{"id":303225,"date":"2014-10-09T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-10-09T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/podcast\/%series%\/family-matters\/"},"modified":"2014-10-09T11:00:00","modified_gmt":"2014-10-09T15:00:00","slug":"family-matters","status":"publish","type":"podcast","link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/podcast\/familylife-today\/family-matters\/","title":{"rendered":"Family Matters"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Brad Wilcox talks about the impact that single-parent families are having on our communities. Brad believes that communities pay a price when we don&#8217;t have a strong marriage culture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":294104,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"https:\/\/web.familylifetoday.com\/fl2014-10-09.mp3","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"00:","filesize":"23.54M","filesize_raw":"24686507","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":""},"categories":[2848],"tags":[5459,5458,5457,5456],"podcast_series":[],"cwp_profile":[9362],"series":[2101],"class_list":["post-303225","podcast","type-podcast","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultural-issues","tag-healthy-communities","tag-healthy-families","tag-risk-of-divorce","tag-statistics","cwp_profile-brad-wilcox","series-familylife-today"],"acf":[],"episode_featured_image":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1001\/2024\/09\/FLT-Podcast-Cover-2-508x508-3.jpg?w=508","episode_player_image":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1001\/2023\/02\/image-scaled.jpg","download_link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/podcast-download\/303225\/family-matters","player_link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/podcast-player\/303225\/family-matters","audio_player":null,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"light","subscribeUrls":{"apple_podcasts":{"key":"apple_podcasts","url":"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/familylife-today\/id212174303?mt=2&app=podcast","label":"Apple Podcasts","class":"apple_podcasts","icon":"apple-podcasts.png"},"google_podcasts":{"key":"google_podcasts","url":"","label":"Google Podcasts","class":"google_podcasts","icon":"google-podcasts.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/0j5UaKdQOHQCuo1bt0ebEm","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"},"youtube":{"key":"youtube","url":"","label":"YouTube","class":"youtube","icon":"youtube.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/feed\/podcast\/familylife-today","embedCode":"<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"wx4xbY6aZL\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/podcast\/familylife-today\/family-matters\/\">Family Matters<\/a><\/blockquote><iframe sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/podcast\/familylife-today\/family-matters\/embed\/#?secret=wx4xbY6aZL\" width=\"500\" height=\"350\" title=\"&#8220;Family Matters&#8221; &#8212; FamilyLife\u00ae - A Cru Ministry\" data-secret=\"wx4xbY6aZL\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\"><\/iframe><script>\n\/*! This file is auto-generated *\/\n!function(d,l){\"use strict\";l.querySelector&&d.addEventListener&&\"undefined\"!=typeof URL&&(d.wp=d.wp||{},d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage||(d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage=function(e){var t=e.data;if((t||t.secret||t.message||t.value)&&!\/[^a-zA-Z0-9]\/.test(t.secret)){for(var s,r,n,a=l.querySelectorAll('iframe[data-secret=\"'+t.secret+'\"]'),o=l.querySelectorAll('blockquote[data-secret=\"'+t.secret+'\"]'),c=new RegExp(\"^https?:$\",\"i\"),i=0;i<o.length;i++)o[i].style.display=\"none\";for(i=0;i<a.length;i++)s=a[i],e.source===s.contentWindow&&(s.removeAttribute(\"style\"),\"height\"===t.message?(1e3<(r=parseInt(t.value,10))?r=1e3:~~r<200&&(r=200),s.height=r):\"link\"===t.message&&(r=new URL(s.getAttribute(\"src\")),n=new URL(t.value),c.test(n.protocol))&&n.host===r.host&&l.activeElement===s&&(d.top.location.href=t.value))}},d.addEventListener(\"message\",d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage,!1),l.addEventListener(\"DOMContentLoaded\",function(){for(var e,t,s=l.querySelectorAll(\"iframe.wp-embedded-content\"),r=0;r<s.length;r++)(t=(e=s[r]).getAttribute(\"data-secret\"))||(t=Math.random().toString(36).substring(2,12),e.src+=\"#?secret=\"+t,e.setAttribute(\"data-secret\",t)),e.contentWindow.postMessage({message:\"ready\",secret:t},\"*\")},!1)))}(window,document);\n\/\/# sourceURL=https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-includes\/js\/wp-embed.min.js\n<\/script>\n"},"spectra_custom_meta":{"_wp_page_template":["default"],"transcript_url":["https:\/\/transcript.familylifetoday.com\/fl2014-10-09.pdf"],"audio_file":["https:\/\/web.familylifetoday.com\/fl2014-10-09.mp3"],"transcript_content":["<strong>Bob: <\/strong>The incidence of divorce in our culture is sometimes overstated. For example, you\u2019ve probably heard the statistic that half of all marriages end in divorce. That\u2019s just not the case; but researcher, Brad Wilcox, says the trajectory we\u2019re on, as a culture, is not a healthy trajectory. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>We\u2019ve never had the level of divorce like we\u2019ve had today. We\u2019ve never had the level of single parenthood like we have today. And we\u2019re also very affluent country. In some ways, we can afford\u2014we can afford all that\u2014but one of the things we have to recognize is that kids and communities pay a price when we don\u2019t have a strong marriage culture. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>This is <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> for Thursday, October 9<sup>th<\/sup>. Our host is the President of FamilyLife<sup>\u00ae<\/sup>, Dennis Rainey, and I\u2019m Bob Lepine. We\u2019ll hear today what the stats have to say about the state of marriage and family in the United States. Stay tuned. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tAnd welcome to <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em>. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>1:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThanks for joining us. I feel a little like I\u2019m back in school today with a professor here. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>We do. I wish our listeners could see all the awards \/ academic achievements of our guest, Dr. Brad Wilcox. Brad\u2014thanks for being on the broadcast. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Dennis, it\u2019s great to be here today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Brad got his undergraduate degree from the University of Virginia, got his PhD from Princeton, has worked in the area of marriage and family studies for almost two decades, and is currently the Director of the National Marriage Project at UVA. He is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Virginia, visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and a senior fellow at the Institute for Family Studies. Brad has been married to Danielle, his wife, since 1995, and he has a large family. He is also the editor of a book called <em>Gender and Parenthood<\/em>, along with Dr. Kathleen Kovner Kline. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>2:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBrad, you\u2019ve been in the area of marriage and family research now, as I mentioned, for two decades. You\u2019ve been watching people struggle with achieving the American dream. You think there is something that is screaming out of our culture as to why that\u2019s becoming unachievable. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>What we\u2019ve seen in the research on this question\u2014there is a major new study done by Raj Chetty at Harvard University. He and his team looked at the predictors, at the community level, basically, of what predicts the odds that a child who is born poor will, over the course of his life, move into the top fifth\u2014to become wealthy, basically, as an adult. So, it\u2019s one way of sort of tapping the extent to which the American dream is still alive, here in America. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tHe looked at hundreds of communities across the United States, and he looked at questions like school quality. They found that, not surprisingly, poor kids living in places with high school-quality were more likely to live the American dream\u2014to move up into that top fifth quintile. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>3:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBut they also found that the most important factor\u2014beyond school-quality, beyond racial segregation, beyond the income inequality in a community\u2014was the share of single mothers in a community. When kids were living in communities with lots of two- parent families, poor kids were much more likely to move up the income ladder to realize the American dream. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tKids, by contrast, living in communities with lots of single moms were much more likely not to move up the income ladder and not to realize the American dream. So, that was the most powerful predictor in their model of what sort of predicts the American dream, at the community level, here in the United States today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>And this is not because single moms are doing a bad job or aren\u2019t working hard. It\u2019s because they start off with a deficit; don\u2019t they?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Yes, I mean, I was raised by a single mom. I think there are many adults, out there today, who have flourished in the context of a single-mother household. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBut I\u2019m also a sociologist, and I would say to that, \u201cLook, on average\u201d\u2014let\u2019s be honest here\u2014\u201cit\u2019s harder for single moms to raise their kids on their own. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>4:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tAnd communities with lots of single moms are less likely to flourish because they don\u2019t have that father in the picture\u2014who is helping kind of shepherd the neighborhood\u2014basically, have a presence in the community that\u2019s helpful and likely to work to the benefit of the kids in that community as well.\u201d\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>We are for single parents here. We love them. We care about them. We want to help them. We have a ton of them who listen to our broadcast, and we want to equip them to do the very best job they can in raising the next generation. And yet, we are in the midst of what some would refer to as a crisis. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tGo back to the 1960s, Brad, and paint the picture of what this family formation looked like back then. Were there a lot of single parents back then?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>No, there weren\u2019t. I mean, the vast majority of kids were raised by their own married parents. Divorce was about 20 percent, depending on what kind of study you looked at, and non-marital childbearing was a relatively rare undertaking. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>5:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, things were very different in the United States in the 1960s compared to where they are at today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Statistically, about\u2014what is it?\u2014six\/seven percent of all live births occurred to single parent moms back then?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s about right. Yes. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>And today?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Forty-one percent. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Forty-one percent. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Almost one in two babies is born outside of marriage. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>I want our listeners to hear that. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Brad: <\/strong>Right. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>That\u2019s in your community\u2014that\u2019s not in somebody else\u2019s. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Right. What is interesting is that we\u2019ve seen some work\u2014that we\u2019ve been doing at the National Marriage Project\u2014is looking at how what we call \u201cthe retreat from marriage\u201d\u2014the fact that fewer Americans are getting and staying married\u2014has really been concentrated among Americans who don\u2019t have college degrees. <br>\u00a0\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, among folks who do have college degrees\u2014vast, vast majority of those kids are born in marriage. Divorce has actually come down in that community since 1980. Among well-educated Americans, there has been a kind of learning about the importance of marriage \/ the importance of stability and sort of a distaste for divorce. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>6:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tUnfortunately, that kind of marital ethic is less and less found among Americans who don\u2019t have that college degree\u2014they make about two-thirds of the adult population, here in the U.S. So, not just inner cities\u2014but in small towns, in rural communities, and in the outer suburbs of America\u2014we are seeing fewer and fewer Americans getting married\u2014more Americans cohabiting and having their kids in cohabiting relationships. That is\u2014that\u2019s a new thing. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>A lot of people will hear Dennis talk about \u201cWhat was it like, back in the \u201850s and the \u201860s, as compared to today?\u201d They get the idea that we think that the \u201850s and the \u201860s were the Golden Age of marriage and family formation. The truth is\u2014human sin existed in the \u201850s and the \u201860s, just like it exists today. So, however that sin was being expressed then, as compared to now\u2014we were still sinful people back then. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>There was dysfunction back then. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>Sure there was. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>No doubt about it. I\u2019m not suggesting a return to the \u201850s and \u201860s and all of its dysfunction. What I want us to just understand is\u2014what\u2019s happening, today, in our country\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>7:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014is unprecedented\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Sure. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>\u2014in our country. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s right. We\u2019ve never had non-marital child bearing like we have today. We never had the level of single parenthood like we have today, and we\u2019re also a very affluent country. In some ways, we can afford all that\u2014but what I think we have to recognize is\u2014that kids in communities pay a price when we don\u2019t have a strong marriage culture. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Let\u2019s talk about that price for a moment. What is the impact\u2014and again, you grew up in a single-parent home\u2014what\u2019s the impact upon a child\u2019s life?\u00a0 What\u2014single parent moms, who are raising their kids today, listening right now\u2014what should they be aware of and where they may be\u2014well, they may be setting their children up to struggle, going forward?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Right. I think it\u2019s important to start, once again, with sort of a word of hope here\u2014and that is that most kids, who are raised by single moms, turn out okay\u2014but it is the case\u2014it is more difficult. Single moms tend to be a bit more stressed. They tend to be more financially strapped. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>8:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThey tend to have less time to spend with their kids and to be less affectionate, on average, with their kids. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tOne of the things we see, for instance, in the research is that single mothers are more likely to engage in something that is called parentification\u2014where they treat their child as kind of an adult peer and as almost even a co-parent, in a sense, in certain contexts. Often, it\u2019s the oldest child or the oldest daughter in the home. They tell them about their fears \/ their vulnerabilities\u2014maybe their relationship activities. That\u2019s a big burden for a kid to carry. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, these are the kinds of things to be sensitive to\u2014instead of like seeking counsel from or support \/ emotional support from your child\u2014sort of seek that out from your friends, from your family members, or from people in your community. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>It points out the <em>need <\/em>for them to have relationships outside that home that are healthy peer relationships. And the church ought to be the place where you could have those relationships. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>9:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s right. And I think, even today, particularly with social media and with TV, there is a kind of temptation just to kind of live in your own little world and not to really engage friends, family members, a local church community, for instance. Yet, we know from literally tons of research\u2014not to mention, Aristotle, way back in the day\u2014that people who have those strong, social relationships\u2014who are embedded in real communities that are meaningful \/ require sacrifices of them but are also there for them\u2014are much more likely to flourish than people who are kind of doing it on their own or in their own little, privatized leisure world. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>When you and I have talked to single parents\u2014whether it is single moms or single dads\u2014a lot of them have expressed to us this idea that you really have to lower your parenting objectives down to the core issues \/ the survival issues and set some things, that you\u2019d like to do, aside just because there is no capacity to do them or no opportunity to do them. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThen, they\u2019ve also talked about how important it is to have, not only relationships for themselves outside of the family,\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>10:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014but also for their kids to be exposed to other adults outside the family. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Yes, and I\u2019m thinking of a single parent mom who, fortunately, had parents who were engaged in her life as she was raising her kids. For instance, one of the grandparents said, \u201cI\u2019ll take your daughter through <em>Passport2Purity<\/em><em><sup>\u00ae<\/sup><\/em> and go on the weekend with her and walk her through that. We\u2019ll share some of the burden and the load around some of these core life issues.\u201d\u00a0 <br><br>And you know, Bob, <em>Passport2Purity<\/em> is a weekend getaway where the same-sex parent\u2014or in this case, a grandparent\u2014takes the child away and they have the talk around the birds-and-the-bees, around peer pressure, around all the temptations of adolescence that will come their way around the age of 10, 11, 12, 13\u2014somewhere in there\u2014so that you can prepare the child for what they are going to face in adolescence. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tAnd it seems to me, Brad, that\u2019s part of the danger that a single parent ought to be aware of\u2014that if they don\u2019t take the time to do the proper preparation\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>11:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014their children are going to be more susceptible to temptations in the culture. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>There\u2019s no question about it. Kids are much more likely to navigate the culture successfully when their parents or grandparents are in their corner\u2014watching TV shows with them \/ sort of setting some frameworks for both TV, and internet, smartphones with them\u2014than kids who don\u2019t have that engaged parent\u2014not just setting rules for them\u2014but really engaging them over the questions that they are thinking about when it comes to consumption of, not just TV, but also what\u2019s on social media and the like today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>I want to talk about something that is pretty hard stuff\u2014and this could offend some of our listeners, at this point\u2014but I\u2019ve found in the research that I\u2019ve looked at\u2014and I know you\u2019ve seen it\u2014that some of the consequences of being raised in a single- parent home are pretty serious. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>12:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tGo over some of those consequences, if you would, because these are real. Frankly, in an interesting way, these are an apologetic for marriage and family. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>We know, for instance, that boys\u2014who are raised outside of an intact married home by their single mothers\u2014are twice as likely to end up in prison or jail by the time they turn 30, compared to their peers who are raised with both their married parents. And that\u2019s controlling for things like income, and education, and race, and ethnicity. This is a pretty strong association in the research. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe know that the delinquency is remarkably higher among adolescents who have been raised in a single-parent home compared to a two-parent home. We know that dropping out of high school\u2014about the same story. There is kind of this common pattern of risk when it comes to things like delinquency, dropping out of school, using drugs, being pregnant, as a teenager. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThe other interesting piece here is\u2014there is a question\u2014there actually is also a really important point for single parents\u2014around issues of family instability; okay? \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>13:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, what we are seeing more and more in the research is that kids\u2014who are exposed to kind of a family or relationship carousel, where there are people coming in and out of the household or they are forming a tie with someone as a social father, for instance, and then he leaves and then a new guy comes in and he leaves\u2014that\u2019s much more traumatic for a child than when a\u2014like say a mother is a stable single mother, without a series of men coming through the household. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, part of the story here is\u2014you have to protect your kids from adults who don\u2019t have their best interests at heart or who aren\u2019t invested in them. That\u2019s one, I think, positive thing that a single parent can do\u2014is be careful about his or her approach to relationships, for instance, in terms of how the kids are exposed to people. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Bob: <\/strong>You are basically saying that: \u201cBecause I\u2019m a single parent, my kids are going to be drug users, they\u2019re going to be delinquents, they\u2019re going to be in trouble with the law,\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>14:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014and they are going to go on to form unstable family relationships. I might as well throw in the towel now.\u201d\u00a0 What do you say to them?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>It\u2019s important to realize, here, that we are talking about\u2014number one, based upon some research that a colleague of mine at UVA did in psychology\u2014what she found was that basically\u2014was about 10 percent of kids from intact married families, with both parents there, had some serious problems. About 25-30 percent of single mothers had some kids with some serious problems. The point is that, in both cases, the clear majority of kids from both those kinds of homes did fine; but there is a greater risk. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI think\u2014if you have a couple of kids, as we do, for instance\u2014realize some of my kids are pretty darn resilient. You throw anything at them, and they are just going to kind of bounce back. Others of my kids are not that resilient\u2014they are pretty sensitive. There is a certain kind of fragility there\u2014for those kids, something like a divorce would be devastating. You have to recognize that kids are different. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>15:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tIn some cases, kids are going to be pretty resilient, in the face of divorce or single parenthood; but in other cases, they are not. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBut the other piece that I\u2019m trying to add here is that we are seeing, in the United States, especially, the kind of\u2014what my colleague, Andrew Cherlin, has called the \u201cmarriage-go-round.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s actually the relationship-go-round, where people are having multiple relationships, with kids in the household. That\u2019s really the most dangerous thing we see in the US today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>So, would you advise a single-parent mom, who is raising a bunch of kids\u2014would you advise her to begin thinking about forming a permanent relationship called marriage?\u00a0 You grew up in a home\u2014you said\u2014did your mom ever remarry?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>No, she did not. Yes. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Do you wish she would have?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Given what I know now about stepfamilies and a sense of sort of the family instability piece, I\u2019m not sure about that. I\u2019m glad that she was actually pretty careful about all that. We didn\u2019t have a series of men coming through the household when I was growing up, and I\u2019m grateful. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThe way I\u2019d answer your question is this: \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>16:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI think that\u2014and as in many things, adults need to <em>decide<\/em> about sort of how they are going to approach their relationships with other adults, especially in view of their kids. I\u2019m not saying that a single mother shouldn\u2019t get married, but she should be prudent\u2014she should be careful in how she approaches getting to know someone, and how she introduces him to her kids, and make an effort to do that <em>slowly<\/em> and be discerning about his character. The same thing is true for a single father\u2014doing the same thing with a woman that he is dating. