Actually Helpful Tips for Intentional Dating

There’s a marriage crisis in today’s world. Far fewer young people are getting married and settling down to raise a family.

Most people blame this crisis on hookup culture. Others say that young people are putting their careers ahead of marriage. But these aren’t the only problems. More and more young people are struggling to navigating dating culture. They want to get married but can’t seem to find someone.

Rachel Hoover Canto tackles this problem in her new book, “Pretty Good Catholic.” As a young woman, who was recently married, she knows the struggles that young men and women are facing. On today’s episode, she shares her *actually helpful* tips for intentional dating.

Get Rachel’s book, Pretty Good Catholic: Pretty Good Catholic | Vianney Vocations

Transcript:

Colleen (Host): Hello, and welcome to the Living a Culture of Life podcast by Human Life International. I’m your host, Colleen, and I’m joined today by Rachel Hoover Canto. Welcome!

Rachel Hoover Canto: Thanks, Colleen. Thanks for having me.

Colleen (Host): It’s great to have you on the show today. We’re going to be talking about something really important. Obviously, we live in a world where there is a marriage crisis, and a lot of people will attribute that either to the hookup culture or to people putting their careers ahead of marriage. But there’s a whole subsection of Catholics who want to get married—who aren’t hooking up and who aren’t prioritizing a career over a relationship. They’re actively searching for a spouse and simply can’t seem to meet someone.

So today, Rachel is going to be talking about her book, Pretty Good Catholic, where she gives dating advice for young Catholics—or really, any single Catholics. So, Rachel, let’s begin. What was your dating experience like, and what led you to want to write this book?

Rachel Hoover Canto: Sure. So, my experience was like you said—not one of, you know, not wanting to get married or being enmeshed in hookup culture or anything. I had the good fortune of being raised by good parents. I was a devout Catholic from a young age, went to a Catholic college after being homeschooled, etc.—you know, very wholesome environments.

But my struggle personally was just struggling to meet single Catholic men to begin with—who were eligible for marriage, were looking for marriage as well, and weren’t discerning priesthood or religious life instead, or kind of wavering on the fence. And then, if I did meet them, kind of sending the right signals to show I was interested in being asked out or getting the relationship off the ground to begin with.

When I did get into relationships, then there were the big, deep questions of discernment: you know, are we really a good fit for each other? What makes a good marriage—beyond just finding another devout Catholic? Should we all just try to find a Catholic and sort of leave it at that, or is there more to this question? How much do your feelings need to come into play, and how important are those?

And then, I was just on the receiving end of several breakups, and that was always really frustrating. I was back to square one, you know, multiple times—going, “Okay, back to trying to meet people. How do we do this a second time, a third time,” etc.

So, I found—especially as a young professional post-college, trying to settle into a new community in a city—it was just very hard to get from completely single to married, and through all those stages in between.

I also took some detours myself—considering religious life and thinking, “Well, if marriage isn’t working out, then maybe God has something completely different in mind for me,” and just trying to wrestle with that question. So it felt like a long journey.

It does have a happy ending. I got married in January, just a few months ago, and I’m very happy and very blessed with my husband. But I am grateful to be able to start this conversation about Catholic dating and to have my own experience lead me to realize that it’s an important question.

I think if I had gotten married when I was, you know, 22 and fresh out of college, I just would have thought, “I don’t understand why people say this is difficult.” But because I found it somewhat difficult, it led me to start investigating.

I’d always been a writer and was doing some freelance journalism the last few years, and decided to just start exploring—talking to people: “What has kept you from getting married as early as you wanted to? And how can we all maybe start to change this culture and just have a better experience—and maybe have fun while we’re at it?”

You know, sometimes we get so caught up in those deep discernment questions that we forget that this should be sort of a joyful process. You’re finding someone to live your whole life with—it should be a friend and a companion as well.

So I, yeah, just went through all those ups and downs and saw that my friends and my siblings were kind of running into the same thing. I started to sort of pull together different pieces of the puzzle and write about it.

I also started a Catholic singles ministry in my local diocese a couple of years ago, when I was wanting that myself and no one else was doing it. So we did speed dating events and mixers and things, and I got to see a few relationships come out of that—people who are now engaged—and that was really good.

So that kind of showed me, all right, there’s hope here. There’s a different way to do things, and maybe just taking some simple steps—if single people themselves are willing to sort of make a few changes, take some steps forward—then maybe we can all help each other overcome this problem.

Colleen (Host): Yeah, for sure. I definitely found—from what I was reading of your book—it very relatable, either in my life or in people that I know from all over the country. Things that they’ve voiced, with the frustration of: “I’m a young Catholic, I want to be married, I’m not trying to prioritize—like, obviously I’m working—but I’m not so focused on my career that I’m putting off marriage till I’m in my 30s.”

It’s a lot of people in their 20s saying, “I want to get married, and I can’t find someone, and I don’t know why I can’t.”

So I definitely found that relatable. And when we had Dr. Pat Fagan on the podcast last year, he was saying that there isn’t a dating culture anymore. That when he was growing up, there was this—like, the culture—he used the example of a boat on a stream, and the culture was the stream, and dating was the boat. And it kind of just guided people down and toward its natural conclusion of marriage.

And since we don’t have that now, young people are kind of floundering, not knowing what to do. I’m really glad that you were able to write this and help, hopefully, give some guidance to young people who want to be married.

So I guess let’s start first with meeting people, because you went through different stages of relationships in your book, starting with meeting people and going all the way through engagement.

Let’s start with: What struggles do young people face when it comes to meeting other young singles? And what are some ways that they can go about meeting people and getting out of their comfort zone?

