While marriage is touted as THE only way to truly have a successful, committed relationship, there are many distinct advantages to cohabitation that are often overlooked, a few of which are as follows:

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Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are the new family role model as cohabitation becomes an American institution. While celebrities living together is nothing new, what is new is that it has gone mainstream, become widely accepted and wildly popular.

Years of condemnation appear to be backfiring as many cohabitating couples reject the guilt-laden attempts to discourage their living arrangement. Instead, most cohabiters fear a failed marriage even more than the criticism, so opt to live together despite the odds. Now over 60% of all couples who marry will cohabite first and rates of cohabitation will skyrocket since 75% of high school students believe living together is worthwhile and harmless.

Additionally, new studies show that the once negative stigma about cohabitation is changing which helps produce more extensive information about cohabiters and more sophisticated research methods. New findings from a Cornell study show that the odds of divorce among women who married their only cohabiting partner were 28% lower than among women who never cohabited before marriage. Other studies found that women who only cohabited with their husband had lower rates of divorce than women who went straight to marriage.

I think we must “reinvent” and raise our expectations of cohabitation, and our attitudes toward those who decide to live together. There is a commonly held myth that marriage means you will “live happily ever-after.” However, there is no similar assumption of cohabitation other than “it won’t last” which helps create a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It’s time to take a serious and non-judgmental look at cohabitating couples of all ages and help them strengthen and sustain their relationship. Let’s consider finding a new approach to this reality.Technorati Profile

Granted, dealing with the thorny issue of what to say to couples in the pews living in sin, isn’t easy to resolve, yet, I thought addressing these thorny issues in our society IS the role of religion. But what about a practice among some in Baptist churches who say.. “if you’re shacking up, you’re NOT welcome here.”

Jesus came for the sinners… except in Seattle!

Beverly Park Baptist Church in Seattle, stresses that people must be made aware of biblical teaching and that some moral standards must be met before individuals are accepted for church membership. Oh my, I wonder what Jesus would say about this “moral” standard?

Soooooooooooo, when an unmarried, cohabitating couples who’ve been attending the church inquire about joining, they’re told that the congregation is glad with their presence. BUT you’re not welcome as a member unless you marry or move apart. Guess who sleeps in or goes camping next Sunday.

Now everyone has a right to their standards but if you’re going to cut out cohabiters why not cut out alcoholics, adulterers, child abusers, wife beaters, tax cheats and all the other sinners in the congregation. Something about, “let he who is without sin, cast the first stone!” comes to mind.

If there was ever a time for all aspects of society ESPECIALLY mainstream religion to try a different approach to help build and sustain marriages, it is now especially when…

1. Divorce rates for 1st marriages can exceed 70% depending upon factors such as age, education & income
2. Our rate of marriage has dropped 50% in 40 years while cohabitation is skyrocketing
3. Fewer people are getting married now than ever
4. For the 1st time in U.S. history more of us are single than married

Churches must figure out better answers to tough questions about cohabitation as society’s definition of marriage and family continues to evolve. A USA TODAY poll of 1,007 adults found that most today reject the notion that couples who live together before marriage are more likely to get divorced. Instead,

• 49% said living together makes divorce less likely

• 13% said it makes no difference

• 31% said living together first makes divorce more likely

Like it or not, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have become the new American family role model for many and why not, who else can the youth of today look to for answers on how to avoid the high failure rate of marriage in America… highest in the world.

Brad and Angelina have no wedding plans and Angelina said, “The focus is the kids, and we are obviously extremely committed to the children and as parents together… to have a ceremony on top of it is nothing.”

This is the new reality and it is going mainstream, as the USA Today poll also found, respondents appeared open-minded on whether unmarried couples can have a committed relationship. 57%, when asked if an unmarried couple who have lived together for five years is as committed as a couple married five years, said yes

To say come back when you’re no longer living in sin seems to be the absolute opposite of what Jesus was all about. Instead, as one pastor at the Park Central Baptist Church in Dallas says, “If we believe ‘come all who are weary and heavy-laden,’ we must love people, not turn them away.”

So the message seems clear, the congregation should focus on developing relationships first. As a senior pastor of Atlanta’s Wieuca Road Baptist Church states, “churches must build relationships to help people first find faith and then to grow. “We open our membership to anyone… we start with where they are and help them,” “Trying to determine who’s at fault isn’t productive. We take the ‘now what’ approach: [Since] this has happened, now what?”

