By Anne DiBernardo - Florida Catholic
MIAMI � For the countless singles out there, Valentine�s Day can be a sobering reminder that yet another year has gone by without their finding a soul mate, that special person with whom to share their life. They may seriously begin to wonder whether or not they have been called to the vocation of marriage in the first place.Anthony Buono begs to differ. The founder of Ave Maria Singles, a Catholic dating website, says 99.9 percent of people are called to the vocation of marriage.
�It is taking the easy way out for people to say, �Well, maybe I�m not supposed to get married� � that�s highly unlikely. I don�t care how many rosaries you say, or holy hours you do, nothing can preserve you from your own prize if you let it run away from you.�
Currently, the number of U.S. Catholic singles is at a record high � 27 million � according to statistics compiled by the Pew Research Center. Maria Wiering, a blogger for CatholicMatch.com, said that site has more than 1,000 members from the Archdiocese of Miami alone.
�CatholicMatch members join because they�re looking to start a relationship with another Catholic, and success stories abound of happily married Catholics who met through the site,� Wiering said.
According to Buono, single people who are into their 30s and 40s are still single either because they were busy during their 20s and were kind of casual about marriage or they had other things to take care of.
�We don�t really think about marrying anytime soon. So what happens is you find people getting into their late 20s and 30s and when they are finally ready, it�s not so easy, especially for women ... (because) when men are in their 30s and 40s, they are looking for women in their 20s,� said Buono, who also hosted �Road to Cana� on EWTN and answers questions on his blog, 6stonejars.com.
He stressed that people need to seriously consider the vocation of marriage when they are in their 20s rather than putting it off. He also says the idea that there is just one person out there destined for another from all eternity is a romantic myth.
�Even the words used in the marriage ceremony, �forsaking all others� imply that there are in fact �others� out there. The problem is that people don�t want to commit,� said Buono, who has a diploma from Catholic Distance University with a concentration in marriage and family. �God puts people into our lives for opportunities for potential spouses � that�s the work he does. He doesn�t have any one person picked from all eternity.�
FRUSTRATION
Buono started Ave Maria Singles, formerly known as Single Catholics, in response to the frustration of countless single men and women who are in their late 30s and 40s and still searching for a good Catholic spouse. It was 1998 and the Internet was just taking off.
�I think God allowed these sites to arise because we were coming into a time, which we are well into now, where the strong Catholics are scattered all over the place; you don�t have that concentration of them in your community anymore,� Buono said.
�The number of faithful Catholics a single person meets today is anywhere from negligible to nonexistent, so Catholics have to cast a wider net,� said Mary Beth Bonacci, founder of Real Love Inc., an international Catholic singles ministry.
According to Buono, more than 2,000 married couples have met on Ave Maria Singles in the past 12 years. Several other reputable Catholic dating websites also claim many success stories. The sites include Catholic Match, which turned 10 last year, Catholic Singles, Catholic Mates, Catholic Cupid and StRaphael.net.
Singles are encouraged to browse the sites to see which one is the best fit. Ave Maria Singles rejects members who do not accept all of the Church�s teachings, while others are less restrictive.
Buono advises men to be more open about meeting women closer to their own age. �There is plenty of opportunity for women in their 30s and 40s. Men are going to have a lot more in common with a woman from their own generation. I don�t blame these guys for having a desire to have children, but I do blame them for not starting sooner.�
As for �clicking� physically, he says, �Are you talking about a very disturbing type of attraction where you actually have to feel a lust towards them? Or do you mean attraction where you guys get along really well and you never have a forced moment? That�s attraction. And believe me, physical attraction comes when you get along like two peas in a pod.�
EXPECTATIONS
Buono encourages people to have healthy expectations but make them low expectations for the person they are seeking and high expectations for themselves.
�Too many people do it the opposite way. They have no expectations for themselves. They want to find somebody who wants to accept them exactly the way they are and they have super high expectations for the other person that are unobtainable � you can�t find that person.�
Only God�s love is perfect, Buono said. �Marriage is about helping me in my vocation, which is towards heaven, and living life in a social setting. God sanctifies us through our spouse�s sinfulness, not their saintliness. Men are looking for their Blessed Mother and women are looking for their St. Joseph. That�s not how it works.�
EXPERIENCE
Still, not all single Catholics are looking for love on the Internet. Edith Torres of St. Augustine Parish in Coral Gables, a single Catholic in her 40s, believes that if people truly trusted God they would not be going to dating websites.
�I don't think God needs a hand in finding people the right mate. I believe that in time, if that is God's will for you, it will happen organically. If he can lead Tobias to his wife, if he can give children to so many people in the Bible, if he can lead the Israelites to the Promised Land, if he can foretell the prophets of the coming Messiah from the very beginning ... he can lead us to our spouses.�
Victoria Lynn (she asked that her last name not be published), is a practicing Catholic in Texas who founded puriTeewear.com to promote saving the gift of one's self for marriage. She said she is ambivalent about online dating.
"I was one of the first members on Ave Maria Singles (then Single Catholics) 11 years ago, yet still being single, I'm not sure that's a good thing. The blessings, though, are that I have learned quite a bit about meeting men this way and even more about myself,� said Lynn, who is writing an e-book about Internet dating guidelines.
She said it is critical for singles to try not to prejudge, and think they may or may not like someone, until after they have met.
�The fact is we need that face to face encounter to know if there is also that gift of chemistry. At the same time, I feel it is most important to always be deepening our relationship with Christ so we can hear his spirit leading us in each present moment decision about whom we get to know or not,� she said.
Her advice: �The first meeting should always be a brief encounter for coffee, tea or ice cream or lunch to see if you are interested in getting to know each other more. Scheduling a romantic dinner fireside at an expensive restaurant or worse at one of your homes is a bad idea. Keep it simple, use discernment, and trust God.�
As for pictures, Lynn said: �Sure, it can be a guideline, but I must share that the pictures that I liked were always the ones (of guys) who I ended up not liking once we met. The two gentlemen I liked the least in their pictures, but went ahead and met anyway after delightful conversation, ended up being the two I really �fell for�. I've learned to put more weight on the profile and then our conversations.�
