Slides: Lesson 1

Match Made In Eden

God’s Design For Kingdom Relationships

Loneliness is the #1 disease in the Western world.  Fear is the #1 disease in the world.

The greatest disease in the West today is not TB or leprosy; it is being unwanted, unloved and uncared for.  We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair and hopelessness is love.  There are many in the world who are dying for a piece of bread but there are many more dying for a little love.

Mother Theresa

More Single people today in every age group than ever before in the history of the world.

- 46% always or sometimes feel alone

- 54% feel that no one knows them well

Cigna Survey

- Half of Britons over 65 say a pet or television main source of company. (BBC)

- 500,000 under 40 in Japan haven’t left their house or interacted with anyone in 6 months

- Canada 28% households solo.  34% E.U.

Forbes

- Solo households more common than families with children

- 40% in large cities (Manhattan and D.C. 2/3)

Forbes

- Loneliness is the number 1 fear among young people

- 42% Millennial women more afraid of being alone than a cancer diagnosis

2016 Vikeland UK Census

- Emotional pain
- Depression, anxiety
- Cellular changes, chronic inflammation
- Heart disease, stroke, cancer, Alzheimer’s

UCLA

- More ways to meet people than ever
- 2,500 online dating sites in US
- 5,000 online dating sites worldwide
- 25 Major (1 million+ members)

Online Dating Magazine

- 2015 50% of US adults single
- 40 Million American use online dating

Online dating Magazine

- 68% 20-somethings married (1960)
- 26% 20-somethings married (2008)
- 39% said marriage is now obsolete

Pew Research

- Divorce rate dropping because fewer marriages
- Same among the poor as in the 1980’s
- Lower among college educated who are less
  likely to marry
- Lower among white and Asian (lowest)
- Higher among black (highest) and Hispanic
- Best estimate 45% - 60%

Fatherly.com

- 41% first marriages end in divorce
- 60% second marriages end in divorce
- 73% third marriages end in divorce
- The average first marriage lasts 8 years

Divorcelawyersformen.com

-  25% of Millennials will never marry
-  25% co-habituating
-  25% will not marry until age 40
-  Millennials feel marriage is out of reach for them
-  67% say society is just as well off if people have
   priorities other than marriage and children

Pew Research

More Likely To Get Divorced

Parents Divorced

Fight about money

Didn’t graduate high school

Marry before 25

One person smokes

A friend is divorcing

- CDC, WA State Dept of Health, PEW Research

Less Likely To Get Divorced

Religious

College Degree

Your parents were happily married

You watch romantic movies with your spouse

- CDC, WA State Dept of Health, PEW Research

- Latin America 60% births unmarried mothers
-  Belgium, Denmark, France, Sweden majority
- United States, Germany, UK 40%
  (white 29%, Hispanic 53%, black 71%)
- Greece, Israel, Turkey, South Korea 10%
- China, India, North Africa, Southern Asia 1%

Yale

Marriages of the Past
- according to secular social science
- an economic partnership, with clear division of
  labor, from which a relationship may develop.
  (with the added “sanction” of religion”)
  Amazonian, Rural Catholic of Southern Mexico,   
  Rural American

- Biology, Social Needs and Economics

Daniel Everett

Bentley University

Dean of Arts and Sciences