Intellectuelle

He relies on the Barna study, which has been shown to be flawed. It compares the total number of divorces to the total population, rather than the total number of divorces to the total number of married people. Because evangelicals and conservative Christians have a higher marriage rate than atheists, it means a higher percentage of the evangelicals get married, which means more of them are eligible for divorce. In other words, they are comparing the number of divorced evangelicals (or atheists) to the total number of evangelicals (or atheists) when they should be comparing the number of divorced evangelicals (or atheists) to the number of married evangelicals (or atheists).

To illustrate why this makes a difference, imagine that 100% of evangelicals get married at some point in their lives and 25% of them get divorced. This would be a "divorce rate" (using Barna's methodology) of 25%. Now imagine that only 1% of atheists get married and 50% of them get divorced. Using Barna's method of calculated "divorce rate" atheists would only have a 0.25% divorce rate. Now, I'm obviously exaggerating just to get the point across, but when you actually take the time to calculate these correctly, conservative Christians have a slightly lower divorce rate.

I should also point out that even then the divorce rate is way too high, so conservative Christians have nothing to be proud of.

By the way, here is a longer explanation of what I just said, with the actual numbers and calculations and all that.

Having given just a cursory reading to the issue it would strike me that the criteria Barna uses to define evangelical doesn't include attendance at church service. To my mind this is a significant flaw.

In Ireland 90% of the population is Roman Catholic in the statistical sense, yet less than 50% regularly attend Mass. Now while self-identification can be a useful tool in some instances I don't believe it's suitable here. A person attending Mass might not believe in the infallibility of the Pope but that does not mean for all intents and purposes they are not Roman Catholic. (I use Roman Catholic because I'm am slighly less ignorant of the Irish situation versus the American situation)

Even though respondents were not actually asked to self-identify, attendance at services to my mind would have to be included when compiling research on religious groups for demographic purposes. I would have difficult accepting it as valid otherwise.

Macht is right about the divorce rates. Re the age of loss of virginity: after reading the linked article, I made a guess that the study was not controlling for class...and reading this review, I think I'm right:

http://www.theweeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=13668&R=1138119DC9

Red Wine Gums Blogger, that's an interesting point, and I'm sure there a correlation between Evangelical commitment and church attendance. However, I'd like to ask the Evangelicals here their opinion. I was under the impression that church attendance isn't the same 'marker' for Evangelicals that it is for Catholics, because for them church attendance simply isn't mandatory the way it is for Catholics. I remember a year or two ago a lot of evangelical churches didn't have services on Christmas - which is unthinkable for Catholics!

Funny that I have to go to another site to read comments based on a post on my site. However, I found the feedback here very illuminating!

I think I can be forgiven for my use of the statistics as the people in charge of the surveys used them in the same manner. One would not have assumed a bias against the Evangelical faith on the part of Barna or Regnerus. Yet it appears some good questions against their data does illuminate a bias on both of their parts.

Neither one appears to value church attendance as a indicator of commitment to Evangelical faith. Barna specifically excludes it, per his site (which you helpfully pointed out to me). Also, class is also a factor in the viginity study as "the demographic includes more teenagers of a lower socioeconomic class, who are more likely to have had sex at a younger age. It also includes African-American Protestant teenagers, who are vastly more likely to be sexually active."

It appears that the problem may not be so much "Evangelical faith" when taken seriously enough to attend church weekly, but "evangelical" faith taken on a superficial level. That "superficial" level of faith is more damaging to morals than having no faith at all.

In a follow up post, I noted that in order for teens to really commit to viginity before marriage, they need to regard themselves as "special." This specialness certainly needs to be maintained through regular contract with others of the same commitment. Certainly that regular contact would include but not be limited to frequent church attendance.

And church attendance certainly affects the divorce figures. There is almost a 20% difference in divorce rate between Evangelicals who attend church (34%) and those who do not (54%) per the GSS survey as reported here. The same results, unsurprisingly, hold true for all denominations. Those who show commitment to their faith as evidenced by church attendance fare better in obeying that faith than those who do not.

That is good news. However, those who do not maintain that "faith" through "assembling together" end up worse off than if they had no such "faith" in the first place. In a sad way, they may have inoculated themselves against the true demands of the Gospel.

Thanks again. I will probably work this data out further in a follow up post.

Atlantic
I'm probably what could be described as an Evangelical but I'm grown up in a small house church with no denominational affiliation so am reluctant to use the label even without the negative connotation that has arisen in the past few years.

To my mind Hebrews 10:24-25 is pretty explicit and that's only one reference. It's important to meet together. It's expected. Not to include it as a criterion in assessing whether someone is 'Evangelical' or merely Christian is a serious omission.

Caine
I've since subscribed to your blog and look forward to reading your follow-ups.

If you're entertaining Wild Guesses, here's one. :)

I have a Wild Guess that evangelical churches might tend to teach about sexuality with a lot of shame attached. If I feel ashamed about something it's going to be harder to talk about it or even make any kind of adult decision about it. Also, I'm going to feel worse about myself in general, so I will be less likely to make good decisions about what happens to my body.

But if I don't feel ashamed about sexuality, it's easier for me to talk about it with parents, pastors, peers etc. when needed. That way I can learn to make adult decisions, I can hear about how others handle certain situations. I'm less likely to separate out the sexual part of my life into a secretive, responsibility-free zone--instead it's just part of the rest of my life, as an adult with certain responsibilities and commitments to honor.