Rachel Hoover Canto: Sure. So, for Catholics in particular, a lot of them have said to me—when I started interviewing people for the book—a lot of them said, “There just aren’t any other young adults at my parish. I don’t see anybody at church who’s not already married with a bunch of kids, or old, or something.”

So I think a big piece of the puzzle that we do have to acknowledge is the secularization of culture, and how there are fewer young adults practicing the faith. That is a huge part of it.

But for those who are—and there are still plenty of them out there, also looking for spouses—the main thing, I think, is just really stretching your social bubble so that it runs into other spheres that you haven’t happened to interact with yet. And just finding ways of meeting new people on a very regular basis.

I hate to use the phrase “numbers game,” because that seems so kind of clinical, but in some sense it can be helpful to think of the initial stage of meeting people as a little bit of a numbers game. Because if you’re meeting zero people, then you’re not going to end up marrying anyone. You know, if nothing has happened with the people you already know, then probably it won’t.

So at least starting by thinking: How often am I meeting new people? And where are places that I could go where I could meet at least one or two every now and then, you know, to kind of start the ball rolling—is a good idea.
In the book, I actually,  take some advice from a different book—it’s also excellent. It’s not specifically for Catholics, but it’s called How to Get a Date Worth Keeping by Dr. Henry Cloud. And he issues a challenge to his readers to meet five new single people of the opposite sex every week. And yeah, that sounds like a lot but I think it’s a good sort of—it’s a healthy corrective to where a lot of us are now, which is meeting zero new people per week, right?

And so, even if you don’t want to take the five-people-a-week challenge, I think it’s a great idea to take at least a one-person-a-week challenge. And keep in mind that just because you meet somebody, they don’t necessarily have to be someone you’d be interested in marrying. It’s a great skill to practice—just meeting new people all the time, especially new Catholics and new Christians, you know, people with overlapping values that could lead to some potential.

But even just that basic social skill of being able to meet someone and just have a friendly chat with someone we don’t already know is very difficult for a lot of people today—a lot of younger people. Not to be a total old granny, but I do think that, you know, phone use and internet use has something to do with this. We struggle with basic social interaction sometimes. And COVID didn’t help that any—everybody feeling like they needed to be so isolated and kind of stay apart from each other.

So another simple tip that I’ve given people from time to time is: just try leaving your AirPods at home for a week or so. And when you go out for a walk, or when you’re on public transportation, or whatever you’re doing—you’re in line at the grocery store—just try to not be immersed in your own world or in some sort of media. But look around, and look like you’re open to a conversation.

Instead of just saying “thank you” to your barista or whoever and running off, you can, you know, kind of have a little chat while the interaction is going on naturally. You know, “Hi, how’s your day going?” Just very simple things like that. And building that skill of being able to meet random strangers—whether or not you’re actually interested in them romantically—I think is a really good starting point. So that when you do run into someone that you’re actually interested in, it doesn’t feel like such a barrier between you and this stranger. It’s more easy and more natural to just strike up a conversation and see where it goes.

So oftentimes it’s a mindset that you can have everywhere you go. And instead of just thinking, Where do I specifically go to meet a spouse? you can think, I could meet my spouse anywhere, as long as I have this openness to just meeting new people in general, and kind of go through life with that mindset.

I actually know a couple who met in a grocery store parking lot, so it is possible to meet your spouse anywhere! But I could also mention some specific places I recommend going. But I like to start there and say: go everywhere with this mentality of, Maybe I make a new friend. Maybe I meet my spouse. Maybe I just have an acquaintance for a few minutes and that’s all that happens. But all of these things are good, right?

Colleen (Host): Specific—sorry, okay, yeah. Specific places—and then, how do you think online dating plays into that as well?

Rachel Hoover Canto: Sure, yeah. So some places that I like to point out—I mean, there’s the obvious ones. You should—you know, if you notice a younger single person at your parish… or, not everyone who’s single is young, so maybe I should just say a single person in your age bracket at your parish—definitely try to chat with them. All the young adult groups in your area for Catholics.

Most cities I’ve noticed—it seems like it’s pretty socially acceptable to show up to the young adult group at a different parish, even if you don’t go there every Sunday or if you kind of hop around a little bit. For young adults, that seems to be a pretty acceptable thing, so I think that’s a good idea—something good to take advantage of.

But then there are maybe some less intuitive places. Personally, I’ve found that if you go to a ballroom dancing class—or, you know, salsa, swing, any type of partner dancing event—it seems like there’s just a disproportionate number of Catholics there, even if it’s not specifically a Catholic event. It’s very interesting. I’m not sure exactly why.

But, you know, my husband and I recently went to a salsa dancing class and kind of an open dance floor afterward. We ran into someone who goes to our church, who we hadn’t really met before but we recognized him. And we ran into a guy who had a really obvious scapular under his shirt. So I was like, “Well, there’s at least two,” and there were probably a bunch more that we hadn’t noticed yet.

So that’s something that can be great to get into. Plus, dancing is the type of activity that just prompts men and women to interact with each other, so it’s really good for that reason, too.

Number one tip for guys, honestly: girls really like a guy who can dance. So try that as a good little hobby and just see what comes of it.

I also think, especially if you live in a smaller town or an area that doesn’t have a bunch of parishes and activities to go to, being willing to travel and do things like conferences and pilgrimages can be a really great idea.

I was just at the Young Catholic Professionals Conference a few weeks ago. They put on a really good conference every year—hundreds of Catholics from all over the country in their 20s and 30s. It’s not just for single people, but there are a lot of single people there. And this year, they brought in some matchmakers and did a little singles mixer and tried to get people to connect, so that was great.

