When the Enemy Lies

I was sitting in the garden outside of an Adoration Chapel next to a guy who was mocking, manipulating, pouting, pushing, trying to worm his way past my guard, and throwing a huge pity party for himself because I would not let him kiss me.

We had known each other for three months and this was our first date. I had told him he could kiss my cheek, but that did not give him enough pleasure, and pleasure was the reason he came, not me. As often as I had to move his hands, it was obvious a simple kiss would not have satisfied him either. Lust can never be satisfied. Two years later he apologized to me when a priest told him to, and after Our Lady had worked beautifully in his life. But that night he was very wounded, very bitter, and let that affect how he treated me.

It’s not an unusual story. Sadly, it happens all the time. (That does not make it any less sinful.) But that night always stood out to me because I have never felt a blacker or deeper depression and hopelessness.

For several years most of my prominent relationships, both boyfriends and friends, had been psychologically and emotionally unhealthy in the extreme, and I had not healed from them. There were plenty of highly demoralizing guys in passing (like this one) and also my best friend of many years had recently walked out of my life when she did not understand what was going on in my relationships.

There had been some red flags with this guy, but all I heard was my friend’s parting words: “you’re too picky with men, you’re hard and self-righteous and demanding.” I didn’t want to be like that, so I ignored the red flags, and was now sitting with a guy who had forgotten about kissing any part of my face and was whispering in my ear requests a man should only make to his wife.

All I could think was – this will never change. I was twenty-seven and still single, but something was always seriously wrong. This is all there was. No man would ever understand. No man loved and wanted purity with all his heart. I would never find a guy who loved me more than his own pleasure. I was an idealist. I was the only one this crazy. I would always be alone.

If you have any standards of how a man should behave with you (and how he should behave when he is not with you) you face the same thing. You know practicing virtue doesn’t feel virtuous. All you feel is completely miserable. You remember all the ways you aren’t perfect and think you must be a self-righteous fraud to keep holding these standards. You can’t remember at all the beauty of a pure relationship. You feel wretched. You feel sick. You have no friends, no prospects, no hope. There is nothing but filth and ugliness and using people, and because you don’t want this you are doomed to eternal loneliness.

I didn’t tell this guy no for any saintly reason. I wasn’t thinking of God – I felt like a radical fool, how could I claim God was as radical as I am? I wasn’t thinking of my future husband – I didn’t believe the man I wanted existed. I only said no because in all the depression and misery I knew if I abandoned any of my standards, even the smallest, it would not make anything better.

That is a story from three years ago. In five months, I will be getting married.

If you have not reached that part of your story yet, I want to reiterate with you – every lie the enemy throws at you in your blackest moments IS A LIE.

There was only one negative thought that night with any truth in it – that I would “never have a man who met my standards” because my fiancé does not meet my standards, he surpasses them.

His good Catholic persona does not disappear when we are alone, nor do I have to worry about his behavior when we are apart. I have never had to tell him no. He has never made me uncomfortable. He has never grasped after me, physically or emotionally. He has never looked at me and failed to see all of me, the entire person. He has never put his own pleasure or desires ahead of me or my wishes. Everything I never thought a man would be, he is. I have never had a relationship so personal or so close. Every virtue or striving for virtue which others mocked me for having, he is in love with and supports completely and shares with me. With him, I am nothing but cherished, respected, and loved. 

This is not the entire end of the story either. Before meeting my fiancé, God sent a great deal of healing to me through the Echo Community where I volunteered the following summer helping with their retreats. One of my fellow missionaries quickly became my new best friend and is now one of my bridesmaids. I have nine bridesmaids and a guest list that keeps growing longer and longer. It shows how many good people God has brought into my life. If you focus on God, He will not fail to send friends who can support you in your relationship with Him.

Whether you are older or younger than doesn’t matter. Many girls I know are happily married around twenty-two surrounded by good friends. I just had to wait longer than they, and you may have to wait longer than I. What is true is that God wants nothing less for every one of His daughters than to be cherished, reverenced, and loved. That is the love He has in store for you, whenever that day may come. So never settle for less. Trust me, His plans are too good to miss. 

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                                                                                                                  Sarah Larue is the author of nine books, who loves her Faith and writing, and is happiest when putting them together. Currently, she is working on a second edition of her latest series That They Might Have Love, a series for all Catholic young women who want to seek God first in their love lives and find greater love and joy when they are single, dating, and married.