Chastity before marriage? No cohabitation? Data says couples who skip both may have stronger unions

When Fr. Matt DeGance tells engaged couples they should refrain from having sex during the six-month waiting period before their wedding — even for those living together — there's a palpable tension in the silence.

"The majority of the reactions are kind of a quiet pensiveness," he says. And "there are couples that kind of laugh it off or just sort of find it very dismissive, or they're dismissive in their approach."

Even the Catholic Church knows it's countercultural in this day and age to believe couples should not have had sex before they say their "I do's." Public health stats show maybe 5%-10% of those getting married in the United States are virgins at the altar.

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A priest at St. Helen's Church in Vero Beach, Florida, Fr. Matt told Fox News the church will perform around 40-50 weddings this year. It's a huge uptick from previous years — probably, he says, due to the reported religious revival happening in the Catholic Church. 

"We're seeing record numbers of people entering the church. We're also seeing numerous marriages."

Seventy percent of engaged couples seeking pre-marital counseling are living together. That might seem a huge number — but Fr. Matt says it's down from just five years ago. 

Then, he says, "I only had one couple that was not living together, and they were young. And I wanted to make [them] almost like a rare animal zoo exhibit. Like, 'Look, look at them. Don't touch them because they might bite you or something.' But now, we're getting more and more."

The reason, he says, is because of the work the church is doing with a nonprofit organization that Fr. Matt's brother, JP DeGance, founded called Communio. The brothers talked about their work together on a recent episode of "Lighthouse Faith" podcast.

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Communio is a ministry that walks alongside churches and pastors to help them encourage and strengthen marriages by helping young people now coming back to the church form healthier relationships. The data shows there's a direct cause and effect between family decline and faith decline.

While the faith revival is a welcome shift, keeping the pews filled will depend on creating lasting marriages where couples work to keep the faith and then pass on the faith to the next generation. Communio's research shows that a huge percentage of people who now attend church regularly are from two-parent households. 

The problem is, says JP DeGance, is that most churches don't work to cultivate marriage.

"Eighty-five percent of all churches through our commissioned research with the Barna Group said that they spend nothing in the area of marriage and relationship ministry. And just 28% of churches have something substantive in this area of marriage and relationship ministry."

The DeGance brothers grew up in a family of six siblings, five boys, one girl. 

They credit their parents with instilling a deep faith that was part of everyday life. Says Fr. Matt, "We went to mass every week. We said the rosary every day. We practiced the sacraments, [including] confession once a month, as a family. Our parents were very much plugged into charitable work at the soup kitchen."

That sort of generational faith cohesion is hanging by a thread today. And one of the big issues Communio deals with in helping churches is how to fight back against cohabitation, which has become the norm today. 

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The research also shows, says JP, that cohabitation does not guarantee a marriage will work; it's actually almost the opposite.

"For 40 years, they've looked at [this], and the data shows that couples that cohabitate have a much higher, up to a 60% to 80% higher divorce rate."

Marriage in its raw and foundational state, says Fr. Matt, is sacrificial. It's losing one's individualism and creating a whole-life oneness with another person. That is more difficult if couples live together before marriage. JP says it's like being in a two-person rowboat.

"When we cohabitate, each of us are kind of sitting on the edge of the boat and have a leg out in the water thinking that we might jump out, right? And the boat doesn't move very well, and it's unstable, and many people learn through long-term cohabitation — they learn not to be committed."

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Even dating apps are discouraged, says JP, because it's like treating a potential spouse like a commodity. "It's causing us to treat human relationships like a product we pay for. And then you shop for that person like you're shopping for shoes on Amazon."

The business model of cost/benefit analysis is not made for human relationships.

Marriage is about commitment of the highest order, no matter the cost. 

Fr. Matt says yes to that question. Most couples — after they break their silence and get over the shock of being told they should have no sex before their wedding — are willing to try, he says.

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"The women seem to take it a little bit more deeply and seriously than the guys. But I do find the guys will follow a good lead."

And for those 'living in sin," Fr. Matt says, "my next recommendation would be if it is possible to sleep in separate rooms for the time being. And I've seen that work, to be honest. It sounds a little farfetched, but I've seen couples make that commitment. Now, of course, there are no cameras around. There is no morality police."

But at least they're willing to try. He also introduces them to what Pope John Paul II said about sexuality.

Says Fr. Matt, "John Paul II dedicated five years of his pontificate to the theology of the body, and to try to form our young to know that sexual desire is a good thing — it's a healthy thing. Sexuality makes us human, and it's not something to be disdained, but something to be honored and reverenced."

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Many social scientists are now looking at how the sexual revolution of decades ago made sex less honored or revered. It became more like an appetite to be satiated. That changed the relationship dynamic between men and women, child and parent.

Says JP, "In our country, marriage became decoupled from sex, sex from parenting, and parenting from partnering. And as that was on the rise and non-marital households grew in the ‘60s and ’70s, kids raised in those homes start to show up in religious non-affiliation data." 

There's a direct line that can be drawn between the rising number of "nones," as they're called today — people with no religious affiliation — and the genesis of the sexual revolution.

Says Fr. Matt, "I think a lot of our young people are seeing, unfortunately, the fruits of the sexual revolution, a lot of the painful realities of the decades past. And they want stability. They want something better than what's been given [to] them, sadly, either in their own homes or in society in general."

Faith, like any fruit, doesn't fall far from the tree. The data shows that the happiest people are in healthy marriages with children. Fr. Matt says God still holds the best practices for healthy and happy marriages. 

They may be simple tools, but they're challenging to live out — yet the rewards are great.

Fr. Matt says he tries to help young couples see that the ring indeed should and does make a difference — and that their "no" today will make their "I do's" tomorrow much stronger.