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Right. You may have a dating relationship for a while, but the idea of sliding into a relationship where you cohabit is not a good idea\u2014that marriage and a family are established by a commitment and a decision. That commitment is what forges the most secure relationship that children need today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s right. We find, in a study that I\u2019m doing with Scott Stanley and Galena Rhoades at the University of Denver\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>17:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014we find, basically, that people who are kind of deliberate about their sequencing \/ their relationship, prior to getting married, are much more likely to report high quality marriages; whereas, folks, who live together without any kind of commitment of marriage \/ without engagement, are much more likely to report lower quality marriages. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tIt goes right to your point about\u2014it\u2019s important here, as you think about something like entering into a serious romantic relationship, that you do so deliberately and you seek to kind of establish a common ground \/ a common friendship as you go forward. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>We haven\u2019t really talked about the spiritual dimension of life and whether that\u2019s a factor in all of this, but I have to believe that someone\u2019s faith in God\u2014their participation in a local church, their prayer life, their time in the Bible\u2014is having an impact. Single parents \/intact families\u2014this has got to be making a difference; isn\u2019t it?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>John Bartkowski has found that religion is, on average, a force for good for kids in a variety of contexts\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>18:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014but the key caveat there is that\u2014for instance, for married folks\u2014that they are on the same page, religiously, basically. Not, obviously, in every\u2014but they are both attending church together. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWhat we have found in our own research, at the National Marriage Project, is that one of the best predictors of a high-quality marriage is that, when both spouses have the sense that God is present in their marriage\u2014that\u2019s more important than attending church together\u2014you know, beyond just sort of the Sunday routine, there is a way in which people have a relationship with God\u2014that perception is linked to some pretty strong marital outcomes\u2014good ones. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>Can you tell our listeners what the National Marriage Project is?\u00a0 The University of Virginia is sanctioning this\u2014they are behind it; right?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>There are many research projects \/ there are many initiatives\u2014there are many groups at UVA\u2014and I happen to be one of them\u2014the National Marriage Project. What we do is\u2014we look at marriage trends in America. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>19:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe look at\u2014how the culture, how the economy, how the civil society\u2014are affecting marriage and family life for kids. We try to be a voice to\/for the notion that marriage is the ideal context for the rearing of kids. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>You know, 50 years ago, that would have been mainstream. Today, it\u2019s counter-cultural. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Yes, I mean, things have obviously changed a great deal when it comes to all of this. I don\u2019t think anyone really knows where we\u2019re headed on this question of marriage and family in the United States; but what\u2019s also, I think, interesting is that\u2014whether you look at things like child abuse, whether you look at things like graduating from college, whether you look at things like depression\u2014what you find is that kids, who are raised in intact married families are much more likely to be flourishing. Despite all of the changes that we see in the country, it\u2019s still the case that this sort of model of married family life tends to do the best for our kids. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>20:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Your research really\u2014it doesn\u2019t confirm that the Bible is true, but it <em>reflects<\/em> the reality that what the Bible represents really is true\u2014whether people\u2019s opinion in the culture embrace the Bible or not. In Genesis 2\u2014this is God speaking\u2014He said, \u201cTherefore, a man shall leave his father and mother\u2026shall hold fast to his wife\u2026and they shall become one flesh.\u201d\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThere is a progression there\u2014leaving the family you\u2019ve come from \/ cleaving\u2014that is a commitment to stick like glue for a lifetime. That\u2019s a decision we make to form a covenant with the person that we\u2019re marrying\u2014and then, become one\u2014spend a lifetime, not just becoming one flesh through intercourse, but becoming one as we, spiritually,\u2014back to the point you made, Bob\u2014as we pursue God together. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI personally have been encouraged by your research. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>21:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI am really glad, Brad, you joined us here on today\u2019s broadcast. I\u2019ve been looking forward to getting you here on the program for a number of years. You really are in a key spot for those of us who are advocates on behalf of marriage and family. And I just appreciate you joining us. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Brad: <\/strong>Dennis, it\u2019s my pleasure to be here today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>Well, and I should also, probably, let listeners know about the research that you\u2019ve done. It\u2019s available in a booklet called \u201cWhy Marriage Matters: Thirty Conclusions from the Social Sciences.\u201d\u00a0 This is the Third Edition of that document, and we have it in our <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> Resource Center. Go, online, at FamilyLifeToday.com. There is more information there about the \u201cWhy Marriage Matters\u201d booklet that Brad has contributed to. Again, our website is FamilyLifeToday.com; or you can call if you have questions at 1-800- \u201cF\u201d as in family, \u201cL\u201d as in life, and then, the word, \u201cTODAY.\u201d\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tNow, I keep thinking about our mission, here at FamilyLife, as we\u2019ve talked with Brad today about what\u2019s going on in the culture, related to marriage and family. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>22:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe are committed, as a ministry, to effectively developing godly families. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI had somebody ask me recently, \u201cSo, how do you measure godliness in a family?\u201d\u00a0 I thought, \u201cWell, I don\u2019t know if I have a tool to calibrate how it\u2019s doing; but I do know that the criteria includes things like love, and joy, and peace, and patience, and kindness, and goodness, and faithfulness, and self-control.\u201d\u00a0 I mean\u2014the fruit of the Spirit in a marriage and a family really is evidence of whether we have a godly family or not. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tOur goal, here at FamilyLife, is to do all we can do to help cultivate that kind of a dynamic in every family in the world. Of course, that begins with a fundamental, spiritual change in the lives of people who are in rebellion against God. And we are so grateful for those of you who partner with us in seeing this mission accomplished\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>23:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014those of you who share our passion to want to see marriages and families strengthened and growing in godliness. We appreciate our Legacy Partners, who make donations each month, and those of you who are contributing occasionally. We are grateful for your financial support. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tIn fact, if you can help with a donation today, we\u2019d like to say, \u201cThank you,\u201d in a tangible way. We\u2019d like to send you a new resource that Barbara Rainey and her team have put together for your home. It\u2019s a chalkboard in the shape of a house. At the top, it says, \u201cIn this home we give thanks.\u201d\u00a0 There is a place for you to write on the chalkboard the things you are thankful for. This is our thank-you gift to you when you support the ministry of <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> with a donation. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tYou can go to FamilyLifeToday.com and click on the button that says, \u201cI Care,\u201d in the upper right-hand corner of the page\u2014you make your donation online and request the chalkboard when you do that. Or call 1-800-FL-TODAY to make a donation over the phone. Again, ask for the chalkboard. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>24:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tOr you can request the chalkboard and mail a donation to <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> at P O Box 7111, Little Rock, AR. And our zip code is 72223. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tNow, tomorrow, we are going to do a little different kind of diagnostic. We\u2019re going to talk about why being a pastor is a dangerous calling. We\u2019re going to draw some attention to pastors since this is Pastor Appreciation Month. Hope you can join us back as we talk to Paul David Tripp tomorrow. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I\u2019m Bob Lepine. We will see you back next time for another edition of <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em>. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tHelp for today. Hope for tomorrow.\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe are so happy to provide these transcripts to you. However, there is a cost to produce them for our website. If you\u2019ve benefited from the broadcast transcripts, would you consider <a href=\"http:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/donate\">donating today<\/a> to help defray the costs?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tCopyright <sup>\u00a9<\/sup> 2014 FamilyLife. All rights reserved.\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<a href=\"http:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/\">www.FamilyLife.com<\/a>\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t1\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>"],"_seopress_titles_title":[""],"_seopress_titles_desc":[""],"_seopress_robots_index":[""],"duration":["00:"],"show_notes":[""],"_thumbnail_id":["294104"],"filesize":["23.54M"],"filesize_raw":["24686507"],"_uag_css_file_name":["uag-css-303225.css"],"_uag_js_file_name":["uag-js-303225.js"],"_uag_page_assets":["a:9:{s:3:\"css\";s:82560:\".wp-block-uagb-container.uagb-block-e11dbe9f .uagb-container__shape-top svg{width: calc( 100% + 1.3px );}.wp-block-uagb-container.uagb-block-e11dbe9f .uagb-container__shape.uagb-container__shape-top .uagb-container__shape-fill{fill: rgba(51,51,51,1);}.wp-block-uagb-container.uagb-block-e11dbe9f .uagb-container__shape-bottom svg{width: calc( 100% + 1.3px );}.wp-block-uagb-container.uagb-block-e11dbe9f .uagb-container__shape.uagb-container__shape-bottom 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Wilcox talks about the impact that single-parent families are having on our communities. Brad believes that communities pay a price when we don't have a strong marriage culture.","meta_box":{"show_notes":"","transcript_url":"https:\/\/transcript.familylifetoday.com\/fl2014-10-09.pdf","transcript_content":"<strong>Bob: <\/strong>The incidence of divorce in our culture is sometimes overstated. For example, you\u2019ve probably heard the statistic that half of all marriages end in divorce. That\u2019s just not the case; but researcher, Brad Wilcox, says the trajectory we\u2019re on, as a culture, is not a healthy trajectory. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>We\u2019ve never had the level of divorce like we\u2019ve had today. We\u2019ve never had the level of single parenthood like we have today. And we\u2019re also very affluent country. In some ways, we can afford\u2014we can afford all that\u2014but one of the things we have to recognize is that kids and communities pay a price when we don\u2019t have a strong marriage culture. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>This is <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> for Thursday, October 9<sup>th<\/sup>. Our host is the President of FamilyLife<sup>\u00ae<\/sup>, Dennis Rainey, and I\u2019m Bob Lepine. We\u2019ll hear today what the stats have to say about the state of marriage and family in the United States. Stay tuned. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tAnd welcome to <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em>. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>1:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThanks for joining us. I feel a little like I\u2019m back in school today with a professor here. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>We do. I wish our listeners could see all the awards \/ academic achievements of our guest, Dr. Brad Wilcox. Brad\u2014thanks for being on the broadcast. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Dennis, it\u2019s great to be here today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Brad got his undergraduate degree from the University of Virginia, got his PhD from Princeton, has worked in the area of marriage and family studies for almost two decades, and is currently the Director of the National Marriage Project at UVA. He is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Virginia, visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and a senior fellow at the Institute for Family Studies. Brad has been married to Danielle, his wife, since 1995, and he has a large family. He is also the editor of a book called <em>Gender and Parenthood<\/em>, along with Dr. Kathleen Kovner Kline. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>2:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBrad, you\u2019ve been in the area of marriage and family research now, as I mentioned, for two decades. You\u2019ve been watching people struggle with achieving the American dream. You think there is something that is screaming out of our culture as to why that\u2019s becoming unachievable. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>What we\u2019ve seen in the research on this question\u2014there is a major new study done by Raj Chetty at Harvard University. He and his team looked at the predictors, at the community level, basically, of what predicts the odds that a child who is born poor will, over the course of his life, move into the top fifth\u2014to become wealthy, basically, as an adult. So, it\u2019s one way of sort of tapping the extent to which the American dream is still alive, here in America. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tHe looked at hundreds of communities across the United States, and he looked at questions like school quality. They found that, not surprisingly, poor kids living in places with high school-quality were more likely to live the American dream\u2014to move up into that top fifth quintile. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>3:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBut they also found that the most important factor\u2014beyond school-quality, beyond racial segregation, beyond the income inequality in a community\u2014was the share of single mothers in a community. When kids were living in communities with lots of two- parent families, poor kids were much more likely to move up the income ladder to realize the American dream. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tKids, by contrast, living in communities with lots of single moms were much more likely not to move up the income ladder and not to realize the American dream. So, that was the most powerful predictor in their model of what sort of predicts the American dream, at the community level, here in the United States today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>And this is not because single moms are doing a bad job or aren\u2019t working hard. It\u2019s because they start off with a deficit; don\u2019t they?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Yes, I mean, I was raised by a single mom. I think there are many adults, out there today, who have flourished in the context of a single-mother household. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBut I\u2019m also a sociologist, and I would say to that, \u201cLook, on average\u201d\u2014let\u2019s be honest here\u2014\u201cit\u2019s harder for single moms to raise their kids on their own. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>4:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tAnd communities with lots of single moms are less likely to flourish because they don\u2019t have that father in the picture\u2014who is helping kind of shepherd the neighborhood\u2014basically, have a presence in the community that\u2019s helpful and likely to work to the benefit of the kids in that community as well.\u201d\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>We are for single parents here. We love them. We care about them. We want to help them. We have a ton of them who listen to our broadcast, and we want to equip them to do the very best job they can in raising the next generation. And yet, we are in the midst of what some would refer to as a crisis. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tGo back to the 1960s, Brad, and paint the picture of what this family formation looked like back then. Were there a lot of single parents back then?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>No, there weren\u2019t. I mean, the vast majority of kids were raised by their own married parents. Divorce was about 20 percent, depending on what kind of study you looked at, and non-marital childbearing was a relatively rare undertaking. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>5:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, things were very different in the United States in the 1960s compared to where they are at today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Statistically, about\u2014what is it?