Wieuca Road concentrates on accepting individuals, regardless of the issues they face. “Acceptance is not the same thing as condoning. But if you provide the acceptance, there is room to grow,” the pastor said. “If you point fingers, people are more likely to walk away. “I would rather err on the side of acceptance. … People grow with grace. I’ve never seen anyone grow under legalism… Why would people want to go to a church that adds more burdens?”

AMEN!

Here are some interesting tidbits from the Journal of Population Studies about cohabiting couples:

1. D.C. has the greatest percentage of unmarried heterosexual partners living together: 13.5% of coupled households.
2. Vermont is second with 12%, followed by Maine with 11.9%.
3. Utah and Alabama have the smallest percentages: 4.4%.

Those who live together average about two years, generally leading to either marriage or a breakup. Cohabitation research found that within five years of a live-in relationship, about half of couples married, about 40% split up and the rest continued to live together.

As on researcher states, “People want what marriage signifies: that sense of ‘us with a future,’ “But because of the high rates of divorce for the past few decades and many other circumstances, including decreased rates of marriage, there is really a crisis in confidence about the institution of marriage.”

Reasons cited for cohabiting

1. Living with someone before marriage as a way to avoid divorce,
2. High housing costs and tight budgets often lead young people to live together,
3. Seeing little difference between the commitment to live together and the commitment to marriage,
4. Wanting to test compatibility or establish financial security before marrying,
5. A desire to live as married when same-sex marriages are not legal,
6. Cohabitation because it is easier to establish and dissolve.

Current Trends in Cohabitation

In the past, cohabitating was seen as financial unstable. Yet, many of today’s cohabitating couples sometimes combine their earning-powers and purchase a house together. In the past, a cohabitating couple’s relationship may have also been said to be unsound for raising a family. Yet, many of today’s cohabitating couples also have children together.

In the past, these couples were seen as having just a fleeting relationship. Yet, many of today’s couples see themselves as deeply involved but they also view it as less than a full commitment.

Explanations for the Rise in Cohabitation

1. Many cohabitating couples had parents who divorced after many years of marriage, thus, by cohabitating they feel they will avoid the mistakes of their parents.
2. Many cohabitating couples see themselves as far more independent than previous generations and they no longer depend on a committed partner for financial, physical or emotional needs, or general daily chores such as cooking and cleaning.
3. Many cohabitating young people feel they have greater choice, more time to choose a soul mate and less of a need to make a full commitment.
4. Many cohabitating couples expect to invest less and receive less from the relationship by selecting a “wait and see” attitude.

Years of condemnation appear to be backfiring as many cohabitating couples reject the guilt-laden attempts to discourage their living arrangement. Instead, most cohabiters fear a failed marriage even more than the criticism, so opt to live together despite the odds.

Now the average age of a cohabiter has risen to 35. Over 60% of all couples who marry will cohabite first and rates of cohabitation will skyrocket since 75% of high school students believe living together is worthwhile and harmless. Cohabitation is much more diverse than once imagined and the following perspectives provide a small sampling of the many facets of living together outside of marriage.

1) Happily Un-Married: Living Together & Loving It!

Much like in Western Europe, many contemporary couples report high levels of satisfaction with their cohabitation arrangements. They’re buying homes together, sharing investments, raising children from previous relationships and, purposely, having more children together. They believe in long-term, monogamous and committed relationships but do not feel that marriage is necessary or even desired.

2) From Rebellion to Fear: Why Cohabitation Isn’t What It Use to Be!

Our motives for cohabitation have been transformed. Baby boomers, who are now quick to condemn cohabitation, started shacking up to rebel against marriage and as part of the sexual revolution. Now, due to all the Boomers who shacked up in the 60s, got married in the 70s, divorced in the 80s, and who raised the first full generation of children from broken homes, cohabitation is occurring out of fear of failure and not as an act of rebellion.

3) Cohabitation: Here Today & Gone Tomorrow?

The “jury is still out” on the future of cohabitation. It could be a long-term trend or a short-lived cycle that ends in failure. One could assume that with the growth of cohabitation, marriage is an endangered institution. However, it’s too early to say this move away from legally binding relationships is ongoing or that we’re merely seeing the bottom of a cycle and that marriage is on the upswing. Today’s youth are experimenting with new forms of commitment and relationships, just like their Baby Boomer parents.

4) Stealth Cohabitation: Shacking Up While Moving Up the Corporate Ladder!

