Talking with kids about Valentine’s Day

My husband and I don’t really ‘do’ Valentine’s Day. The day has always felt too commercialised for our liking. I think that probably means I’ve never received or given anything for Valentine’s Day in my whole life!

It’s easy enough for someone of my age and stage to disregard the Valentine's Day messaging around me. But what about our teens and pre-teens—is Valentine's Day a ‘thing’ for them? Here are some ways that we can open up meaningful conversations with our kids on the topic of romance. First, some history.

How did Valentine’s Day start?

Saint Valentine’s Day originated as a Roman Catholic (and later Anglican) feast day honouring a martyred saint of that name. According to the earliest tradition, Saint Valentine was simply a priest who cared for fellow Christians who were being persecuted by the Roman Emperor Claudius II in the third century and was eventually executed himself.

One later legend claims that, on the eve of his execution, Saint Valentine wrote a note to his jailer’s daughter, whom he had befriended and healed of blindness, and signed it ‘Your Valentine’. Another common legend is that Saint Valentine also defied the orders of Emperor Claudius II, who had forbidden young men from marrying (as it would prove a distraction from fighting Rome’s battles). According to this legend, Saint Valentine secretly performed Christian weddings for young couples.

These later legends gained popularity around the time of Geoffrey Chaucer (14th century), whose poem The Parlement of Foules associated Saint Valentine’s Day with romantic love. From then on, February 14 became a day when men and women would send messages to their lovers.

Valentine’s Day today

Valentine’s Day has become a commercialised celebration when couples are expected to demonstrate their love by exchanging cards, gifts, chocolates, flowers and spending time together. In a co-ed school environment, Valentine's Day is often seen as an opportunity for people (especially boys) to send a message, card or token of affection to someone they like and ask them to be their ‘valentine’.

Whether Valentine’s Day is a ‘thing’ or not, our tweens and teens are growing up in a world where romance is a constant topic of conversation and a potential source of angst or disappointment. Here are some things we can ask and talk about with them.

Talking points

Are people at school talking about Valentines Day?

We can begin by trying to understand what expectations our teens and their friends have for this day of the year. When I asked my kids, they said it wasn’t really a big deal at their school. But in other schools it may be.

Are there many couples forming in your year?

This is a good general question for broaching the topic of teen romance without asking our kids for too many details. It helps us to understand whether there is a lot of pressure to ‘pair off’ in their school environment.

With our older sons, I try to open up conversations about romance, giving them the opportunity to share if they want to. But I don’t push for details if they seem to want to keep things private.

Do you wish you had a ‘valentine’?

Some teens may feel disappointed if they haven’t attracted any romantic attention from a special someone. It’s good to acknowledge our child’s feelings, even if the dramas of teen romance seem petty to us. We can share our own memories of what it was like to feel overlooked and left out, or to have our romantic feelings go unrequited.

In a future article we will consider how to say 'no' when you don't want to go out with someone.

What do you think being ‘boyfriend and girlfriend’ really means?

This is a helpful way to understand what our kids really mean when they talk about people ‘going out’. Does it simply mean sitting together at school and calling or texting each other after school? Is it normal for kids to hold hands and kiss in the playground at their school? (At our kids’ school ‘PDAs’ are not allowed!) Does it mean going out and doing things together on the weekend? Is this usually done alone or in a group? Are our kids in a context where it’s normal for couples to spend time alone together at each other’s houses?

We may then be able to offer our perspective on healthy expressions of teenage romance.

A crush is just feelings

As we talk with our older children, we can explain that having romantic or sexual feelings for another person is a natural part of growing up. Their adolescent brains and bodies are preparing to seek a marriage partner. We can ask them what it’s like to experience these feelings—what happens in their body and mind when that special person is nearby? (For more on this, see Patricia Weerakoon’s helpful book for teenagers, Teen Sex by the Book.)

What sort of person?

