Church Restrictions?

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Nautilus

Nautilus

Senior Member
Jun 29, 2012
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Ok I don't want to derail another thread so I will ask here. A poster mentioned that her church does not allow them to date until 18? Is this a common thing of individual churches denying things to members? Im assuming its probably more common in charismatic congregations. Anyone else have random church restrictions like this?
 
Nautilus said:
Ok I don't want to derail another thread so I will ask here. A poster mentioned that her church does not allow them to date until 18? Is this a common thing of individual churches denying things to members? Im assuming its probably more common in charismatic congregations. Anyone else have random church restrictions like this?
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I've never heard of a church with dating age restrictions. Maybe they meant they couldn't get married til they were 18.
 
I've never heard of such a restriction at any church I've ever attended. ENCOURAGED maybe, but an actual restriction, nope.
 
I have known people who wanted to date Christians in certain programs (Master's Commission), etc., and I don't know if this is how all of these programs are, but in the case of a certain friend, ANY potential dates had to be screened, approved, and chaperoned, at least for a while (until they finally got approval to date on their own, and even then...) Dating anyone outside the group was heavily discouraged, verging on the point of nearly being forbidden, even if they attended the same church.

I knew a guy who was on a dating site and he met a girl he was interested in but quickly abandoned the thought of dating her because she said, "First, you'll need to ask my mentor for permission and she'll have to approve of you to date me." He said, "Why should I have to win approval from someone I don't even know [and it's not even here parents] just to ask someone out?"

I have to admit, I doubt I'd be interested in anyone who said I had to jump through X amount of hoops to even go to dinner with them... Just my own rebellious nature at work.
 
I've never been to a church that even encouraged teens to not date until they were 18 much less prohibiting. I would presume that most churches believe that Godly parents are going to be able to best determine for their children what is an appropriate age to begin dating.
 
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For the most part I agree with the majority of you all. The exact wording was 'In my church, we're not allowed to start dating until the age of 18.' which was what threw me off. That just seems like something that isn't the church's place in my ind.

@JimmyDiggs, why do you find this to be a reasonable request but moreso reasonable restriction?
 
seoulsearch said:
I have known people who wanted to date Christians in certain programs (Master's Commission), etc., and I don't know if this is how all of these programs are, but in the case of a certain friend, ANY potential dates had to be screened, approved, and chaperoned, at least for a while (until they finally got approval to date on their own, and even then...) Dating anyone outside the group was heavily discouraged, verging on the point of nearly being forbidden, even if they attended the same church.

I knew a guy who was on a dating site and he met a girl he was interested in but quickly abandoned the thought of dating her because she said, "First, you'll need to ask my mentor for permission and she'll have to approve of you to date me." He said, "Why should I have to win approval from someone I don't even know [and it's not even here parents] just to ask someone out?"

I have to admit, I doubt I'd be interested in anyone who said I had to jump through X amount of hoops to even go to dinner with them... Just my own rebellious nature at work.
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I'm sorry Kim but that sounds a lot like a cult.
 
zeroturbulence said:
I'm sorry Kim but that sounds a lot like a cult.
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That's exactly what I told my friend as well. All I can say is that my friend must have a lot more faith than I do because they hung on, even with all the "requirements" and "restrictions" and is still dating the person, almost 2 years later.

Me, I'm sure I wouldn't have even made it past the first "approval" committee! (Especially when I find they're all wearing hoods and carrying pitchforks.) No disrespect intended!
 
Any kind of restrictions a church lays out are in contrast Gods gift of free will

I attended a church that didn't allow drinking, and another church that discouraged dancing to the point of shunning anyone who did it for a period of time.

I thought churches were getting more lax about that kind of thing, apparently not.
 
In the UK I have only ever heard (quite some time ago) of one Church imposing similiar kinds of rules, that being those running the 'The Discipleship' movement, the Church being 'The Vineyard Movement' which was set up by a fellow called John Wimber, I'm not sure if he is even alive anymore (right, a quick look at Google says he died in 1997) or what has since happened to this Church, but it is certainly something I would strongly disagree with!
 
jb said:
In the UK I have only ever heard (quite some time ago) of one Church imposing similiar kinds of rules, that being those running the 'The Discipleship' movement, the Church being 'The Vineyard Movement' which was set up by a fellow called John Wimber, I'm not sure if he is even alive anymore (right, a quick look at Google says he died in 1997) or what has since happened to this Church, but it is certainly something I would strongly disagree with!
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I think if a discipleship type class was involved and imposing dating rules for sake of, "your focus needs to be on Christ, not hooking up", it would make a little more sense than just a straight up no dating rule.

jb did remind me I heard similar rules imposed by the founding vineyard member too.
 
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