There are lots of others that I haven’t personally been to, but there’s something called the National Conference for Single Catholics—NCSC, I think. They’re doing it in mid-August this year in Las Vegas. It’s, as the name implies, a bunch of single Catholics getting together from all over.

And there are many others. So, the National Eucharistic Congress—that’s happening in July. If you can get a ticket and go, maybe with a group from your diocese, that’s a great idea. A lot of people who travel for that type of thing are single and don’t have kids, and they’re able to do that kind of thing more easily. So you just sort of organically run into people in that category, I think, a lot more.

So yeah, just getting outside your normal sphere in whatever way you can—including geographically, just going somewhere else and kind of meeting people from around the country.

And then you asked about online dating, which kind of has a similar effect if you’re willing to maybe not limit it to just people super close to you, but expand your range to, you know, within a couple hours’ drive or something like that. Just see if some of the surrounding cities—maybe there are people you wouldn’t have run into otherwise.

I do think it’s a great tool. I caution people that if it becomes your only tool to meet people, that can be a problem. Just because, again, we lose our social skills very easily when we’re stuck behind the screen all the time. So I don’t recommend just kind of obsessively refreshing the app and using that as your only means of communication or meeting people.

And I also think it should be solely a tool for meeting someone initially, and then you should meet in real life as soon as you possibly can and carry on the relationship in real life from there. Don’t get kind of stuck in the messaging land for too long.

That’s one of the tips I got from—actually, he’s a psychologist—Dr. Oh no, I talked to too many psychologists for the book, I’m going to blank on which one he was… Dr. Greg Bottaro has a video, actually, on YouTube where he gives seven tips for online dating. And his number one tip is: it’s really online meeting, not online dating. You know, use it as just one more way to meet somebody you wouldn’t have met otherwise, and then carry on the actual dating in real life and build the relationship naturally that way.

So I do think it’s a good tool, especially if you can be kind of as flexible as possible with your parameters—sort of let God surprise you a little bit with the people who come your way. And then also keep trying to meet people in real life as well, and just kind of keep a well-rounded, well-balanced life and meet people everywhere you go.

Colleen (Host):
That’s such helpful advice—thank you. I think, like you said, it’s really sterile to say it’s a numbers game, but it’s kind of true that the more people you’re meeting, the more connections you’re making. And you never know who’s going to have a brother that’s really cute that you’re going to fall for—or a friend or something like that as well.

Rachel Hoover Canto: So, right—not to be too utilitarian with every friend you make either—but you never know. I mean, that’s how people get connected so often, especially before the internet and before we had this expectation that everyone had to kind of go out into the wild blue yonder and find their own spouse. I mean, people just—they met through their neighbors and their friends. Going to a wedding reception, they met a cousin of the bride or whatever, you know? It was just—it was natural through these connections.

And,  I think we—speaking of which—we should be trying to set up our friends and letting our friends know that we’re willing to be set up with people. You know, sometimes it’s just—we’re not thinking about ways to sort of nudge people toward marriage and make that happen. We’re thinking that’s somehow off-limits, and there’s no reason it should be. We should be open to kind of whatever way the connection happens.

And also, just like—for any mentors who are listening—not being afraid, if someone you know is looking for someone, to kind of nudge them toward someone that you think they’d be a good fit with. Obviously not pressuring them but just remembering that finding a partner is a community effort sometimes—not just single people making the effort.

Colleen (Host): And I think that’s what Dr. Fagan was kind of talking about—that it used to be a whole culture would help, and now it feels very… it seems like a distant thing. Or saying that you want to find a spouse seems desperate in a way. And I think that it’s important to recognize that if you are called to marriage, that’s a good thing. You’re pursuing your vocation. And obviously, God is going to fulfill you in other ways—like your spouse isn’t your end happiness—but remembering that if it is your vocation, there is a real calling there, and a real lack without them.

Rachel Hoover Canto: Right. I think if someone felt called to religious life, they would take action—to go visit religious communities, and, you know, apply and consider which religious order they might be called to be a part of. At least, that would be the right approach.

And we should be doing the same thing with marriage, with finding a spouse. You know, it’s a joint effort between us and God and the people around us.

Colleen (Host): Yeah, for sure. Then, you also talked in your book about the tips for young people asking out other eligible singles. Can you talk a little bit about the struggles that Catholics will face in those communities—and, or, anybody I guess—young people too, but especially Catholics? And some things that they can do to actually start going on dates and not just meeting all these eligible singles?

Rachel Hoover Canto: Sure. So yeah, I find that a lot of the feedback I got from interviewees—especially from women—was: “I meet these great guys, and we just kind of chat at the party or the, you know, cocktail hour, or whatever they’re at. And we have a great conversation, and then he’s just like, ‘Alright, see you around,’ and doesn’t ask for my number or anything.”

And they’re kind of let down, like, “Alright, what did he want? Was he just not interested, or… or what?”

What I hear from men is often uncertainty about what women want—and how long they should sort of hover around doing “intel,” so to speak, before actually explicitly saying, “Will you go on a date with me?”

So I think it’s an instance of, as you mentioned, Dr. Fagan saying there’s a breakdown of the dating culture. We don’t have shared rules or shared expectations for how this should go at all, really. You know, men and women seem to have very different expectations for how it should go, and each individual sort of makes up their own rules and then thinks, “Well, why isn’t he doing this correctly?”

