Religious Dating: Path to Community Engagement
If you’re trying to engage communities, it might help to reach out to the people who are actually trying to get engaged!
You probably know couples who met in church, temple, etc. But these days, a surprising number of people of all faiths are eschewing singles bars and regular online dating sites (tawdry or otherwise) in favor of meeting a nice potential spouse with similar religious inclinations. Finding a companion or life partner is a core social need in any community, so religious dating sites, events, and services have sprung up to combine the volume of the former with the virtues of the latter.
Why should news orgs care about religious dating?...
Social activities may not seem like traditional journalistic “news,” they are terribly interesting and important to communities. Also, communities of faith often overlap with communities that are under-served by, and under-represented in, mainstream news media. Increasingly, religious communities are actively reaching out to communities of difference through dating sites, services, and events. Some of these are strongly focused on matrimony, but others also are highly social. Building bridges with these projects can help news orgs connect with many kinds of communities.
Christian dating sites like ChristianCafe and ChristianSingles are especially popular and visible. But others cater to Muslims, Jews, and other communities of faith. Some have also gone mobile.
Dating (religious or otherwise) may sound like it has little to do with news, but the connection goes deeper. Communities prefer to connect with media outlets that respect their values—and values are the cornerstone of religious dating. Technology and media (especially the Internet and cell phones) are often criticized for undermining religious values and practice. In contrast, religious dating sites use technology and media to keep religious values intact by helping folks with similar religious values find each other—in such volume that they have a statistically better chance of a close match.
Carolyn Moynihan wrote about a Catholic woman looking for a husband in Meeting Your Match:
“Attractive, extroverted and accomplished in her profession, Miss X could have landed a date at the office or among the gym crowd with no trouble at all. But she was a practicing Catholic and wanted to meet men who shared her values before she would consider dating them. Anything else would be a waste of time. “...I was reminded of Miss X (now, happily, Mrs. Right) by a recent New York Times article describing courtship arrangements among American Muslims. Here is another faith community, much more socially defined than Catholics, but also immersed in a secular culture more or less unfriendly to its sexual values and customs.”
Moynihan goes on to list a number of different kinds of dating events used by the Muslim community in the market for matrimony: banquets, speed dating, and of course online Muslim dating services, such as Muslima.com. While the site is primarily a matrimonial matchmaking one, it also features electronic Muslim chat and pen pals. Talk about defying Islamaphobia!
How can news orgs connect with religious dating services, events, and sites?
- Talk to the people running these projects to find out what their goals are, how the understand their community’s needs, and whether people from local communities are already participating.
- Ask whether they’d be comfortable with having their events/services listed in a mainstream news venue. Some religious communities distrust news media and prefer to promote their dating efforts all by themselves. Even though some may say “no thanks,” it makes a good impression to ask their permission and respect their decision.
- List religious dating items in your event listings, community services directories, and community calendars. Give them a clear, simple process for submitting their information for publication.
- Cover religious dating respectfully. Too often, coverage of anything involving courtship or dating devolves into snide wisecracks (like “Holy Hookup, Batman!” or “Yenta on steroids”) that can sound dismissive, salacious, or disrespectful—and thus increase frictions. Stories about religious dating can be lighthearted and fun—just be careful that you’re not using humor to put anyone down.
