Lifeway Research: Pastors Encourage Single Adults, Some Provide Targeted Ministries

Lifeway Research: Pastors Encourage Single Adults, Some Provide Targeted Ministries

I’m afraid this is too little too late, and it also still sounds like a lot of pastors and Christians are apathetic about meeting the needs of single (especially never married) adults who are over the age of 30.

If you’re a church, or a secular or religious conservative, you need to meet people where they are and meet their needs where they are currently, rather than lambasting people for not being married, shaming them, or lecturing them about being single and the so-called importance of the Nuclear Family.

And stop putting the onus on single adults to meet their own needs and the needs of other single adults.

If your church has staff and devotes funds to minister to married with young children, drug addicts, divorced adults, or people in the grieving process,
you need to also set aside church staff and funds to set up programs and services to cater to single adults over the age of 30,
rather than making this hypocritical exception where you put the burden on single adults to set up single adults ministries and fund raise for single adult ministries.

To put this another way, many churches expect that older single adults who want more attention and effort poured into older single adults at the church will be told to take the matter into their own hands and to create and maintain singles classes and singles activities, rather than the church making it happen.

Most of you churches these days behave like international secular corporations, like a McDonald’s, where you cater to various special interest groups  (such as married couples, divorced adults, people in addiction recovery, or millennials or gen Z), but you’re telling me, you hypocrites, you cannot be bothered to view older single adults as another interest group you would be willing to market to and serve? That makes no sense.

I’m sorry, but no. That is complete hypocrisy.

If your church (like many churches) has classes, social functions, pot luck meals, and sermons devoted regularly to ‘married- with- children couples’ and THEIR particular needs and concerns,
and you don’t demand that married members set up these classes and provide elbow grease to other married couples (and you don’t), it’s totally hypocritical and infuriating to demand that single adults do the heavy lifting for single adult ministries.

If your church is willing to pick up the slack and provide services to married couples (and all of you do this, because you WORSHIP parenthood, natalism, marriage and the Nuclear Family), you can damn well also cater to the needs and interests of older single (and childless) adults as well, and stop asking the single adults to sponsor, create, manage or maintain the programs in place for older single adults.

Another news flash for churches and preachers:

You’re not going to diminish the phenomenon of delayed marriage or the increasing number of single adults by doing any of the following
(which you’ve tried before for over a decade now, these approaches do not work, and actually drive singles away from churches AND from the faith itself, in some cases):

• shaming or criticizing single adults for being single and assuming they are still single because they are failures, losers, ugly, fat, too picky, selfish, or man-hating, career-obsessed feminists,
• by yelling at them to run out and marry right away
  (that is not how marriage actually happens);
• wrongly thinking dating sites are an instant solution to finding a mate, so advising all the Christian singles you know to “just try dating sites like e-Harmony!”,
• lecturing adult singles over the age of 30 on the so-called wonders of The Nuclear Family and marriage
  (as though the reason they’re not married yet is that they dislike, or don’t value, marriage or The Nuclear Family – eye roll),
• telling single adults bogus how- to- get- married advice that does not work
  (such as, ‘Just trust in the Lord, pray, wait, have faith, and in due time, He will send you a spouse!,’
  ‘Once you’re content in your singleness is when God will send you a spouse,’ etc)
• refusing to help marriage-minded single adults who’d like to get married opportunities at church to meet other marriage-minded singles for the express purpose of dating leading to marriage
  (i.e., saying that doing so would make church a “meat market,” that church’s only purpose is to “worship the Lord”),
  or
• patronizingly instructing older single adults that their only or main purpose so long as single is to act as free labor to the church or to society in general (eg., to act as free babysitters to the married- couples- with- children, to act as free maid service to mop the church’s kitchen floor, etc).

(Link): Lifeway Research: Pastors Encourage Single Adults, Some Provide Targeted Ministries

August 16, 2022
By Marissa Postell

As the number of single adults in the United States continues to grow, so does the need for ministry to single adults in churches.

According to a 2020 profile of single Americans by Pew Research Center, nearly 1 in 4 (23%) U.S. adults ages 30-49 are single—not married, living with a partner or in a committed romantic relationship.

And the 2021 U.S. Census Bureau data on America’s Families and Living Arrangements reveals many of these have never been married.

A 69 Year Old Man Wants to Self Identify as a 40-Something to Increase His Chances on Dating Sites

A 69 Year Old Man Wants to Self Identify as a 40-Something to Increase His Chances on Dating Sites

(Post Updated Below, December 2018)

I wonder if this man, named Ratelband, is like 99% of men – a sexist ass clown, who, despite being 60-something, only wants to date 20 -something women?

