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« 'Passport through Darkness' Gives Victims Voice | Main | Troubled by the Twiblings? »

January 12, 2011

The Virgins-Only Dating Website

Is WeWaited.com really a perfect haven for Christians struggling in a sex-obsessed culture?

Amy Julia Becker

Fewer and fewer Americans are getting married. Those who do are, on average, waiting longer to wed than have previous generations. But according to Time's "Who Needs Marriage? A Changing Institution," women and men still want to meet and build relationships with each other, so marriage remains an ideal. Because of this, reports Stephanie Rosenblum in The New York Times, online dating sites of a remarkable variety have proliferated in recent years. Some are based purely on physical appearance, others focus on hobbies and interests, while others highlight education or the type of computer you use.

Wading into these crowded waters is WeWaited.com, a dating site exclusively for virgins. Only 30 percent of applicants to the site are admitted, and they gain access through a fee and a survey designed to assess their trustworthiness. The site's founders admit that some virgins are left out due to the rigorous screening process, while some who lie about their sexual activity make it in. But, according to its homepage, WeWaited.com mostly achieves its goal: "to use virginity as a significant compatibility tool to bring people together."

If movies like The 40-Year-Old Virgin and covers of Cosmopolitan weren't enough, sociological data back up the fact that virginity before marriage is rare in the West. According to the Guttmacher Institute, 95 percent of Americans engage in premarital sex. So WeWaited.com offers a safe space for the small segment of the population who want to stay virgins until marriage. It enables partners who value their own virginity to pair up, and it affirms the desire to remain chaste before marriage.

The founders of the site, a husband and wife team who exchanged their "vows and their virginities" on their wedding day, believe virginity is something that goes beyond physical intercourse. They see it as physical, emotional, and spiritual, and believe waiting to exchange their "whole selves" until their wedding was a blessing.

WeWaited.com (formerly called YouandMeArePure.com) is not explicitly Christian, but its view of sex as something involving the whole person aligns with the Christian view. As Wheaton provost Stanton L. Jones writes in the January issue of Christianity Today, sex has meaning, and that meaning is derived from God's intentions for sex, not from our intentions or desires. For Christians, sex is not a merely physical act, but one with implications for gender relationships, embodiment, procreation, personal fulfillment, and God's glory. "God made sexual intercourse to create and sustain a permanent, one-flesh union in a male-female married couple," Jones writes.

So on many levels, providing a space for virgins to meet one another is a good thing. It affirms a biblical perspective on the purpose of marriage as well as the significance and goodness of sex within marriage. And in spite of cultural norms and sociological data that suggest virginity is impossible, WeWaited.com provides proof that it is possible and desirable, if challenging, to remain a virgin into adulthood.

Despite its strengths, the site, and the idea of Christian virgins seeking only fellow virgins as partners, poses problems. First, by narrowing the pool of potential partners to virgins, Christians run the risk of making virginity — rather than a commitment to the gospel — the litmus test of a relationship. God cares about virginity. But, as Paul wrote, "Do not be yoked together with unbelievers" (2 Cor. 6:14). A shared love for Jesus matters even more than a pure sexual past when it comes to Christian relationships. Second, although Christians uphold an ethos that supports sexual relations exclusively within marriage, virginity should not become an idol. To eliminate the vast majority of the population — including a good majority of Christians — as potential marriage partners may well emphasize sexual purity at the expense of God's power to forgive and redeem.

The Bible advocates sexual purity. Further, though, a number of passages demonstrate how Christians should respond to sexual activity outside of marriage. Jesus, for instance, refuses to condemn the woman caught in adultery (John 8). He chooses a Samaritan woman who is living with a man who is "not her husband" as one of the first evangelists (John 4). The text assumes that the women's sexual activity will be different in the future because of their encounter with Jesus, and with God's grace, God's willing and undeserved forgiveness for their sin. "Go and leave your life of sin," Jesus says.

