I imagined my hymen to resemble one of those paper-covered doorways that cheerleaders taped up for the boy’s basketball team to tear through on their way into spirit rallies (as did my boyfriend, which was why he accepted handjobs but, for fear of breaking me, never reciprocated). The gaping hole formed by the empty prongs resembled what I imagined my insides might look like if I ever gave into sin, or what repentant teenagers at my church called “slipping sexually”. Yet when I went to pull off the ring band, I halted at the sight of it. Beneath the protective tape, I secured my stone to the sticky underside. Pinching the loose gem, I dug through my backpack for something to hold my heart. “Hurry and put it away,” my coach shouted. They represented “mommy and daddy standing next to me to help me stay strong”, my mom had explained with hope in her voice. My ring’s band was bashed, but I was relieved to see my two diamond chips were still intact. “Wait! There!” Mary cried, and I crawled out of bounds to retrieve my displaced heart. I shook my head against the encroaching fear that she could be right. “What if you lost it?” Mary murmured, swiping her finger through a water droplet. When my dad gave me the ring, he said it represented my commitment to guard my heart, as instructed in Proverbs 4:23. Our point guard, Mary, who took her namesake seriously, fell to the floor to help me scour the court. Mid-drill, my team-mate hurled a chest-pass at me with such force that the stone of my purity ring popped out and skittered across the court. By which, I imagined, she meant those cheap silver rings. My parents were proud to give me a special ring, as opposed to what my mom called “Jesus junk”. Early espousers, like my family, marked this rite of non-passage with gemstones or diamond rings some passed down heirlooms. These rings sealed the deal when in the mid-1990s, an estimated 2.5 million American teenagers publicly pledged to pastors, parents, friends and future spouses that they would not engage in premarital sex. The slogan “true love waits” was eventually coined and then stamped onto silver rings and widely distributed for $9.95 at youth revivals, Christian rock concerts, purity balls and evangelical bookstores in the mall. This was a moral crisis the religious right had to confront. About 65% admitted to “some kind” of sexual contact.Īmy Deneson with her purity ring. Well-known evangelist Jimmy Hestler circulated tracts reporting that while the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated half of all American teens professed to having intercourse by age 17, a study of evangelical teenagers revealed that 43% confessed to fornicating by 18. In our born-again circles, word spread through church newsletters arguing that Christians could no longer be complacent over the epidemic of premarital sex. In 1991, my family was early to join the crusade to protest America’s promiscuity with public purity pledges. Protecting my purity was a daily topic in my devout Christian household, located a few rusty miles outside of Milwaukee. Accepting it meant I promised to stay a virgin until my wedding night – to keep my mind innocent, my body untouched, my soul blameless – so that I could one day present my husband with the ultimate gift. O n my 13th birthday, my parents escorted me to a candlelight dinner and presented me with the finest ring I had yet had the privilege to call mine. I slammed my locker, forgetting to take off my own ring. “Wrap it in a tissue, then, and wedge it in the crack of your math book”. The concern over leaving her ruby ring just hanging there on a hook was apparent. Losing one’s purity ring was tantamount to losing the real thing – at least according to the rumors that spread via prayer circles. As the first of my friends to receive such a gift, they came to me for tips on taking care of the first precious piece of jewelry many of us had been entrusted to protect. By 1993, I’d worn my purity ring – a blue topaz birthstone ring – for more than two years.
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