I think a good place to start is just to look at what tends to work. I talked to a bunch of men and a bunch of women, and I tried to get their feedback on what they would like to see more of—and kind of how each side could be a little bit flexible and try to meet in the middle a little bit.

I also talked to some professional matchmakers who were really helpful with their tips as well. And one of their recommendations was very concrete. This matchmaker—her name’s Christina Peña, if anybody wants to look up more of her wisdom—she said:

“Gentlemen, if you speak to a woman at a party or whatever for at least 10 minutes and the conversation’s going well, that’s when you should ask for her number.”

It was very specific, very concrete. Now, a lot of women might say, “Ten minutes doesn’t feel quite long enough,” or whatever—and okay, you can tweak that a little bit. But just the idea of: if the conversation’s going well and you find yourself interested in continuing to talk to this person, and she doesn’t have rings on—appears to be single—then that’s a good sign that you should just plan a time to continue the conversation.

Right? And that’s what a first date really should be. It should be pretty low pressure—nothing crazy, nothing super expensive or anything—just a time to continue chatting and getting to know each other.

So that’s just a little bit of a mindset shift, I think, that especially the guys—as the normal pursuers—can have. Just before you leave, make sure you have a way to get in touch with her again. Make it clear that you’re interested in following up.

Then, for women—I heard a lot from men that we just need to be a lot more obvious than we think we need to be when we’re interested in someone. But not necessarily go straight to asking him out—you know, most guys don’t want that. But they do want very clear signals that the door is open and that they can come knock on it, right?

And so, I think the art of appropriate flirtation, and sort of “dropping the hanky,” is one that’s largely lost. I was not good at it myself. I used to think the ladylike way to behave was to completely ignore the guy I liked and just sort of leave it all to Divine Providence, I guess.

But if you’re generally going through life just being sort of friendly to everyone you meet, then that’s a good start. And then, when you are actually interested in a guy, you could just dial that up to eleven—you know, smile extra, really make eye contact a little longer than you think you should at every interaction, laugh a little more, kind of lean in a little closer. That kind of thing.

I think sometimes in the Christian world we get kind of this icky feeling about the word “flirt” and act like that’s something sort of secular or gross to do somehow. And I guess that word can be used different ways, but—it’s necessary to send signals, whatever word you want to use for that. Flirting or whatever. Just sending signals in an appropriate way to let someone know that you’re interested, you’re open to something if they are too—and kind of get that ball rolling.

And then that just gives the man more encouragement. You know, he might have been rejected many times over, and he’s just getting kind of tired of it, or whatever. He needs a little prompting to know that he’s welcome to ask, and that he’s probably going to get a yes.

So I think, yeah, just sending signals on both sides and knowing how to be a little more direct in our interactions would do a lot for most people who are kind of in that place where they’re meeting a lot of people, but it’s just not getting off the ground.

Colleen (Host): Yeah, I’m glad you brought up the eye contact, because that was probably the biggest thing that I’ve heard in the many articles I’ve read—in different women’s magazines and stuff—about this. The importance of eye contact.

It might be uncomfortable—but obviously not having a staring competition—but the fact is, people respond and form a bond with those they spend time gazing into the eyes of. And so by holding eye contact just a little longer than it feels comfortable, it’s a really good way to make the person notice you and maybe have more initiative to take action.

Rachel Hoover Canto: So yeah—actually, the same couple who met in the grocery store parking lot, as far as I recall the way their story went—she saw this guy she thought looked cute and decided she was just going to try making eye contact with him a little longer than is normally done with a stranger, and just sort of see if that would spark anything.

And he noticed, and he walked over to her and started a conversation. And actually—he wasn’t even Catholic at the time—but he later converted. So there’s a lot that can come of something very simple like that. And it does feel odd to us, but I think again that’s partly a modern-day thing. We’ve just gotten to the point where making eye contact with a stranger feels very strange.

And it shouldn’t really be that way. I mean, I think everyone’s going to have to get a little outside the comfort zone, right? In some way or another—because the comfort zone is the place where you already are: single and not meeting anyone.

Colleen (Host): The eyes are the gateway to the soul. Good tip. This actually is a good segue—you said he wasn’t Catholic—into a section of your book where you talked about “dating outside your tribe.” Could you talk about what that is, and especially why it specifically applies to young Catholics, or Catholics in general, today?

Rachel Hoover Canto: Sure. So, a lot of people ask this as they’re struggling to meet fellow single Catholics and get a relationship off the ground—or finding that the Catholics they do meet are kind of, for lack of a better word, weird.

Actually, I hear that from a lot of women, unfortunately. That was the biggest piece of feedback I got from Catholic women: that Catholic guys can tend to be kind of weird and awkward. And the biggest feedback from Catholic men was that women don’t let them ask them out—because they’re always sort of clumped up with a group of friends, or they don’t seem interested, they’re not sending the signal.

So anyway, if anyone’s listening and wants to know the harsh, honest truth of where some of the problems lie—that’s some feedback for both sexes.

But, sorry—your question was about dating outside your tribe. One of the common questions people ask is, “Should I be open to dating people who aren’t Catholic? You know, if this just isn’t working out, maybe limiting myself to Catholics is too limiting.”

And I think, essentially in the book, I cover that by ultimately saying: there are very good reasons why marrying someone of the same faith is important. As a Catholic, even a fellow Christian of a different group or denomination doesn’t necessarily agree on some key, important things about marriage that are really important to agree on.

So ultimately, I can’t recommend marrying someone who’s not Catholic. There are always exceptions out there where it works out fine—but usually, if you’re heading toward marriage, that person should at least be open to Catholicism, interested in it. You should be talking about it very openly—making sure you’re on the same page about things like contraception, divorce, and just the sacramental nature of marriage and what that means.