There’s still a “don’t ask, don’t tell” mentality but it’s not in the military – it’s in corporate America. It’s not about sexual orientation – its about live-in relationships. It’s true that the social stigma of cohabitation has been transformed from a time when it was shameful, to a time when Brad and Angelina have become the new American family role model. But the stigma in business is still strong, especially for women, and the bottom line is shacking up may hurt your chances of moving up.

Baby boomers were known as trend setters and while cohabitating trend setters like Oprah, Brad and Jolene are in the spotlight now… many boomers have been “living in sin” for decades. The 60s were a time that every institution in America was tested and for many, discarded. Marriage is one of those institutions and we have never been the same since. In place of marriage many are opting for the new “institution” of cohabitation. The novelty of living together outside of marriage is no longer new, but the fact that it has become mainstream is.

The way couples define commitment is dynamic. In our parent’s time, pre-1960s, few couples lived together without virtue of marriage. If they did, no one ever talked about it. Now, in part, due to all the boomers who shacked up in the 60s, got married in the 70s, divorced in the 80s and who raised the first generation of children from broken homes, cohabitation is back with a vengeance.

Since so many of the children of boomers fear a failed marriage, nearly 10 million couples are living together, instead, in an attempt to “learn from their parents mistakes.” The fact is that many of these parents who made the mistakes have gone back to cohabitation, as well. Living together is not just for the twenty-something crowd.

Try before you commit, is a logical yet frequently discredited approach to building a successful relationship in the shadow of decades of failed marriages. While the U.S. leads the world in divorce, when it comes to cohabitation, we are playing catch-up with our Western European cousins who have some of the highest cohabitation rates in the world. This time around, we have the opportunity to get it right, to make cohabitation a successful institution rather than a failed social experiment as it was in the 60s.

Our motives have changed, seeing that we no longer cohabitate to rebel, to indulge in free love or to reject our parent’s values. Instead, our motive is fear-based… we don’t want to make the same mistakes our parents did or have another failed marriage ourselves. This time around, we need to take a totally different approach to improving the fitness and sustainability of our live-in relationships. We need a clear, step-by-step method that is not touchy-feely, judgmental nor complicated and is based on the reality of what it means to be in a committed relationship in the 21st century.

According to a recent USA TODAY/Gallup Poll of 1,007 adults, most people today reject the notion that couples who live together before marriage are more likely to get divorced. Almost half (49%) said living together makes divorce less likely; 13% said it makes no difference. Just 31% said living together first makes divorce more likely; 7% had no opinion. Respondents also appeared open-minded on whether unmarried couples can have a committed relationship. Half the sample was asked if an unmarried couple who have lived together for five years is as committed as a couple married five years; 57% said yes, they are.

Europe leads in cohabitation

• In Denmark, Norway and Sweden, shacking up is very common; roughly 50% of all children are born into families of unmarried couples, whereas the same figure for several other Western European countries is roughly 10%.
• In late 2005, 21% of families in Finland consisted of cohabitating couples (all age groups). Of couples with children, 18% were cohabitating. Of ages 18 and above in 2003, 13.4% were cohabitating. Generally, cohabitation amongst Finns is most common for people under 30. Legal obstacles for cohabitation were removed in 1926 in a reform of the Finnish penal code, while the phenomenon was socially accepted much later on among non-Christian Finns.
• In the UK, 25% of children are now born to cohabiting parents.
• In France, 17.5% of couples were cohabiting as of 1999.

Cohabitation in the Middle East is rare unless you have a “sex slave!”

• The cohabitation rate in Israel is less than 3% of all couples, compared to 8%, on average, in West European countries.
• Cohabitation is illegal, living in sin according to Islamic law, with one exception: sexual relations between a female slave and a male master are allowed.

Cohabitation in Asia still taboo unless living in poverty!

• In India, cohabitation is generally taboo. Increasingly large numbers of young couples in big cities prefer it. As in other places, people with conservative religious views are opposed to it. Female live in partners have economic rights under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act of 2005.
• In Japan, according to M. Iwasawa at the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, less than 3% of females between 25-29 are currently cohabiting, but more than 1 in 5 have had some experience of an unmarried partnership, including cohabitation.
• In the Philippines, around 2.4 million Filipinos (18% of population) were cohabitating as of 2004. The vast majority of them are between the ages of 20-24. Poverty was often the main factor in decision to cohabitate.