ordinary afternoon into a memorable one. He wanted to tell them how he had asked her to be his girlfriend and what she had answered. His words tumbled out. No one was in a hurry to interrupt him.
During dinner there were jokes and a small discussion about which of the two had made the first move. His mother wanted to ask what they understood by being boyfriend and girlfriend. His father was on the verge of saying that perhaps it would be better to wait. But they saw his happiness and kept quiet. They would find a better moment, they thought.
The weeks that followed were full of new things. He waited for her messages after class; she saved him a place when they met up with friends. They discovered songs they later thought of as their own. They made plans for the following Saturday and sometimes laughed as they spoke of places they would visit “when they were grown up.”
His parents liked seeing him happy. They also noticed that he began to live with his attention fixed on his phone and put some things off until later. They told themselves it was a stage, that there was no need to exaggerate. Neither wanted to be the person who extinguished that first joy.
The conversation remained unfinished.
One Friday they argued because he had forgotten she was going out with some girlfriends and spent the afternoon expecting to see her. There were messages written in anger, replies that seemed harsher on the screen, and words neither knew how to take back afterward. They broke up.
The immediate cause might seem trivial. Both of them were truly sad.
Days later, he sat down to dinner without his phone beside his plate. His parents let him talk. He told them he missed her, and that the more he thought about what had happened, the less he understood what they had been during those months.
“I liked her so much,” he said. “She liked me too. But we never talked about anything other than seeing each other, messaging, and being together the following weekend.”
He remembered the places they had promised to visit when they were older. They had not been plans; they were a happy way of imagining themselves still close. He was only beginning to think about what he would study. She had dreams of her own that he did not know well. Neither had asked what sharing a life would mean later on. They had not even thought about whether they were ready to begin getting to know each other with that intention.
“I think we both got carried away,” he said. “It was lovely. It really was lovely. But we said we were boyfriend and girlfriend without knowing what for.”
His mother listened. There was no need to strip what he had lived of its beauty to acknowledge what it had lacked.
He looked up.
“Had you thought it was too soon?”
His father nodded.
“We did. We were afraid of spoiling your happiness.”
“I would have been angry if you'd told me,” the boy admitted. “But thinking about it would have helped.”
None of the three could know for certain whether a timely conversation would have changed his decision. Perhaps not. Nor could they find out now: they had let the chance to talk pass while that hopeful excitement was still intact.
The boy did not conclude that loving her had been a mistake. He concluded that he still needed to grow before asking someone else, and himself, for what he now understood courtship to mean. He could remember that happiness with gratitude, accept that parting hurt, and recognize that both had set out on a journey without asking where they wanted to go.
In another house, at another dinner, a young man also waited until everyone was seated.
“I have a girlfriend.”
His mother put her spoon down on her plate. His father asked the young woman's name. There were smiles and questions like those at the first table.
He was twenty-three. He was about to finish his degree and worked part-time. He had met his girlfriend among university friends. He liked talking with her: he could share good news without first having to explain why it mattered, and when they disagreed about something, neither seemed intent on winning by wearing the other down.
A few days earlier they had gone for a walk after class. He told her he intended to look for full-time work after graduating, though he did not yet know whether he would have to move. She spoke of the studies she wanted to continue. Neither had the future settled. They had listened to each other without turning the other's uncertainties into an obstacle that needed to be hidden.
The family welcomed his news with pleasure. After dinner, while he helped put away the glasses, his father asked what he hoped for from that relationship.
“I want to get to know her well,” he replied. “We're taking our time.”
It was an honest answer. He, too, had no reason to announce a wedding, set a date, or pretend to a certainty he did not yet possess. But he could already talk with her about work, housing, faith, and family. They could ask whether they might one day want to share their whole life and what they would need to learn in order to do so.
The words “I have a girlfriend” had brought the same joy to both tables. But why had each begun that courtship? The younger boy could only formulate the question when it ended. The older one was beginning to ask it while he could still discuss it with his girlfriend.
Age does not decide for them. It does change what they are in a position to offer and ask for. The sixteen-year-old boy needed room to grow and prepare before undertaking a relationship with a real prospect of marriage. The university student could see that horizon more closely, though being twenty-three and having a job did not in itself make him mature.
Sometimes we speak of the seriousness of courtship as though we had to defend it from romantic excitement. I think it helps to begin by acknowledging how beautiful that excitement can be.
Waiting for a call. Choosing words carefully. Discovering that someone remembers a detail everyone else forgot. Walking more slowly because there is still something to say. Being glad to find a particular person, with a voice and a way of seeing the world all their own: none of that needs an apology.
Romantic hope makes us attentive and allows us to see possibilities we had not imagined before. It would be sad to greet every budding story with a list of suspicions. It would also be sad to ask that excitement to decide for us.
Courtship, lived honestly, lets us get to know the other person and recognize whether we can build a marriage with them. That does not mean every courting couple must marry, nor that at the beginning they can already know whether they will. It means both need to understand where they wish to go. If today we know that forming a home is still a very distant possibility, it is worth asking what we are promising in the meantime and what we expect the other person to give in return.