Similarly, Paul often addresses congregations of new believers who engaged in sexual sin before their conversion. He instructs them with a message of forgiveness for the past and encouragement for new life in Christ in the future. And as Peter writes, "you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do — living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry. . ." (1 Pet. 4:3). Contemporary Americans, including many Christians, have sex before marriage. In so doing, they bring harm to themselves and to others. But God's grace has always been able to redeem sins of the past.

Christians should be concerned with sexual purity. And it is a relief for Christians to find a safe space that does not assume premarital promiscuity as the norm. Moreover, God's ideal for marriage includes both partners entering a covenant as virgins who give of themselves — body, mind, and spirit — only to each other. WeWaited.com implies that virginity is crucial to compatibility. But the highest concern for Christians in dating, and ultimately marriage, is a relationship based on the love and grace of Jesus Christ, the one who forgives all sin, the one who calls us to forgive one another, the one who can make all things, and all people, new.

Comments

Interesting idea, and far be it from me to mock genuine attempts on the part of Christians to meet and marry each other. So, kudos for that. Sociological data does NOT suggest that virginity is impossible, just uncommon. However, this particular site not only runs the risks that Amy aptly outlines, but it also will replicate (if not exacerbate) the gender ratio problem. There will be far more Christian women who can honestly join this dating website than men. Moreover, it would seem to privilege the one classic measure of virginity, self-reported vaginal intercourse, to the neglect of other ways that creative humans have expressed premarital sexual behavior. Well-intentioned, then, but it misses the mark for which it aims. And I would love to know, a year or two from now, if the women on the site will have found the men on the site appealing. My hunch is "no."

Reading this, I wondered about those people who had had premarital sex? Particularly, those people who had done this before becoming Christians? If we truly believe repentance is possible, virginity has struck me as an odd standard.

I'd much prefer a site where to join you had to commit to chastity outside of marriage. If someone had had sex in the past, that should be disclosed, but should not in itself bar them from the site. The important thing is their present actions and views when it comes to premarital sex.

Good article. Sexual purity does not necessitate virginity, particularly because the blood of Jesus Christ purifies all.

Regarding the site, I do wonder how they confirm people's virginity, especially the guys. Self-reporting is not exactly the most reliable method.

It might work. After the second world war was over, I came home and looked up old friends. A girl I was interested in introduced me to her mother. The girl was engaged. Her mother introduced me to the girl's sister. We "kept company" for seven years. We did not sleep together until we were married. We were married for 53 years when my wife died. So far our marriage has produced five children, six grand children and five great grandchildren. Maybe people who meet through these introductions will have happy marriages like ours. If they're honest and work at it as we did. if they learn to cooperate and not compete with each other, it might work. It might work. Please, God.

I was a virgin until I married. So was my wife. So were two of my three children.

I am completely offended at the arrogant comment made by "Mark."

He said, " And I would love to know, a year or two from now, if the women on the site will have found the men on the site appealing. My hunch is, 'no.'"

What hypocrisy, vitriol and rationalization! I guess I and my son could not possibly be appealing.

Interesting. One thing I wondered about. In the application process, do they make allowances for those who have been raped but haven't had consensual sex outside of marriage? Technically, a rape victim (if a virgin before) isn't a virgin anymore, but the person isn't to blame for this. But does this site recognize that? Just something I wondered about.

Thanks for making the point about not making virginity an idol. I've seen that happen far too often.

I think this idea wanders into evangelical bizarreness territory. Although my husband and I were among the 5% of Americans who waited until marriage to have sex, that did not stop him from being unfaithful five years into the marriage. Yet I know men who were not virgins and yet have remained faithful to their wives for 15+ years. This website could give women a false sense of security and encourage the belief the virginity matters above all. Similarly, if one puts the sexual aspect of the relationship on this kind of pedestal, it could seriously damage a partner's ability to forgive infidelity later on in the marriage.

Although the idea of the site may initially look good to many within the Evangelical subculture it has a tendency to gravitate towards moralistic therapeutic deism and moral elitism. I needn't say anything more since many of the previous comments are spot on.

