Interesting observation

[DZoolander]

was just on Facebook and something dawned on me. The friends I have from my childhood church school have a higher rate of divorce than my friends from public school.

Seems that the church school folks sit at around a 60% divorce rate while my public school friends sit at around a 40%

Hmmm

 

[archer75]

What's your guess here?

One might be that church folks (depending on the church) are rushed into marriages that are based on nothing and then divorce at a higher rate.

 

[mkgal1]

was just on Facebook and something dawned on me. The friends I have from my childhood church school have a higher rate of divorce than my friends from public school.

Seems that the church school folks sit at around a 60% divorce rate while my public school friends sit at around a 40%

Hmmm

I realize it's anecdotal.....but that's my experience as well (although, not quite "childhood church"....but the Protestant evangelical church we attended early in our marriage and years later).

This article states it's true on a larger scale:

One of the most common statements that I've seen is "Christians divorce at the same rate as non-Christians," undoubtedly giving the world another opportunity to shout "Hypocrite!" This is controversial statement that is surely going to attract eyes and pageviews, but how accurate is it? Some sociologists are even reporting that religious conservatives divorce more than the rest of society.

.....and knowing what a lot of these churches teach about marriage, that makes good sense to me.

 

[mkgal1]

What's your guess here?

One might be that church folks (depending on the church) are rushed into marriages that are based on nothing and then divorce at a higher rate.

I do think that's part of it. Also.....another thing that's promoted is this idea that compatibility doesn't matter too much---that it's not about "finding the right person....but BEING the right person". That doesn't help, either (IMO).

Another thing.....this idea of marrying young is often "to avoid lust"....and that's just a fallacy. If one has a lust issue---becoming married is only going to give them a target for their lust (for a short time....then it will, most likely, be directed elsewhere).

 

[snoochface]

I've been pretty amazed how since we moved back to the bible belt and joined a very conservative church, almost everyone we've met is on at least marriage #2. Not widows and widowers either. I can only think of one couple besides the pastor and founders of the church who hasn't been divorced. I'm sure there are others, it's a big church, but compared to my unbelieving friends I would say Christians are winning the divorce rate.

 

[Hetta]

What's your guess here?

One might be that church folks (depending on the church) are rushed into marriages that are based on nothing and then divorce at a higher rate.

I have noticed an alarming number of very young marriages in a church which my son used to attend. He dated a girl from that church for a couple of years, and we loved her very much (as did he of course). Ultimately, the amount of pressure placed on him to marry her *ASAP* (he was at the time 18-19yo, and she was a year younger) was too much, and he broke up with her rather than be pressured into an early marriage. Bear in mind that they are/were both on the medical track and it would be a long time before they had any income. I couldn't understand why the families/church put so much pressure on everyone to marry so young, but most of this girl's friends who were her age were either engaged or married, and a couple even had a baby already! In my experience, marriage and parenting can be extremely hard, and not for the faint of heart. I had a sense that many of these young people were perceiving it to be like playing house, and had little preparation or strength for the hardships ahead.

 

[Hetta]

Oh and amongst most of my old high school/college friends, there is a mixture. One married her HS sweetheart and they divorced two years later, but she remarried and has lived happily ever since. Another 2 or 3 are married to men they met in their twenties. Another one is divorced from both her husbands, and yet another just married for the third time! I don't know anyone who married in their teens, and we have all agreed that we were far too crazy to marry under the age of about 25.

 

[RedPonyDriver]

I don't know anyone who married in their teens, and we have all agreed that we were far too crazy to marry under the age of about 25.

I married for the first and only time at 34. Prior to that I was too busy with my career and life to even THINK about marriage. Sure I'd had a couple of long term relationships but they ended when I started feeling pressured to give up my independence. My husband never tried to make me become the "little wifey" and knew that there'd be times when my career would take priority in my life. Now, I'm semi-retired and enjoy spending time with my hubby...

but yeah, most of my friends have been through at least one divorce.

 

[snoochface]

I think the pressure to marry young is because premarital sex is one of the Big Three Sins that many churches have based their doctrine on. It's like, the Bible and Christianity is complex, applying it to everyday lives is complicated, so it's easier to come up with the pared down set of don'ts that everyone has to live up to.

 

[DZoolander]

Well, my church and I had a bit of a falling out when I was young, so there's a big chunk of missing time that I wasn't involved in these people's lives. In other words - I wasn't around when they got married. My knowledge of the details of their marriages are limited then to whatever I've been comfortable asking (which isn't a lot), and what I can surmise by other circumstantial observations... like... age of their kids...etc.