This man says in one of these articles that when he joins dating sites and states his age as 60-something that he gets no responses, but I bet he does – probably from other 60- something women, but he probably only wants to date 21 year old women.

Most men are sexist, ageist douche canoes like that; they don’t want to date women their own age, nope; they feel entitled to women 10 or more years their junior.

(By the way, this dude thinks he has the face of a 40-something (he says so in one of the articles)? I am currently in my 40s as I compose this post, and no, honey, you don’t look like a 40-something man. You don’t even appear to be an attractive 60 something man, sorry.)

(Link): Man, 69, sues to lower age 20 years: ‘You can change your gender. Why not your age?’

Excerpts:

Ratelband cites several reasons as to why he wants to lower his age from 69 years to 49 years.

The Dutchman, who is a motivational speaker and media personality in the Netherlands, says that he’d likely have better luck dating, gaining employment, and making large purchases, such as homes or vehicles, if he were younger on paper.

…Ratelband adds, “When I’m on Tinder [dating site] and it says I’m 69, I don’t get an answer. When I’m 49, with the face I have, I will be in a luxurious position.”

“You can change your name. You can change your gender. Why not your age?” he asks.

Single, 54, and a New Dad: Why Some Start Families Late by A. Ellin

Single, 54, and a New Dad: Why Some Start Families Late

(Link):  Single, 54, and a New Dad: Why Some Start Families Late by A. Ellin

Excerpts:

August 5, 2016

SPARKY CAMPANELLA never heard the thrumming of a biological clock. But his “sociological clock” — his sense that he was missing out on something important in life — boomed mightily. At the age of 54, he decided to do something about it. He became a father.

He was single, but so what? “I decided I could either do it myself, or wait for the right partner to come along,” said Mr. Campanella, a Los Angeles fine arts photographer whose son, Rhys, is a little over 1 year old. Over the years he had dated women who had children of their own, but he realized that he didn’t want to be a stepdad.

….It’s a question many childless people over 50 are asking themselves. Of course, dealing with night feedings and rambunctious 2-year-olds are not for the faint of heart. But with their finances in order and their careers in place, with their life spans extended, some older people are concluding: Why not start — or continue — raising children in later life?

Salvation Army Bans Duggar / Quivering Cult’s ‘Retreat’ (Called ‘Get Them Married’) that Promoted Arranged Marriages for Teen Girls – Quivering Advocates Are Anti-Adult Singleness and Anti-Celibacy

Salvation Army Bans Duggar / Quivering Cult’s ‘Retreat’ (Called ‘Get Them Married’) that Promoted Arranged Marriages for Teen Girls – Quivering Advocates Are Anti-Adult Singleness and Anti-Celibacy 

Before I present you with the links to the news reports about this story (which are much farther down the page), I wanted to make some introductory comments in general, and a few specific comments refuting a few points from a pro-Quivering page about celibacy.

In regards to the specific news story I am blogging about today, this Quivering group is completely overlooking Apostle Paul’s comments in (Link): 1 Corinthians 7 that it is better for people to remain single than it is to marry – and Paul does not say that this teaching is in regards only to “a few,” or only a “minority” of people.

The Bible nowhere states that marriage is “a norm,” or that God expects or wants all, or most, people to marry.

It just so happens that in other cultures thousands of years ago, most people did happen to marry – one should not deduce from this cultural situation that God supported it or wanted it to be so. It just was what it was.

If the Bible said that all or most ancient Jews painted their bodies green once a year and balanced weasels on their heads while jumping up and down on a watermelon one week out of a year, one should not assume from this that

• 1. God created that cultural practice and/or that
• 2. God wanted Americans in the year 2016 to practice these things as well.

The Quivering group’s position on marriage, celibacy, and singleness is unbiblical, not to mention disturbing.

According to this article (linked to much farther below), the Quivering group was going to call this event, (where they set up marriages for little girls to marry), “Get Them Married.”

Why not have an event called, per 1 Corinthians 7, “It Is Better To Stay Unmarried”?

Am I opposed to marriage? No.

Is the God of the Bible against marriage? No.

But the Bible does not say that being married is better or more holy for girls, women, or culture, than being single, but a lot of Christian groups, and these wacky Christian cults, insist otherwise.

Christians need to do a better job of recognizing adult singleness and celibacy as legitimate, godly, biblical lifestyles and choices for all persons (and not only meant for a small minority of people who were supposedly “gifted” with it), instead of promoting marriage and natalism as the only legitimate avenues or as ways of fixing culture, the nation, or as pleasing God.