I ran into a lot of couples who dated someone who wasn’t Catholic, and then that person did organically convert—often just from the witness of the Catholic partner. And so they ended up going into marriage both Catholic, both on the same page, which is wonderful.

So there’s something to be said for maybe being open to that if it happens to come your way. You don’t necessarily have to go out seeking non-Catholics to date, but you can just see if God brings someone into your life, and sort of take it one step at a time with prayerful discernment—staying strong in your own faith and just seeing what comes of that.

That’s one angle of this. But then, within Catholicism, we also have a lot of divisions and competing opinions about all sorts of things.

The most obvious one is probably the Liturgy—like, is the Traditional Latin Mass really the best or only way to go? Or is there a broader spectrum of acceptable options? And sometimes that corresponds to differences of opinion on how to interpret certain doctrines—maybe even things that touch on marriage.

Colleen (Host): Like the whole topic of Natural Family Planning, for example.

Rachel Hoover Canto: Exactly—yes. What constitutes grave matter? What’s a good enough reason to be avoiding pregnancy?

Some people would say basically nothing is, and others would say, “Well, certain things,” or “Lots of things.” So ultimately, again, it’s important to marry someone who’s on the same page about how you interpret those things.

Preferably, both people should be constantly deepening their understanding of what the Church actually teaches and why. Not being “more Catholic than the Church,” so to speak—going more extreme in either direction—but really just trying to find and live out the truth, whatever that is.

I think it’s hard to know sometimes—just when you’re trying to start a relationship—you know, how much do you need to already agree on to get that relationship off the ground, and how much is just not going to work?

I find that Catholics oftentimes tend to be, I guess, very, very hesitant to even start dating someone without sort of checking a lot of boxes first and making sure that there’s all this agreement and overlap. At least, that might not be all Catholics, but I’ve definitely run in some circles where that’s the case.

And I think sometimes online dating can almost exacerbate this, because people are going into that, um, dating website or whatever, and putting in a bunch of filters—not just things like age and, you know, hair color or whatever (which maybe is too shallow)—but also things like, um, not just “must agree with Church teaching on everything,” but like, “This is specifically my viewpoint on this or that,” or “I really want someone who is a fellow, you know, Trad,” or, you know, traditional Catholic, as it’s usually termed, or someone who shares some specific traits sort of within the umbrella of Catholicism.

And I completely understand the temptation, because I was in that mindset at one point myself. I was really, um, I guess sort of limiting myself to really trying to meet guys who I thought kind of already fit into the same part of the Catholic spectrum that I did. And I realized eventually that that was just really limiting. There just weren’t that many, you know, in my circles. So I needed to kind of branch out and allow God to take the reins a little more.

What I found is that it’s a couple of different things. Number one, sometimes you assume that people of your same tribe or same flavor of Catholicism only hang out in very specific places, and you’re limiting yourself unnecessarily. Because if you, as a more traditional Catholic or more, um, charismatic Catholic, can go to something—then so could someone else of the same tribe. And maybe you end up running into each other.

But I think also there’s sometimes a lot of fear and/or a lot of pride wrapped up in that—fear of, I don’t know, accidentally marrying someone you didn’t want to marry, or marrying someone who doesn’t respect your devotions or convictions or something.

Which, you know, the beginning of a dating relationship and marriage are usually pretty far apart. I mean, you can take all the time you need to figure out if you’re compatible with this person or not. And if you’re not, you can end it.

And you know, there’s sometimes maybe not as much to fear as we think there is. It’s important not to get yourself in a relationship that’s pulling you away from God in some way. We should fear—in a healthy sense—anything that’s damaging our own faith in some way.

So I do think if you’re going to get past, you know, maybe a date or two with someone, you should be seeing evidence that they’re a morally solid person who’s generally going to be heading in the right direction.

But if you’re talking about things where there’s legitimate differences of opinion and it’s not quite so clear that the Church really teaches one thing or the other, I think that’s such a great opportunity for both people in the relationship to just continue learning, continue growing in your faith, and exploring whether, you know, by the time you were to get married, maybe you would be in perfect alignment—or close enough.

Maybe it is just a matter of different devotions, and you can bring both into your future family. Or maybe there is real disagreement here that you can’t get past—but you need to give it some time to know that that’s the case.

I feel like I’m being a little—um—maybe a little long-winded, but I guess the point is: I think as long as someone basically subscribes to, you know, everything that the Church officially teaches, and is striving for holiness, and has the goal of Heaven as the highest goal in their life—and they’re constantly wanting to grow in their faith and learn—those are the most important qualities to be looking for. Everything else can just very quickly become much too limiting, I think.

So, definitely, among sort of the community—or so to speak, at least in my experience—I do primarily attend the Traditional Latin Mass. I think it’s wonderful for all kinds of reasons. But I’ve found that sometimes in that community, there’s this, uh, a little bit of a sense of like, “I want somebody who already is in this with me.” And it almost seems to be a desire to not have to explain to someone why you’re doing what you’re doing, or not have to deal with any possible disagreement.

And I have found that, when I’m willing to just kind of open up my social circle a little more than that, and talk to different types of Catholics, I can have great conversations with people—and kind of just share my own joy in what I’ve found in this liturgy and in the traditions that go along with it. And people are—either they’re willing to just sort of hear that, or they’re like, “Nah, not my thing,” you know? And it’s pretty quick to tell if someone’s going to be at least open to learning about what you’re into.

