Triple Date

Christian Courtship, Couples in Love, & Ask Me Anything

Christian Courtship in an Oversexed World: A Guide for Catholics
by T. G. Morrow
Our Sunday Visitor, 2003
(299 pages, $13.95, paperback)

Couples in Love: Straight Talk on Dating, Respect, Commitment, and Sexuality
by John R. Waiss
Crossroad, 2003
(230 pages, $19.95, paperback)

Ask Me Anything: Provocative Answers
for College Students
by J. Budziszewski
NavPress, 2004
(173 pages, $9.99, paperback)

reviewed by Mike Aquilina

One day you find yourself holding a newborn. The next day you find yourself responsible for teenagers, and suddenly the questions of dating and courtship—questions that, increasingly, are setting serious Christians apart from the rest of parenting society—become more than academic.

This year, my wife and I found ourselves parents of two teens, one boy and one girl. Terri and I knew where we stood on the boy-girl questions. But we also knew that we needed to prepare for the inevitable “why” questions. So we started reading. I’ll discuss the three books we found most helpful.

Sexual Summa

T. G. Morrow’s Christian Courtship in an Oversexed World is remarkable: It’s a popular treatment, conversational like a magazine column, yet at the same time a very thorough and even systematic discussion of sexual morality.

In fact, it is somewhat like a Summa. The author engages all the major “relationship” books and fads of the last decade or so (Venus and Mars, etc.) on their own terms, sifts out the good, trashes the bad, and brings every discussion to the best Christian conclusion.

But Morrow writes so well that you hardly notice you’re doing theology. He draws stories from his own dating experience and from his extensive pastoral work as a chaplain for several Christian singles groups. The narratives carry the argument better than any proof ever could.

Mike Aquilina is vice president of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology (www.salvationhistory.com) and a general editor of The Catholic Vision of Love catechetical series.

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