I don't have the citation, but way back in sociology courses we read a study of correlations between alcoholism and Christian denomination. The denomination in the study with the most intense rules and shame about alcohol use--Mormonism--had the highest actual rate of alcoholism. The denomination with the least amount of shame about alcohol use--Roman Catholicism--had the lowest actual rate of alcoholism. I wonder if sexuality might be the same way?

Red Wine Gums Blogger, I agree with you on the importance of meeting together – I was just under the impression that it is in fact less important to Evangelicals.

Heather, what sort of evidence do you have for your Wild Guess? Personally, I wonder if there’s anyone left out there who raises children to think of sex of something shameful – anecdotally, I recall the atheist blogger Evangelical Update who wrote, “I have found, however, that many Evangelicals are very open about their marital sex lives - much more so than non-Evangelicals. I have read comments on these sweet little Evangelical ladies' blogs that make me blush or at least think, "Eeeewwww! I didn't need to know that!” In the conservative Catholic blogosphere, I’ve run across fun discussions on the morality of sex toys and whether or not it’s appropriate to teach your sons about NFP by letting them help their sisters to chart their cycles.

Personally, it would be my guess that controlling for class and for religious commitment would make everything a lot different. And my unsupported Wild Guess would be that another cause might be an antinomian attitude amongst some less-churched Evangelicals.

And I wish you had a citation for your alcoholism study. I would be very surprised if the facts are as you describe them. The only studies I can find online that appear to address alcoholism and religious affiliation directly are subscription-only, so I can’t see the data. However, deaths from cirrhosis of the liver are a good proxy for alcoholism rates, and Utah has the lowest rate in the US.

Had to look up antinomian ;) No that would not be the main contributing reason for the problem of sexual impurity in general or the divorce rate .... at least not from the pew I sit in.

I have to think it out a little more, but will tell you that my experience in this corner of the world has seen problems with sexual impurity being underground in Evangelical churches for a long time, and a virtual explosion of divorce among the confessing Christians that I knew in the past ten years. Not all remain members of congregations after that. I suppose that would have bearing on what is called nominal Evangelicals, but at earlier times ( before their married lives bombshelled) they could be called quite devoted to church attendence.

In numerous Evangelical circles it is not uncommon to regularly attend church several days a week, and that is without special services. Sometimes it is hard to be in this type of church and be "nominal" as we might usually label that. No, I think the numbers represent an implosion within the church.

I have also seen in recent years, multiple divorce and remarriage. That is saying something to me, but I can't quite get a handle on the entire explanation.

I do however doubt how seriously we can take the Barna statistics. The most valuable service they provide is to make us face up to the fact that there is a huge disconnect between what we call each other to in faith and what we corporately are living. we are fooling ourselves when we think we can talk about sin with euphemism, and I think this may be one of the great contributing factors to the effects of sin's damage in our lives, and those of our fellowships. We are not taking sin seriously. We don't say that grace excuses us from sin, we just call sin things like fault or mistake and excuse it away as "everyone does this". We talk plenty in a roundabout way"how to make our marriages stronger" " just say no" and all the programs that are aimed at giving "alternatives" to the world, flesh, and the devil. Yet, we shy from the time consuming "accountability" and the plain talk of what sin's wages are -because who wants to offend and further hurt the many divorced? There is no easy way, and when your main compulsion is to have everyone like you, to be "winsome" with the gospel you just won't speak of sin or denying self, or any of the other things that are requisite for choosing purity and faithfulness.

Here is my sadness: I have seen better people than I fall into immorality, divorce, and fall away from their faith. I have seen a few make it back, but so damaged! And I have to say that my own choices of not going that way have had to do with my orneriness more than my virtue. I say that with shame. I think we ought to have valued virtue in our churches more. At least the ones I attended.It was preached, make no mistake, it really was preached, but less and less valued and followed.

Ok- that is enough soul baring for one day.

I had originally thought that the "fornication" statistics of Regnerus followed the pattern of Barna. I had said so in my post here, but in interactions with the author, such was not the case. Though Barna's stats are in doubt regarding Evangelical divorce, Regnerus' are not so tainted.

Evangelicals (and that means WHITE Evangelicals accoring to Regnerus) are fast losing the ability to "keep their knees together" prior to marriage and do appear to be worse at this than even their secular peers. Combined with the trend ilona posted above, we really may be well on the way to an "implosion" in the Evangelical camp.

I urge everyone to see my post linked above as well as Regnerus' response. Also check out my post on "Aren't You Special" to see my hope-against-hope suggestion of a direction to peruse to rescue Evangelical sexual morality.

It is only a suggestion; I would be open to any others. The status-quo is obviously on a collision course with disaster.

Atlantic, my Wild Guess does not come with any evidence. That's what makes it a Wild Guess.

Thanks for the, uh, tip concerning evangelical blogs about marital sex. Obviously I'm not reading the right blogs.

I do think there's a lot of difference between blog discussions about What's Allowed and What's Not Allowed, and actually owning something (allowed or not) as part of one's own life or the lives of family members.

ilona's comment on sexuality being "underground" in her church context gets at the same issue.