That was the headline of the Daily Mail. While I am fully aware that not all conservative Christian teens practice abstinence, I was stunned at the idea that there is virtually no difference in the rates of premarital sex between Christians and non-Christians. According to Relevant magazine, a 2009 study revealed that 80% of evangelicals between 18-29 years of age had sex, compared to 88% of their peers.
Do you find this statistic shocking? Do you have reason to doubt the validity of these findings? Assuming the stats are accurate, I’m not too surprised myself. In a sex-crazed culture like our own, it takes a lot of moral fortitude to abstain from sex before marriage. And when you couple that with a culture that discourages young adults from marriage until their late 20s or early 30s, it’s no wonder so many young Evangelicals are succumbing to this sin.
UPDATE: Kevin DeYoung provides some good reasons to trust the accuracy of this report.
Thinking to Believe 
October 27, 2011 at 4:26 am
Do I find the statistic shocking: Yes
Am I surprised: No
The ability to get sex is so easy and you really don’t have to go out of the way to get it. It is generally all around you saturated in the culture.
As a saying I once heard at Uni (2000-2004) – “Tower for an hour” (The Tower being a club and the max time limit required to “pull”)
According to organisers of “Soul Survivor” here in the UK, this is one of the most pressing issues of our time.
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October 27, 2011 at 6:56 am
Shocking: Yes
Surprised: No
Modern “Christianity” teaches youth to embrace the culture and the cultural practices. Youth are not taught to come out from among the world and be separate in mainstream churches. God’s Grace is used as a seal of God’s approval instead of a blessing of God’s love.
The recipe of embrace sinfulness, conform to the social norms, and the abuse of God’s Grace; then we shouldn’t be shocked at all. This should embolden us to preach God’s holiness like never before.
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October 27, 2011 at 7:23 pm
Evangelicals fornicate but won’t drink wine because it’s against the Bible.
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October 31, 2011 at 8:03 pm
Arthur not all evangelicals refrain from wine. The refrain from abusing it.
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December 30, 2011 at 1:56 am
Kevin DeYoung wrote a post showing why we should be skeptical of this study. He points out that minorities were severely over-represented, and since minorities have more children out of wedlock (which generally requires more sexual activity), this likely skewed the numbers.
He also points out that many refused the survey, and reasons that they could have been the sexually inactive crowd for whom a survey about contraceptives did not seem to be relevant to their lives.
He also questions just how “Christian” some of these people were. It’s one thing to self-identify as a Christian, but it’s another thing to show this in your life. If we looked strictly at those who identify as a Christian AND attend religious services on a weekly basis, DeYoung suspects that we will see that Christians are having just as much premarital sex as non-Christians. And I agree.
See http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevindeyoung/2011/12/13/premarital-sex-and-our-love-affair-with-bad-stats/.
Jason
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