Woman Marries First Time at Age 50 – A 700 Club Episode

Woman Marries First Time at Age 50 – A 700 Club Episode

This woman’s story was on today’s broadcast of Christian TV show “The 700 Club”

She did not marry for the first time until she was 50 years old to a guy the same age or a bit older than her. I think the show said he was divorced before.

You can listen to her story here:

• (Link): Feb 12, 2016 “700 Club” episode

Her story starts around the 11:15 mark of the video

——————–

Related Posts:

(Link): Stop Telling Women Their Most Valuable Asset Is Their Youth (From Time) 

(Link):   True Love Waits . . . and Waits . . . and Waits – editorial about delayed marriage and related issues

(Link): The Grief, Happiness, and Hope of Late-in-Life Singleness by H. Ferguson

(Link):  Want To But Can’t – The One Christian Demographic Being Continually Ignored by Christians Re: Marriage

(Link): Woman’s First Marriage at Age 40+

Preacher Andy Stanley on the 18-25 Demographic Leaving Church and Church Membership Decline in General

Preacher Andy Stanley on the 18-25 Demographic Leaving Church

Pastor Andy Stanly, son of famous Atlanta preacher Charles Stanley, was quoted as saying:

He insisted that church leaders “pretty much agree on the goal” and that “the problem isn’t Jesus or God or the Bible, but the approach that is driving people away,” citing historical trends which demonstrate the progressive decline in church attendance, particularly among the 18-25 year old demographic. “We are financing their exit from church,” he lamented. ((Link): Source)

Look, Rev. Stanley, it’s not just the 18- 25 age bracket that is leaving church: it’s people over 30 years of age, especially the never married, widowed, or divorced people, who are leaving. I’m one of them. We are leaving because our needs and concerns are not being addressed. Our needs are not being met.

The under- age- 25 demographic is leaving for some of the same reasons the over- 30 unmarrieds and single women in particular are leaving (which I won’t get into here – well, just a little bit).

What I can tell you will NOT work or bring in the under-25 demographic: rock and roll music; preachers wearing Hawaiian print shirts; neato, cutting edge multi-media in church services; the preacher of a church using Twitter and other social media; using gimmicks in church services (such as zip lines, live camels on stage, etc); trying to be hip, cool, or relevant.

“Gender complementarianism,” which is taught, believed, and practiced at most churches that teach conservative doctrine, is driving capable, intelligent females of all ages AWAY from church attendance, because such churches generally limit women to roles such as church nursery baby sitters or secretaries, and won’t allow them to fully use their God-given talents or allow them to pursue what they are interested in within church.

I could go on with other reasons why people have stopped attending church, but I’ll leave it at that.

I do agree with Stanley on this point (it’s one I have raised on my own blog numerous times before, that preachers and Christians spend more time bitching and hand wringing about liberalism than they do in actually helping those in their own churches, which offers no incentives for anyone who would otherwise consider coming to Christ, and is a turn-off); here are his quotes:

A major reason for the decline of the church, Stanley contended, is that Christians have focused too much on policing the behavior of outsiders without looking at the inside.

“If in the past 50 years, the church had done a good enough job policing our own behavior, then we would not be able to build churches big enough and fast enough today,” he said, adding that the imperatives of the New Testament are addressed to Christians. “Who doesn’t want to be part of a community that loves one another, prays for one another, shares and cares for one another? But that’s not what comes to mind when people think of the church.”

“The reason the church grew in the first century is because women were valued there like nowhere else in the world, children were treasured like nowhere else, and slaves were attracted because everyone was equal before God. It was all about ‘one another’ and the culture eventually paused and took a look at that and the Gospel spread.”

My advice to preachers and other Christians:

If you want your church to grow, start by meeting the needs of people in your church- all of them, in all life situations and from all backgrounds- not just homeless people in your downtown; starving African orphans; and don’t spend all your energy griping about liberalism, homosexual marriage, and abortion – maybe this is part of the reason Christ told followers not to obsess so much about the speck in someone else’s eye, but to concentrate on the log in your own.