We can ask our teens and pre-teens to tell us about their ‘crush’. What is it they like about that person? Why do they want to be around them?
This can open up a conversation about what to look for in a marriage partner. We can share what we appreciate about our husband/wife and why we think we make a good team. We can encourage our kids to see that, when it comes to long-term suitability, the external qualities they might find attractive in a person are not as important as that person’s character, values and behaviour. We can ask questions like: How does your crush treat their friends? How do they treat the less popular people at school? How do they treat their parents and siblings? How do they talk about all these people when they are not there? What do they seem to value most in life?

I also encourage our sons to focus not so much on who they like as who they would like to become. Instead of just waiting around for the right person to notice us, we can be proactive in becoming the kind of person who would make a good marriage partner—or better, just a mature Christian person! We can ask all of the above questions about ourselves and seek to grow in Christlikeness.

Two destinations

When I was younger, someone pointed out that there are only two destinations for a youthful romance: you will either break up or get married. And if you’re still at school, it’s probably a long way to go before you’re ready for marriage.

When our kids’ peers start pairing off, this can be a helpful perspective—you don’t need to rush off and find a boyfriend/girlfriend just because everyone else is. It may be best just to focus on your own growth and development and start thinking more seriously about relationships when you are a little older.

It’s OK not to get married

It’s important to remind our kids that not everyone ends up getting married. As Christians, the goal of life is to glorify God and do good to others with the unique personality, gifts and circumstances that he’s given us. We can do that whether we are married or not.

I encourage our kids to simply focus on walking the path that God has marked out for them—faithfully pursuing the interests, abilities and opportunities that he’s given them—and maybe one day they will look up and find that God has brought someone like-minded alongside them, someone to walk the path with together.

The value of friendship

In our overly sexualised world, it’s good to remind our children of the value of friendship. In his book The Four Loves, CS Lewis explains how friendship is different from romance (p. 57–58). Firstly, friendship is not exclusively limited to two people; we can enjoy friendship with a whole range of different people. Secondly, friendship is less intense. Friends don’t often talk about their friendship as such; they stand side-by-side, engaged in a common activity, rather than sitting face-to-face.

It’s important to encourage our children to build strong and lasting friendships, rather than just seeking romantic connections. Mixed friendship groups are safe places to get to know people of the opposite sex without the pressure of an exclusive romance. Our teens can ‘practise’ relating to members of the other sex and start to discover the different ways that they might think and behave. They can start to work out what sorts of personalities they find attractive and compatible. Most importantly, having a good group of friends helps to protect our children from the loneliness that can creep in when people start ‘pairing off’.

If our kids find themselves attracted to someone at school, we can encourage them to start by simply becoming friends. Without the idealistic ‘glow’ of a romance, we can truly get to know someone as a real, three-dimensional person.

You are already loved

In all of these discussions, it’s good to remind our children that their worth does not depend on feeling attractive, desirable or popular on Valentine’s Day. There are different kinds of love—it’s not just romantic love that can fulfil us. Let’s remind our kids that they are deeply known and loved by the God who made them and who has a perfect plan for their life. They are also held safe within a network of relationships with people who love and value them for who they are—their parents and siblings, their extended family, their church family and their friends. Whether or not they receive a ‘valentine’ or have a teenage romance, they can rest in being truly loved for life.

References

'A history of Valentine's Day', History.com. 

'Biography: Saint Valentine', Britannica.

'A parent's guide to Valentine's Day for kids', Focus on the Family.

Lewis, CS (1977), The Four Loves, Fount Paperbacks.

Weerakoon, P (2019) Teen Sex by the Book: A Call to Countercultural Living, Fervr.

Weerakoon, P (2020) Talking Sex by the Book: Giving Kids a Bible-Based View of Identity, Relationships and Sexuality, Youthworks Media.
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Harriet Connor is the Content Editor for Growing Faith and the editor of Parenting in God's Family: Biblical Wisdom for Everyday Issues. She is the author of Families in God's Plan: 12 Foundational Bible Studies (Youthworks Media, 2021) and Big Picture Parents: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Life (Wipf and Stock, 2017). She lives on the Central Coast of NSW with her husband and four sons.

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