Laura, I had the same question as I researched this topic--both about rape and also about widows/widowers. There is nothing on the general site that speaks to these questions, and I didn't want to falsify my own information as a married woman by trying to gain full access to the site. Regardless, you make a good point, which is to say that the loss of virginity is not always chosen.

The site misses the mark for Christians. We are called to radical grace, love, forgiveness and sacrifice, not to a mere narrow moralism. We are called to be in the world but not of it, not to exclusivist conclaves, whether in the real world or cyberspace.

Ok, so I was curious as the others, as a victim of childhood abuse, if I would be "worthy" of their site as well - I don't know yet however I did notice that they DO have a sister-site called "We Abstain" which I think is a very good thing.

Leslie,

The only thing about the sister site is that it is far more vague about what abstinence means. It asks people to make a commitment to abstain "for now," and so it doesn't seem to model the idea of abstaining until marriage. Still an acknowledgment that there are non-virgins who are chaste, although I think I would prefer to see the two sites joined together in some way.

Oh, I agree Amy Julia, it just relieves me *slightly* that they aren't as, um, fundamentalist (not the right word I want, but hopefully others will understand what I'm getting at) as I was worried they would be.

Leslie,

Maybe that is the point. The people who created this site and wish to use it ARE (IYHO) narrow fundamentalists who want to date others of like mind who have remained virgins until marriage. If that is who they are and what they desire, do we have any right to judge them for it? Everything else out there under the sun exists in the form of dating match up services website communities. Why shouldn't we allow them this when there are thousands of other dating sites one can join? Judging goes both ways you know.

The only valid question I see here is regarding those who never chose sex outside marriage but had it forced upon them.

Jan,
I didn't read Leslie's comment as judgmental of those who created the site. I think she's concerned that the site is too concerned about "technical" virginity without considering the circumstances revolving around the loss of virginity without consent. If the site doesn't consider this issue, then it runs the risk of essentially telling rape victims that they're "impure" and at fault in some way, which just adds to the sense of shame that many victims feel. That's my concern, too.

Another concern is that should the site allow otherwise abstaining people who have unfortunately been victimized to use the site, how do the potential dates respond? One would hope that the response would be compassion and understanding, even if the relationship didn't work out.

But that's not always how people, even Christians, respond to hurting people. I can imagine some frustration/anger on the part of virgins who use this site to find another virgin to marry, then find out that this potential mate isn't "technically" a virgin. (Again, I'd hope that the other person wouldn't respond this way, but some people are jerks.)

I'd love to hear a response from the site administrators/creators on this issue. Since I'm married, I can't exactly sign up and apply for admission, though I'm very curious as to their screening process.

Laura - right - Who wouldn't want to have 100% assurance that the person they married hadn't ever been with someone else, ever... but we live in a messy, fallen world. People talk about HPV and being "One Less" but the truth is, HPV is spread by men who've slept with more than one woman.
If two virgins find each other - that's awesome. But I also know a lot of people who by some standards aren't. The sad fact is that 1 out of 6 women will be rapped or attempted to be raped in their lifetime and I've seen stats that say as high as 1 out of 4 women were sexually abused as children. That's a LOT of women that by the most narrow definition of virgin are not considered virgins. So... how legalistic are the people behind this site? Are they trying to help foster "waiting" while at the same time fostering care and concern for those who haven't - whether it be by force, not being a Christian during, or even being a Christian and making a mistake or do they look upon those who haven't as second class citizens? I have absolutely no issues with encouraging people to wait - at all. I have no issue with their dating service. I have an issue when I don't know what their definition of virgin is - and I looked ALL over their site for it; but now at least we know that they don't look at people who aren't virgins as second class citizens - their site "We Abstain" seems to make that pretty clear.

My, how critical so many of you are! Virgins and virginity are truly curse words in our culture. Even many in the church mock those who try to stay sexually pure - there's no support from the pulpit, one's friends or family.
As someone who's written 2 books on sexual purity, I'm glad to see a site that makes room for that vilified 5% of the culture that's trying to hold the line.

