Faith Creates a Better Life--And Better Society

Rebecca Hagelin has a powerful new column at WorldNetDaily that both religious and secular folks should check out. It's entitled, "Shocker! Faithful really do sin less." That is indeed not a shocker for religious people, but actually may come as a shocker to secularists who think they can find some meaningful morality outside of religion.

The core of her piece is a new paper from Pat Fagen at the Heritage Foundation that goes into great detail on the impact of faith on social stability.

A few of the findings Hagelin cites:

When mothers and their children share the same level of religious practice, they experience better relationships with one another.

mothers who became more religious throughout the first 18 years of their child's life reported a better relationship with that child, regardless of the level of their religious practice before the child was born.

Compared with fathers who had no religious affiliation, those who attended religious services frequently were more likely to monitor their children, praise and hug their children, and spend time with their children. In fact, fathers' frequency of religious attendance was a stronger predictor of paternal involvement in one-on-one activities with children than were employment and income – the factors most frequently cited in the academic literature on fatherhood.

She also says of the findings

Couples are far more likely to stay together if they're religiously active

Religiously active couples also report greater happiness and satisfaction with their marriages. The incidence of domestic violence drops, too. Men who attended religious services at least weekly were more than 50 percent less likely to commit an act of violence against their partners than were peers who attended only once a year or less

Fagan notes that traditional values and religious beliefs were among the most common factors teens cite to explain why they are abstaining from sex. And religion affects out-of-wedlock childbearing: Compared with those who consider themselves "very religious," those who were "not at all religious" are two to three times more likely to have a child outside of marriage.

the use of cigarettes and the abuse of alcohol and drugs drops significantly among those who are religiously active

people who are religiously active are at a much lower risk of depression and suicide. They also tend to live longer.

Of course fringe dwellers such as the Coat Hangers at Dawn crowd will undoubtedly find some excuse to explain away a reality which inconveniences them. After all, they find sexual responsibility something to be mocked rather than sought after.

Hagelin sums it up, putting these findings into a societal context. You see, religious virtue should be pursued not only for the good of the eternal soul, and not only for the well-being of the individual, but also for the safety and stability of our civilization:

None of this would surprise our Founding Fathers, who knew that no people could be self-governing without religion. In his Farewell Address, George Washington referred to religion and morality as the "great pillars of human happiness" and noted: "Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."