And that goes for so many other things besides liturgy as well. I think we’re already working with a very limited set of people if we’re talking about practicing Catholics who actually believe in the faith, right? So we probably shouldn’t be limiting ourselves drastically further by saying, “I only want somebody who’s in this really, really specific subset of Catholicism.”

Be a little more open, and remember that I also have something to learn from this other person—and God could be doing something really good for both of us in this relationship because we have some differences. Some differences within the umbrella of what legitimate Catholicism looks like.

Yeah, and also remembering that dating is the time for those conversations. You don’t have to have it all figured out by the time you go on the first date. Going on a first date doesn’t mean that you’re committing to marrying that person. It means that you’re interested in them enough that you want to have those kinds of conversations and work through them—and, you know, learn more about it together and grow together.

Colleen (Host): Exactly, yeah—so much should come out organically over the course of the first several dates. That’s what dates are for: to get to know someone better.

Rachel Hoover Canto: And not just to get to know their opinions, because that’s one aspect of a person—but usually it’s the aspect that could actually change more easily than a lot of other things. Our own opinions can change.

I think sometimes we get very hung up on opinions and beliefs instead of looking for deeper qualities, like virtues. You know: is this person humble? Is this person chaste? Is this person going to be a good parent? Are they charitable toward others around them? Right? And you need a little time to see those things. Somebody can say things about themselves, but they’re not—you’ve got to see them walk the walk.

So I think getting to know someone over the course of a few weeks, a few months—however long it takes—can be really beneficial. And then you’re also going to get to know their opinions, or devotions, or whatever else alongside that. It gives you a more complete picture of the human person, rather than starting with sort of an interview mindset: “What do you think about this?” “Well, I think that.” “Oh no, we’re not compatible. Goodbye.”

It’s just very—it’s a little objectifying, really. And it doesn’t seem to respect that we’re well-rounded human beings with different aspects of our personality, and deeper things about us than just our current opinions on current events, so to speak.

And also, worrying so much about having every single possible box checked off, you forget to just have fun and enjoy the adventure of getting to know another person that God has created—like another child of God.

Colleen (Host): Yes!

Rachel Hoover Canto: Yes! I think one of the biggest sort of mindset shifts that I wish more single Catholics would go through—and something I had to go through—was going from seeing other people as potential spouses for me, and sort of going in with what I call a “spouse interview” approach, versus seeing another person as a unique image of God.

It’s an honor to spend a little time with this person and get to know them a little, whether or not we end up married, whether or not we even go on a second date. In the moment, it’s good to just focus on the person in front of you. Say, “Who are you? All right, this is who I am,” and then later we can reflect on whether we’re compatible or not, and whether we’re going to take one more step in this relationship or not.

I think that’s such a more human and more charitable way to look at another person—and it’s really good practice for marriage in a way, too. Because even if someone checks all your boxes right now and agrees with you on every single opinion, people change a lot over time. You could be married, they could check every box when you get married, and then 20 years later they could have a change of opinion on all kinds of things. They could even have a severe crisis of faith, where you wonder, “Is my spouse going to stay in the same faith as me?”

And ultimately, you still have to love that person no matter what. So loving people just for their opinions—or these changeable things—I think it’s just a mistake to begin with. It’s not setting yourself up on the right foundation. Rather than loving a person in a more human way—more for their whole self and the sort of fundamental tendencies of their personality—we focus on externals. And those externals, or those not necessarily external but non-essential things, aren’t the person.

Colleen (Host): Yes! So yeah, what advice do you have, then, for couples who are in the middle of dating—discerning marriage and all of that? You had some sections of your book on that, so what would you say to them?

Rachel Hoover Canto: Yeah, that’s a big topic, right? I mean, you’re really starting to answer the question: “Should I marry this person?” And that’s really big. And the other person’s answering that question about you. It’s sort of two discernments going on in conjunction with each other, which can be kind of scary.

You could think that you know—and in fact, a lot of people will tell you, if you ask, “How do I know when I’ve found the one?”—they’ll say, “When you know, you know.” I got so frustrated with that phrase, because a couple of times, I knew, and then… he didn’t also know. So it didn’t work out, right?

In some sense—I mean, people ask me when I knew I was going to marry my husband—and I say, “Well, in a certain sense, I knew once he proposed and I said yes.” Because up till then, I didn’t know absolutely for certain that he was even going to propose. You know? It’s a joint discernment.

So I think—oh, I mean, there are so many different aspects of this. I think one of the biggest things I would suggest is just staying in tune with reality. And what I mean by that is: look at how the relationship is actually going right now, and see that as evidence of how it will likely go in the future.

I see a lot of people—including myself, I went through this—looking at the state of their current dating relationship and thinking, “Yeah, it’s kind of… it’s hard in this way or that way,” but being a little bit in denial. Saying, “No, no, it’s all good, it’s fine—I’m sure this is just a difficult stage we’re in right now. Maybe once we’re engaged, or once we’re married, it’ll actually all be better.” And I think oftentimes that’s a mistake.

Now, yes—every relationship goes through rough patches or difficulties now and then. But if you’re just dating someone, you’re supposed to still be, generally, in kind of the honeymoon phase. I mean, even the phrase “honeymoon phase” is funny—because doesn’t that imply it should at least last through your actual honeymoon, like, after you get married?

So sure, you might have little blips—maybe you had a disagreement here or a tough conversation there. That’s normal and can be part of a healthy relationship. But overall, you should have joy and peace. You should enjoy being with this person. You should see yourself growing in a good direction, getting closer to God, maybe even experiencing a lot of healing from old wounds.

