L ast week’s “speech heard ’round the world” put me in mind of an insightful author’s 2012 book. The Catholic Girl’s Survival Guide for the Single Years, by Emily Stimpson (now Emily Stimpson Chapman), languished on my bookshelf for quite some time. I can’t remember who gave it to me, and while I’m sure they meant well, it was a bit demoralizing. Who wants a reminder of their loneliness, all in bright pink? I hid it on my shelf, and if my procrastinating tendencies hadn’t come to the rescue, it would’ve ended up at a Goodwill.

Thank goodness it didn’t, though.

I stumbled across Chapman’s work again (thanks, Mom!) a few years later, this time in the form of a podcast on which she was a guest. Her discernment and words of wisdom struck me unexpectedly, and I began digging into more of her writing, specifically on her Substack and in her 2016 book, The Catholic Table. Increasingly intrigued by this woman’s well-worded thoughts, I searched through my shelves for that dreaded pink book — eventually finding it in a give-away bag in the back of my car.

What I’d originally scorned as cheesy and unnecessary ended up being eminently practical and relatable. And if I’d only read the introduction, I’d have seen that this book truly wasn’t like those other “singles” books that plague the self-help market and cause ice-cream shortages at the grocery store.

This book was funny, clear, and thought-provoking, providing readers with definitions, historical context, exemplary role models, and even handy phrases for answering nosy relations. Most importantly, it gives encouragement where it’s very much needed, and not in the form of trite sayings. The current dating scene is fraught with difficulties of all types, and the Catholic dating scene is certainly not immune.

For Catholics, there are rules (yes, rules) that order what we can and can’t do, and this goes for dating. What’s beautiful about Chapman’s book is how she begins with the human person, stressing a woman’s dignity and worth regardless of her relationship status, weaving that theme in with lessons on real beauty, learning to be gentle, and the virtue of endurance. And while each person will have her own unique dating experience, Chapman gives concrete advice for each stage of the process that is universally applicable. Her brief, clear sections on potential red flags and orange flags in a man’s behavior are also much needed, given how easy it is to become too smitten to pay heed to such signs, or too willing to overlook them out of desperation.

Throughout the book’s chapters, we discover the wisdom of Edith Stein, are introduced to John Paul II’s Theology of the Body, and see why sharing an apartment with other women even when you want your own place might be worthwhile. Chapman also doesn’t shy away from more intimate issues, covering them in a chapter aptly titled “Sex, Chastity and the Biological Clock,” with firmness and discretion.

Perhaps most helpful for me when I read the book was her chapter on women and work. This is, undoubtedly, a prickly topic right now, and it was enlightening to read the advice of someone who had lived the single working life for quite a while (and is still living aspects of it — Chapman helps support her family through her writing). She stresses the importance of selecting a career that would be compatible with a future family, but cautions that no matter what career you choose:

No matter what the culture says, you are not what you do. Your job is not you. Likewise, your job is not your life. No matter how much spare time your lack of a husband and family may afford you, a job cannot and should not be used to fill that gap. . . . A secondary vocation is just that—secondary. . . .

On the flipside, you also don’t want to make the mistake of thinking of your work merely as a way of killing time before your wedding. . . . Right now and for the foreseeable future, you are your own husband, and you’ve got to provide for yourself as best you can. . . .

More important, you can’t think of your work as just “killing time,” because in God’s plan for you, this time of waiting was not unaccounted for. Again, he has work for you to do.

Chapman, at the book’s opening, is clear that she’s not promising that everyone who feels called to marriage will find a spouse. She walks readers through such questions as “Is singlehood a vocation?” and “What if I’ve missed my vocation?” The Church, Chapman writes, “doesn’t equate the unconsecrated single state in life with a vocation akin to marriage. And that’s for good reason.” As for the “missed vocation,” Chapman refers readers to World War I, which claimed the lives of so many men that a large number of women — who had legitimate calls to marriage — had no one to marry. This situation has its equivalents in our own age, and, as Chapman writes, “not everyone will necessarily enter into the vocation to which God calls them.” That can occur because of “illness or accident,” but, “these days, more often than not, it happens because of the misuse of that thing called free will.”

Some people may vehemently disagree with Chapman, and others may find her words and advice consoling. Chapman herself didn’t get married until much later in life — which is quite the story in itself, if you would spare a moment — and her lived experience, tempered with faith, wit, and prudence, rings true throughout the book.

So next time, instead of asking that lovely young woman at church why she’s not married yet, just know that she’s up against a lot and say a prayer for her vocation. And if you feel called, do give her this book — but be sure to tell her not to stuff it on the shelf.

It’s not what she thinks it is.