Critical thinking is necessary to evaluate seemingly good ideas and discern whether they hold up. I think most of these commenters are just legitimately concerned that the exclusivity of this site may err on the side of the letter of the law, while eschewing the spirit.

I am a rape victim who was a virgin until that day. I definitely suffered from feeling that my very conservative, Godly parents, or other Christian adults I might have confided in (I was 19), would feel that, because I was dating the man, I had been "asking for it". As a result, I never reported the assault.

It is definitely possible, really even probable, that this website, unless it includes some kind of very gracious, careful allowance for this type of applicant, could be quite destructive. In my case, it didn't occur to me until much later that I couldn't, in the strictest, technical sense, call myself a virgin anymore. It would have been pretty devastating to have a dating website be the one to tell me.

Not to take anything away from the very substantive discussion happening here, and not to be too cynical, but how does it impact the conversation that at least part of the point of the site is to make money? It's great for marketing to attract a very specific slice of the population and be able to direct ads to them that would be of particular interest. It's hard to know to what degree but that has to be a significant part of their motivation, right?

After reading that "95% of Americans engage in premarital sex, I was not too suprised at the many who found a website for virgins only, bizarre, hypocritical, unreliable, and even mercenary. Finding a virgin in "Christian" America today represents for some the "audacity of hope".

I would not be surprised if some non virgin brought a lawsuit against the website for discriminating against non abstainers. There is recent precedence for such litigation.

Is it too much to just wish this site well along with persons who want to remain virgins until married?

I am a virgin: one that frequently says that I want to marry a virgin. All I mean by this is that I will not marry a person that has voluntarily had premarital sex, with the knowledge that sex outside of marriage is wrong. By knowledge, I mean awareness of the fact, whether they were Christian or not at the time. Therefore, I will be willing to marry a widower or a person whose only sexual experience occurred during sexual abuse or rape.

Now about repentant sexual sinners and those who had premarital sex before they became Christians.

To the latter, I do not accept that having done it before you accepted Christ is a good enough excuse in and of itself, because Christian morals are very widely known to Christians and non-Christians alike. Unless of course you had no knowledge that it was wrong to do so. Furthermore, Christianity does not make a person more or less likely to have premarital sex. As we know, many Christians engage in premarital sex having convinces themselves that it is OK or for other reasons. Therefore, I really do not see what having accepted Christ has to do with it.

To the former, we all know that repentance does not guarantee change. As much as Christians illogically perpetuate the idea that past sin should have no bearing on the present or future, the glaring truth is that the past affects the present and determines the future in all aspects of life. It is the reason Christians, like non-Christians, are still on earth and not back in the Garden of Eden. Wrongdoing has its consequences here on earth; I am therefore unwilling voluntarily to put myself in a position to suffer the consequences of a sin that I have worked hard to avoid committing.

Besides, I think it would be best marry someone who shares your past and/or present struggles, experiences, failures and victories, as much as we feel like doing the reverse. There is also the fact that there seems to be many more people having or that have had premarital sex than there are those that have not. It seems that virgins are the ones likely to struggle with finding a mate.

Finally, my virginity is a reflection of my commitment to fidelity among other things. It is more than a mere technicality.

Virginity may not say much about compatibility, but it does say a lot about character.

So I had the radical thought of contacting the site admins to find out about victims, etc... And the site owner, Lety responded with a very humble and loving email...actually two because I had another question for her. If I understand correctly they review victims on a case by case basis...I think that's why I couldn't find the info on the site. They actually haven't had many applicants either. I loved what she called us...spiritual virgins. I doubt she coined the term but it was a nice one to see. She also took many of your questions and coomments to heart and has updated the website to try to provide explanations to help others who come along. I could feel her heart through her writing and I believe most of you would appreciate her.

So basically if you are a victim you can still apply and I truly believe you will be treated graciously should they refer you to their other site. I know I'm waffling on joining he we abstain site but not sure yet.