That actually surprised me. During my relationship with my husband—before we got married—I discovered wounds in myself I didn’t even know were there, and I experienced a lot of healing. And a lot of people I’ve talked to say the same thing. Love heals people. And when it’s a good relationship, you’ll find yourself growing and becoming better in so many ways. So that’s something to look for. Those are green flags.

On the flip side, if you’re experiencing a lot of anxiety, strife, and tension in the relationship—if you’re fighting regularly, or if your conflicts aren’t respectful disagreements but are actually fights—those are not good signs. And those patterns are probably going to continue, no matter what stage of the relationship you get to.

Even if you do get married, the grace of the sacrament of Matrimony is powerful—but it doesn’t instantly flip a switch and completely change people’s habits or relational dynamics. So if someone is repeatedly showing you who they are in this dating stage, pay attention.

I think we sometimes idealize the person we’re dating and tell ourselves, “This is how they really are, and what we’re experiencing right now is just temporary.” But staying grounded in reality—being honest with yourself, with God, and maybe one or two trusted friends or family members—about what’s actually going on in the relationship can be so helpful.

Just getting it all out there in words and realizing, “Okay, this actually isn’t going well. No matter how much I want it to go well, it’s not.” That clarity might mean the relationship needs to end—or at least that some dramatic changes need to happen.

And I get it—there’s often this scarcity mindset. Because it is hard to meet people, hard to get a relationship started, hard to reach whatever stage you’re in. You might think, “If I don’t make this work, I’ll never find someone else. I’ll never find someone better. This is the best there is.” But that’s often just not true.

Sometimes we try to take up crosses that God isn’t giving us, instead of waiting for Him to show us, “These are the real crosses you’re called to carry.” Every life is going to have crosses—but that doesn’t mean every difficult relationship is a cross you’re meant to bear.

I think one of the biggest things, too, that was really good for me to hear—my spiritual director said this to me while I was engaged, and I’ve really taken it to heart. She said, “People talk all the time about marriage being hard.” I mean, for myself, growing up and all through everything, over and over and over, all my married friends—they would all say, “Marriage is hard. Marriage is hard.”

My spiritual director was the only person who ever told me, “Marriage doesn’t have to be hard.” She said her marriage wasn’t hard. She was married like 30 years. They went through a lot of suffering together, but she said marriage wasn’t hard—life was hard. And we were just together in this difficult life, but our marriage itself, our relationship, was very good. That was a source of peace and joy.

So keep that in mind when you’re dating, too, you know? Is it your relationship that’s hard and causing the hardship in your life? Or is it just that life is hard, and the relationship is actually something that God is giving us to help you—to have a companion through this difficult life, to help get through things together, and have grace to go through life together?

Yeah, I think sometimes we hear “marriage is hard,” and we think that means my dating relationship should be difficult. But it doesn’t really have to be that way. There could be little hard moments, but overall it should be pretty—it should sort of flow, and it should feel pretty happy and natural.

Colleen (Host): Yeah. I think it’s easy to get into that mindset of, like, “Well, if marriage is hard, then therefore we should figure out how to do the hard while we’re dating. Like, even if it’s hard now, this is just practice for when we’re married.” And that’s not necessarily true.

Rachel Hoover Canto: You have to remember what commitment level you’re currently at and how much investment is required of you. You’re not required to go through every possible hardship for a person that you’re just dating. You can discern which hardships are just temporary things that are worth getting through and possible to get through, and which things are truly deeper flaws in the relationship itself—things that go down to the foundations and are going to make it really just not lead to a healthy, happy marriage.

If your relationship is not currently making you happy, probably your marriage with that same person won’t either. That’s, I think, a good guiding principle.

Colleen (Host): Yeah, for sure. Well, thank you so much for this. Is there any other last thoughts you’d like to share with our audience before we wrap up for today?

Rachel Hoover Canto: I’m always pretty passionate about kind of going into the chastity and physical affection issue, but it’s a really big one, so maybe we don’t have time for all of that today. But, just as far as advice for people who are getting further in that relationship and discerning marriage—I think there are a lot of really good chastity resources out there.

I also think that sometimes they stop at the point of just saying, “Save sex for marriage, save sex for marriage,” which is really important—really, really, really important, obviously. And there are great tips out there about, you know, if that’s a temptation for you, how to sort of set good boundaries and overcome that.

I’ll just say that I personally found those a little incomplete at times because people will also say things like, “Don’t go too far in other areas,” like, you know, don’t go too far with physical affection in general. But then they’re very reluctant to specify what too far actually means.

So I worked really hard on a chapter about that. I have a lot of really concrete, practical things in there—about, you know, example boundaries that couples gave to me that they said, “This worked really well for us when we were still dating.” So I have sort of suggestions that people can look at.

Then I also kind of clarify, what does the Church actually teach on this? When is it a sin of lust—even if you didn’t actually, you know, commit fornication or adultery? Like, what else counts as, you know, lusting after someone in your heart, and what maybe isn’t?

You know, sometimes we can be too scrupulous or too lax on this issue, and I tended toward the scrupulous end. And sort of, you know, my trial and error kind of had to get to a point where it was like, “Alright, this is a healthy way to have a good amount of physical affection in a relationship while still, you know, keeping your head clear to discern well, and not doing anything that breaks the commandments.”

So I would just encourage couples who are dating to have really open conversations about your physical affection. What are you doing currently? Are you both actually comfortable with that? Do you think you should be making a change?

Sometimes we just are very reluctant to talk about those things directly because it seems—I don’t know—kind of a little too messy, a little too biological or something. And, you know, if you can, you don’t have to be overly racy, but if you can just say to someone, “I know we’ve been doing this on a regular basis, but I’m realizing it’s actually temptation for me. Can we not do that anymore?”

