How to Date at a Christian College

Dating at a Christian college is different.
It is unique and impossible to match.

For example, asking a girl to hang out 
always means a guy is interested - always.

And if a guy asks a girl to go a a walk -
that's like a marriage proposal friends!
[aka the girl above is done for - ring is in pocket.]

You think I'm kidding don't you?! Well I'm completely serious actually.

It's ridiculous and funny how intense and crazy
dating can be here in these parts of town.

Nothing is what it seems. 
Everything has way more meaning than you'd think.

I've never had the pleasure of personally dating here on campus,

but I've witnessed my fair share of "marriage-proposal-walks" and all.

So I'm still going to poke fun at the whole ridiculous concept!

And no I'm not thinking or making fun of any couple - this is all for fun friends!
We're are simply discussing dating on Christian campus from one viewpoint.
Not the only viewpoint or even the absolute viewpoint (just the right one)!
Sorry - had to address the uptight and take-everything-personally crowd.

Anyways, I was talking to some people about this strange dating world here.

And I discovered that really not much has changed in about ten years.

Dating on a Christian campus is still the same as it was a decade ago!

So I want to let you read this hysterical piece by Eric.

It is part fiction and part non-fiction.

And it tells the story of dating at a Christian college.

Eric Rivera lives with his wife and two daughters in Trevose, Pennsylvania. After graduating with a degree in Creative Writing in 2006 from Taylor University, he has been attempting to answer a single question: Is banking on the invention of time travel the best way to deal with deep-rooted emotional pain?  You can find Eric on twitter at: @elriveralives.

How to Date at a Christian College

by Eric Rivera

You invite a girl to take a walk with you around campus. 

(The girl is now genuinely confused as to whether you have just in-fact offered to enter into ‘pre-engagement’ with her.)

You have.

After the walk, you are invited back to her place (the lounge in her dormitory) for drinks. You find it perfectly normal to be served hot cocoa. You actually drink the hot coca without disappointment. 

You now repeat these events in the same order for the next three weeks. 

On the next open dorm night, you invite this girl over to your room to play a board game. This is actually considered a ‘smooth move,’ by all parties. 

When she comes over, you actually play the board game, and you actually both enjoy it. Your friends walking by look in and find it normal as well - they know it’s best not to ask to join you at this time. 

Congratulations! When the board game ended, you automatically began dating. 

You must now immediately meet each other’s parents and extended relatives. Fall break is right around the corner - much to plan. 

Your new girlfriend is a huge hit at home. Your mother indirectly suggests to you that she could be the ‘one.’ This is largely based on the girl’s good manners, agreeable nature, and extremely positive disposition on everything. Your new girlfriend thinks she is lucky to have such great in-laws - not everyone is as lucky as she is.

When your girlfriend returns to campus after visiting your family, she is swarmed by girls on her wing and begins sharing all about the weekend. During the story, she needs to find a discreet way to allude to the fact that the two of you did not share the same room, for example she will say something along the lines of ‘the house was lovely, but the guest room where I stayed was a bit drafty.’ Her friends will heave a silent sigh of relief when they hear this and think highly of you.

Things are going just as planned. Only one thing left to do. 

You and your girlfriend must now seek a mentor couple and this is perfectly normal to you, and to your friends. In fact, the couple you ask to mentor you does not even need to ask what you mean. Everyone finds this normal. 

Congratulations! You are now in pre-marriage counseling.

Time to seal the deal. Tell your girlfriend that you’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this and that the two of you should start going to the same church. (Use the word ‘submission’ only if she does first.) 

She agrees. 

Congratulations! You have just ‘moved in together’ and can finally cut ties with all of your other friends on campus. No need for them anymore. 

You now spend every waking moment together and, with the exception of a few classes (next semester’s schedule is already planned to resolve this), share in everything. 

At the same moment your girlfriend drops the last relationship she has apart from you, something unfortunate happens.

You accidentally notice another girl around campus. 

You feel very guilty about this. Especially guilty since you have just made your girlfriend entirely dependent on you in every way. Whoops. 

You feel like you may need to confess your wandering eye to your girlfriend, in fact you do confess it, and she actually forgives you. You both think this was a normal response to the situation. 

Your mentor couple shares a story of when something similar happened to them in college. Sounds pretty much like you two, so the outcome should be the same for you and your girlfriend. 

Mentor couples are rarely wrong. 

You feel better.

To consecrate this renewed hope in your relationship, you reveal all of the dark secrets of your entire life to your girlfriend. You call this a testimony. Instead of being disturbed by what you have just told her, your girlfriend is actually deeply touched by the fact that you have done this. She feels more connected to you than ever. 

You get hugged. 

Uht oh! After being entirely transparent, pre-maturely vulnerable and co-dependent on each other in such a short amount of time, you have now given birth to a quiet, festering contempt for one another.

You soon become that awkward couple eating in the cafeteria who have nothing left to talk about, look miserable, but can't break up because you thought you were supposed to get married. 

Your mentor couple calls to ask you and your girlfriend to baby-sit for them. 

You let it go to voicemail. 

Your girlfriend calls her mother-in-law for advice.

They cry together. 

You need to find a way out of all of this - fast. Being so open in the past turned out badly. Try a different approach. 

You tell her that she has become an ‘idol’ in your life and must break up. (It’s widely understood that human idols are the worst sort of idols). When she explains this reason to her friends, it actually makes sense to them, and they admire you for the self-discipline you display. All very normal. 

A few months later you call one of the girls who admired you for dumping the human idol. 

You invite her to take a walk with you.