Before my senior year in high school, I always wanted to wait to have sex with someone I was deeply in love with, because I knew for me that it meant a lot, but not necessarily until marriage.

But it was what Father Gary told me, that when you give yourself to someone in sex, that's the ultimate act, you can't become any closer biologically and emotionally. Its one of the most intimate, maybe the most intimate act you can perform.So if you wait until marriage, you're committing to the person that you do marry. that you've never given this part of yourself to anybody before. That is the ultimate act of love.

Maybe it was because I was raised Catholic, maybe it was because I've always been an idealist myself. I said, you know, this makes a lot of sense.

All photos ©2010, Dan Habib