Why it matters that globally, fewer people are married, more are living single. All around the world, marriage is in decline and single living is on the rise.
For evidence, the percentage of women in Africa who reach their late forties without ever having married ( it is increasing ), the average age at which people marry for the first time, of those who do marry ( that is increasing, too ), and the proportion of people in their late forties who are divorced or separated ( also increasing ).
Churches don’t just have a deficit of men—they have a shortage of unmarried young men. This trend makes it harder for young women to find mates who are spiritually compatible.
Unmarried women are unlikely to find eligible men in their churches—or even in their local area.
Liana, a single Christian woman in her late 20s, meet me and ask, I was once again at a loss for an answer. She said, “ , there just aren’t any single Christian men! I’ve read all the books, know that God is in control and all of that, but when there literally aren’t enough men to go round, I really don’t know what else we’re supposed to do as Single Ladies?”
In a church culture where marriage to another Christian is seen as the best and often only option, but with a ratio of 60:40 single women to men, the situation for women like Liana can be problematic.
Over the subsequent weeks of analysis, the scenarios of single women like Liana appeared to be the norm. The normal experience of a single Christian woman was to be asked out by two non-Christians, and no Christians from her own congregation. This meant that 63 per cent of single women in the church hadn’t been on a date with another member of their own congregation in the past two years.
“I’ve never been asked out by another church member in my entire life,” wrote one 23-year-old woman. “I go to a small group, I go to services, I really don’t know why it hasn’t happened!” “But outside of the church, it is different,” added another, “in my friendship groups, people have asked me out loads – they are very fine with it.”
The more I read through the open answers, the more the frustration became palpable. Are we under a judgement because of the rate of immorality in our modern world?
Women are frustrated with the lack of godly men, and particularly with the lack of initiation from men in their church. Another Lady said to me, “The Christian men are wanting sex, and yet when I was dating an atheist, when he found out that I didn’t want sex before marriage, he was fine with that…he was perfectly OK with not having sex before we were married.”
Another, in response to some of her main frustrations, wrote, “I’ve had more lovely/respectful dates with unbelievers in the past six months than in three years at my church. I honestly wish I’d joined them way sooner.”
What are the sources of the scarcity of marriageable men in the church? What is God saying in regard to this scarcity?
Let us not only focus on the scarcity of men. As there is scarcity of men, there are also scarcity of virgins in the Church. Before you complain there are no marriageable men, are you a virgin in Christ?