For more on this issue, please see other posts at this blog:

(Link): Christians and Churches are Youth Fixated (blog posts here at Christian Pundit)

—————-

And That’s What Churches Get for Ignoring Unmarrieds from Ages 30 – 59

And That’s What Churches Get for Ignoring Unmarrieds from Ages 30 – 59

(Link): 60% of Congregations’ Giving Not Keeping Up with Inflation

Quotes:

According to the report [report from the Indiana University School of Philanthropy], “only about 4 in 10 congregations had revenues that kept pace or were ahead of inflation between 2007 and 2011. Congregations with the oldest average age of attendees were more likely to report that revenue growth lagged behind inflation.” Philanthropic success appears tied not only to the age of congregants, but also to pastors’ attention to giving.

So, churches cannot attract or keep 20-somethings, yet spend all their time and resources trying to reel them in (many 20-somethings have little to no income anyhow), and they ignore the singles ages 30- 59 (many of whom are employed and earning pay checks, and who comprise up to about 50% of the American population), and are now filled with folks who are retired (ages 65 and up), and these older folks either don’t have much money to give, or are unwilling to give it to their churches.

If churches paid more attention to the unmarrieds from ages 30 – 59 and tried to meet their needs, they would not be driving them away, and therefore they’d probably be receiving larger tithes, or tithes more often, from that group. But no, they continue to brush off or ignore singles ages 30 – 59 – to their own folly.

And all I can say is ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

And then there’s this ((Link): source):

The majority of churches say that finding enough funding and volunteers are the two biggest obstacles to doing outreach locally, nationally, and internationally.

Yeah, gee, maybe if churches stopped driving unmarrieds of age 30+ away with treating them like crud and only assisting marrieds and discussing parenting, they’d have more willing volunteers for their projects.

The Annoying, Weird, Sexist Preoccupation by Christian Males with Female Looks and Sexuality

The Annoying, Weird, Sexist Preoccupation by Many Christian Males with Female Looks and Sexuality

(Abbreviation: “Chr” = Christian or Christianity – you can figure out which by the context)

I touched on this topic in (LINK): my last post.

—RUTH AND BOAZ–

I was watching Christian author Laurie Cole interviewed on a Chr. television show, and she mentioned how the Bible character Boaz, an unmarried man, must have noticed Ruth’s “godly character,” and that is what attracted him to her.

I rolled my eyes when I heard that remark by Cole’s. Cole may be right about that view, but it’s not the norm in most of contemporary American Christianity.

Sad to say, most Christian males are just as shallow, fixated upon, and judgmental about a female’s physical appearance as most secular males are.

This is why I laughed when Cole seemed to intimate during the interview, after she talked about Boaz being attracted to Ruth for Ruth’s “godly character,” that a young, unmarried Christian woman should rest assured that she can attract a Christian man to marriage who also has godly character.

From what I have seen on blogs, books, and forums, most Christian males, even the (I’m going to be blunt) physically ugly and fat ones over the age of 35 (the ones who post their photos, or who I have seen personally in singles classes at churches), all feel entitled to a stick-thin, 25- year- old- movie star Megan Fox clone.

Further, many Christian pastors and male bloggers coddle such men in this erroneous thinking and reassure such Chr. men that this entitlement mentality and fixation on female youth and beauty is biblical, acceptable, okay, and normal.

(See, for instance (Link): this post (discusses Pat Robertson and Driscoll), (Link): this post (Christians marketing beauty products to women) and (Link): this post (Christians send conflicting messages about physical appearance to women).)

I have seen a smattering of blog posts over the years by married Christian males who chastise Chr. men over this undue emphasis and desire for young and hot female wives, and stress that men need to be considering the woman’s character and commitment to God, not just looks. Good for them, I say, but this sort of admonishment is pretty rare.

My own personal view on looks: physical appearance does matter.

But looks matter to both genders (most women would prefer to date/marry a good looking man), looks don’t just matter to men only (more on that point in a future post), but physical appearance should not be one’s primary or only criteria in selecting dates or a marriage partner.

—MOST MALE CHRISTIAN LEADERS PERPETUATE THE UNBIBLICAL, SEXIST HABIT OF MEN TO VALUE A WOMAN’S LOOKS ABOVE ALL ELSE, DO NOT HOLD MEN ACCOUNTABLE / CORRECT THEM —

For a lot of Christian men, female looks remain top, or sole, criteria – and they are not corrected on this thinking from the pulpits or in Christian material.

If anything, most Christians encourage Christian males to keep thinking this way.

As a matter of fact, much Christian preaching and dating advice (usually by males, but on occasion, by Christian females who sell out their own gender) push Chr. women as young as 15 years of age, to diet and look pretty; they stress to Christian females that their value remains in what they look like – not in their brains, talents, or that God loves them.

