Monday, September 30, 2002
Churchgoers more likely to walk down the aisle
A story published today by the Washington Post reports that according to sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox of the University of Virginia, the odds of marriage are higher among people who regularly attend church.
Wilcox found that urban women with children who attend church at least several times a month are twice as likely to have been married at the time of giving birth than urban mothers who did not attend church frequently.
It's not just that these women get married because their faith compels them to get right with God. "Church is a good way to meet people," Wilcox said. "They may get social support from congregations for their relationships and for the things that are particularly important in starting a marriage, such as tips on jobs and the like."
Church attendance is no guarantee that unwed mothers in urban areas will get married. "One of the more surprising findings in the report is that one-third of all unwed urban mothers are frequent churchgoers," Wilcox said. "This means that many unmarried mothers are more integrated into the social fabric of their communities than we once thought."