\u2014six\/seven percent of all live births occurred to single parent moms back then?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s about right. Yes. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>And today?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Forty-one percent. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Forty-one percent. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Almost one in two babies is born outside of marriage. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>I want our listeners to hear that. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Brad: <\/strong>Right. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>That\u2019s in your community\u2014that\u2019s not in somebody else\u2019s. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Right. What is interesting is that we\u2019ve seen some work\u2014that we\u2019ve been doing at the National Marriage Project\u2014is looking at how what we call \u201cthe retreat from marriage\u201d\u2014the fact that fewer Americans are getting and staying married\u2014has really been concentrated among Americans who don\u2019t have college degrees. <br>\u00a0\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, among folks who do have college degrees\u2014vast, vast majority of those kids are born in marriage. Divorce has actually come down in that community since 1980. Among well-educated Americans, there has been a kind of learning about the importance of marriage \/ the importance of stability and sort of a distaste for divorce. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>6:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tUnfortunately, that kind of marital ethic is less and less found among Americans who don\u2019t have that college degree\u2014they make about two-thirds of the adult population, here in the U.S. So, not just inner cities\u2014but in small towns, in rural communities, and in the outer suburbs of America\u2014we are seeing fewer and fewer Americans getting married\u2014more Americans cohabiting and having their kids in cohabiting relationships. That is\u2014that\u2019s a new thing. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>A lot of people will hear Dennis talk about \u201cWhat was it like, back in the \u201850s and the \u201860s, as compared to today?\u201d They get the idea that we think that the \u201850s and the \u201860s were the Golden Age of marriage and family formation. The truth is\u2014human sin existed in the \u201850s and the \u201860s, just like it exists today. So, however that sin was being expressed then, as compared to now\u2014we were still sinful people back then. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>There was dysfunction back then. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>Sure there was. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>No doubt about it. I\u2019m not suggesting a return to the \u201850s and \u201860s and all of its dysfunction. What I want us to just understand is\u2014what\u2019s happening, today, in our country\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>7:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014is unprecedented\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Sure. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>\u2014in our country. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s right. We\u2019ve never had non-marital child bearing like we have today. We never had the level of single parenthood like we have today, and we\u2019re also a very affluent country. In some ways, we can afford all that\u2014but what I think we have to recognize is\u2014that kids in communities pay a price when we don\u2019t have a strong marriage culture. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Let\u2019s talk about that price for a moment. What is the impact\u2014and again, you grew up in a single-parent home\u2014what\u2019s the impact upon a child\u2019s life?\u00a0 What\u2014single parent moms, who are raising their kids today, listening right now\u2014what should they be aware of and where they may be\u2014well, they may be setting their children up to struggle, going forward?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Right. I think it\u2019s important to start, once again, with sort of a word of hope here\u2014and that is that most kids, who are raised by single moms, turn out okay\u2014but it is the case\u2014it is more difficult. Single moms tend to be a bit more stressed. They tend to be more financially strapped. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>8:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThey tend to have less time to spend with their kids and to be less affectionate, on average, with their kids. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tOne of the things we see, for instance, in the research is that single mothers are more likely to engage in something that is called parentification\u2014where they treat their child as kind of an adult peer and as almost even a co-parent, in a sense, in certain contexts. Often, it\u2019s the oldest child or the oldest daughter in the home. They tell them about their fears \/ their vulnerabilities\u2014maybe their relationship activities. That\u2019s a big burden for a kid to carry. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, these are the kinds of things to be sensitive to\u2014instead of like seeking counsel from or support \/ emotional support from your child\u2014sort of seek that out from your friends, from your family members, or from people in your community. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>It points out the <em>need <\/em>for them to have relationships outside that home that are healthy peer relationships. And the church ought to be the place where you could have those relationships. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>9:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s right. And I think, even today, particularly with social media and with TV, there is a kind of temptation just to kind of live in your own little world and not to really engage friends, family members, a local church community, for instance. Yet, we know from literally tons of research\u2014not to mention, Aristotle, way back in the day\u2014that people who have those strong, social relationships\u2014who are embedded in real communities that are meaningful \/ require sacrifices of them but are also there for them\u2014are much more likely to flourish than people who are kind of doing it on their own or in their own little, privatized leisure world. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>When you and I have talked to single parents\u2014whether it is single moms or single dads\u2014a lot of them have expressed to us this idea that you really have to lower your parenting objectives down to the core issues \/ the survival issues and set some things, that you\u2019d like to do, aside just because there is no capacity to do them or no opportunity to do them. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThen, they\u2019ve also talked about how important it is to have, not only relationships for themselves outside of the family,\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>10:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014but also for their kids to be exposed to other adults outside the family. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Yes, and I\u2019m thinking of a single parent mom who, fortunately, had parents who were engaged in her life as she was raising her kids. For instance, one of the grandparents said, \u201cI\u2019ll take your daughter through <em>Passport2Purity<\/em><em><sup>\u00ae<\/sup><\/em> and go on the weekend with her and walk her through that. We\u2019ll share some of the burden and the load around some of these core life issues.\u201d\u00a0 <br><br>And you know, Bob, <em>Passport2Purity<\/em> is a weekend getaway where the same-sex parent\u2014or in this case, a grandparent\u2014takes the child away and they have the talk around the birds-and-the-bees, around peer pressure, around all the temptations of adolescence that will come their way around the age of 10, 11, 12, 13\u2014somewhere in there\u2014so that you can prepare the child for what they are going to face in adolescence. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tAnd it seems to me, Brad, that\u2019s part of the danger that a single parent ought to be aware of\u2014that if they don\u2019t take the time to do the proper preparation\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>11:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014their children are going to be more susceptible to temptations in the culture. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>There\u2019s no question about it. Kids are much more likely to navigate the culture successfully when their parents or grandparents are in their corner\u2014watching TV shows with them \/ sort of setting some frameworks for both TV, and internet, smartphones with them\u2014than kids who don\u2019t have that engaged parent\u2014not just setting rules for them\u2014but really engaging them over the questions that they are thinking about when it comes to consumption of, not just TV, but also what\u2019s on social media and the like today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>I want to talk about something that is pretty hard stuff\u2014and this could offend some of our listeners, at this point\u2014but I\u2019ve found in the research that I\u2019ve looked at\u2014and I know you\u2019ve seen it\u2014that some of the consequences of being raised in a single- parent home are pretty serious. