All Dead Ends Lead to the Forum

(From the files of Catholic Match)

After a couple of weeks into my Catholic Match membership, the selection of eligible singles who lived in the area was pretty much exhausted.  Branching out to include all of New England and parts of New York also revealed dismal results.  Even searching for women by typing in certain hobbies and music yielded very little for me.  I was starting to get discouraged and had an uneasy feeling about my first foray into the world of online dating.

Then I noticed in the upper corner of my profile page a heading entitled "Forums" and after clicking on it, the website took me to Catholic Match's online community.  Topics of discussion were divided by category and they included: Prayers & Support, Dating & Single Life, Member Meet-ups, Divorced Catholics, Community Help, Saint Peter's Square, Single Parenting, Wedding and Marriage Prep, Ages 45+, Ages Under 45, Widows and Widowers, Understanding the Faith, Sports & Games, Eastern Rites, Entertainment & Humor, and Men's and Women's Discussions.  Saint Peter's Square was for subjects that really didn't fit those other categories.  Community Help was a place to discuss technical issues with the website.  The individual Men's and Women's groups were gender specific and men couldn't see or read what the women were talking about and vice versa (...unless they made a fake account).

There were many rules in the forums.  Everything from banning the use of profane language to demanding topics be meaningful and not trivial.  They listed  "Coke or Pepsi?" as a topic that was too trivial and I found that to be odd since many of the more lighthearted subjects discussed in the forums were actually like that.    

The forums had three volunteer moderators who were also Catholic Match members looking for love.  They had the power to lock a post down if a discussion got out of hand.  Two of the moderators were close to 50 years old and one was close to 60.  This was not a good sign and I wondered how effective Catholic Match was if even the moderators languished on this website year after year after year.

The website's co-creator, who was married with kids, also trolled the forums and sometimes fights broke out with members who were critical of the website.  He too had the power to lock down discussions or simply make them disappear altogether.

I've heard it said that some people fail at online dating because they just can't seem to engage with others based solely on a profile since it reveals no social cues.  Some singles hit it off by reading body language and hearing tones and inflections.  I figured the forums would be a way for me to bring some of my hobbies, personality and humor to the table through the written word and perhaps this might grab the attention of the woman of my dreams.  After all, for each forum participant, there were plenty of "lurkers" who chose to read the forums but either decided not comment or couldn't comment because they had a free membership.

Well, my first post didn't go so well.  I lamented that after two weeks on the site, I felt alone because there weren't any singles who seemed to have much in common with me.  Moderator Jerry, who refused to use a profile photo, remarked that if I was feeling alone, I must be the one with the problem.  That was my first introduction to something that was quite common on Catholic Match: Victim Blaming.

This website made some pretty great claims about finding love and with success stories that bordered on the miraculous, I had high expectations for Catholic Match.  What better way to deflect criticism of this site than to shift blame on individual members.  "Your expectations are too high."  "You're trying to date out of your league."  "You have too many deal-breakers."  "You're being too unrealistic."  "You're not contacting enough women."  (Maybe the website didn't have enough members of the opposite sex who were attractive, witty or moral.  Ever think of that?!)

With dating no longer a realistic possibility, I spent more time in the forums despite my initial disagreement with moderator Jerry.  There were many other members here who had reached dead ends long ago and were now marooned on Catholic Match...not just for years but for decades.  Some were women who had wanted families but were now beyond the age of fertility.  How sad.  If the website's success rate was better, perhaps this would not be the case.

Unfortunately, the Covid lock-downs of 2020 would put an end to all dating in general for quite some time and the forums allowed people to kill time, gain a sliver of human interaction and vent frustrations.  Some Catholic Match members even found a real sense of fellowship here but my interactions with this virtual community usually led to arguments and misunderstanding.