“Seminary is not breeding grounds for dysfunction. It is actually a very ideal place to take the first timid steps into adulthood”
I’m writing in response to the letter writer who suffered from limerence, love addiction, in seminary, and who questioned why seminary became so mainstream, asking if we “contemplated the unspeakable dangers inherent within the framework of the seminary experience.”
A girl going to seminary is 18 years old. Though not full-fledged adult, she has approached the stage of adulthood. She is ready to embark on marriage and on the building of her own home. The writer suggests sending her away from her family to live in a dorm full of girls is a dangerous experience.
In truth, seminary does not provide a totally cloistered environment. That is the very nature of the success of this institution. The object of seminary is to take girls from their homes, from their lifestyles, habits, and computer screens, and put them in a safe environment where they can redefine what they want their future to look like and flex some independence.
Seminary is not breeding grounds for dysfunction. It is actually a very ideal place to take the first timid steps into adulthood. Speak to any seminary girl and you will hear of the hand holding. The heavy supervision, from eim bayits, to curfews, to a gamut of rules of dos and don’ts. If there is dysfunction, then it will rear its head during the seminary year. But that is the natural course of growing up. These same problems will come out during college, working, and definitely marriage. This is not a problem of seminary. It’s hard, and it hurts, but it’s called growing up.
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