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>12:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tGo over some of those consequences, if you would, because these are real. Frankly, in an interesting way, these are an apologetic for marriage and family. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>We know, for instance, that boys\u2014who are raised outside of an intact married home by their single mothers\u2014are twice as likely to end up in prison or jail by the time they turn 30, compared to their peers who are raised with both their married parents. And that\u2019s controlling for things like income, and education, and race, and ethnicity. This is a pretty strong association in the research. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe know that the delinquency is remarkably higher among adolescents who have been raised in a single-parent home compared to a two-parent home. We know that dropping out of high school\u2014about the same story. There is kind of this common pattern of risk when it comes to things like delinquency, dropping out of school, using drugs, being pregnant, as a teenager. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThe other interesting piece here is\u2014there is a question\u2014there actually is also a really important point for single parents\u2014around issues of family instability; okay? \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>13:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, what we are seeing more and more in the research is that kids\u2014who are exposed to kind of a family or relationship carousel, where there are people coming in and out of the household or they are forming a tie with someone as a social father, for instance, and then he leaves and then a new guy comes in and he leaves\u2014that\u2019s much more traumatic for a child than when a\u2014like say a mother is a stable single mother, without a series of men coming through the household. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tSo, part of the story here is\u2014you have to protect your kids from adults who don\u2019t have their best interests at heart or who aren\u2019t invested in them. That\u2019s one, I think, positive thing that a single parent can do\u2014is be careful about his or her approach to relationships, for instance, in terms of how the kids are exposed to people. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Bob: <\/strong>You are basically saying that: \u201cBecause I\u2019m a single parent, my kids are going to be drug users, they\u2019re going to be delinquents, they\u2019re going to be in trouble with the law,\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>14:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014and they are going to go on to form unstable family relationships. I might as well throw in the towel now.\u201d\u00a0 What do you say to them?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>It\u2019s important to realize, here, that we are talking about\u2014number one, based upon some research that a colleague of mine at UVA did in psychology\u2014what she found was that basically\u2014was about 10 percent of kids from intact married families, with both parents there, had some serious problems. About 25-30 percent of single mothers had some kids with some serious problems. The point is that, in both cases, the clear majority of kids from both those kinds of homes did fine; but there is a greater risk. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI think\u2014if you have a couple of kids, as we do, for instance\u2014realize some of my kids are pretty darn resilient. You throw anything at them, and they are just going to kind of bounce back. Others of my kids are not that resilient\u2014they are pretty sensitive. There is a certain kind of fragility there\u2014for those kids, something like a divorce would be devastating. You have to recognize that kids are different. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>15:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tIn some cases, kids are going to be pretty resilient, in the face of divorce or single parenthood; but in other cases, they are not. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tBut the other piece that I\u2019m trying to add here is that we are seeing, in the United States, especially, the kind of\u2014what my colleague, Andrew Cherlin, has called the \u201cmarriage-go-round.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s actually the relationship-go-round, where people are having multiple relationships, with kids in the household. That\u2019s really the most dangerous thing we see in the US today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>So, would you advise a single-parent mom, who is raising a bunch of kids\u2014would you advise her to begin thinking about forming a permanent relationship called marriage?\u00a0 You grew up in a home\u2014you said\u2014did your mom ever remarry?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>No, she did not. Yes. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Do you wish she would have?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Given what I know now about stepfamilies and a sense of sort of the family instability piece, I\u2019m not sure about that. I\u2019m glad that she was actually pretty careful about all that. We didn\u2019t have a series of men coming through the household when I was growing up, and I\u2019m grateful. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThe way I\u2019d answer your question is this: \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>16:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI think that\u2014and as in many things, adults need to <em>decide<\/em> about sort of how they are going to approach their relationships with other adults, especially in view of their kids. I\u2019m not saying that a single mother shouldn\u2019t get married, but she should be prudent\u2014she should be careful in how she approaches getting to know someone, and how she introduces him to her kids, and make an effort to do that <em>slowly<\/em> and be discerning about his character. The same thing is true for a single father\u2014doing the same thing with a woman that he is dating. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Right. You may have a dating relationship for a while, but the idea of sliding into a relationship where you cohabit is not a good idea\u2014that marriage and a family are established by a commitment and a decision. That commitment is what forges the most secure relationship that children need today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>That\u2019s right. We find, in a study that I\u2019m doing with Scott Stanley and Galena Rhoades at the University of Denver\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>17:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014we find, basically, that people who are kind of deliberate about their sequencing \/ their relationship, prior to getting married, are much more likely to report high quality marriages; whereas, folks, who live together without any kind of commitment of marriage \/ without engagement, are much more likely to report lower quality marriages. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tIt goes right to your point about\u2014it\u2019s important here, as you think about something like entering into a serious romantic relationship, that you do so deliberately and you seek to kind of establish a common ground \/ a common friendship as you go forward. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>We haven\u2019t really talked about the spiritual dimension of life and whether that\u2019s a factor in all of this, but I have to believe that someone\u2019s faith in God\u2014their participation in a local church, their prayer life, their time in the Bible\u2014is having an impact. Single parents \/intact families\u2014this has got to be making a difference; isn\u2019t it?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>John Bartkowski has found that religion is, on average, a force for good for kids in a variety of contexts\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>18:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014but the key caveat there is that\u2014for instance, for married folks\u2014that they are on the same page, religiously, basically. Not, obviously, in every\u2014but they are both attending church together. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWhat we have found in our own research, at the National Marriage Project, is that one of the best predictors of a high-quality marriage is that, when both spouses have the sense that God is present in their marriage\u2014that\u2019s more important than attending church together\u2014you know, beyond just sort of the Sunday routine, there is a way in which people have a relationship with God\u2014that perception is linked to some pretty strong marital outcomes\u2014good ones. