The other night my friends and I got into a spirited discussion on relationships and religion. It was prompted by my best guy friend telling us his uber-religious, saving-herself-for-marriage girlfriend asked him to change his religion so they could get married. Mind you, they've been dating for four months and it hasn't even been consistently since she's been on the fence about him. He likes her but he doesn't love her and is on the brink of cutting her loose after all the religious and marriage talk. But it brought up an interesting topic, whether or not relationships where two people believe different things can work at all. In my experience...um...maybe. Because I lack an actual religion, nearly all of my relationships have been interfaith. Some have faltered because of the difference while others (read: one) have flourished. So I guess I'm of two minds on this particular subject.
I dated someone seriously a few years ago who was what my friends and I refer to as a "card carrying Christian", meaning she was quite devout in her faith. I knew this from the start since she had a tattoo of a cross on her wrist and one of our first conversations was about religion. We talked about it, knew where each other stood and it really was never an issue for us. In fact, we both liked that we were of different faiths because it made things more interesting. Her family, however, was not as thrilled. Her mother was fine with whatever my beliefs were, as long as I believed in god, which I do. Her brother-in-law is a part-time minister and didn't like me solely because of the religion thing. And her sister, who was one half of the plot to set us up in the first place (long story), was torn between liking me and being on the same page with her husband about my lacking a religion. Because she's very close to her family, it was important to me that they like me and I tried to make nice with her bro-in-law. Until it became apparent that he and I were just two very different people who seemingly couldn't get along. In spite of all the awkwardness between the two of us, my relationship with her was awesome and the end had nothing to do with religion. Our time together brought me closer to my faith in some ways, even though she never tried to convert me. And I'm thankful for that.
I kinda feel like this was the only relationship I've ever been in where I truly knew what my own belief system was. And it was definitely the only one where I was practicing those beliefs. It took me a long time to reconcile all of that and even longer to apply it. But one of the things I loved about that relationship was that there was so much acceptance. She was genuinely curious about my beliefs and, although she didn't agree with all of them, she didn't mock them or make me feel like I was wrong to believe it. She went to church most Sundays and I'd find some other way to keep myself busy during those hours and then meet up with her and the fam for lunch, no big deal. It worked out fantastically well and showed me what an interfaith relationship could and should be. The problem is that I don't think much has changed since I wrote this a few years ago. A lot of people are still terribly uneducated or close minded about other faiths and they shut down when you try to explain yours to them because it conflicts with what they believe. I feel like that's what's going on with my best guy friend's lady friend (that's a mouthful). He says they've never talked about religion, other than to share what they consider themselves to be, and already she's on him to convert. I guess we'll see what happens with that. I just don't want him to get caught up in something that's not right for him, with someone who doesn't love him for who he is.
