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PaperclipPerfector  12d ago (text post)   2770 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 21, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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N = 1 but I just got married, and we waited until marriage. It definitely happens even now. I am personally acquainted with at least three other couples that were the same.

Caveat: we are all religious though. I don't know if there are non-religious people who would be interested in waiting, but I would think it's very rare at this point.

I'm not religious anymore, but I see the good effects it has, and I also believe that you can probably make yourself believe anything if you give it a try, forgetting about Epicurian trilemmas or God of the gaps writings (as long as we're not into fantasy territory like with Young Earth Creationism). I was raised fundamentalist and the only times I went to church was when I was with other family members, which was like, twice total in my youth, so I would have to adjust to whatever church she went to.

Uh, what are the churches with actual young people?

I didn't meet my wife at church, but I've visited both a PCA Presbyterian church and a Southern Baptist church that had really substantial cohorts of 20somethings. For a while I attended an EFCA church (kind of a small, rather interesting denomination) that had only a handful of young women, but they were, for some reason, all staggeringly beautiful. I did successfully ask one of them out, but the date was kind of lame; but we parted as friends.

A related phenomenon: now that we're married, my wife and I don't have to try to find a church with young people, so we just go to the local church I like best. We are one of four couples below the age of 40; I can think of two eligible single girls there and one young man. It's a bit grim but we're trying to do outreach and things to make young people think it's worth a visit.

The more I think about this, the more extremely conflicted and broken I feel about everything. I was taught to not have sex before marriage, and so even the thought of a blowjob is gross to me, but I was never raised in the church and my family existed almost outside of the community entirely, and then I went and got my liberal education and lost my faith, because I could not longer believe that the earth is 6000 years old, because I could no longer believe that God would damn someone to an eternity of hellfire for being born in the wrong place. When I was 16 I started masturbating and dabbled in watching pornography. I feel like either traditional relationships or liberal ones, I would be very out of place in, and it feels like it's already too late for me. I am also disgusted by the results of liberalism leading to the death of Charlie Kirk. I might have to make a new post tomorrow in Wellness Wednesday about this, but it's obviously going to be super personal and uncomfortable. I now remember one reason why I never dated in high school.

because I could not longer believe that the earth is 6000 years old, because I could no longer believe that God would damn someone to an eternity of hellfire for being born in the wrong place

Man, it's not that hard to find a church that doesn't screw these things up.

Is it? As someone who took religion seriously enough on its own terms to be turned off by its falsity, it seems like a central problem that no religion has solved, by virtue of them all explicitly saying false things.

Yes? I'm not sure what you're adding by simply stating your own personal incredulity and declaring falsity. Someone else could equally declare your statements false. They're turned off by your falsity.

Sorry I wasn't trying to be snarky. The original comment seemed to make it seem like truth about matters of fact was a minor issue that could be routed around, but in my experience that was the central problem with all religions.

Truth is the central problem with your comments, though. It's not a minor problem that can be routed around.

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