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>Can you tell our listeners what the National Marriage Project is?\u00a0 The University of Virginia is sanctioning this\u2014they are behind it; right?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>There are many research projects \/ there are many initiatives\u2014there are many groups at UVA\u2014and I happen to be one of them\u2014the National Marriage Project. What we do is\u2014we look at marriage trends in America. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>19:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe look at\u2014how the culture, how the economy, how the civil society\u2014are affecting marriage and family life for kids. We try to be a voice to\/for the notion that marriage is the ideal context for the rearing of kids. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>You know, 50 years ago, that would have been mainstream. Today, it\u2019s counter-cultural. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Brad: <\/strong>Yes, I mean, things have obviously changed a great deal when it comes to all of this. I don\u2019t think anyone really knows where we\u2019re headed on this question of marriage and family in the United States; but what\u2019s also, I think, interesting is that\u2014whether you look at things like child abuse, whether you look at things like graduating from college, whether you look at things like depression\u2014what you find is that kids, who are raised in intact married families are much more likely to be flourishing. Despite all of the changes that we see in the country, it\u2019s still the case that this sort of model of married family life tends to do the best for our kids. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>20:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Dennis: <\/strong>Your research really\u2014it doesn\u2019t confirm that the Bible is true, but it <em>reflects<\/em> the reality that what the Bible represents really is true\u2014whether people\u2019s opinion in the culture embrace the Bible or not. In Genesis 2\u2014this is God speaking\u2014He said, \u201cTherefore, a man shall leave his father and mother\u2026shall hold fast to his wife\u2026and they shall become one flesh.\u201d\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tThere is a progression there\u2014leaving the family you\u2019ve come from \/ cleaving\u2014that is a commitment to stick like glue for a lifetime. That\u2019s a decision we make to form a covenant with the person that we\u2019re marrying\u2014and then, become one\u2014spend a lifetime, not just becoming one flesh through intercourse, but becoming one as we, spiritually,\u2014back to the point you made, Bob\u2014as we pursue God together. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI personally have been encouraged by your research. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>21:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI am really glad, Brad, you joined us here on today\u2019s broadcast. I\u2019ve been looking forward to getting you here on the program for a number of years. You really are in a key spot for those of us who are advocates on behalf of marriage and family. And I just appreciate you joining us. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<br><strong>Brad: <\/strong>Dennis, it\u2019s my pleasure to be here today. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>Bob: <\/strong>Well, and I should also, probably, let listeners know about the research that you\u2019ve done. It\u2019s available in a booklet called \u201cWhy Marriage Matters: Thirty Conclusions from the Social Sciences.\u201d\u00a0 This is the Third Edition of that document, and we have it in our <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> Resource Center. Go, online, at FamilyLifeToday.com. There is more information there about the \u201cWhy Marriage Matters\u201d booklet that Brad has contributed to. Again, our website is FamilyLifeToday.com; or you can call if you have questions at 1-800- \u201cF\u201d as in family, \u201cL\u201d as in life, and then, the word, \u201cTODAY.\u201d\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tNow, I keep thinking about our mission, here at FamilyLife, as we\u2019ve talked with Brad today about what\u2019s going on in the culture, related to marriage and family. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>22:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe are committed, as a ministry, to effectively developing godly families. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI had somebody ask me recently, \u201cSo, how do you measure godliness in a family?\u201d\u00a0 I thought, \u201cWell, I don\u2019t know if I have a tool to calibrate how it\u2019s doing; but I do know that the criteria includes things like love, and joy, and peace, and patience, and kindness, and goodness, and faithfulness, and self-control.\u201d\u00a0 I mean\u2014the fruit of the Spirit in a marriage and a family really is evidence of whether we have a godly family or not. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tOur goal, here at FamilyLife, is to do all we can do to help cultivate that kind of a dynamic in every family in the world. Of course, that begins with a fundamental, spiritual change in the lives of people who are in rebellion against God. And we are so grateful for those of you who partner with us in seeing this mission accomplished\u2014\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>23:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\u2014those of you who share our passion to want to see marriages and families strengthened and growing in godliness. We appreciate our Legacy Partners, who make donations each month, and those of you who are contributing occasionally. We are grateful for your financial support. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tIn fact, if you can help with a donation today, we\u2019d like to say, \u201cThank you,\u201d in a tangible way. We\u2019d like to send you a new resource that Barbara Rainey and her team have put together for your home. It\u2019s a chalkboard in the shape of a house. At the top, it says, \u201cIn this home we give thanks.\u201d\u00a0 There is a place for you to write on the chalkboard the things you are thankful for. This is our thank-you gift to you when you support the ministry of <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> with a donation. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tYou can go to FamilyLifeToday.com and click on the button that says, \u201cI Care,\u201d in the upper right-hand corner of the page\u2014you make your donation online and request the chalkboard when you do that. Or call 1-800-FL-TODAY to make a donation over the phone. Again, ask for the chalkboard. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>24:00<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tOr you can request the chalkboard and mail a donation to <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> at P O Box 7111, Little Rock, AR. And our zip code is 72223. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tNow, tomorrow, we are going to do a little different kind of diagnostic. We\u2019re going to talk about why being a pastor is a dangerous calling. We\u2019re going to draw some attention to pastors since this is Pastor Appreciation Month. Hope you can join us back as we talk to Paul David Tripp tomorrow. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tI want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I\u2019m Bob Lepine. We will see you back next time for another edition of <em>FamilyLife Today<\/em>. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<em>FamilyLife Today<\/em> is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas. \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tHelp for today. Hope for tomorrow.\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tWe are so happy to provide these transcripts to you. However, there is a cost to produce them for our website. If you\u2019ve benefited from the broadcast transcripts, would you consider <a href=\"http:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/donate\">donating today<\/a> to help defray the costs?\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\tCopyright <sup>\u00a9<\/sup> 2014 FamilyLife. All rights reserved.\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t<a href=\"http:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/\">www.FamilyLife.com<\/a>\u00a0 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t1\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>","theme_header_position":"","post_header_is_sticky":"","is_header_overlay":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/podcast\/303225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/podcast"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/podcast"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/91"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303225"},{"taxonomy":"podcast_series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/podcast_series?post=303225"},{"taxonomy":"cwp_profile","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cwp_profile?post=303225"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=303225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}