My answer to this rather trollish question was as follows
“You can ask him yourself why he does this and whether he can look you in the eye and say it’s not something to be repented of.
Do not cause trouble in your family by sharing it on. Go direct like a man to your father.”
A cleavage-sporting cucumber, yesterday.
One Roman Catholic reader responded to my comment as if I had asked the question, and gave one of their answers
“You should explain to your Dad that if you could catch him then so could your mother of sister and suggest that he goes to the Priest to confess his sins. The Priest will be able to grant him absolution.”
I am a Hindu girl but my boyfriend is Muslim, he keeps complaining about my clothes that they are too modern and I should wear hijab whenever I meet him. He says that I should not show my face to other boys it is a sin. What should I do?
He seems to be picking and choosing what bits of his religion apply to him. He ought not to be marrying a non-Muslim girl and he ought not to be dating without any intention to marry.
Mixed-faith romance often ends in tears.
If he is so concerned about the issues of haram and halal, then he should be consistent and choose a jeevan sathi who shares his deen.
I think if you are wise you will marry someone who shares your cultural and philosophical outlook. If he cannot find the integrity to be consistent and end the relation with you, you can help him out.
One Muslim reader then replied:
The Hindu girl should think twice if they want to continue their relation. If she is really interested in marrying a Muslim she should immediately convert to Islam. Let her future husband lead and guide her.
Respect her decision but don’t take it personally. She may just happen to be in love with someone else or you may not be her type. Don’t be upset about it, however don’t be suddenly very different with her than you were before.
I am not in favour of asking, you have to be able to gauge it with eye contact, smiles and then do the lean-in. You cannot really kiss someone by stealth, or even if you can, you shouldn’t.
People don’t walk around with this sign on their clothing, normally. If they did, there may be fewer misunderstandings.
Something to exclude first
Always worth as well checking you don’t have a breath issue. Just to exclude that as a reason why, in the absence of any more obvious reason.
Kissing onus
The onus is on the girl to help you to create a situation where you can repeat it if she actually would like to be kissed and was simply taken by surprise.
No biggy, you’ll see
But the main thing is, don’t treat it as anything major. It is a minor thing, really minor, as you will know for sure in due course even if your cheeks are burning today. No biggy; it is a smally of the smallies. You may feel that you have lost face, however, unless the person concerned was glanding some powerful acid that she herself was immune to, that is not likely to be the case in actual fact.
It depends. If someone had said they were interested before but you had a partner then, and gave that as a reason, then you could say something like “when you told me you were interested before, I had a partner and didn’t want to be disloyal, but that hasn’t worked out. It’s over. So if you are still interested we can go out”.
But if you are simply asking out of vanity then I don’t think it would be very nice to get the other person’s hopes up only to dash them again.
The golden meanie
In between those two extremes there lie all kinds of other scenarios, but I wouldn’t ask that person unless you are ready to go if they say “yes” and if you have a reasonable reason why you didn’t say yes before, such as that you had a partner then, or you were dealing with a stupid infatuation, or that you didn’t realise you has so much in common with the person. Or you thought they miht have been just joking around and now you hear they have a serious character and were probably not. Or you thought they were not going to be living in the area for long, or you weren’t going to be, and that’s changed. These are all reasonably valid reasons for changing your mind about someone’s approach.
“I said no earlier because I thought I had a chance with someone better than you” is a bad reason. I wouldn’t bother asking in those circs. Or “I didn’t know you were rich” is another bad reason.
Maybe the first step is to be honest with yourself as to what reason or reasons made you turn this person down before and what really changed. Then you can see if you can sell that reason to the other person.