If that person loves you and wants what’s best for you, they should say yes, “I’m okay with changing our boundaries and changing, you know, what level of physical affection we have.”

And just because you’ve done something once doesn’t mean you have to keep doing it. You can actually sort of redraw the lines. Step one, I think, is just communicating really well about those things. And then also, with prayer, just looking into what—what does the Church actually teach?

The Church doesn’t say exactly when it’s appropriate to kiss, for example, or what level or type of kissing is acceptable. You know, there’s really no concrete guidelines from the Church on that.

And there’s a reason for that, actually, because the real sin is something that’s happening in the soul. It’s—are you treating someone with lust, or are you treating someone with love?

So, delving into that and learning where you might be too scrupulous or too lax in this area, I think, could be really fruitful and also lead to a lot of good habits that can extend into marriage as well.

One of my friends who I talked to for the book mentioned that communicating really well with her husband before they were married about things like kissing led to being able to communicate better about their intimate life after they were married and just have more open conversations about it, which is really important.

So, I encourage people not to shy away from the topic but, you know, delve into that even if it’s hard and see kind of where God is leading both of you together.

Colleen (Host): Yeah, definitely. And also, like you said, knowing yourself—knowing where you tend to be scrupulous and where you tend to be lax.

In my own personal dating experience, I found it really helpful to have a spiritual director to kind of go to for just an outside source. So it’s not all on me, not knowing if I’m being too scrupulous or not—just to kind of bounce things off of.

So definitely, definitely a messy area that there’s not always clear guidance on, because, like you said, the Church doesn’t draw out lines like, “Okay, on this date you do this, on this date you do that.”

 Rachel Hoover Canto: Right. Well, because the Church doesn’t even really talk about dating. Dating is kind of a modern phenomenon. It’s not done in every culture, right? So the Church doesn’t get so specific.

But the Church does give us principles that I think we can use to sort of extrapolate to our circumstances. And there’s a beautiful area to kind of exercise your free will and your prudence and actually grow in virtue because it’s not just a checkbox of rules.

That was something that was originally really uncomfortable for me—I just wanted rules, just give me a rule, you know? But I found that, instead, kind of using actual discernment and figuring out, “Alright, here’s where maybe a line was crossed. I was at least in temptation. I don’t want to do that again.”

But here’s where that was just me being scrupulous and it’s actually fine, and this is a good way to sort of express love and affection to someone.

And talking about all of that with my now husband—he comes from a Hispanic family, they’re very affectionate; my family is not as affectionate—so it was just sort of a different landscape for each of us.

Learning to kind of meet each other where we were and figure things out together was just so fruitful. So I’m really grateful, at this point, for the Church just giving the basic, the general principles of chastity and then saying, “Chastity is a virtue you’re going to have to build and exercise on your own, sort of in your own day-to-day circumstances.”

Just like, you know, gluttony—the Church doesn’t say, “You can only eat up to two cheeseburgers a day,” or whatever. The Church just says, “Don’t be gluttonous,” and gluttony means, you know, excessive eating or using food for not its intended purpose.

Then we have to figure out exactly what that means for us, and that’s part of just being human, and it’s actually a good thing even though it’s difficult.

Colleen (Host): Well, and it seems like one of those areas, too, that’s going to depend so much on the individuals and the relationship and what could be a temptation for one person isn’t necessarily for another.

Navigating that and really trying to figure out where your boundaries are—and obviously there are some things that are too far. That’s not like—I’m not saying just do whatever feels good because it’s not a temptation—but there are things that are too far.

But really trying to figure out within the area of what’s okay. What’s okay for you might not be okay for someone else.

 Rachel Hoover Canto: Right. And again, I mean, the book has some pretty, pretty direct details, you know, and really good advice that I was able to pull from a lot of different people on what things are too far for essentially everyone, you know, and you need to know this.

I think, yeah, sometimes you have to get a little more direct than most people are comfortable hearing. So I think putting it in book form and saying, “Alright, this chapter—heads up—it’s going to be pretty direct on these issues, but it’s useful.”

If parents are thinking of giving this to their teen or child, maybe they should pre-read that just to make sure. But obviously, I’m coming from a Catholic perspective. I got feedback from solid Catholics and made sure I’m not recommending anything inappropriate.

So yeah, I was very excited for that chapter to be out there in the world. I hope it’s a good resource for people. And yeah, well, I hope the whole book is a good resource for people, but that one in particular took a lot of prayer and consideration to kind of get it right.

Colleen (Host): Yeah, well that’s—I mean, you know, when you’re doing the prayer and the consideration, God is going to guide it and He’s going to use it.

So thank you so much for coming on the show today to talk about your book Pretty Good Catholic. I’ll put it in the description so people can check it out. I think it’s on Amazon?

 Rachel Hoover Canto: Yes, it’s on Amazon.

Colleen (Host): Do you have it on any websites or your own blog anywhere, or is it just—?

 Rachel Hoover Canto: People can go to prettygoodcatholic.com—that redirects to the publisher’s website where you can buy it. And like you said, it’s also on Amazon in ebook form and everything else.

Colleen (Host): Cool. Well, thank you so much for joining us, Rachel. This has been a great conversation.

 Rachel Hoover Canto: Thank you for having me.

Colleen (Host): And yeah, thank you, and to all of our listeners, please like, follow, and subscribe. Check out the new ebooks we have coming out, and keep on living the culture of life. God bless.

(This transcript was AI generated. Please refer to the original audio to verify any quotations).