They all have kids, and most of their kids are now of college age (as compared to me, with my first set of kids being 6 and 2.5 years old). They all also seem to have gotten divorced within the past 6-7 years (so apparently as their kids have gotten older).

So, clearly they all got married relatively young. My church was WELS Lutheran, so it was pretty conservative on those types of issues. They promoted early marriage, taught that sexual sin (including masturbation) was second only to murder in the eyes of God, etc. Knowing how the church taught on these issues, yeah, I'd guess most married relatively young to "flee from immorality", avoid premarital sex, etc.

and yeah - I'd guess that factors into the failure rate as well.

The pattern seems to continue though... Like one old friend of mine is married to her Church's pastor...and their oldest son (at 19) just got married this past weekend.

 

[Hetta]

The pattern seems to continue though... Like one old friend of mine is married to her Church's pastor...and their oldest son (at 19) just got married this past weekend.

Wow. 19. They must be supporting the couple then because either they must be in college, or in their first jobs. I just disagree with that perspective. I'd rather my kids had pre-marital sex than tied themselves down to a rash marriage that ended in divorce - just for the sake of having "sanctified" sex. Not that it's any of my business what my adult kids do of course.

 

[mina]

It's probably about half and half for people I know. A lot of my peers from school (public) are on their 2nd (or 3rd!) marriages (people in their 30's). Many people I went to school with married right out of high school or college. These are people who were in the church , or who went to church for their parent's sake but don't claim to be Christians, or who don't claim to be Christians at all and never did. I grew up in the rural south and people marry young there. It's more of a generational/cultural thing than a Christianity thing there I suppose. I do think the church pressure is there for young couples, but it's not only in the church. I was sort of a weirdo for having a career and not marrying until my late 20's (both in the church and outside the church). There are a lot of older couples that have stayed together that married very young , but it doesn't seem to translate well to my generation in that area. And still there are some couples in my peer group that married young and are still together and seem happy.

 

[FireDragon76]

Look at these forums, they are full of completely unrealistic expectations about marriage. So, it's not surprising. Many conservative evangelicals effectively have a pseudo-sacramental/magical view of marriage.

"Sanctified sex" is part of the issue, it's the flip side of the bizarre purity culture.

 

[DZoolander]

I've been pretty amazed how since we moved back to the bible belt and joined a very conservative church, almost everyone we've met is on at least marriage #2. Not widows and widowers either. I can only think of one couple besides the pastor and founders of the church who hasn't been divorced. I'm sure there are others, it's a big church, but compared to my unbelieving friends I would say Christians are winning the divorce rate.

Yeah, I know what you mean. My wife and I tried a more "rural" life a few years back and moved to North Carolina in the middle of the bible belt. We had the same experience talking to people there.

Like the girl that cut our hair. When I started getting to know her, she would always invite my wife and I to church and ask if we watched "The God Channel" on cable. By all appearances she was quite devout. So one day as she's cutting my hair, I asked about her husband (whose picture was up on the wall near her station).

"Oh, we've been married for about 4 years now. Those aren't all my kids though. Some were from his previous marriage. Before we got married he was married to my old best friend."

"Oh, is he widowed?"

"Nah, they just had a falling out."

Really now...lol Well, I guess when you're in a place with a full time population of around 700, the pickens are pretty slim and concessions need to be made!

 

[DZoolander]

Or another time...my wife needed to see a doctor, so as part of the inpatient process, she had to answer this long survey...

The questions included things like...

"Have you ever engaged in sex with multiple partners at once?"
"Have you ever accepted money for sex?"
"Has your husband ever engaged in Homosexual sex?"
"Has your husband ever engaged in Homosexual sex for money?"
...etc...etc...

so my wife asks "Does anyone ever answer 'yes' to these questions up here?"

"Oh honey, you'd be surprised!"

(once again, full time population 700)

 

[mina]

I used to teach in a rural community. It had heavy religious overtones, but most of the families weren't what I would call committed Christians or even really religious. One year I refer to as the Hatfield and McCoy year. Little Susy couldn't sit next to little Billy b/c their parents used to date and have a baby together but they are ex's and now hate each other. The whole class was related in some way by their parents' relationships. I had parents coming to school to complain that their kid couldn't sit next to so and so's kid b/c they were in a feud with that kid's family or it would upset their kid if the other kid talked about their grandma which the other kid wasn't allowed to see anymore.......if one kid looked at another kid the wrong way; one of them would go home and tattle and I would get visits from parents about how the other kid "bullied" their child by looking at them....all because the families had bad blood, shared babies, and broken relationships with each other. It was a fun year that nearly drove me to drink.

 

[DZoolander]

Yep that's small town America for ya lol