What is the State of Relational Health Today?

A CONSTELLATION OF RELATIONSHIPS

Researchers wanted to account for various relational realms, so the survey included questions about family of origin, current household, close friendships and trusted advisors, such as a pastor or professional counselor.

When it comes to family of origin, practicing Christians and U.S.

adults overall are equally likely to have a living mother (58%). The proportions that have a living father also are the same (46% practicing Christians vs. 45% U.S. adults), less than half in both groups, but practicing Christians are slightly more likely to have a sibling (89% vs. 85%).

There are more significant differences when it comes to relationships that people make for themselves. Practicing Christians are much more likely to have a spouse (58% vs. 49%) and a child (68% vs. 59%). Among those 35 and older who have children, practicing Christians are also slightly more likely to have a grandchild (60% vs. 56%).

Outside the family, the overwhelming majority of both groups has close friends (95% vs. 91%). It’s worth contemplating what this means: One in 20 practicing Christians and one in 10 U.S. adults say they do not have a close friend.

Practicing Christians are more likely to have a counselor or therapist (25% vs. 20% all U.S. adults) and, unsurprisingly, almost twice as likely to have a pastor or priest (92% vs. 47%).

Marital Status

Although practicing Christians outpace the general population in being currently married, some aspects of marriage are similar across groups, including the age when first married. Among adults of any age who have ever been married, one’s 20s, particularly the early- to mid20s, is the most common age range for a first marriage; however, the average increases among each successively younger generation. Men tend to marry for the first time two to three years later than women. Teen marriages are less common (16% all adults) as are first-time spouses in their 30s (14%).

One in three practicing Christians who have ever been married has also been through a divorce (33%), slightly less than the 39 percent of all adults that have divorced. Widows and widowers are less common than divorcees, but they still make up a significant percentage of adults: Eight percent of all respondents’ marriages ended with the death of a spouse.

Singleness

While the majority has been married, a sizeable number has not: One in four practicing Christians (26%) and one in three among all adults (35%) have never wed.

About one-third of these singles reports they are involved in a romantic relationship, with fewer couples among practicing Christian singles (31% vs. 37% of single U.S. adults). Similar percentages of singles are engaged (5% vs. 6%), in non-cohabitating serious relationships (9% all), dating (9% all) and not dating but looking (27% vs. 25%). Practicing Christian singles are less likely to be living with their significant other (8% vs. 14%).

More than half of Christian Millennials (55%) are single, significantly more than the percentage of singles in older Christian generations (between 35% and 40%). Some of the disparity is due to cultural norms surrounding marriageable age, and the more pronounced rise in singleness in the general population indicates the upward pressure on those norms: Millennials (70%) are far more likely than Gen X (48% single), Boomers (38%) and Elders (35%) to be single.

Parenting

At first blush, the significantly higher percentage of practicing Christians who are parents (68% vs. 59% all adults) might indicate that practicing Christians are generally more open to having children. However, accounting only for people who are married, practicing Christians and the general population track closely when it comes to frequency of parenthood (84% vs. 82%, respectively).

Among those who have kids, the number of children and their ages are similar across both groups. Most are parents of two kids, followed by parents of a single child. One-fifth in both groups of parents has a toddler or infant (0–5 years). The percentage rises for those with school-aged children (6–12 years) while fewer have teens (13–18 years). Two-thirds of parents in both groups (65%) have an adult child (19+ years).

The Ambiguous Loss of Unwanted Singleness

Kelly Haer is the director of the Relationship IQ program at the Boone Center for the Family. She has a PhD in family therapy from Saint Louis University, a master’s degree in counseling from Covenant Theological Seminary and a bachelor’s degree from Furman University. Kelly has a wealth of experience working with singles in a variety of contexts, such as counseling sessions, the church community and research studies, including a project with eHarmony.

Check out the Boone Center for the Family website (www.boonecenter.pepperdine.edu) for resources on ministering to singles including a blog, an eBook chapter and a Quick Reference Guide.

My father married at 23. My mother and my older sister married at 21. Growing up, I expected that my life would follow a similar course. I was painfully wrong.

I spent a dozen post-college years as a single person in the church. It was a mixed bag. On the good end, I remember my pastor asking me to review the transcript for his singleness sermon. I felt seen, recognized, included and respected. On the bad end, I remember many assurances from fellow congregants that God would bring me a special someone soon. I met my husband more than a decade after those assurances. Perhaps that was “soon” to God, but it sure didn’t feel soon to me!

While many people may relate to my experience, there is no “typical” single. There is great variety. Though I deeply longed for a spouse, not everyone desires marriage. Some have never been married, whereas others are single again through divorce or death. Experiences differ by age and gender. Ministering to such a diverse, growing group of people can be challenging; it is critical not to make assumptions about any one single person.