For a sixteen-year-old boy or girl, that question can be uncomfortable. Their feelings are intense; the future seems remote. Even so, the months pass within real life. An early relationship can take up the time meant for growing, studying, and cultivating friendships; it can accustom two young people to dependence on constant attention. It can also bring them closer to emotional or sexual decisions whose consequences they are not yet able to understand and which may offend God. None of this happens inevitably, but it would be dishonest to pretend it never happens.
And if the relationship ends, it can hurt a great deal. A young person's pain is not small because their parents know from experience that they will be able to overcome it. Sometimes that suffering is part of learning to love. At other times it could have been avoided by letting an affection grow more calmly, without bringing forward commitments for which neither was ready.
It is worth talking about all this without turning anyone's romantic history into a measure of their worth. A girl does not lose dignity because she has had two boyfriends, just as a boy does not gain prestige by having had several girlfriends. It is unjust to judge harshly in girls the very thing excused in boys. What matters, for both, is learning to treat others and be treated with respect, without becoming accustomed to promising what they cannot yet offer.
A father or mother can help greatly by remembering what that first love felt like. They can receive the news tenderly and later, at a quiet moment, ask what their child hopes for from the relationship. They can suggest time to get to know one another, spend time with friends, and attend to duties without assuming that every attraction must immediately become courtship. Accompanying their child includes daring to speak, even when they cannot be sure the child will want to listen.
No age by itself settles all these questions. Some very young people are capable of admirable prudence; some adults flee every emotional responsibility. We will always need to look at the particular people.
Knowing them takes time. At first, we meet in chosen moments: when both want to see each other, when they have prepared what to talk about, when differences still seem small. Later come fatigue, setbacks, duties that conflict, and opinions neither knew the other held. Then we begin to discover whether we admire the real person.
Idealizing does not mean expecting good things. It means keeping what we already know out of sight because we fear it will change our story. “Deep down, he respects my faith, even though he mocks it.” “He never keeps his promises, but with me he'll learn.” We can sincerely desire someone's good without building on an imaginary version of that person.
It also helps to look at ourselves. Do we know how to ask forgiveness? Do we sustain our duties while in love? Can we listen to an answer we did not expect?
Some couples have taken very large steps without discussing what they mean. They share weekends, trips, and passwords. They know one another's schedules, but have never sat down to say what they hope to build.
Others have begun a sexual life or moved under the same roof as though they were already spouses. Here we need to speak clearly: courtship is not yet marriage. Loving one another deeply, having been together for years, or planning a wedding does not replace the marriage commitment or the sacrament.
For that reason, couples should not begin a conjugal life before marrying. Sexual intimacy and living together as spouses belong to marriage. Living together “to try it out” brings forward a self-giving proper to that bond without having undertaken it.
Speaking clearly does not entitle us to despise those already in that situation. We can speak respectfully, understand their difficulties, and accompany them in putting their life in order, without concealing from them the good to which they are called.
If someone asks what they hope for from their relationship, perhaps they reply:
“We're fine as we are.”
It may be true that they enjoy being together. But feeling good does not by itself settle what they are promising one another or whether the way they live that affection corresponds to their faith. The question they have left unfinished is still there. Perhaps one imagines marriage and fears frightening the other away by mentioning it. Perhaps the other wants companionship, but has no intention of taking that step. While neither speaks clearly, both can feel they agree while in reality living within different projects.
Talking does not oblige anyone to promise what they do not yet know. It allows each person to know the truth necessary to choose freely. An uncertain answer, sincerely expressed, can open a conversation. A feigned certainty used to preserve the relationship ends up exacting a higher price.
That is why courtship needs a direction even when it does not yet have a date. It gives us the opportunity to discover whether we want and are able to move toward marriage with this person. On that path we learn whether there is esteem as well as attraction, whether trust withstands a difficulty, and whether we can speak about our disagreements without punishing one another for having them. We also need to discuss how to help each other draw closer to God together and what place faith will have in the life we imagine sharing.
That knowledge may lead us to conclude that we should not marry. It is a painful conclusion, but it can be honest and good for both. No one should continue a relationship simply because much time has passed, because the families have grown attached, or because they fear hurting the person they love. Gentleness matters when telling the truth; concealing it indefinitely usually hurts more.
Preparation does not begin when a ring is bought, either. It begins in modest gestures: keeping one's word, organizing one's time, learning to work, managing what one has, and mastering an impulse that could harm the other person. Someone still very young can practice those virtues without rushing into a commitment. Someone already considering forming a home needs also to look at what real steps they can take to make it possible.
In the following articles in this series, we will talk about these questions: how to distinguish falling in love from true knowledge, what living chastity means, and why living together “to try it out” is not the same as preparing for marriage. We will also talk about the conversations couples need to have and what it means to prepare a life together as well as a wedding.
For now, I would like us to stay with the opening question: why begin a courtship? Romantic hope deserves to be received joyfully. And the two people living it deserve to know where they are going.
I think again of the two tables: of the phone no longer beside the boy's plate and of the glasses the university student put away while talking with his father. Neither needed to be given a wedding date over dinner. Both deserved a family able to rejoice, accompany them, and speak the truth with affection.
That conversation can also begin between the young people themselves, on an ordinary afternoon, without solemnity or interrogation. After talking about the day, when they no longer need to fill every pause, one can ask the other:
“What are we learning to build together, and where might it lead us?”
It is worth listening to the answer. And it is worth having the freedom to give one's own.
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