Please excuse any typos...I'm typicing this on a blackberry.

Has anyone really read what the website actually says?

"the virgin person enjoys of an extra attribute no less beautiful called virginity"

"the innate sexual innocence is shared as the greatest gift in the physical form and as evidence of love that no subsequent sexual acts can provide"

I think this is a twisted ideal of sexual purity. They are emphasizing, not purity, but being a virgin (which I wonder how they would define- does kissing count? Does having once had a crush count? Does lust count?). This virginity is idolized as a beautiful aspect of a person and as a gift. One wonders how with these values, anyone might give up such a wonderful attribute for marriage. And worse yet, if a person does get married, all of a sudden since they've had sex on their wedding night, sexual acts cannot provide such proof of love and are made to be less important, and thus adultery and emotional cheating are not as bad in this view than in one that values sexual purity. The goal is to make it to marriage, not a lifelong attitude.

How could a girl know the guy is still a virgin? yea its hard to know when you're only meeting online.

Though I probably won't join myself, I'm glad that Lady Leslie asked the founders the abuse/assault question. That was the foremost thing to bug me when I saw the site.

I'm a Christian female who is over 40 years old and still a virgin; I was waiting until marriage to have sex, but it looks like I may never get married.

I find the responses from some quarters in Christianity over these subjects troubling and disrespectful, such as the comments in this article that one virgin wanting another virgin is akin to idolatry.

I'm guessing the Christians who are advocating "one- virgin- wanting- another- virgin- to- marry- is- idolatry" philosophy are in the 95% of those who have had sex outside of marriage, and you are trying to rationalize or justify your fornication on some level to those of us who have not slipped in that area?

It's very easy for you to have that attitude, but if you're the one who is over 40 and have hung on to virginity this long, you are entitled to another virgin (if you so choose), and it's natural to want to hold out for someone else who has waited too.

The Bible esteems virginity and tells us to remain so until marriage, so it's quite odd to see a Christian writer sort of downplay this, or mock it, or to insult those of us who are actually living the celibate life past 35.

People like me need encouragement to keep on, because the church and the culture at large treat us like weirdos for not doing it, and sex is thrown in our faces on every television show, most web sites, and magazines.

The last thing I need is some so-called Christian blog trying to make me feel bad, weird, or guilty for holding on to my virginity by asking me to be more charitable to those who caved in sexually.

Why not congratulate me and those like me for holding in there and not giving in to the urges and the immense cultural pressure to sleep around? I'm sure not getting a pat on the back for it from secular culture, and even a lot of Christians treat you like you're weird if you're not sleeping around.

Brit wrote: 'This virginity is idolized as a beautiful aspect of a person and as a gift.'

Brit, I can only surmise you must be in the 95% and not the 5%? Virginity is indeed one huge example of sexual purity - to suggest it's a "twisted" version of it is wrong and unbiblical.

Brit wrote: 'This virginity is ... a beautiful aspect of a person and as a gift.'

Because it is. That obvious fact seems to have eluded you.

Brit wrote: 'One wonders how with these values, anyone might give up such a wonderful attribute for marriage'

You can because you are holding on to the virginity precisely so you can later "give it up" for/to your marriage partner on your first night together as husband and wife, if you marry. It's really not rocket science, Brit.

I'd be amazed if anyone like this is actually a Christian since they do not seem to place any sort of importance or value at remaining a virgin until marriage, at all, but mock and ridicule it, or ask me to consider the feelings and sensitivities of those Christians who caved in and had sex before marriage? That is entirely backwards.

No, how about Christians show Christians who are still virgins the respect they deserve for following the Bible's teachings on this issue, instead.

God will forgive you if you are a Christian who has had sex outside of marriage, but I'm picking up other sorts of attitudes and vibes in the original post, and in some of the replies here that there's more going on here than that. What a topsy turvy, upside view to essentially ask virgin Christians to please congratulate the Christians who fornicate for having fornicated.

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