One thing that’s clear from the data, however, is that singles want to find help and refuge in their church as they navigate unpartnered life—so it’s important that churches be ready to receive and relate to singles. Yet the data also suggest that pastors feel ill-equipped to address the challenges of singleness.

Where to begin this daunting task?

Understanding what it’s like to be single is a good place to start. For singles who want to be married, the missing spouse is a type of ambiguous loss.* The longed-for partner, though physically absent, is alive in the minds of the hopeful, much as a spouse who is missing would be. It is difficult for singles to name, and thus hard to grieve, what is lost. This is partly because the partner could be found tomorrow—or never.

Because people often attend church with family, singles may feel the pain of ambiguous loss there more acutely than other places—such as the workplace, the gym or the grocery store—where people tend not to be with their families. Yet church can also be a place where that pain is endured and ultimately healed. Ambiguous loss can cause a single person to become frozen in one of the stages of grief or to rapidly cycle through them all. Corporate songs of lament became a refuge for me during my single years. I could bring my pain before God while surrounded by the Body of Christ.

Singles may wrestle with questions of identity and safety. Why am I single? Is my singleness temporary or permanent? What can I do to find a spouse? How do people perceive me? These questions are challenging because there is often no clear answer. But this lack of clarity offers an opportunity to seek identity and safety not in answers, but in Christ. As such, it is important not to rush to the rescue with clichés like “You’re so great, I’m sure God will have someone for you soon,” “It will happen when you least expect it” or “When you’re satisfied and content God will bring someone into your life.” Although well-meaning, these responses sometimes short circuit an uncomfortable process through which God is working. They can also alienate singles who feel missed, dismissed or generally not taken seriously. And, finally, they may communicate falsehoods. The single person doesn’t know—and will never know—if God will bring them a spouse. And neither do you.

Better to say you don’t know why God has allowed them to remain single, or when or if God might have a spouse for them. As unpleasant as these answers may be, they are honest and take pain seriously. Rather than dismissing the other person’s pain, they draw you into it. Compassion means “to suffer with.”

It isn’t wrong to offer encouragement, but make sure it is rooted in biblical truth more than in statistical probabilities inferred from the experience of previous generations. You can encourage singles— or anyone, in fact—to find comfort in the lives of people like Joseph, Job and Paul, who lived in daily uncertainty, not knowing the outcome of their struggles.

When praying for a single person who hopes to marry, it is better to pray that God would provide a spouse. Praying for a spouse as though certain that person exists, on the other hand, can heighten the feeling of ambiguous loss.

If you are married, fostering true friendship with singles, sharing the joys and sorrows of your life and marriage, will help them feel like they are more than a ministry project. And these genuine relationships will make it easier to include relevant, singles-oriented sermon illustrations! On an even more practical note, having many single friends can position you to be a helpful matchmaker. And if you’re genuinely acting as an interested friend, you’ll be able to discern whether your friends would appreciate offers to set them up or whether you’re better off keeping your suggestions to yourself.

Seek communal ways to celebrate the significant events of your single friends’ lives. Promotions, professional advancements, hobby achievements and sporting events are good opportunities to rally around the single person who is not celebrated within a marriage and family.

Don’t allow singles without children to be invisible on Mother’s and Father’s Days. Many singles who long for marriage also long for children of their own. Of course, singles can adopt children, though many will not, given the demands of single parenting. Recognizing singleness as a type of infertility can be powerful and poignant.

Involving singles in church leadership can also help singles be seen and find belonging. My own ambiguous loss as a longtime single makes me especially thankful for how God has positioned me now: helping church leaders minister to singles through the RelateStrong Leadership Series at the Boone Center for the Family.

*My thanks to Dr. Pauline Boss for her groundbreaking work on the theory of ambiguous loss.

RELATIONAL & EMOTIONAL SATISFACTION

As anyone in a relationship can testify, having one does not necessarily equal relational happiness—but it’s a necessary start!

On the whole, emotional satisfaction is positive overall, but practicing Christians tend to report higher emotional satisfaction than the general population. They are more likely to generally feel loved (84% vs. 73% all), satisfied with their relationships (77% vs. 69%), satisfied with life (76% vs. 63%) and happy to be themselves (82% vs. 70%). They are also more likely to say that feelings of loneliness are infrequent (61% vs. 55%).

Nevertheless, asymmetries in relationship satisfaction exist between subgroups, even among practicing Christians. Most notably, married people tend to be happier than singles and parents are generally more satisfied than those who don’t have children.

More than 20 years ago, Paige Benton Brown characterized the bulk of what had been written in Christian circles about singleness as stemming from a pervasive attitude that singles “bear the cross of ‘Plan B’ for the Christian life.”⁶ Brown, by contrast, sought to place her identity in her redemptive status rather than her marital status, and to celebrate her singleness at the time as God’s best for her. Brown also noted that the range of human relationships extends beyond the marriage relationship, and that “Christian growth mandates relational richness.”

