The Ex-Convert<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/span>
\n<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cCome pick out your rings for the True Love Waits ceremony,\u201d said my mom, holding a James Avery catalog.<\/p>\n
I was 17, and the ring ceremony would be held at my church in a few weeks. \u00a0I wasn\u2019t particularly looking forward to the ceremony. \u00a0 Although I actively participated in my school\u2019s theater program, I always felt awkward and embarrassed in front of my church congregation when it came to religious proclamations. \u00a0My cheeks would become rosy when asked to lead prayers at youth services. \u00a0Even when I was 9 and newly baptized, I felt so embarrassed by the event that I denied the whole thing to my friends the next day at school.<\/p>\n
The ring ceremony struck me as particularly humiliating because ideally, the father would be giving his daughter a ring after she signed a pledge card. \u00a0(The boys participating in the ceremony would only be signing cards, but the girls would also be getting purity rings from their fathers.) \u00a0I knew my father would not be there. \u00a0He was recovering from clinical depression, following a manic episode, associated with his bi-polar disorder. \u00a0He preferred to stay away from church. \u00a0While manic, he attended a faith-healing church and stopped taking his medicine. \u00a0Now that he was taking medicine for his manic\/depressive disorder, he referred to that time in his life as being \u201cmessed up on religion.\u201d<\/p>\n
My mother would make excuses for my father\u2019s absence. \u00a0She always did. \u00a0No one at church knew about my dad\u2019s struggle with mental illness, and it was a taboo subject. \u00a0As soon as we walked into church, we were expected to smile and stop talking about all the family problems.<\/p>\n
Thus, the ring ceremony felt like a big lie.<\/p>\n
I also felt like a liar for taking the \u201cTrue Love Waits\u201d pledge. \u00a0Although, I had never had sexual intercourse, I had participated in some teenage fondling with my boyfriend. \u00a0 The campaign mentioned letting go of past mistakes, but I still felt like damaged goods by signing the card and wearing the ring.<\/p>\n
At this point in my life, I was trying desperately hard to be a good Christian girl. \u00a0Even though I hated the public nature of the event, I wanted to make the pledge to get right with God and become \u201cpure\u201d again. \u00a0The cards we signed read:<\/p>\n
Believing that true love waits, I make a commitment to God, myself, my family, my friends, my future mate and my future children to be sexually abstinent from this day until the day I enter a biblical marriage relationship.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I took this pledge very seriously and, deciding that time heals all wounds, swore off dating, at least until I got to college. \u00a0At that point, I figured I would have time and distance away from my perceived sexual \u201csins\u201d to begin a new start, looking for a godly husband.<\/p>\n
While in college, my interest in theology and church history led me to convert to the Catholic church. \u00a0In an act of rebellion against my Protestant past, I purged my life of Protestant kitsch. \u00a0I left all my Protestant bibles at my parents\u2019 house, burned the poster in my room depicting John Calvin, and sold my Protestant apologetics and devotional books on Amazon. \u00a0But for whatever reason I continued to wear my purity ring.<\/p>\n
The strange thing about this is that as a Catholic, I no longer felt the same way about \u201cpurity\u201d and sexual sins. \u00a0Sure, the Catholic Church was more strict on things like birth control than my old Protestant Church, but I held to a very traditional, dare I say, Medieval, version of Catholicism, which held that activities such as fondling were some of the more benign sins a person could commit (venial, rather than mortal sins). \u00a0 I suppose this was part of my attraction to Catholicism, even if I would later reject that as well.<\/p>\n
I continued to wear my purity ring on my wedding ring finger until I became engaged my senior year of college. \u00a0At that point I moved the purity ring to my right hand to wear my engagement ring on the left. \u00a0I can\u2019t say that I stayed completely \u201cpure\u201d by Evangelical standards until my wedding night, but my fiance and I did refrain from sexual intercourse until we were married.<\/p>\n
Although I am an atheist now, I still keep my purity ring in my jewelry box, a crucifix hanging above my bed, icons adorning my walls, and Catholic head coverings hanging above my dresser mirror. \u00a0I\u2019m not sure why I keep these things around. \u00a0Too lazy to get rid of them? \u00a0To remind me of my past? \u00a0Or perhaps an irrational, sentimental liking for Christian kitsch.<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n
This post is part of the Purity Rings project, in which young adults who had purity rings as teens and have since come to question the rationale behind them share their stories.\u00a0For more purity ring stories, click\u00a0here<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/166\/2012\/09\/kacysring.jpg\" "\\"kacysring\\"")
<\/a><\/em>A guest post by Kacy of\u00a0The Ex-Convert<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/span>