serin2 w/f819?

I am working with RS232 for the first time. I am using a 16F819 and SEROUT2 commands to communicate from the PIC to the PC utilizing a MAX232 driver. All is working well in this mode. I have some questions about serial input with a PIC without hardware USART. How do you use SERIN2 without an interrupt of some type to initiate the command? Or is this impossible? Even if SERIN2 were built into a continuous loop it seems the timing would be off without two way signaling. I thought I would ask before investing a lot of time into a fruitless venture. Comments please!