Although Brown’s essay encouraged a paradigm realignment for singleness, old mindsets change slowly; a comparison of the responses of single practicing Christians to their married counterparts indicates there is still room for churches’ growth in meeting their felt needs. Single practicing Christians are more likely than married practicing Christians to admit they are dissatisfied with their relationships (13% vs. 4%), and to say depression (38% vs. 29%), loneliness (36% vs. 24%) and grief (30% vs. 22%) affect their most important relationships. Singles are also less likely to have a positive experience with a church as a help source when they turned to a church leader during a difficult situation (77% vs. 87%). Curiously, single practicing Christians are more likely than their married counterparts to attend a church where they never hear leaders talk about marriage (20% vs. 8%), singleness (52% vs. 43%) or parenting (24% vs. 16%). When their church leaders address difficult or sensitive issues, such as addiction or sexual intimacy, singles are less likely to find the church’s efforts to be helpful (49% vs. 68%). Overall, single practicing Christians are less optimistic in their expectations of the Church being a source of help for navigating relational difficulties (78% vs. 84%).

That being said, they are just as likely as married practicing Christians to say they would prefer to go to a pastor or priest in a time of personal crisis, with two in five placing a pastor / priest in their top three sources of help (39% vs. 38% of married practicing Christians). This signals a meaningful opportunity for churches: If singles know relational help is available to unmarried people, they are likely to take advantage of it.

Churches sometimes unconsciously (or even consciously) communicate a hierarchy that puts “married with children” at the pinnacle of value. That’s unfortunate, because practicing Christians without children (78%) are already less likely than practicing Christian parents to report an abiding sense of being loved (87%) and to be satisfied with their relationships (71% vs. 79%). They are more likely to frequently feel lonely than those with children (20% vs. 11%), and to say that depression (38% vs. 31%), loneliness (34% vs. 26%) and anxiety (42% vs. 34%) affect their most important relationships. Childless practicing Christians are also less likely to include a pastor or priest among the top three most preferred people to turn to for help with a personal crisis (34% vs. 41%) and less likely to hold an optimistic overall expectation of a church being a source of help for relationship struggles (77% vs. 83%).

If they have actually experienced a church’s help, however, practicing Christians without children are equally likely to have had a positive experience as practicing Christians with children. Again, this signifies an open door for churches that are prepared to give relationship guidance to people who are hungry for help, but may not look like a church’s “ideal” nuclear family.

Practicing Christian parents enjoy numerous positives, including (perhaps unexpectedly) less relational strain: Those without kids are more likely to acknowledge marriage problems affect their most important relationships (33% vs. 24% of practicing Christian parents).

There is encouraging news: Both single practicing Christians and childless practicing Christians have consistently higher rates of emotional and relational satisfaction than their counterparts in the general population. Singles who are practicing Christians are more likely than other singles to feel loved (76% vs. 63%), satisfied with their relationships (65% vs. 58%) and satisfied with life (66% vs. 51%). Similarly, those without children who are practicing Christians are also more likely than their counterparts to feel loved (78% vs. 66%), satisfied with their relationships (71% vs. 61%) and satisfied with life (70% vs. 55%).

This may indicate that churches are taking to heart reminders of the early Church’s emphasis on community fellowship or affirmation of singleness and are moving in the right direction. Teaching on belonging to a spiritual family and dedicating one’s life to a missional vocation may likewise buffer practicing Christians from some of the negative aspects of being childless.

When it comes to frequent feelings of loneliness, however, singles and the childless in both groups respond similarly (16% practicing Christian singles vs. 19% all U.S. singles, 20% childless practicing Christians vs. 18% all U.S. adults without children), which signals an area for Christian communities to address. The weekly rhythms of church life are one solution, as there is a strong correlation between frequent contact with loved ones and being satisfied relationally. Practicing Christians who say they are usually or always satisfied with their relationships are significantly more likely to have weekly contact with loved ones (89%) than those who say they’re dissatisfied with their relationships (81%).

Yet, according to social neuroscientist Dr. John Cacioppo, “To end loneliness, you need other people—plus something else. You also need . . . to feel you are sharing something with the other person, or the group, that is meaningful to both of you. . . . Loneliness isn’t the physical absence of other people—it’s the sense that you’re not sharing anything that matters with anyone else.”⁷ Beyond providing opportunity for human contact, churches are places of shared meaning. Churches can and should be places where the gospel is embodied, where the grace of God overshadows whether one is married or single, a parent or childless, or any other relational distinction.

With that in mind, let’s take stock of the relationships people say are most in need.