The Nauseating Push by Evangelicals for Early Marriage

The Creepy Push by Evangelicals for Early Marriage

With news that people are getting married later in life, if at all, some conservative Christians, in the past few years, have been pushing Christians to get married real early, say at age 18 or 19, or some suggesting age 21 or 22.

I don’t know why people are getting married later, though I might be able to come up with a few theories. I don’t know what the solution is, but I know what it is not: pushing kids to marry before age 25.

I found this long, mostly nauseating article at Christianity Today:

(Link): The Case For Early Marriage, by Mark Regnerus, first published in 2009

It’s a four or five page editorial, I’ve only seen the first two pages, and I am already fed up with it. I will address the author’s comments a bit at a time.

After mentioning that most Christians are having sex outside of marriage he (the author, Regnerus), makes these statements:

“What to do? Intensify the abstinence message even more? No. It won’t work. The message must change, because our preoccupation with sex has unwittingly turned our attention away from the damage that Americans—including evangelicals—are doing to the institution of marriage by discouraging it and delaying it.”

I’ve come to the conclusion that Christians have made much ado about sex but are becoming slow and lax about marriage…

Another indicator of our shifting sentiment about the institution is the median age at first marriage, which has risen from 21 for women and 23 for men in 1970 to where it stands today: 26 for women and 28 for men, the highest figures since the Census Bureau started collecting data about it.
— end —

Regnerus’ only concern is with “young” Christians (ages teens to 20s). How ageist. How about Christian women today who are age 35, 45, etc., who want to get married but have been unable to? Why is the spot light only focused on the 20 somethings by pastors, Christian blogs, and Christian magazines?

I suspect the hand wringing over young singles not getting married young may have something to do with fertility, given how often this author laments that women’s “childbearing” years are passing them by. He seems primarily concerned with getting ’em married young so that kids can be produced.

This point leads me to another: the author, Regnerus, makes several unfounded assumptions; here is one:

• [quote missing]

Aside from being ageist – where is your concern for age 40+ women who want marriage? – Christians need to understand that some Christians are highly ambivalent about having children (they don’t care if they have children or not), while others are so firm in knowing they want none, they consider themselves what is known as “child free.”

A Christian should not push for marriage on the sole or primary basis that marriage is about “baby making.”

The author assumes that churches are hyping celibacy too much, but not touting the greatness of marriage nearly enough.

Oh get a clue, pal!

Maybe the celibacy message was poured on thick among teens back in the 1980s or 1990s and a bit today, but if you are a Christian virgin over the age of 30 today, you hear nothing from pastors or Christian blogs about the topic! It is just assumed that older Christians who have never married are having sex.

This author’s “solution,” which is for churches to preach and hype on marriage EVEN MORE than they already are doing (and have been doing for 40 or more years now) is quite similar to what Candice Watters wrote about this subject, and she was wrong too – I gave her the smack down (Link): here.

The author comments about how the average age of men and women for marriage has risen, and he uses the phrase “our shifting sentiment about the institution” in introducing this issue. The ‘rising age’ might not be an expression of sentiment – do not assume that because women are marrying at age 27 that they prefer this; there may be plenty that wanted marriage by 25 but it did not happen until 27.

I certainly felt I would be married by age 30 to 35. I never expected to still be unmarried by age 40+. Do not assume I, or by extension, any other woman, delayed singleness this long because I am expressing “anti marriage” sentiment. One cannot marry if one received no marriage proposals. (I received one years ago but had to break things off.)

Links about the never ending obsession with why the kids are bailing on church (one stop thread)

(Series of links to pages about declining church membership and/or the Christian faith, particularly among people under the age of 25. I might include links by older / unmarried/ mentally ill people who say they felt alienated by churches and quit, too… On second thought, I might paste some of the testimonies into a new, separate post later.)

I had no plans of making any new posts this evening, but as I was browsing the Christian Post site, I found this:

(Link): Why Are Young People Leaving Religion?

As I find more stories and reports whose authors write about or continue to pass out and faint over people under the age of 30/25 dropping out of church, I’ll add those links to this post; it has been tagged with the phrase “ageism – one stop thread” (located on the right hand side of this blog).

You may want to click that link every so often to see if I’ve added any new links.

I’ve seen many such stories over the past few years but did not think to save links to them.

I’m sorry to beat a dead horse (I talked about this issue here, among other posts), but really, I can’t fathom what all the hand wringing is about over people under the age of 25 leaving church or the faith. Perhaps I should feel concerned, but I don’t. I can’t even fake concern. (click “more” to read the rest of the post…)