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Why Are We Still Single (or Single Again)?
by Anastasia Northrop
PART I |
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 Having organized the National Catholic Singles Conference for the last four years, I've given a lot of thought to why so many more people are single now than in any time in history. People are marrying later and some are not getting married at all. This is a very new phenomenon. According to the US Census bureau, in the last thirty years the percentage of Americans living alone has more than doubled, the percentage of thirty year olds who have never been married has tripled, and the percentage of people living alone relative to couples living with children has increased almost six times.
As Jillian Straus, author of the insightful book Unhooked Generation: The Truth About Why We're Still Single, said, "Not only are singles the fastest growing population group in the country, most of us will spend more of our adult lives single than married." As a little girl growing up I certainly never imagined I'd be over thirty and unmarried. Yet somehow here I am. And I'm not the only one. The "why?" behind this phenomenon seeks an answer. A look at the cultural influences of our time is very revealing. Many of them are contributing to the current situation.
I've categorized these influences into what I call the "Seven C's of Self-Centered Singleness." We live in an unabashedly self-centered culture which makes it very difficult to live a God-centered and others-centered life. Granted, selfishness is nothing new, but today we live in a society where selfishness is not only accepted but approved and encouraged - in fact, it's expected. We are literally bombarded by a message of selfishness everywhere we go – it's just "normal." Being raised in a culture like this is akin to fish swimming in a polluted pond. We are affected by it whether we like it or not, whether we fully realize it or not. This "self-centeredness" is the water in which the fish of the seven C's of singleness thrive. (Note that I'm not saying every single person is "selfish"; I'm simply starting to paint a picture of the society in which we all live, which undeniably has an affect on how we live.) The various components of "self-centered singleness" have all converged together in the last forty years to produce a dying culture.
By examining the "Seven C's" we can better understand what influences may (or may not) be affecting our own lives and the lives of those around us. Only when we understand a situation are we able to do anything about it. So let's go...
Choices and Careers: Our generation grew up with many more choices, and particularly different choices than people in our parents' generation. We also grew up with different expectations, especially for women. Now, instead of growing up and expecting to get married and have a family, girls expect to go to college, establish a successful career and then (perhaps) get married. It's laudable that women are able to be educated and choose a career, but it is quite the contrary when they are expected to put a career before their vocation to marriage. When a woman is likely to be considered backwards and unambitious when she declares her main goal in life is to be a wife and a mother, it's no longer about a "choice."
Men, on the other hand, have always had to be concerned with their jobs – and for good reason - so they could provide for their families. But now the emphasis is on having a successful career not in order to support a family, but in order to be comfortable, to have more toys, and to have more fun. In one online author's listing of the nine reasons why a man should not be in hurry to surrender his singlehood "focusing on your career," "building wealth," and "keeping your toys" comprise a full third of the list. It used to be that a boy was brought up to think about his future job but in connection with his vocation, with finding a wife or becoming a priest. It was common for these decisions to be made when a man grew up, somewhere around eighteen or twenty years old – not thirty-five. Now there is simply not that social expectation.
Lastly, we live in the day not only of multiple choices but seemingly endless choices. If one "item" doesn't work out, (or if it gets boring or difficult to manage) then all one has to do is log on and get an upgrade! We have to be careful not to bring this mentality into our relationships. In our materialistic society it sometimes can be very easy to treat people like objects to obtain, to have and to use. Jillian Strauss recounts the story of the man who said that he could have married four of the five women with whom he had been in a serious relationship, but he didn't since he always was worried there might be something better around the corner. This plethora of choices has led to a widespread hesitancy to commit, to a desire to keep one's options open. What irony! Today we are able to meet many more potential spouses through travel, college, the internet etc., yet fewer of us are married.
Comfort, Cows and Culture:
C number three does not need much explanation. We've all heard the idiom, "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?" Good question. There is plenty of "free milk" going around these days. But what if one is not getting free milk? What is the incentive to remain single? One answer may be comfort. As my mother always says, the older you get, the more set in your ways you become and the harder it is to change. If you get used to living by yourself the way you want to, doing what you want to do, when you want to do it, it becomes more and more difficult to make the transition to a life where you aren't doing what you want to do when you want to do it. Another one of our online author's reasons to stay single is precisely that. As he candidly remarks, "When you're single the world is your oyster. You can pick up and go anywhere you want, do anything you want, any time you want. No one is in the background nagging at you to do chores, go shopping, or ‘grow up.' You're absolutely free to hang out with your buddies, party till dawn and find plenty of time for your personal interests and hobbies. Best of all, you have the luxury of being all by yourself, if you feel like it." If one enjoys living like this, remaining single can clearly be the more comfortable option. Fear of change and the enjoyment of comfort can lead one to take the path of least resistance and remain in the single state one is accustomed to.
Our culture is not only self-centered, but it is also materialistic and individualistic and consequently wounded. Materialism and individualism are two obvious ways in which our self-centeredness is lived out, especially in American culture. It's hard to be American and not be individualistic. We value work, achievement and autonomy. But our individualism has led to loneliness. As Mother Teresa said, "There is a lot of suffering in the world - an enormous amount. Material suffering means to suffer hunger, suffer from having no shelter, suffer from all sorts of diseases, but I still think that the greatest suffering is to be alone, to feel unloved, to simply have no one. I have reached the point of becoming more and more aware of the fact that the worst suffering a human being can experience is to be unwanted."(4) Loneliness is so painful precisely because, as our late Holy Father John Paul II has emphasized through his "theology of the body," we were made for union and communion. We were made for love and from love because we were made in the image and likeness of the Trinity who is Love. Lonely is the opposite of the communion we were created for. No wonder it hurts! As Catherine Doherty, a woman who worked in the slums in America and Canada asked, "Do we realize how utterly, tragically lonely man is, especially in our Western world?.... Loneliness holds the men of our age and times in a grip that seems unbreakable. Yet, it can be broken! It can be broken by love..."(5)
As we continue this Lenten season let us contemplate the radical gift that Christ, Who is Love Itself, made for us through His death on the Cross. He who experienced the painful abandonment of His closest friends in His darkest hour is the only One who ultimately will be able to heal our wounds of loneliness. He is the only One who is able to fulfill us completely. Through receiving His Love poured out on us from the Cross we will not only experience a greater fulfillment than we could ever imagine; we will be able to bring that love and fullness to all of our relationships.
Choices, Careers, Comfort, Cows and Culture are the first five of the seven C's of Self-Centered Singleness. Next month I'll discuss the last two of the seven C's, the two which possibly are having the greatest effect on the number of singles in society today. And lastly, in part three I'll propose the remedy for our situation.
"Man cannot live without love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible for himself, his life is senseless, if love is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he does not participate intimately in it." – Pope John Paul II (The Redeemer of Man 10)
Written by Anastasia Northrop
Footnotes
- Jillian Straus, "Lone Star: Being Single," Psychology Today Magazine, (May/Jun 2006) available online: http://psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=20060424-000003&page=1
- Matthew Fitzgerald at http://www.askmen.com/dating/curtsmith_100/134_dating_advice.html
- Ibid.
- Mother Teresa, Love: A Fruit Always in Season, http://www.magnificat.ca/english/mteresa.htm
- Catherine de Hueck Doherty, The Gospel Without Compromise, (Notre Dame: Ave Maria Press, 1976) p. 23
Hear more on this and other singles-related topics at the 2008 National Catholic Singles Conferences, April 25-27th in Chicago, IL and June 27-29th in San Diego, CA. Dynamic speakers, uplifting worship and fun socials with 500+ other Catholic Singles! For more information visit www.nationalCatholicsingles.com.
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