Divorce effects on religion

[Jason McCullough]

Found on metafilter, yeah, but really interesting (http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm).


"There is consensus that the overall U.S. divorce rate had a brief spurt after WW2, followed by a decline, then started rising in the 1960s and even more quickly in the 1970s, then leveled off [in the] 1980s and [has since] declined slightly." 7 However, such gross statistics are misleading. There are a number of factors involved that obscure the real data:

* The normal lifestyle of American young adults is to live together for a period of time in a type of informal trial marriage. These relationships frequently do not endure.
* Couples enter into their first marriage at a older age than in the past.
* A growing percentage of committed couples have decided to live in a common-law relationship rather than get married. This is particularly true among some elderly who fear reduction in government support payments.


Hilariously, the more strict the religion the higher the divorce rate. Multiple angles about baptists being in the south, getting married younger, stricter = poorer, etc.

[Jasper]

No surprise there. Strict "no sex" adherence religions often lead people to not live with each before getting married. You can't really know if you can get along with someone for years until you've lived with them, pent up horniness leads to snap decisions, and if you then proceed to immediately have kids (as many do when married) you hit the most trying stretch of marriage before having a chance to adjust to it.

[Sidd_Budd]

Strict "no sex" adherence religions often lead people to not live with each before getting married. You can't really know if you can get along with someone for years until you've lived with them
Seems reasonable, but studies find that cohabitation before marriage either has no relation with divorce, or is associated with a greater likelihood of divorce.
... and if you then proceed to immediately have kids (as many do when married) you hit the most trying stretch of marriage before having a chance to adjust to it.
Being pregnant when you get married is associated with greater divorce rates, but I've never seen findings where a first birth in the first year of marriage is associated with greater divorce risk, compared to a first birth in, say, the third year of marriage. Generally, having kids is associated with lower rates of divorce (but also lower couple satisfaction).

Example of research comfirming these assertions: 2002 CDC Report (http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_23/sr23_022.pdf)

So born-again couples tend to have factors that are associated with lower divorce rates, like lower cohabitation rates before marriage, and high church attendance. If born-again Christians don't have lower divorce rates in practice*, relative to other religious groups, it's plausible born-again folks also tend to have risk factors as Jason mentioned (i.e., they get married younger, they tend to be poorer ). These risk factors seem to cancel out the protective factors.

I personally wish some evangelicals would be more open to secular marriage & family therapists (and vice-versa, since these couples do have many strengths) by realistically facing the challenges in their community, rather than railing against the decay of morality.

Let he who isn't yet stoned make the first cast into the sea of sin...or something like that.

*I know Jason's original link stated Evangelicals had [i]higher divorce rates than non-Evangelicals, but later research (http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=BarnaUpdate&BarnaUpdateID=95) from the same organization (Barna) found no difference between the two. Still a surprising finding.

[shift6]

Shouldn't the thread be entitled "Religion effects on divorce"? For a minute, I thought the thread was going to be about divorcees looking to religion after the fact or something.

Also: born-again Christians vs. "Other" Christians? Uh, what the fuck?